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Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal)
Linux Journal presents a
book excerpt
from Using SUSE Linux on Your Desktop by Chris Brown PhD.
"Given the rapid pace of software development in the Linux world, it is inevitable that some topics that are bleeding-edge as this book goes into production will be mainstream technology by the time you get to read it. One such is the Xgl X server and the compositing window manager compiz. Together with a modern graphics card, these components (which are shipped with SUSE Linux 10.1) offer some stunning visual desktop effects comparable (dare I say this?) to the best that the Mac has to offer. These effects include transparent windows, fade-in/fade-out of windows and menus, animated window minimization, and the ability to put four desktops onto four faces of a cube and spin the cube (in 3-D) to switch desktops. The overall result is to give the desktop a more fluid, organic feel."
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Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 17:32 UTC (Thu) by ajross (subscriber, #4563) [Link] As much as I hate to sound like an eye candy fan, does anyone know what the current plans are for this software in popular distributions? Vista will be shipping in just a few months, and I fear we're heading for another round of fanboy wars where the windows folks crow about their new toy, and the linux geeks end up respnding with stuff like "Well, we have that too, you just have to ...".It makes everyone look bad, basically. Any chance that this is going to "just work" any time in the near future?
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 18:00 UTC (Thu) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link] Many distributions seem to shipping similar "eye candy" now. AIGLX is part of upstream Xorg 7.1 release and Fedora Core 6 (and the current development tree) includes Compiz which works with AIGLX and compositing is enabled by default in Xorg. Metacity is the default window manager and you turn on Compiz by enabling it in Preferences-=> More Preferences-=> Desktop Effects.
It mostly just works.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 18:43 UTC (Thu) by quintesse (subscriber, #14569) [Link] Except if you're using KDE with Fedora I guess :-(
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 18:48 UTC (Thu) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link]
There is some work being done on Compiz with KDE too
http://webcvs.freedesktop.org/xorg/app/compiz/kde/
You can run compiz --replace to enable it in KDE.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 19:54 UTC (Thu) by NapalmLlama (guest, #26327) [Link] Does anybody know if there's any KDE-native configurator yet? A few months ago I went to great lengths ripping all the Gnome stuff out of my system, so I'm very reluctant to install something (like gconf) that's going to pull it back in again. That's about all that's stopping me from giving XGL a whirl right now...
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 15, 2006 4:24 UTC (Fri) by Tashlan (guest, #17277) [Link] > AIGLX is part of upstream Xorg 7.1 release and Fedora Core 6...> It mostly just works.
True, but don't forget the drivers. I am stuck waiting for compatible 3D drivers for my Nvidia card. :(
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 19, 2006 3:48 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Get a better computer. ;)I've got my GMA950 and it works with AIGLX.
Those Core Duo (or whatever the hell Intel is calling them) are looking very good right now.......
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 29, 2006 4:36 UTC (Fri) by Tashlan (guest, #17277) [Link] > Get a better computer. ;)> I've got my GMA950 and it works with AIGLX.
I appreciate the sentiment, but replacing a motherboard and CPU to "upgrade" to a less powerful GPU is not an option I'm willing to consider. I don't need new hardware, I need new software. This hardware is capable of fullfilling my needs; only the driver restricts my ability to do so.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Oct 22, 2006 19:21 UTC (Sun) by ylec (guest, #41252) [Link] Like Thaslan I'm satisfied with my nVidia Corporation NV34 [GeForce FX 5200]and I see this working perfectly without any difficulties after an installation standard Nvidia driver from nvidia.com site with Novell SLED 10
With Fedora Core 6 (test 3)x86_64, I spent 2 days:
I tried to skip aiglx, and install xorg-x11-server-Xgl from source like in fedora core 5 but the difference of package source is too much with FC6 !
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 18:51 UTC (Thu) by madscientist (subscriber, #16861) [Link] Also, Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy Eft) will be released in later October, and it will ship with the basics to support this including the new version of Xorg etc. However, it's considered pre-production quality so I believe the plan is it'll disabled in metacity so you have to install an alternate package or two. I do remember reading an article recently by someone who had tested it, though.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 19:13 UTC (Thu) by thebluesgnr (guest, #37963) [Link] AIGLX is considered stable, and so is compiz. The metacity compositor, however, isn't, and that's probably what you remember reading about.
