Re: WM features

["Dana Jansens" <danakj orodu net>]

On Jan 21, 2008 1:24 AM, Nathaniel Smith <njs pobox com> wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 21, 2008 at 01:41:31AM +0000, kettani lalla fatima zahra wrote:
> >    Hi all,
> >    i have a question about window manager's features. Is there any WM that
> >    can force an application specific window to behave as a system modal
> >    window?
> >    I know for example that mwm offers XmNmwmInputMode resource that can be
> >    used by an application to set a system modal window, but i am interested
> >    by a customisation that could be done through WM without being invoked by
> >    the application it self.
>
> If I'm understanding "system modal window" correctly, then the usual
> way to create such a thing is to make a full-screen override redirect
> window.  All window managers allow for such a thing (because override
> redirect windows override the window manager's control).

The application would need to actively grab the keyboard as well, to
prevent the window manager's user from moving focus to windows beneath
the full-screen window.  Since the WM has no knowledge of the intended
behavior, it may still move focus at its discretion. So, you probably
want to watch for that and return focus to your window if it does
move.

Alternately, you can grab the entire X server, causing all other X
applications to temporarily freeze.  This may cause weird things like
cause your music player to pause until the server grab is released.

There's no real nice way to do what you want, but there are ways.


dana