Michael Toomim <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skribis: > Bruce Miller wrote: > > Michael Toomim wrote: > >> So you want the "control alt plus" version of viewports?
> > I'm not sure what that means; I assume you means that what I > > described _is_ already available in sawfish with the right > > command combinations? If so, I'm not really surprised... I'd > > gathered from Daniel's posts, and references to his code, that > > something much like it was either there or doable. > Not sawfish -- XFree86. Press Control-Alt-KeypadPlus or > Control-Alt-KeypadMinus. Actually it's the virtual resolution feature of XFree86. It always happens when you scale down, but it's independent. You can have any higher virtual resolution if you have (much) more RAM than your monitor can display pixels. > > My objection to the current scheme is that it conflates so many things > > that it's not recognizable as anything that the word "viewport" might > > mean, to me at least. Well there is an imprecision in the word viewport, because no matter how many of whatever you define for yourself, there is only ever one viewport: exactly the portion your screen currently shows. And unlike the human viewport (focused on a word, while clearly seeing the column of text, the page, subconsciously aware of things a metre away), the computer one is cruelly bounded by the plastic around the screen. Compared to the ease with which one can turn the head and the eyes to look at a different paper, changing the viewport on the screen involves the hand and thus is very cumbersome. That's why having predefined viewports makes life easier. But it shouldn't be a must, since it very much disrupts the impression of continuity, which is the great thing about bigger than screen workspaces. > You're basically describing the XFree86 "viewport" feature. Try it out > and let me know what you think. Yes, it's the hardware implementation of what window-managers implement as viewports. Being hardware it's much more efficient. At the same time it's very inefficient, because a lot of things that are not currently visible get redrawn as they are updated. But while the newest machines with 64Mb graphics RAM can easily cope (unless you need it for 3D games), many PCs (including both of mine) have no RAM to spare. The really bad thing is that it is almost unusable -- it would need a major rework! There is no edge resistance, and the movement is far too fast for precise positioning. Just as bad: there is no hook for informing the window-manager and desktop. These would be necessary for sticky windows and icons. (Yes those are a contradiction with the bigger-than-screen-workspace illusion, but a very useful workaround for the far smaller-than-human-viewport screens.) coralament / best Gr�tens / liebe Gr��e / best regards / elkorajn salutojn Daniel Pfeiffer -- -- http://dapfy.bei.t-online.de/sawfish/ -- _______________________________________________ Xpert mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/xpert
