nazgul@alfalfa.com (Kee Hinckley) (05/18/91)
Several people have noted that my response to the question about Mwm's placement of icons was not terribly substantive and rather rude in tone. My apologies, it certainly would have been better sent via mail, or not at all. I would like to clarify however that I wasn't just being flip when I suggested that one of the reasons mwm (and Motif) are difficult is because they offer so many options. I consider that to be both an advantage and disadvantage. GUIs like Open Look considerably limit your options, but the lack of choices does make things easier. Back to the question at hand though. After playing with it I'm not entirely sure what algorithm Mwm *does* use. If I deiconify a window, and then create a new window and iconify it, it fills the space left by the last window (this is Mwm 1.1). In my mind that space ought to (and this is what I had thought Mwm did) be left open so long as a window corresponding to it exists. In other words each window should have an icon position that is remembered and not disturbed unless the user explicitly moves things around. Thoughts? -kee
don@atlantis.coral.com (Don Dewar) (05/18/91)
) Return-Path: <uunet!alfalfa.com!motif-request> ) Subject: Mwm question ) To: motif@alfalfa.com (The Motif Discussion List) ) Cc: kddlab!cs.titech!wnoc-tyo-news!dclsic!sjc!leia!harkcom (Alton Harkcom) ) X-Mailer: Poste 1.0 ) From: uunet!alfalfa.com!nazgul (Kee Hinckley) ) Date: Fri, 17 May 91 20:01:48 -0400 ) ) Several people have noted that my response ... ) ) Back to the question at hand though. After playing with it I'm ) not entirely sure what algorithm Mwm *does* use. If I deiconify ) a window, and then create a new window and iconify it, it fills ) the space left by the last window (this is Mwm 1.1). In my mind ) that space ought to (and this is what I had thought Mwm did) be ) left open so long as a window corresponding to it exists. In ) other words each window should have an icon position that is ) remembered and not disturbed unless the user explicitly moves ) things around. Thoughts? ) ) -kee ) ) And here we go... I disagree and it is a matter of personal perference and style. I like to conserve screen space as much as possible and I bring up lots of clients and "iconify" and "deiconfify" them all the time. I think the current algorithm makes better use of screen realestate. I believe your method gives a better sense of spacial reference of where the icon will be, but I don't find that particularly useful, whereas some else might. This brings to mind your original statement about mwm being too flexible. Here is a case where I would like to do it one way and you would like to do it another. Should this be yet another user cutomizable feature of mwm? I don't believe you could argue that either algorithm is better. They both have advantages and disadvantages, so which do you choose. Here is my interpretation of the alogorithm by the way. A client will be iconified back to the same place if that space is available. If you iconify a client that has never been iconified before, it will be iconfied in the first available space. If a new client has been iconfied into a space used by an existing client, the existing client will be iconified into the first available space. +---------+ | Coral | |@@@@@*@**| |@@*@@**@@| Don Dewar |*@@**@@@@| Coral Network Corporation, Marlborough, MA |@***@@@@@| Internet: don@coral.com |@@**@@@@@| Phone: (508) 460-6010 |*********| Fax: (508) 481-6258 |Networks | +---------+