Comment 69 for bug 150690

On Sun, 2010-05-23 at 17:17 +0000, Paul Beardsell wrote:
> If I wanted
> an app's display to open on a particular workspace on a monitor I could do
> so by specifying '-display xxxx:0.3' or to choose a particular monitor I
> could use '-display xxxx:3'. We miss a trick or two now. And whereas
> implmentation details are left unspecified the intention is clear. Where
> and when do we get the opportunity to use anything other than :0.0 on a
> modern Linux box, now?

I would like you to know that multiple X servers on a single box are
used heavily in enterprise and academic installations to run thin X
clients, and multi-screen X servers (not Xinerama) are used to provide
multiple consoles on a single desktop computer in many educational
installations as well as a few home installations I've seen.

Please don't knock off existing functionality just because you don't
understand what it is used for - it is often there to provide for a
legitimate need that cannot be satisfied otherwise, even if you have not
personally have required it.

> If that was sorted then this bug would not exist in
> its current form i.e. with a workaround simply being to disable Compiz.

I don't agree, and I think the implementation details for workspace
management and paging should stay firmly inside a specific WM's
implementation. I might be a good idea to specify a freedesktop.org API
for pagers to talk to window managers, but if you've hardcoded in a spec
how workspaces should be implemented then a lot of cool things like
GNOME Shell's dynamic workspaces wouldn't happen (or be so much harder
to implement).

--
Oded Arbel <email address hidden>