Making the Caps usable Desktops.

[nvrpunk]

Is it possible to make the caps usable desktops?

[RYX]

Unfortunately no (at least not yet). Because you can never be sure that they have a rectangular shape. If people set their viewport size to a value different than 4, the caps get a non-rectangular shape and it is not possible to correctly draw the output on them ...

You can write plugins that draw on the cube caps, but you'll not be easily able to handle input up/down there ...

I am not very deeply involved into development so I can be wrong. Maybe someone else has some more details on this.

:)

[McNash]

Unfortunately no (at least not yet). Because you can never be sure that they have a rectangular shape. If people set their viewport size to a value different than 4, the caps get a non-rectangular shape and it is not possible to correctly draw the output on them ...

:)

That's true, but the answer to that could be to only allow caps as desktops if the number of desktops is 6.

/McNash

[nvrpunk]

Well the one thing I notice with the reflection plugin is that you can no longer make the cube lay so that the cap is showing across the screen and stays there.

My gf found a good use for it. Locking out her desktop from other people coming by her computer. I think this would be a very good option for the caps, with a password requirement to move them off the caps back to the desktop.

Just a thought, I am sure we could go all day long on uses for the caps.

The underlying thing is how much of the core would have to be changed to add the functionality with the caps.

[OpnSrc]

Well the one thing I notice with the reflection plugin is that you can no longer make the cube lay so that the cap is showing across the screen and stays there.

My gf found a good use for it. Locking out her desktop from other people coming by her computer.

I miss that feature of beryl - does anyone know how to do that with compiz-fusion?

I think this would be a very good option for the caps, with a password requirement to move them off the caps back to the desktop.

Just a thought, I am sure we could go all day long on uses for the caps.

The underlying thing is how much of the core would have to be changed to add the functionality with the caps.

Hope the developers pick up on this idea(s).

[TB2]

Well the one thing I notice with the reflection plugin is that you can no longer make the cube lay so that the cap is showing across the screen and stays there.
I think this would be a very good option for the caps, with a password requirement to move them off the caps back to the desktop.

I just found out, you just need to tick "Snap to top face" in the "Rotate Cube" Plugin which will enable you to rotate to the cap and stay there.
It would also be quite neat if it was possible to start power point presentations or flash/avi/any movies on the cap so you can browse on the side and then switch to the top for the presentation instead of going fullscreen.

[SmSpillaz]

That's true, but the answer to that could be to only allow caps as desktops if the number of desktops is 6.

/McNash

Nope.

First of all, I don't think it is fair to only allow people with 4 viewports to have such functionality :D

Jokes aside, the actual way that the cube is drawn is a bit weird. You have to imagine that in a 'cube', ideally all edges are equal, but in the real world, they are not (Widescreen monitors FTW ... rest are 4:3 anyways :)) So long story short, the top face is not the same size as everything else, which causes problems with input up there ;-)

There is a way to explain it to show that it doesn't add up, but if you think about it, the top four edges of your screen might be 1280, which makes the top face 1280x1280 ... but your actual resolution is 1280x800

Hope that helped

SmSpillaz

[steve8track]

Speaking of the checkmark to settle on the top of the cube, I was wondering if we could get the old feature Beryl used to have of using Ctrl+Alt+Up and Ctrl+Alt+Down to view the caps. I used to use that more than unfolding the cube, and now that I can change the caps' images with the spacebar, it would be especially nice. I've also notice that despite having a shortcut to change the bottom cap, there is no way I know of to settle on the bottom cap.

Another cube related feature that I think would be neat would be if you could enable the desktop wall and the cube at the same time. Then, for example, each section of the wall would be a cube, and a cube with 4 sides and a wall with 4 sides would create 16 desktops that are quicker to get to than if the "cube" has 16 sides. I realize this might not be possible, but I hope it is, because it would be awesome, even if most think it's crazy :p.