It seems Ubuntu is going to be behind on this, as edgy will still require manual installation of packages and editing of configuration files to get compiz working. Other distributions, like SUSE, Fedora and Mandriva do this all from the GUI.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 14, 2006 21:17 UTC (Thu) by anonymous21 (guest, #30106) [Link] Ok, I just remembered that Ubuntu edgy will probably set up AIGLX by default. So it seems the only thing missing is to integrate compiz into a nice preferences capplet that says "Enable effects" or something like that. Unfortunately the user will still have to learn what compiz is, how to install it and how to set it up.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 15, 2006 16:21 UTC (Fri) by madscientist (subscriber, #16861) [Link] I'd be surprised if there weren't alternative packages available for Edgy that did all this for you. Maybe not from Ubuntu main, but in universe or multiverse.
What about "Looking Glass" from SUN? Posted Sep 14, 2006 23:18 UTC (Thu) by kornak (guest, #17589) [Link] Speaking of eye candy, I remember a spectacular demo from SUN about 3 or 4years ago. Whatever happened to "Looking Glass"? I know that it was limited by its strong Java requirements much like everything else from SUN, but, it was still pretty slick. Is it functional yet? You would think it would be by now.
What about "Looking Glass" from SUN? Posted Sep 16, 2006 18:09 UTC (Sat) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Looking glass is still around and Sun open sourced it under the GPL license.
https://lg3d-core.dev.java.net/
To bad on it's dependancy on Java, eh? Hopefully Sun finishes up with open sourcing that.
This 3d stuff is very cool. Right now with 2d interfaces you have a very limited and simple interface. I've heard GUIs described as a 'caveman interface', all you do is point and grunt. There have been some limited efforts to expand it.. such as 'mouse gestures', for instance. But with this stuff there is much more openness to create realy sophisticated intefaces. To make a REAL "Human Interface".
Of course we all have heard of the Unix directory system described as a series of caves or a tree or whatnot.. but what if you can actually interact with it like such? Such as moving from room to room with the ability to arrange items in a real space, really interactive environment with more complex symbolism and such. How would you like your CVS or whatnot show up as a file cabinate you can just flip through in addition to issuing commands?
Some interesting things I've found...
Here you can see a couple videos which I can't watch right now because their flash :(, but if you can you may be able to see how XGL and it's fluidity lends to a more natural interface:
Hopefully the UI stuff begins to support multiple pointer devices, which would be especially nice for touch screen interfaces...
Here is a example of a multitouch screen device:
Lowfat is a effort to create a 3d file manager designed to provide a natural interface for humans. It's much cooler then it sounds like.
Croquet is a ongoing long-term academic project to create a next generation 3d multi-user interface.
Of course there are gaming that are doing massive multi user interfaces. I think it would be neat that you'd be able to interact with other people and maybe even have something were you could even run X apps inside of.
All sorts of things like this are cropping up more and more. Its going to be very interesting to see were it all goes.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 15, 2006 21:09 UTC (Fri) by job (guest, #670) [Link] I hope the name Compiz sticks. It's a very good name for a compositionmanager, plus it gives me fond memories of the Compis computers.
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 18, 2006 17:11 UTC (Mon) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link] I would guess that the ideas of Compiz are going to be merged into more usable WMs...
Don't get me wrong, I use and LOVE Compiz, but it doesn't really integrate in neither GNOME or KDE. In GNOME, it has it's own gconf keys, and doesn't follow the keysettings from the normal configuration. It's even worse for KDE, as it doesn't use gconf.
Quinnstorms version even uses her own csm thing instead (backstep, in my mind), so GNOME integration is just as bad with those packages.
Generally, I'd like to see Metacity, and... Ehm, KWM(?) get a plugin system that could load the Compiz plugins, so that we don't have to have a non-intergrating WM, but still get the benefit of common effects...
Animate the Desktop with Xgl and Compiz (Linux Journal) Posted Sep 15, 2006 22:35 UTC (Fri) by larryn (guest, #3457) [Link] It looks like most people forget Mandriva :) I installed Mandriva 2007 RC1, AIGLX and Compiz are there. I select Compiz and it work with an onboard Intel card with just one click :)
Placing four desktops onto four sides of a cube is evil and wrong Posted Sep 21, 2006 14:19 UTC (Thu) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link] Linux developers teach lobotomized dog-brain desktop stupidity. 4 sides constitutes a square -- not a Cube. Teaching that a virtual desktop has '4 screens' with no top & bottom, induces an evil curse that pervades all Linux distributions.
Placing four desktops onto four sides of a cube is evil and wrong Posted Sep 21, 2006 21:33 UTC (Thu) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] What about people that use 12 sided squares?
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