Re: xinerama and struts

[Mark McLoughlin <mark skynet ie>]

Hi Ben,

On Thu, 12 Sep 2002, Ben Jansens wrote:

> Another issue that may crop up is when using Xinerama at 2 differnt
> resolutions. The strut on the larger resoution monitor (1) at the
> bottom moves off the right hand corner and into no-man's land below
> the display of monitor (2). Or does it exist at the bottom of monitor
> (2) as well? What are panels excepted to do in this situation? Kicker
> currently puts itself in a straight line, thus existing in no-man's
> land below the visible space of (2).
>
> I'll try show what i mean with diagrams :)
>
> Monitor (1) and (2)    Where panels (and thus the strut)
>                        could go. (Kicker right now)   Another option.
> +-------+-------+      +-------+-------+              +-------+-------+
> |       |   2   |      |       |   2   |              |       |   2   |
> |   1   |_______|      |   1   |_______|              |   1   |.......|
> |       |              |.......|.......               |.......|-------+
> +-------+              +-------+                      +-------+
>
> Xinerama is a bit of a headache.

	So, when I was working on the GNOME multi-screen support I'd
decided I didn't want a sore head and choose to use the following
excerpt from the proposed new Xinerama spec as a a bit of a cop out :

<quote>
  Physical screen layout requirements.

    We did take note that screens can be configured in any layout
    that a vendor allows.  You could make an L or an X or just a
    straight line of screens.  However for the purposes of Xinerama,
    this could get very confusing.  You could lose windows in the
    gaps where there is no monitor.  The logic for warping a pointer
    becomes awkward.  Neither does the protocol allow for a screen size
    definition beyond width and height.  Therefore we determined that
    for Xinerama purposes the configuration of screens much be
    some sort of rectangle.
</quote>

	Sounds reasonable to me ... so I chose to ignore the issue :-)

	If the future Xinerama spec is going to mandate that a
rectangular screen layout is required, I don't think its worthwhile
trying to break your back supporting a non-rectangular layout,
especially when it would add significant implementation complexity.

Good Luck,
Mark.