Re: RFC: FULLSCREEN_MONITORS property

[Havoc Pennington <hp redhat com>]

Hi,

Elijah Newren wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On 3/9/07, David Trowbridge <trowbrds gmail com> wrote:
> <snip>
> > Back to my requirements for this -- I really, *really* don't want users to have
> > to think about configuring "virtual" monitors in order to do something like have
> > a VM across two of their three heads and still interact with their host on the
> > third.  Apps that want to take advantage of more than a single screen will work
> > best when they know about xinerama, and chances are that I, or the flight
> > simulator programmer, or the graphics app hacker will know better about their
> > individual usage of multi-monitor windows than the window manager or the user.
>
> So, your hint is an application specific override to the current
> handling of xinerama only.  

Current handling of xinerama or current handling of fullscreen? e.g. if 
vmware opens a dialog, should the WM center it on one monitor or across 
the two vmware covers?

David, I think your comment that the app hacker knows better applies 
exactly to the extent that the behavior change is only in one app. If 
two apps need to coordinate, then the app hacker may know better, but 
isn't in a position to implement the behavior.

It does make sense to me that certain apps (games, vmware) might say 
"cover multiple monitors" where the multiple monitors are distinct 
spaces (what I called "b)" originally) for all other apps. So I'd go 
with Elijah and say the hint makes sense, though I'm not clear yet on 
whether it should cover only fullscreen behavior or all "xinerama awareness"

I do think some of the other issues raised need addressing, but they 
appear orthogonal to this hint since this hint assumes case b) and 
doesn't take a position on how we distinguish a) and b)

Perhaps there's a caveat that if we add a global hint to specify case 
a), this app-window-specific hint would need to match that overriden 
monitor layout rather than what the Xinerama extension reports.

Hmm, another unrelated thought; is this hint really per-window or should 
it be on the group leader - seems to me we'll have to effectively figure 
out the xinerama request of the transient parent in order to place 
dialogs, anyhow.

Havoc