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Help me find the window-manager of my dreams
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Carl Alexander
May 22, 2012, 2:10:06 PM5/22/12
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Hi all---
I sat in front of an X head of one sort or another most every day
from about 1992 to 2005, but not since --- until a few months ago.
I've been using Xubuntu (11.10 and now 12.04) without customizing
the UI, so as to get comfortable with the new normal. Now I have
a pretty good idea what I love about the new --- and what I miss
about the old. So I'm looking for some advice, which I suspect
will take the form of recommendations for window-managers.
My old X setup was already long-in-the-tooth in 2005, and I
already know that my old window-manager (ctwm) is not the right
answer. (Not least because one of the main reasons I gave up
having an X head was that I spend easily half my time on Macs
these days, and switching back and forth between click-to-focus
and focus-follows-mouse was making me crazy. Claude (the c in
ctwm) hates click-to-focus, and ctwm's support for it is lacking.)
So I'm hoping people can tell me about modern window-managers that
can DWIW.
There are two critical features ctwm that I want from a new
window-manager: DontMoveOff, and Occupy.
DontMoveOff (which IIRC goes all the way back to twm) prevents
windows from being dragged off the workspace --- not even partway
off: if you grab a window by the titlebar and drag it in ctwm
with this flag set, it will stop when its leading edge meets the
edge of the desktop. (This is sort of the antithesis of the
feature in xfwm where draging a window to the border between
workspaces will switch you into that workspace, bringing the
window with you.) (I've been told edge resistance in compiz may
be close enough to suit me --- but I'd love to hear about modern
window-managers that explicitly support DontMoveOff.)
Occupy lets you set which applications are allowed to place their
windows in which workspaces. I use some applications that spawn a
lot of little windows, and I very much prefer having them show up
in their own workspace, so I can stay focused on work in another.
(I suspect a tool like wmctrl or devil's pie might let me do this
even with window managers that don't specifically support it ---
but I'm holding off on looking into those for now.)
Other ctwm features I would really _like_ in a new window-manager,
but aren't critical, include windows that are literally tabbed
(that is, the titlebar occupies a fraction of the top of the
window --- like the tab on a file folder). Another is "NoTitle",
which sets a list of apps whose windows won't be given titlebars.
that won't be given titlebars). And configurable menus, bound
to various kinds of clicks on the workspace background.
Those are the things I'm really feeling the lack of. This next
one I'm not even sure exists, and it's very much a "boy it would
be nice" rather than a "not having this is driving me batty". But
where better to float the idea than here?
I've started using xrandr with two identical monitors, and what
I would totally love would be a virtual workspace manager that
integrates with it. So, say I have 7 vitrtual workspaces, each
1920x1200; w1 is in my left monitor; w2 in my right; there's a
workspace manager widget in each display. I click w5 in my
left workspace manager; it takes over that screen. I move my
mouse to the right, and it crosses into w2 on that display....
I'm sure you get the idea. Does anything do this?
If this sounds like a window-manager you know and love, please
let me know.
Thanks in advance!
---Alex
I sat in front of an X head of one sort or another most every day
from about 1992 to 2005, but not since --- until a few months ago.
I've been using Xubuntu (11.10 and now 12.04) without customizing
the UI, so as to get comfortable with the new normal. Now I have
a pretty good idea what I love about the new --- and what I miss
about the old. So I'm looking for some advice, which I suspect
will take the form of recommendations for window-managers.
My old X setup was already long-in-the-tooth in 2005, and I
already know that my old window-manager (ctwm) is not the right
answer. (Not least because one of the main reasons I gave up
having an X head was that I spend easily half my time on Macs
these days, and switching back and forth between click-to-focus
and focus-follows-mouse was making me crazy. Claude (the c in
ctwm) hates click-to-focus, and ctwm's support for it is lacking.)
So I'm hoping people can tell me about modern window-managers that
can DWIW.
There are two critical features ctwm that I want from a new
window-manager: DontMoveOff, and Occupy.
DontMoveOff (which IIRC goes all the way back to twm) prevents
windows from being dragged off the workspace --- not even partway
off: if you grab a window by the titlebar and drag it in ctwm
with this flag set, it will stop when its leading edge meets the
edge of the desktop. (This is sort of the antithesis of the
feature in xfwm where draging a window to the border between
workspaces will switch you into that workspace, bringing the
window with you.) (I've been told edge resistance in compiz may
be close enough to suit me --- but I'd love to hear about modern
window-managers that explicitly support DontMoveOff.)
Occupy lets you set which applications are allowed to place their
windows in which workspaces. I use some applications that spawn a
lot of little windows, and I very much prefer having them show up
in their own workspace, so I can stay focused on work in another.
(I suspect a tool like wmctrl or devil's pie might let me do this
even with window managers that don't specifically support it ---
but I'm holding off on looking into those for now.)
