terminal transparency, Imagemagick, and X11 root window problem

Solution 1:

I use feh to accomplish this and it works on debian and ubuntu with windowmaker and wterm(rxvt base):

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Feh#As_a_desktop_wallpaper_manager

Excerpt:

When using GNOME, you must disable Nautilus from controlling the desktop. The easiest way is to run this command: 
$ gconftool-2 --set /apps/nautilus/preferences/show_desktop --type boolean false

I'd be curious if that helps, since it sounds like the issue isn't with the background itself in X, but some other silly gnome tool(really, ancient school yet using gnome?! ;)

Solution 2:

If you do tail the syslog and grep for X, does it show any potential errors?

sudo tail /var/log/syslog | grep X

I am not that familiar with Imagemagick, but if I was in the same position I would definitely check out the config files for it and make sure everything is sounds (vars pointed properly, etc).

Try turning on debugging for imagemagick as well ( -debug X11).

http://www.imagemagick.org/script/command-line-options.php#debug