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X11 - Window Managers

X was developed in 1985 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology by the X Consortium and is now owned by the Open Software Foundation (OSF).

X is a protocol of commands that are sent and received between an
application and a special graphical terminal called an X Server.

The real power of X is evident when X server and the application are not on the same machine.

Consider, for example, that 20 users can be logged in to a single machine and be running different programs that are displayed on 20 different remote X servers. It is as though a single machine was given multiple screens and keyboards. It is for this reason that X is called a network transparent windowing system.

X11 - XFree86 : Freely redistributable implementation of the X Window System that runs on UNIX.

X 11 Documentation: /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/doc/ (same as /usr/X11R6/doc/)
Documentation on graphics hardware supported by X and how to configure X

Windows Managers

Window managers enclose each application inside a resizable bounding box with buttons, as well as possibly a task bar, a menu bar and a Start button.