Other ctwm features I would really _like_ in a new window-manager,
but aren't critical, include windows that are literally tabbed
(that is, the titlebar occupies a fraction of the top of the
window --- like the tab on a file folder). Another is "NoTitle",
which sets a list of apps whose windows won't be given titlebars.
that won't be given titlebars). And configurable menus, bound
to various kinds of clicks on the workspace background.
Those are the things I'm really feeling the lack of. This next
one I'm not even sure exists, and it's very much a "boy it would
be nice" rather than a "not having this is driving me batty". But
where better to float the idea than here?
I've started using xrandr with two identical monitors, and what
I would totally love would be a virtual workspace manager that
integrates with it. So, say I have 7 vitrtual workspaces, each
1920x1200; w1 is in my left monitor; w2 in my right; there's a
workspace manager widget in each display. I click w5 in my
left workspace manager; it takes over that screen. I move my
mouse to the right, and it crosses into w2 on that display....
I'm sure you get the idea. Does anything do this?
If this sounds like a window-manager you know and love, please
let me know.
Thanks in advance!
---Alex
Aaron W. Hsu
May 22, 2012, 4:41:44 PM5/22/12
to
Carl Alexander wrote:
> DontMoveOff (which IIRC goes all the way back to twm) prevents
> windows from being dragged off the workspace --- not even partway
> off: if you grab a window by the titlebar and drag it in ctwm
> with this flag set, it will stop when its leading edge meets the
> edge of the desktop. (This is sort of the antithesis of the
> feature in xfwm where draging a window to the border between
> workspaces will switch you into that workspace, bringing the
> window with you.) (I've been told edge resistance in compiz may
> be close enough to suit me --- but I'd love to hear about modern
> window-managers that explicitly support DontMoveOff.)
You do not need to stick just to Compiz to get that sort of thing. KDE's
> DontMoveOff (which IIRC goes all the way back to twm) prevents
> windows from being dragged off the workspace --- not even partway
> off: if you grab a window by the titlebar and drag it in ctwm
> with this flag set, it will stop when its leading edge meets the
> edge of the desktop. (This is sort of the antithesis of the
> feature in xfwm where draging a window to the border between
> workspaces will switch you into that workspace, bringing the
> window with you.) (I've been told edge resistance in compiz may
> be close enough to suit me --- but I'd love to hear about modern
> window-managers that explicitly support DontMoveOff.)
Kwin also support snap edges, which basically do what you want, except that
they give up on forcing you if you keep trying to move the window off the
screen. A quick check has not revealed to me whether you can configure
DontMoveOff on Kwin, but you might want to check out one of Gnome 3 or KDE
4.8 and see how they serve your needs.
I know that some of the alternatives should support what you want, but I
have never actually wanted to do this, so I do not know which ones do. Some
popular modern WMs are OpenBox, FluxBox, Fvwm2, WindowMaker, StumpWm (if you
like tiling window managers), among others. You might want to check out
www.xwinman.org.
> Occupy lets you set which applications are allowed to place their
> windows in which workspaces. I use some applications that spawn a
> lot of little windows, and I very much prefer having them show up
> in their own workspace, so I can stay focused on work in another.
> (I suspect a tool like wmctrl or devil's pie might let me do this
> even with window managers that don't specifically support it ---
> but I'm holding off on looking into those for now.)
launchers, so that when you launch a given program, it will launch in its
own workspace. This works very well in Gnome, where you have arbitrary
workspaces that are created on demand.
Otherwise, I think there are some advanced settings in KDE that will let you
have some control over how windows are placed, and where. I do not use
these features, so I have only seen them in the System Settings. Other
window managers might require that you explicitly set this somehow when you
launch the application, but again, I do not know how you might do it, but I
would be surprised if some of the other WMs could not do this.
> Other ctwm features I would really _like_ in a new window-manager,
> but aren't critical, include windows that are literally tabbed
> (that is, the titlebar occupies a fraction of the top of the
> window --- like the tab on a file folder). Another is "NoTitle",
> which sets a list of apps whose windows won't be given titlebars.
> that won't be given titlebars). And configurable menus, bound
> to various kinds of clicks on the workspace background.
of the tiling window managers support this to one degree or another. In the
System Settings of KDE you can set up custom rules for windows that
indicates whether to allow them to have title bars or not, with different
ways of matching what windows should trigger the rule.
> I've started using xrandr with two identical monitors, and what
> I would totally love would be a virtual workspace manager that
> integrates with it. So, say I have 7 vitrtual workspaces, each
> 1920x1200; w1 is in my left monitor; w2 in my right; there's a
> workspace manager widget in each display. I click w5 in my
> left workspace manager; it takes over that screen. I move my
> mouse to the right, and it crosses into w2 on that display....
