On Friday 31 July 2009 03:01:09 pm John Morris wrote: > Hi Sveninin, > Thanks for your thoughtful reply. My basic response is, Yes, I > can do that, but that is not what I want to do. Read on for the > details if you are interested. > > >Don't know how your Mac window manager treats Scribus > >windows, but normally there should be 3 buttons in upper > >right corner of the (Scribus) application window; > >'Minimize', 'Restore down' and 'Close', respectively from > >left to right. Those buttons are 'document-window-specific' > >and should not be confused with the similar > >'application-specific-ones' often above them (but last time > >I used a Mac they were in the upper-left corner). By holding > >the mouse pointer over them you should see their names in a > >tooltip frame. > >'Restore down' permits resizing multiple document windows > >inside of the main (Scribus) application window. > > Yes, those buttons are available in Scribus in the upper > left-hand corner, where they are in just about every Mac > application. While the tool-tips don't show (they do for the > toolbar buttons), they are not needed because these buttons' > functions are familiar across the interface. > However, these buttons don't help much with what I want to do. > I don't just want to jump from one application to another or from > one set of applications to another set. I need access to all my > applications all the time in as flexible a way as possible. > Sometimes I need to see a client's email message while working on > a layout document. Sometimes I need to see a Word document while > marking up a PDF file. Sometimes I need to see two layout > documents at the same time while referring to a couple of email > messages as well as a drawing in illustrator and an image in > Photoshop. Those are the simple cases and it gets much more > complicated from there. Aside from the wasted screen real estate > of the extra window title bar, my main problem with the whole MDI > is that it puts an opaque background behind all my Scribus > windows. That means I can't arrange the Scribus windows in a > nonrectangular fashion in order to see the little bit of an email > message that I need behind those windows. If the main Scribus > window were completely transparent where no windows and no > toolbars appeared, I could just maximize the window and treat it > as if it had toolbars outside the windows. That has worked fairly > well for me in other applications. > For what it's worth, I don't really like Apple's new system of > packing large toolbars at the top of each window. What a waste of > space, I would much rather have a single toolbar with small icons > that I can move independently of the window and can serve > multiple windows. The one saving grace is that I can quickly hide > the toolbar with a click on the button at the right edge of the > title bar. Unfortunately, only some developers understand that I > would do this to increase the size of the content area _of that > window_ and so they shrink the whole window when I hide the > toolbar. > > >Maybe I should not add this; I use a windowing system where > >I can define as many 'Desktops' as I like; one for IRC and > >E-mail and such, another for webbrowser and FTP-client, > >third for managing local files and such, and a > >fourth/fifth/sixth for graphical work. I can switch quickly > >between desktops either vith a mouseclick or a keyboard > >shortcut. > >My systems are Linuxes; there must be a way to do multiple > >desktops on a Mac? > > I've not used Linux in any serious way, but I imagine this is > similar to Spaces in Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5). As I understand it, > it works reasonably well with well-behaved applications. However, > I have heard that most versions of MS Office do not support > Spaces very well. I don't use Spaces at all; my life is not that > cut and dry. There is no one set of applications that I will be > using to the exclusion of others such that I would ever want to > make any of them less accessible. > I primarily get around by closing windows I don't need any > more, hiding the applications I'm not using immediately, > switching applications with command-Tab (similar to Ctrl-Tab in > Windows and I'm sure Linux has an equivalent) and moving windows > around when I need to see several from different applications. > > I would like to make the switch from Macintosh to a good Linux > distribution because I like Apple's choices less and less these > days. However, the Mac OS is deeply embedded in my life and I > don't have much time to explore other options these days. I > imagine that the Mac OS will continue to be my main OS for at > least the next five years. > > Best, > John
I have four switchable desktops, each one measuring 1280 x 1024. I usually run a 640 x 480 or 800 x 600 viewport into the current desktop and ramble around on the larger desktop with the mouse. I can switch between desktops with one detent rotation of the mouse wheel on empty space. Once you try Linux you are spoiled for anything else. -- John Culleton Create Book Covers with Scribus/e-book $5.95 http://www.booklocker.com/books/4055.html
