# Xsnow: frequently asked questions

* ### Xsnow seems to run, menu shows up, but no snow or Santa visible
  In some desktop environments, xsnow is running in the root-window
  because it cannot create a transparent window to paint in. 
  To create a transparent window, a 'compositing' window manager needs
  to be running. Remedies:
  * start xsnow like this:

     ````
     xsnow -xwininfo
     ````
     and click on some place on your desktop (not in a window).
     Changes are that snow etc. are painted, but not erased, 
     (the "spaghetti" effect) or that the
     resulting quality is poor. In that case, use the following remedy.
  * before starting xsnow, start a compositing window manager like
    `xcompmgr`, `compton` or `picom`, like:

    ````
    xcompmgr &
    ````
* ### After starting xsnow, nothing happens or "spaghetti" is painted 
  It could be that you are activating a vintage version of xsnow 
  (probably version 1.42 or older). Check out the output of the
  command

  ````
  xsnow -version
  ````
  In some distributions, xsnow-1.42 is still installed. Alas... Or maybe
  your vintage xsnow is a remnant of an old installation. Try to get rid of
  it and install the new xsnow (version 3.0 or later).

* ### Difficulties installing xsnow
  In the [downloads](../downloads) section you find a recipe how to do
  a normal install. In the file `dependencies` in the source tree, the
  needed libraries and packages are listed. Make sure that they are 
  installed before attempting to install xsnow. The names are as they are
  known in Debian distributions, it is possible that in your distribution
  the names are somewhat different. 

  If the standard suite: 
  "`./configure; make; sudo make install`" fails, you can try to run the
  script `simplemake.sh`. Probably you have to adapt it, see the comments
  in that script.

* ### Snow will not land on top of windows
  Normally, the windows, as well as the bottom of the screen, will collect
  snow. In Wayland however, it is afaik not possible for a program like xsnow
  to collect data about the whereabouts of windows. So, it is not possible to 
  collect snow on windows in Wayland. 

* ### The menu gets a pink color and xsnow is running too slow or jerky
  These are symptoms of a too heavy loaded system. For example, raspberry 
  pi 3B, especially when running an arm64 (64 bit) kernel, is affected.
  The remedy is to tweak some settings of xsnow to make it less heavy-weight:
  settings->CPU-factor, birds-># Birds, snow->Intensity.

* ### Still no success....
  If there are still problems, have a look at [issues](../issues), particularly
  the <b>Window manager issues</b> section.

* ### Where can I find the newest version of xsnow?
  The newest version of xsnow is on this website in the [downloads](../downloads)
  section. Normally here is presented a pre-release, possibly not as stable
  as we want it to be. In the "Files" tab 
  of [sourceforge](https://sourceforge.net/projects/xsnow/)
  the latest stable version is shown, along with older versions.

* ### Can I use xsnow as screensaver?
  Xsnow can be used as a screensaver-app for the program
  [Xscreensaver](https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/).
  In many distributions, xscreensaver can be installed from the repository.
  In the "settings" tab of
  xsnow you can define a background picture  to be used when xsnow is started by
  xscreensaver.  The man page (search for "xscreensaver") contains information 
  how to set things up.

* ### Which version of xsnow am I running?
  The version is shown:
  * in the "settings" tab
  * after the command `xsnow -version`
  * on standard output after start-up

* ### Where can I file a bug or a feature request?
  You can contact me: [via this website](/contact) or via the "Tickets" tab on
  [sourceforge](https://sourceforge.net/projects/xsnow/).

