Re: [wmii] Re: layout per tag.

On Wed, 09 Aug 2006 15:55:19 +0200
Kai Grossjohann <kai.grossjohann_AT_verizonbusiness.com> wrote:

> Denis Grelich wrote:
> > I have to disagree completely. There should be no fixed layouts in
> > the window manager, in any case. There were reasons this was dropped
> > in earlier wmii versions.
> Well, but what if someone wants them?

Then that someone should /stop/ wanting them. If a method has flaws and
can be easily superseded by another method, it's obviously time to
re-learn.

> > Rather, the applications should provide for
> > enough hints (and the wm should listen to them, of course, while
> > placing them into their views) to dynamically create usable layouts.
> > Fixed layouts are a totally wrong approach to this problem.
> It is impossible for the application to provide those hints because
> different people have different preferences. For example, I have
> Thunderbird fully maximized in a single column. And when I create a
> compose window, I want to open a second column with that compose
> window.
>
> Perhaps others prefer a single column with two windows in it. Some of
> those people want default layout, some want stacked layout.

You firstly have to realise what you really want. Of course you could
make something one hundred percent customizable, but how would that
really help? It would make things much, much more complicated, and in
the end, you spend more time with customizing than with using your
application.
And then, what's the main difference between a human brain and a
computer, no matter how powerful? A human brain is /intelligent,/ and
the worst thing a computer can be on this planet is /smart/ (which
again causes lots of pain in the human brain mentioned above ...)
A human can easily adapt to something unfamiliar. Thus it is much
more feasible solution to write software that behaves in one
well-defined and nice way that people can adapt to and work with
productively. Some customization is surely needed, as people have
different interests and tasks, but this should not be applied where it
does not really help anyone.

> I think what's needed is a program similar in spirit to kstart. One
> would say "wmiistart $OPTIONS $APPLICATION" and the $OPTIONS would say
> how to tag the application, and what the column layout should be and
> stuff.
>
> And then one would want to have hooks in the wmiirc event loop that
> allows one to do different things for different applications: open a
> new view for them, open a new colum for them, re-use an existing
> column, change the column layout, ...

Talking of complexity ...
You didn't mean all of this seriously, did you? oO

Regards
Denis