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

Chris Foster <foster_AT_physics.uq.edu.au> writes:

> On Wed, Feb 14, 2007 at 01:15:47PM +0000, Mark Gibbens wrote:
>> >(1) I *really* like the way wmii has come to revolve around one
>> >principal window management model. The column model is as close to
>> >perfect as I can currently imagine. I think adding different
>> >management models again would be a step backwards. There is an
>> >inspiring purity of concept with wmii and I like the idea that you can
>> >move closer to perfection by a process of constant simplification.
>>
>> Another aspect of the model is that there are exactly two levels: the
>> columns and the windows within the columns. Your suggestion is to add
>> another level whereas my suggestion is to keep the number of levels
>> the same.
>
> I think a row-based analogue of the column layout is so conceptually
> similar that it wins over the idea of creating yet another layer.

But Mark has a point with his suggestion to just support showing
multiple views at the same time.

Conceptually, one could imagine that there are rectangular regions on
screen, each of which shows one view. Then, one could adapt that
concept to make it work for two purposes: one purpose is to handle
Xinerama, and another purpose is to handle the original request.

To handle Xinerama, one would say that each head is such a rectangular
region.

To handle the rows, one could support splitting a rectangular region
into an upper half and a lower half. (I'm avoiding the terms
horizontal and vertical here, because I'm always confused which is
which.) One could then support merging two adjacent rectangular
regions. (Two regions on two different heads would then never be
adjacent.)

One would not need to support splitting a region into a left half and
a right half because this is already handled by columns.

However, Mark claims that the currently provided nagivation by views
can be used to handle navigation by rectangular regions, as well. But
I don't see how that would work.

Proposals: (1) Provide commands to navigate to the next/previous
rectangular region. (2) Conceptually line up the regions from left to
right (regardless of their actual orientation on screen) and define
that moving right from a rightmost column will move to the next region
in sequence.

Kai
Received on Wed Feb 14 2007 - 16:23:41 UTC