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The text cursor in X Windows is too thin for me to see easily. It would be great if I could make the text cursor wider so that it was more visible.

I know how to change the size of the mouse cursor in X by going to System > Preferences > Appearance and customizing the Pointer so that it is larger. But I have not been able to find any setting that allows me to alter the appearance of the text cursor.

So how can I make the text cursor easier to see?

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Use something like Gursormaker to edit one of the existing cursor themes from /usr/share/icons to make the "xterm" cursor more visible, then export it to an X11 cursor theme. Place the theme directory in ~/.local/share/icons. You should then be able to select it as a cursor theme.

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geekosaur, is "xterm" not one of the mouse cursors? I'm looking to change the text cursor that appears in text windows, input boxes, and terminal windows. Thanks anyway. –  user8979 Mar 6 '11 at 11:57
"xterm" is the name of the cursor; the same cursor is used for all of those. Ask the freedesktop folks why they called it "xterm" instead of "text"; it surprised me when I saw it, too. –  geekosaur Mar 7 '11 at 2:14
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