bryan@chroma.UUCP (Bryan Ford) (06/10/89)
In article <205@tlvx.UUCP>, sysop@tlvx.UUCP (SysOp) writes: >In article <2459@wpi.wpi.edu>, john@wpi.wpi.edu (John F Stoffel) writes: >> >> >> DEC has a really neat way of playing with windows on their >> workstations. When you click and drag a window around on the screen, >> you can move the window so parts of it go off the edge of the screen. > >Have you played with the hack that's called something like "vscreen"? It makes >a workbench that's much larger than your screen size. This would have the >effect on windows that you're looking for, since you can push windows to >areas off-screen. It's been a while since I ran it, but I think it takes up >RAM for the whole screen. I was surprised to see it run tho; it scrolls fast >too. Actually, these are two quite different things, both of which would be extremely useful. VScreen, like you said, just creates a huge, virtual screen you can scroll around in. However, it takes mega-memory. Ever try making a Workbench screen 4x the normal size? Unless you've got the new 1-meg Agnus, you're going to be hurting badly in chip RAM. On the other hand, moving windows off screen would be just like moving windows behind "imaginary windows" on the edge of the screen. Smart-Refresh windows and Super-Bitmap windows would get their contents saved and Simple-Refresh windows would just get dumped, the same as what happens when you move a window behind another. It shouldn't be too much work to implement this in the OS, but it would be enough. :-) So, these two things are actually two completely different "features". Both are useful, and it would be nice for both to be implemented in the OS, but I doubt that that will happen, at least in the near future. Bryan