XQuartz installation on macOS

Table of Contents

Motivation

Whether working or studying everybody uses various sorts and types of software on their computer. Students taking Statistical Courses, as taught by the Mathematical and Statistical Methods group at Wageningen University & Research, will most likely use R. Students enrolled in MAT-15303 Statistics 1 and MAT-15403 Statistics 2 will use R Commander instead of basic R. Therefore, they will need to install R Commander.

R Commmander has been programmed in Tcl (Tool Command Language) and uses Tk as a graphical user interface toolkit. To be able to use R Commander correctly on macOS, software needs to installed that enables the use of Tcl/Tk. XQuartz is the only software on macOS, which enables the operating system to use Tcl/Tk.

In the text some symbol combinations are used for shortcuts, the following table explains the meaning of these symbols in relation to specific keys on your keyboard. To use the shortcuts press the keyboard keys simultaneously, e.g. ⇧⌘A means ⇧+⌘+A.

Icon		Keyboard Meaning		Icon		Keyboard Meaning
⌘		command		⇪		caps lock
⌥		option (or alt)		↩		carriage return (return/enter)
⌃		control		⌫		delete/backspace
fn		function		⌦		forward delete (fn + ⌫)
⇧		shift (either left or right)		⎋		escape

Download

At the time this post was written the release of XQuartz was version 2.7.11. It will work on Mac OS X Snow Leopard (version 10.6.x) or later, up to and including OS X Mountain Lion (version 10.8.x).

Download XQuartz using the following link: XQuartz v2.7.11 (ca. 75.9 MB)

The latest release of XQuartz, however, is version 2.8.5. This version should be used for OS X Mavericks (version 10.9.x) or later.

Download XQuartz using the following link: XQuartz v2.8.5 (ca. 103MB)

XQuartz Installation

The icons and screenshots shown in this post are for XQuartz v2.7.11 and have not been updated to the latest version of XQuartz. The procedure described, however, is still the same, although the version number displayed below can be different depending on the version you are installing.

To install XQuartz on macOS perform the following steps:

1. Open the downloaded XQuartz disk image or package. This file will most likely reside in Finder > Downloads (shortcut: ⌥⌘L). The file can more easily be found by switching into List view (shortcut: ⌘2). To switch to Icon view use the shortcut: ⌘1. The XQuartz disk image will look like the image displayed below in Figure 1 (version number may differ!).

2. Opening the XQuartz disk image will cause a window labeled ‘XQuartz-2.7.11’ or ‘XQuartz-2.8.5’ to appear containing a XQuartz installer package. This package looks like the image shown in Figure 2, however the version number may be different. Double click the XQuartz installer package to open the installer.

3. The installer for XQuartz will appear, showing the Introduction as displayed below in Figure 3. Click the ‘Continue’ button to proceed.

4. Next the Read Me will appear as shown in Figure 4 below. Click the ‘Continue’ button to proceed.

5. Right after the Read Me a Software Licence Agreement will appear. By clicking the ‘Continue’ button you will be asked to agree with this software licence agreement as diplayed in Figure 5. Click on ‘Agree’ to proceed.

6. The installer will select the best destination to install the software for you and will display the Installation Type as shown below in Figure 6. Click on the ‘Install’ button to start the software installation.

7. Before the software installation will commence, confirmation of the user is requested as displayed in Figure 7. Either use the finger print scanner on the touch bar of your mac or confirm using the password of your mac.

8. Most likely a security request will pop up from your operating system, requesting access to control system events as shown below in Figure 8. Click on the on the ‘OK’ button to grant access.

9. Now you will be warned that to make XQuartz your default X11 server, as shown in Figure 9 below, you will need to log out and again log into your system. Click on the on the ‘OK’ button to continue.

10. The software installer will start installing XQuartz onto your mac. When completed the installer will show a summary stating, that the installation was successful (see Figure 10). Click on the ‘Close’ button.

11. The installer will finally ask you, whether you want to keep or move the XQuartz installer package to the trashbin. Click ‘Move to Bin’ to discard the installer package and simultaneously close the XQuartz disk image. In reality the XQuartz disk image will be put into the trashbin from which it can still be recovered!