One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

[stealthbanana]

Well it works nice, would like screensaver support.

When I ran it with feisty, I have the option of starting KDE normally using kwin, or an alternate login entry to enable bells and whistles to annoy windows vista users. I did this mainly as I have this running on a laptop with a radeon xpress 200M, not the fastest of GPUs. When running fullscreen video, I get very bad framerates, so would appreciate the ability to boot into KDE with the horrible XGL if I so choose, but still retain it for Compiz. I personally think Compiz as default is a bad idea as it will not run supersmooth on lower end computers which many newcomers to Linux / Kubuntu will be installing on.

Oh, and when running Emerald, I miss no way to change the theme. Yes there is the Theme Manager, that will show me what I have available, but for the life of me (and I may have just overlooked it) no way to make the changes on the system with out resorting to a shell and typing 'emerald --replace' (well I make a wee tray icon in ruby to do just that, but not everyone will be able to do that).

Ideas? Comments.

[dibl]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

Concur.

- Even if they want to ship it with Compiz enabled by default, it would be nice to have a "Eye Candy - On/Off" button somewhere obvious, so the new user can just disable it right away.

- Emerald -- nice window decorations, but the user interface remains too mystical for the casual user (there IS a GUI means of doing it, but it's far from obvious).

- What ever happened to Aquamarine? I personally wasn't crazy about it, but it was (a) finished and (b) free -- why dump it?

[stealthbanana]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

A wee bit more research digs up

usr/share/xserver-xgl/xserver-xgl-notification.update-notifier

Name: Xgl server setup changed
Priority: High
Terminal: False
DontShowAfterReboot: True
DisplayIf: true
Description: The Xgl server will now be started automatically next time you login. It is no longer necessary to use any special X session to start Xgl, and such sessions will likely fail to work properly. Please select a regular session from your session manager next time you log in. To disable Xgl autostart for this user, create a file named ~/.config/xserver-xgl/disable

So time to expand my wee script to flip this as a nasty wee hack.

[thedevilsjester]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

- Even if they want to ship it with Compiz enabled by default

Please dont! The whole Berly/Compiz XGL/AIGLX system is horribly buggy on multi user setups, a quick google search shows its a very common issue, and if you enabled it by default, that would be a very bad idea.
The exact app that is responsible is still open to debate because each blame the other, but the whole system is fatally flawed.

Instead, install it by default but dont have any of it start (any of it) unless you say so, like Sabayon does.

[3vi1]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

Well.... committee decided it would be installed/enabled by default (if the hardware supported it).

But, I just tested with my hardware (nvidia 7600GT) and it was not installed by default. I installed compiz, ran it manually once, and it always starts now.

I've had some problems with Beryl/Compiz in the past, but they're getting fixed so fast that I don't see this as a problem. In fact, installing it by default is the best way to root out all offending hardware problems. Expect things to get very stable, very fast.

[integr8e]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

That's very nice to know; I just uninstalled Compiz because I've been having an issue with my computer freezing on me whenever I've been away from it for a while. Compiz is usually using 40-80% of my CPU at those times and I'm seeing if it was Compiz causing the freeze (I was having some issues before Compiz, but may have fixed those). I'm going to wait about 2-3 days to see if it was Compiz, and regardless of the results, will probably reinstall it (I really like Compiz; just doing some debugging).

[thedevilsjester]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

Well.... committee decided it would be installed/enabled by default (if the hardware supported it).

But, I just tested with my hardware (nvidia 7600GT) and it was not installed by default. I installed compiz, ran it manually once, and it always starts now.

I've had some problems with Beryl/Compiz in the past, but they're getting fixed so fast that I don't see this as a problem. In fact, installing it by default is the best way to root out all offending hardware problems. Expect things to get very stable, very fast.

The issue I speak of has been there since day one, and hasnt been fixed yet, so I dont see it being fixed any time soon, and makes the system completely unusable, regardless of the video card. (I have an nVidia 7600 GT also)

I've tried with many different setups and its always the same. When switching VTs, the VT you are switching to will, at random, turn off your screen. I.E. you get a White or Black screen, or the screen shuts off entirely (disconnect notice on my monitor). It doesnt matter if Compiz is enabled on all VTs or just one, it will still do it. A quick Google search shows that its a common issue. As I said its fairly random, I could switch 100 times with no issue, or it could happen every other time, but it _only_ happens when Compiz is enabled.

[stealthbanana]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

OK, had a wee blast to try and sort out the enabling and disabling of XGL for those of us with ATI cards, so you and enable or disable it for next boot, reload emerald, kwin and compiz.

