On Wed, 2006-03-15 at 06:21 -0700, Brian Pendleton wrote: > I'm just wondering how many people have tried Xgl(OpenGL accelerated X > windows) and what you're experience with it has been like.
I'm running it on an unmodified FC3 box with stock system X and the nvidia drivers. I'm using some LD_LIBRARY_PATH magic to make it work. Xgl works well and even hides the fact that you're running one X server on top of another. Compiz is probably what most people are interested in. As a proof of concept it is pretty remarkable. I think, though, that most of the effects are more annoying than useful. The wobbly windows might be good visual (tactile?) feedback if it was more subtle. Right now it's kind of out of control. Fun at first but annoying after a while. The "expose"-like function is very nice and well-done, except for the bouncing windows. The Alt-Tab feature is interesting but I hope it gets cut from the final release. It's a good demonstration of technology but suffers from major usability issues (the whole screen turns into a mess of translucent windows). I don't mind seeing live previews of the apps as I cycle through them but I'd also like to see the app's icon which is what most of us are trained to look for. I don't use the cube desktop thing at all since I can't get it work on my setup (probably due to the fact I'm running FC3 and a now-old version of gnome). Gentle shadows really helps the eye separate windows. And I like the clean, cairo-driven edges of the window decorations in compiz. Makes the old metacity at work look kind of 90s. I will be trying out AIGLX in the future. Compiz should run just fine on AIGLX. I believe the AIGLX solution is cleaner and more flexible in the long run than Xgl is. But the end result is the same. > > I recently installed it and everything seems to work quite well. I think > I'm getting addicted to the cube and wobbly extentions. The only problems > I've had are a few apps needed to be recompiled(xterm) and some GL apps > seem to have trouble starting up (wine chokes trying to initialize > directx, other apps too) and seem to take a bit of a performance hit. But > it's very pretty :). I posted some screen shots a few days ago... but > they still aren't up yet... Apps are still behind the curve with integral support for the alpha channel. translucent windows really do no good if you're just setting a blanket alpha on the entire window. We need apps that are aware of the alpha channel and use it appropriately. Terminals are the first apps to support this. I'd like to see an app like gaim really take advantage of the alpha for doing subtle pop-up information windows (the gnotifications plug-in for example) and maybe the buddy list like Adium does. Also on-screen displays of information (new mail notifications, volume control, etc) could really benefit from translucency. Michael > > -Brian > > -------------------- > BYU Unix Users Group > http://uug.byu.edu/ > > The opinions expressed in this message are the responsibility of their > author. They are not endorsed by BYU, the BYU CS Department or BYU-UUG. > ___________________________________________________________________ > List Info: http://uug.byu.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/uug-list -------------------- BYU Unix Users Group http://uug.byu.edu/ The opinions expressed in this message are the responsibility of their author. They are not endorsed by BYU, the BYU CS Department or BYU-UUG. ___________________________________________________________________ List Info: http://uug.byu.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/uug-list
