Running Qubes on a HiDPI display

[li...@mullvad.net]

Hi,

I'm looking for a new laptop and most new laptops have HiDPI / Retina displays. this is great given that you run an OS that can scale stuff up so you don't have to work with a magnifying glass.

I'm wondering about the current state of this in Qubes, is it possible to do scaling of the UI to a reasonable size on a HiDPI screen? I found a few short threads on this list mentioning HiDPI, but most of them were just mentioning that stuff became super tiny, they did not contain a fix. The closest I got was this, but it's specific to KDE and it doesn't really say if they got it working or not:

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/qubes-users/HiDPI/qubes-users/u_etmgr8MWs/CeMbCYUgw7cJ

So my question is this: If I get a small laptop with a 1080p screen or a slightly larger laptop with a 4K screen, will I be able to scale my UI to something usable? Which window managers support this? all of them, or will I be limited to a subset of the available window managers? I would like to use Xfce and/or Awesome, but solutions for any WM are welcome in this thread of course.

/Linus

[Achim Patzner]

> Am 11.01.2016 um 16:10 schrieb li...@mullvad.net:
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for a new laptop and most new laptops have HiDPI / Retina displays. this is great given that you run an OS that can scale stuff up so you don't have to work with a magnifying glass.
>
> I'm wondering about the current state of this in Qubes, is it possible to do scaling of the UI to a reasonable size on a HiDPI screen?

Radio Yerevan answered: “In principle, yes. But you have to know what you’re doing.”

I’m currently trying it on a Lenovo W540 and as I used to avoid X11 on Unixoids (by using the self-configuring GUI of a certified Unix 8-) ) my last experience was X11 one a MicroVAX (which was easier, btw.).

You have to work at several places at once. The startup of the X server in lightdm.conf (which will give you larger windows contents but won’t help you with font sizes and window headers) as well as several config tools depending on your UI choices.

Maybe we should collect some money and get a suitable HiDPI system like a W540 (prices are dropping because everybody is either waiting for the P series or buying W541) for the project.

> I found a few short threads on this list mentioning HiDPI, but most of them were just mentioning that stuff became super tiny, they did not contain a fix.

The fixes can easily be found in Google if you are able to describe your problem. It’s nothing related to Qubes. Even I found them for my situation (and they were simple enough that I didn’t bother writing them down; I’d just look them up again if I ever needed them again).

The annoying part is their application; if they are part of your user related configuration files modifying your template is not sufficient.

The only part where it is getting difficult ist the fact that (mechanism around) vconsole.conf seems to be completely broken in regards to setting a different font and I I still have to find out how to avoid starting a GUI for entering the disk decryption password (not so much a resolution problem as one of the “where is my UI going right now” kind).

> will I be limited to a subset of the available window managers?

Isn’t one that is really doing the things you need enough?


Achim

[li...@mullvad.net]

On Monday, January 11, 2016 at 7:53:54 PM UTC+1, Achim Patzner wrote:
> > Am 11.01.2016 um 16:10 schrieb li...@mullvad.net:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm looking for a new laptop and most new laptops have HiDPI / Retina displays. this is great given that you run an OS that can scale stuff up so you don't have to work with a magnifying glass.
> >
> > I'm wondering about the current state of this in Qubes, is it possible to do scaling of the UI to a reasonable size on a HiDPI screen?
>
> Radio Yerevan answered: “In principle, yes. But you have to know what you’re doing.”
>
> I’m currently trying it on a Lenovo W540 and as I used to avoid X11 on Unixoids (by using the self-configuring GUI of a certified Unix 8-) ) my last experience was X11 one a MicroVAX (which was easier, btw.).
>
> You have to work at several places at once. The startup of the X server in lightdm.conf (which will give you larger windows contents but won’t help you with font sizes and window headers) as well as several config tools depending on your UI choices.
>
> Maybe we should collect some money and get a suitable HiDPI system like a W540 (prices are dropping because everybody is either waiting for the P series or buying W541) for the project.
>
> > I found a few short threads on this list mentioning HiDPI, but most of them were just mentioning that stuff became super tiny, they did not contain a fix.
>
> The fixes can easily be found in Google if you are able to describe your problem. It’s nothing related to Qubes. Even I found them for my situation (and they were simple enough that I didn’t bother writing them down; I’d just look them up again if I ever needed them again).

I didn't know if the solutions for different Linux distros would apply to Qubes since it's a quite special setup with Xen and virtual machines running their independent instances of X. If I interpret your answer corretly I should be able to fix it in Qubes using instructions for any other distro? I'll try that whenever I get the laptop.

>
> The annoying part is their application; if they are part of your user related configuration files modifying your template is not sufficient.
>
> The only part where it is getting difficult ist the fact that (mechanism around) vconsole.conf seems to be completely broken in regards to setting a different font and I I still have to find out how to avoid starting a GUI for entering the disk decryption password (not so much a resolution problem as one of the “where is my UI going right now” kind).

I see. The console itself I don't care very much about as I spend all my time in X, but I will of course need a working disk password prompt. However, as the disk password prompt is a one time thing It's completely OK that it's tiny, at least in my opinion.

>
> > will I be limited to a subset of the available window managers?
>
> Isn’t one that is really doing the things you need enough?

Of course, but I didn't specify here what I needed nor what anyone else needed. People might have other needs than the scaling capabilities in a desktop environment / window manager and thus I wanted them to be able to reference this thread to see if their preferred software could do scaling in Qubes.

>
>
> Achim

Thank you for your answer.

/Linus