If there is a way to do it via the GUI I have not found it. Anyway, a wee bit like the old kicker app in Beryl. Written in Ruby, so you will have to install korundum.

Its a nasty little hack thats sits on your systray, and can muck your system up with the kwin --replace option if its already running. Will show a green LED if XGL is enabled, a red LED when its disabled.

You will also need a file called enable or disable in /home/<user>/.config/xserver-xgl

OK, its the first thing I have written since playing with AMOS yeas ago, feel free to alter etc.

Copy the code into say kate, save it somewhere logical as kggcc.rb , make it executable and run it, enjoy.

kggcc.rb

#!/usr/bin/krubyinit
#kggcc.rb
#kubuntu Gutsy Gibbon Compiz Controller
# (c) stealth.banana at gmail.com
# do what you want with this, no warranty at all
# don't come crying when it breaks something
# improvements welcome.

require 'Korundum'

switch= open("|echo $HOME").gets
XGLSWITCH = switch.chomp + '/.config/xserver-xgl/'
NAME = "Simple Compiz Control"

class MySystemTray < KDE::SystemTray
 slots 'quit()',
	'checkforxgl()',
	'flipxgl()',
	'launchccsm()',
	'launchemerald()',
	'emeraldreplace()',
	'compizreplace()',
	'kwinreplace()'
	
 def initialize() 
	super
   setCaption(NAME)
   icons = KDE::IconLoader.new()

   @redled = icons.loadIcon("redled", KDE::Icon::Toolbar)
   @greenled = icons.loadIcon("greenled", KDE::Icon::Toolbar)


   @flipxglAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Flip XGL status")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@flipxglAction, 
	   self, SLOT('flipxgl()'))


   @launchccsmAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Configure Compiz")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@launchccsmAction,
       self, SLOT('launchccsm()'))
 
   @launchemeraldAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Configure Emerald")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@launchemeraldAction,
       self, SLOT('launchemerald()'))

   @compizreplaceAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Restart Compiz")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@compizreplaceAction,
       self, SLOT('compizreplace()'))

   @emeraldreplaceAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Restart Emerald")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@emeraldreplaceAction,
       self, SLOT('emeraldreplace()'))

   @kwinreplaceAction = contextMenu().insertItem("Restart Kwin")
   contextMenu().connectItem(@kwinreplaceAction,
       self, SLOT('kwinreplace()'))


	checkforxgl()
	connect(self, SIGNAL('quitSelected()'),
       self, SLOT('quit()'))

 end

 def quit() 
   exit()
 end


 def flipxgl()
	Dir.chdir(XGLSWITCH)
	if File.exists?("disable") 
		File.rename("disable","enable")
		setPixmap(@greenled)
		popup("XGL is now enabled")
		else
		File.rename("enable","disable")
		setPixmap(@redled)
		popup("XGL is now disabled")
	end

 end


 def popup(msg) 
   KDE::PassivePopup::message(NAME,msg,self)
 end


 def launchccsm()
	open('|ccsm')
 end


 def launchemerald()
	open('|emerald-theme-manager')
 end


 def emeraldreplace()
	open('|emerald --replace')
 end


 def compizreplace()
	open('|compiz --replace')
 end


 def kwinreplace()
	open('|kwin --replace')
 end


 def checkforxgl() 
	test1 = File.exists?(XGLSWITCH + "disable")
	test2 = File.exists?(XGLSWITCH + "enable")
	if test1 == false and test2 == false
		popup("Please create the correct file in .config, exiting")
		quit()
	end
	if test1 == true
		setPixmap(@redled)
	end
	if test2 == true
		setPixmap(@greenled)
	end
 end
end
about = KDE::AboutData.new("Kubuntu Gutsy Gibbon Compiz Control",NAME, "0.1")
KDE::CmdLineArgs.init(ARGV, about)
app = KDE::Application.new()
syst = MySystemTray.new()
syst.show

app.exec()

[integr8e]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

Well, good news (sorta)! I've gone 3 days without a freeze now I've uninstalled Compiz and disabled the powernowd daemon on my desktop. I suppose I can give Compiz another try, just am really getting tired of the system freezes

[juantovarm]

Re: One or two notes on Compiz/Fusion

Whwn it was beryl with emmerald, there was a wiky that described step by tep on how to compile it, how to fix your xorg.conf if necessary and how to make a beryl session. That does not exist anymore. What happened to the docummentation? Where do i look for info? why not make a wiki on compiz/fusion? Why not give us a choice to have compiz-fusion enabled or disabled sessions. And if we DO have the possiblility why not tell us how to do it?