6 ms·

Accidentally making windows vanish in my old-fashioned Unix X environment

47 points by raid2000 3y ago

pk-protect-ai 3y ago
That's a dedication ... eating glass for 35 years or so ... I'm not better though, over decades I've stuck with GNOME 2 (MATE desktop atm) ... This made me think right now, what exactly do I want from a desktop environment, and why am I satisfied with GNOME 2? I need to make a list of it and really think about it.
pmontra 3y ago
I also used those windows managers around 1990, iconify to desktop and no task bar. I use a heavily customized GNOME 3 desktop now, with an autohiding task bar that appears when I move the pointer to the bottom edge. My desktop is an empty solid color image that sometimes appears between windows. I don't keep anything there, even when it was still possible by default. Too much clicking but I don't like that defaults get more and more opinionated. Let people do whatever they want.
chrsw 3y ago
"old-fashioned"... oof
dsr_ 3y ago
I did this to myself 15 or 20 years ago, and ever since have put a collection area for iconified windows on a panel. In XFCE, it's easy to create a completely transparent panel running Window Buttons with "show minimized windows only" ticked, which emulates putting the icons on the desktop but corrals them to always show up in one location. Typically, if I have more than one minimized window, I've made a mistake -- but that's what the corral is for, saving me from mistakes.
jmclnx 3y ago
I like this quirkiness of X window managers also. Some (like fvwm) will do exactly what you tell it to do, no more, no less. Sad to see these type quirks will go away when Linux moves completely to Wayland.
- raid2000 3y ago
  Yes. Some of them are are only a couple thousand lines of code[1]. No background "activities", no keyboard shortcut stealing from other apps. 1: https://git.suckless.org/dwm/files.html https://git.suckless.org/dwm/files.html
  - ratmice 3y ago
    XGrabKey?
- TacticalCoder 3y ago
  > Sad to see these type quirks will go away when Linux moves completely to Wayland. I started using Linux when I was 25 or so. I'm 51 now. I do believe there's a far from zero probability that X is going to outlast me... Even if I live until 80! P.S: and the day X dies, in decades, I do also think it's possible that, at long last, Wayland shall be as customizable and allows to do all the amazing thing X allows to do.
  - p_l 3y ago
    The customizability is possible, but not the ease of it Because with wayland you don't write "just" a window manager - you write also the gorilla and most of the jungle, because a "WM" also has to be full Window Server with handling of input, rendering, display configuration, possibly linking extra virtual displays (still haven't figured exactly what part of the protocol handles it, but apparently pipewire can create virtual display that can be used for example by OBS)
  - bornfreddy 3y ago
    Unfortunately, I don't share your optimism. Judging by the fiasco that systemd is and how it managed to completely win over init scripts, even the opensource world is not immune to fashion / politics / ...
    - hulitu 3y ago
      Systemd has not took over the world. Slackware is still doing fine without it.
numpad0 3y ago
On Windows, there is "Move" menu item in shift+right click context menu on taskbar icons. Selecting this item, then pressing left/right/up/down key brings window immediately into closer edge of valid desktop area, with mouse pointer sent to that window titlebar. This item existed since at least OS/2, and although it was not found in early version of Windows 11 new taskbar, it has since been re-implemented. I know because I needed it while it had been missing :p
- kjellsbells 3y ago
  I believe that is only available for native Windows apps. Alt-Space was the keyboatd shortcut for it, very useful if the window had moved so far offscreen that you could not reach it with the mouse. However, this doesn't seem to work with the newer Electron style apps, like Teams. They do not appear to follow the classic Windows patterns.
  - xeromal 3y ago
    Yeah, there's some delineation in those apps. I notice the same behavior when I hover over the "maximize window" icon in Windows 11 and some apps show an outline of the options of I have but electron apps including chrome
    - mmis1000 3y ago
      At lease for the function that trigger by hoving maximun button. I believe windows do expose this api, firefox has this enabled for years even they draw the whole screen include icons using xul. And electron apps in native resize button mode also use actual windows resize button (Or fake one created by electron itself?) that has this function enabled. It's just some million-dollor company that are too dumb to support it properly (Or probably PM pushed it back because no user requires it?)
pluc 3y ago
Never understood the point of "a desktop" because of this. Why bother to have programs you only use on-demand just sitting there? The same thing, that I find more useful, can be achieved by actually running the programs you need (through a run menu) and just having them exist. Windows are my desktop icons, I don't need what I don't use. (I use fluxbox with rofi)
- dsr_ 3y ago
  There's more than one preference on how to do things.

