Re: [wmii] "Rows" of columns? (feature/behaviour suggestion)

On Tue, Feb 13, 2007 at 04:46:30PM +0100, Anselm R. Garbe wrote:

> I don't understand why people ask for such mixture-layouts (in dwm
> we had the same discussion already). Actually, I think you only need
> such mixture layouts, if your screen is too small. So, the real
> solution for the problem in my eyes is: wether use a floating setup,
> or buy a bigger screen.

How do I buy a bigger screen for my laptop?

I can't, so I have to use a floating setup when I want to mix a wide
window with two narrow ones? That doesn't suck less: it sucks more.

> Apart from that, I believe that windows in rows scale poorly
> compared to windows in columns, because in my observation the
> width of a window is of much more importance than its height.
> And there's also a reason for this observation - it is text. In
> western civilizations we usually read line-based (regardless if
> from left-to-right or vice versa), but text expands into the
> width. Hence you can easily handle more than 20 windows in a
> column, but you can hardly handle more than 5 columns at all
> (this makes windows nearly unusable).

The issue is is not scalability.

None of my "mere mortal" friends (including myself) ever have 20
windows in a column, or even, frankly, 5 in a row. We're not talking
about managing tens of windows here (or at least I'm not). We're
talking about flexible (but nicely managed) layout options for a few
windows.

It is a _genuine_ use case to want one wide window and several (or
maybe even just two!) on a small screen (eg a laptop screen). Audio
editing is one example but there are others.

> Or you just adapt your usage patterns to column layout (which is
> doable) and maybe you want to buy a better screen.

Column layout doesn't work well with windows which want to be wide.
Buying a better screen is not an option in many circumstances. Using
the floating (or managed, or whatever you call it) layer defeats a
large part of the purpose of using a window manager like wmii in the
first place.

-Andy

-- 
Andy Gimblett
Computer Science Department
University of Wales Swansea
http://www.cs.swan.ac.uk/~csandy/