Re: Configuration

[<Jim Gettys hp com>]

No pixie dust.

There are (at least) two parts to the configuration of applications:
that of the applications themselves, and their display on a given
display environment.

With the migration of running applications (possible in GTK2.2),
we have a further challenge:

The properties of the display will differ during the execution of
an application, and may differ greatly on a dynamic basis.

For example, I may start an application on my handheld, and then request
it to go to a high resolution display wall, so the screen real-estate
may change by a factor of 10 (or more) on the fly.

So we have to separate parts of the configuration (those having to do
with the rendering on an X server) from other parts of the configuration
(that may have to do with other properties).  The rendering configuration
is clearly a property of the display server and not necessarily set by the
user at all.

How these all get communicated is an interesting challenge: but we
must avoid the trap of the centralized single registry that Windoze presents
applications.
                                     - Jim

--
Jim Gettys
Cambridge Research Laboratory
HP Labs, Hewlett-Packard Company
Jim Gettys hp com