47 points by raid2000 3y ago

That's a dedication ... eating glass for 35 years or so ... I'm not better though, over decades I've stuck with GNOME 2 (MATE desktop atm) ... This made me think right now, what exactly do I want from a desktop environment, and why am I satisfied with GNOME 2? I need to make a list of it and really think about it.

pmontra 3y ago

I also used those windows managers around 1990, iconify to desktop and no task bar. I use a heavily customized GNOME 3 desktop now, with an autohiding task bar that appears when I move the pointer to the bottom edge. My desktop is an empty solid color image that sometimes appears between windows. I don't keep anything there, even when it was still possible by default. Too much clicking but I don't like that defaults get more and more opinionated. Let people do whatever they want.

chrsw 3y ago

"old-fashioned"... oof

dsr_ 3y ago

I did this to myself 15 or 20 years ago, and ever since have put a collection area for iconified windows on a panel. In XFCE, it's easy to create a completely transparent panel running Window Buttons with "show minimized windows only" ticked, which emulates putting the icons on the desktop but corrals them to always show up in one location. Typically, if I have more than one minimized window, I've made a mistake -- but that's what the corral is for, saving me from mistakes.

jmclnx 3y ago

I like this quirkiness of X window managers also. Some (like fvwm) will do exactly what you tell it to do, no more, no less. Sad to see these type quirks will go away when Linux moves completely to Wayland.

raid2000 3y ago
Yes. Some of them are are only a couple thousand lines of code[1]. No background "activities", no keyboard shortcut stealing from other apps. 1: https://git.suckless.org/dwm/files.html https://git.suckless.org/dwm/files.html
- ratmice 3y ago
  XGrabKey?
TacticalCoder 3y ago
> Sad to see these type quirks will go away when Linux moves completely to Wayland. I started using Linux when I was 25 or so. I'm 51 now. I do believe there's a far from zero probability that X is going to outlast me... Even if I live until 80! P.S: and the day X dies, in decades, I do also think it's possible that, at long last, Wayland shall be as customizable and allows to do all the amazing thing X allows to do.
- p_l 3y ago
  The customizability is possible, but not the ease of it Because with wayland you don't write "just" a window manager - you write also the gorilla and most of the jungle, because a "WM" also has to be full Window Server with handling of input, rendering, display configuration, possibly linking extra virtual displays (still haven't figured exactly what part of the protocol handles it, but apparently pipewire can create virtual display that can be used for example by OBS)
- bornfreddy 3y ago
  Unfortunately, I don't share your optimism. Judging by the fiasco that systemd is and how it managed to completely win over init scripts, even the opensource world is not immune to fashion / politics / ...
  - hulitu 3y ago
    Systemd has not took over the world. Slackware is still doing fine without it.

numpad0 3y ago

On Windows, there is "Move" menu item in shift+right click context menu on taskbar icons. Selecting this item, then pressing left/right/up/down key brings window immediately into closer edge of valid desktop area, with mouse pointer sent to that window titlebar. This item existed since at least OS/2, and although it was not found in early version of Windows 11 new taskbar, it has since been re-implemented. I know because I needed it while it had been missing :p

kjellsbells 3y ago
I believe that is only available for native Windows apps. Alt-Space was the keyboatd shortcut for it, very useful if the window had moved so far offscreen that you could not reach it with the mouse. However, this doesn't seem to work with the newer Electron style apps, like Teams. They do not appear to follow the classic Windows patterns.
- xeromal 3y ago
  Yeah, there's some delineation in those apps. I notice the same behavior when I hover over the "maximize window" icon in Windows 11 and some apps show an outline of the options of I have but electron apps including chrome
  - mmis1000 3y ago
    At lease for the function that trigger by hoving maximun button. I believe windows do expose this api, firefox has this enabled for years even they draw the whole screen include icons using xul. And electron apps in native resize button mode also use actual windows resize button (Or fake one created by electron itself?) that has this function enabled. It's just some million-dollor company that are too dumb to support it properly (Or probably PM pushed it back because no user requires it?)

pluc 3y ago

Never understood the point of "a desktop" because of this. Why bother to have programs you only use on-demand just sitting there? The same thing, that I find more useful, can be achieved by actually running the programs you need (through a run menu) and just having them exist. Windows are my desktop icons, I don't need what I don't use. (I use fluxbox with rofi)

dsr_ 3y ago
There's more than one preference on how to do things.