> I'm sure you get the idea. Does anything do this?
even when you change workspaces. KDE has a very powerful Plasma concept
that allows you to do all sorts of things with your desktops, and even have
multiple desktops doing different things (such as holding icons, widges,
menus, images, and so forth).
I think in general that you will find nearly all of the modern Desktop
Environments and popular window managers can do at least some of this stuff,
though for some it might require some reading and careful hacking to get it
just right. I have been very pleased with the latest releases of both the
Gnome and KDE desktop environments, and the old standby WMs continue to be
good choices.
In other words, things are really pretty good in the Desktop world of Linux
right now, IMO, and you are spoiled for choice and options, even within a
single DE, like KDE, which is amazingly configurable.
--
Aaron W. Hsu | arc...@sacrideo.us | http://www.sacrideo.us
Programming is just another word for the lost art of thinking.
Ian Zimmerman
May 23, 2012, 12:04:24 PM5/23/12
to
The following message is a courtesy copy of an article
that has been posted to comp.windows.x as well.
Good post from Aaron. I'll just add sawfish to the list of WMs to try.
There's also this webpage:
http://www.gilesorr.com/wm/table.html
--
Ian Zimmerman
gpg public key: 1024D/C6FF61AD
fingerprint: 66DC D68F 5C1B 4D71 2EE5 BD03 8A00 786C C6FF 61AD
http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/c66875cda51109f76c6312f4d4743d1e.png
Rule 420: All persons more than eight miles high to leave the court.
that has been posted to comp.windows.x as well.
Good post from Aaron. I'll just add sawfish to the list of WMs to try.
There's also this webpage:
http://www.gilesorr.com/wm/table.html
--
Ian Zimmerman
gpg public key: 1024D/C6FF61AD
fingerprint: 66DC D68F 5C1B 4D71 2EE5 BD03 8A00 786C C6FF 61AD
http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/c66875cda51109f76c6312f4d4743d1e.png
Rule 420: All persons more than eight miles high to leave the court.
Carl Alexander
May 24, 2012, 8:51:01 PM5/24/12
to
On Tuesday, May 22, 2012 4:41:44 PM UTC-4, Aaron W. Hsu wrote:
....
most of a day running KDE, and it's now my top candidate. At some point
late in the last century, I picked up a strongly negative (and for all
I know, entirely wrong even then) impression of KDE as slow and bloated.
I should know better than to believe everything I thought I knew a dozen
years ago....
Cheers,
---Alex
....
> In other words, things are really pretty good in the Desktop world of Linux
> right now, IMO, and you are spoiled for choice and options, even within a
> single DE, like KDE, which is amazingly configurable.
Thank you for that thorough reply --- on account of which I've now spent
> right now, IMO, and you are spoiled for choice and options, even within a
> single DE, like KDE, which is amazingly configurable.
most of a day running KDE, and it's now my top candidate. At some point
late in the last century, I picked up a strongly negative (and for all
I know, entirely wrong even then) impression of KDE as slow and bloated.
I should know better than to believe everything I thought I knew a dozen
years ago....
Cheers,
---Alex
Aaron W. Hsu
May 25, 2012, 5:24:49 PM5/25/12
to
Carl Alexander wrote:
> Thank you for that thorough reply --- on account of which I've now spent
> most of a day running KDE, and it's now my top candidate. At some point
> late in the last century, I picked up a strongly negative (and for all
> I know, entirely wrong even then) impression of KDE as slow and bloated.
> I should know better than to believe everything I thought I knew a dozen
> years ago....
The Motif toolkit used to be considered slow and bloated as well. By all
> Thank you for that thorough reply --- on account of which I've now spent
> most of a day running KDE, and it's now my top candidate. At some point
> late in the last century, I picked up a strongly negative (and for all
> I know, entirely wrong even then) impression of KDE as slow and bloated.
> I should know better than to believe everything I thought I knew a dozen
> years ago....
accounts, most modern software is mathematically bloated, by which I mean
that there is so much waste in a modern system that they are all bloated.
On the other hand, we have a lot of computing resources that most people are
okay with wasting if it gets them features faster and if the performance is
good enough. Motif is now one of the best toolkits to use if your
application will be used primarily through SSH tunnelled X sessions, for
example, because toolkits like GTK or Qt use redundant drawing abstractions
on top of the basic X ones that result in tangible overhead when running
network application. On the other hand, most graphics cards on modern
machines are fast enough to easily handle the fancy graphics now used in KDE
4.8. On the other hand, there are still known issues. For example, KDE 4.8
had a major feature introduction that greatly increased the performance of
the blur effect for windows, which was often one of the first things that
people would turn off on systems that were resource starved. Now, the blur
effect can be left on for most modern machines.
Enjoy your time in the modern X Desktop age! And remember, if you spend
enough time to get good with one environment and it still does not do it for
you, there are plenty of other [saw]fish in the sea!
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