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Xinerama: 1-screen wide desktops with 2 screens
Status:
RESOLVED: WONTFIX
Severity:
enhancement

Comments

Description Roc Vallès 2007-11-24 17:03:51 CET
At the moment, the way 2 screens is handled, desktops become 2-screen wide. This means that, when changing desktops, what is shown in both screens does change, thus making it uncomfortable to work with multiple desktops with Xinerama.

In my box (and example. maybe a really easy and convenient one), both screens are 1280x1024. It would be nice if desktops were still 1-screen wide and I could see a desktop in each screen, changing desktops separately on each screen.

In the event of me trying to make a screen display a desktop that is being displayed on another screen, it would be the most reasonable to just switch both.

With this feature, xfwm would become really comfortable to use with Xinerama.
Comment 1 xsdg 2007-11-24 17:22:08 CET
I've been pining for this for ages.  From what I've been told, Xinerama was not designed with this functionality in mind, and further, implementing this functionality would break some freedesktkop UI guidelines or something like that.

Regardless, I'm certainly willing to break poor guidelines and will lend a hand with hacking/testing where possible (and time permitting, which has been the main limitation for me thus far).

For some background, as well as a few implementation ideas, see the xfce4-dev thread "Where to start? Implementing independent workspace switching with Xinerama" that I started on 18 Apr 2007.
Comment 2 Olivier Fourdan editbugs 2007-11-24 19:36:57 CET
(In reply to comment #1)
> I've been pining for this for ages.  From what I've been told, Xinerama was not
> designed with this functionality in mind, and further, implementing this
> functionality would break some freedesktkop UI guidelines or something like
> that.

You misunderstood, it does not break "guidelines" but the basic of the standard.

Why? Because, to make is simple, the "current workspace" is defined as a property attached to the root window.

With Xinerama, you have *1* root window shared by several physical displays. You cannot set two different values of a given property at the same time.

To achieve what you want, you would have to use different properties, one for each physical display, which means changing the specifications and *all* implementations (not just the WM, but also gnome, kde, etc.).

> Regardless, I'm certainly willing to break poor guidelines and will lend a hand
> with hacking/testing where possible (and time permitting, which has been the
> main limitation for me thus far).

You will have to "break" libwnck, and all other program that adhere to the standard... See my explanation above.

> For some background, as well as a few implementation ideas, see the xfce4-dev
> thread "Where to start? Implementing independent workspace switching with
> Xinerama" that I started on 18 Apr 2007.
> 

Yes, and where did that end up?
Comment 3 Olivier Fourdan editbugs 2010-02-25 20:18:47 CET
Use Zaphod mode instead? 

As explained, I cannot implement what that feature and stay compatible with the standard. I choose to stay compatible with the standard.

Bug #3687

Reported by:
Roc Vallès
Reported on: 2007-11-24
Last modified on: 2010-02-25

People

Assignee:
Olivier Fourdan
CC List:
2 users

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