XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

Master One · 2007-01-24 13:57:48

New to Arch & XFCE4, trying to figure my way through customization, I stumbled over the following issues:

1. Session Manager: Configured to automatically store sessions on logout, when I open thunar + terminal + firefox, logout, login, only tunar comes back automatically, but not terminal & firefox. The ~/.cache/sessions folder has a Thunar file, a thumbs folder, and xfce4-session-....:0, xfce4-session-....:0.bak and xfwm4-.... files, but nothing else. So I wonder, is the session manger not that advances as in GNOME / KDE, or is there something else wrong (in KDE I got about everything restored when loging in again, including firefox)?

2. Window Manager: Whenever I open a program, the window comes up in the left upper corner. In KDE I could save a default location for individual programs, means I could store the windows position and even on which virtual screen it should be opened on start. I suppose this feature is missing in XFCE4? Is there any way to influence the behavior, so for example to generally let windows open centered on screen?

3. Notification: Menu -> Setup -> Notification Settings only tells "Configure the Xfce notification daemon" and let's me choose a position. If I click "Preview" I popup shows up with some sample text. What is this notification daemon for?

I'm sure there are some more things to ask, but let's leave it with this for now ;-)

elasticdog · 2007-01-24 14:52:29

I can answer #2...you are correct in saying that feature does not exist in Xfce4, however, it does have "smart placement" which can be adjusted based on window size. Basically it will automatically center windows that are below a certain size, and once they get bigger than that, new windows will try to be arranged automatically in the best place to have coverage. You can adjust the minimum size setting under Settings -> Window Manager Tweaks -> Placement

Master One · 2007-01-24 16:19:55

elasticdog wrote:

I can answer #2...you are correct in saying that feature does not exist in Xfce4, however, it does have "smart placement" which can be adjusted based on window size. Basically it will automatically center windows that are below a certain size, and once they get bigger than that, new windows will try to be arranged automatically in the best place to have coverage. You can adjust the minimum size setting under Settings -> Window Manager Tweaks -> Placement

Indeed, when I open terminal now, it gets centered, although it's not really a replacement for the mentioned functionality. Hopefully the dev of team will consider this feature for an upcoming version, but for now I think I can live with the current situation (especially because I'm gonna suspend-to-ram most of the time anyway, once I have setup suspend/hibernation).

baze · 2007-01-24 16:38:59

2. saving the position of a window when a program is closed and restarted is up to the program itself and not part of the window manager, that's why it's left out of xfwm4.

3. the notification daemon just pops up those little informations. they are sent to the daemon by the tool that wants to inform you via dbus and then displays it. that's all it does.

Spider.007 · 2007-01-24 21:01:15

1 > Worked fine here yesterday; but since the upgrade to 4.4 its broken here as well. I am not sure if this is a bug or an upgrade-issue?

Master One · 2007-01-25 09:20:48

baze wrote:

2. saving the position of a window when a program is closed and restarted is up to the program itself and not part of the window manager, that's why it's left out of xfwm4.

I don't think think, that's the proper way, because I don't know any program, that does it by itself, and it does not seem logical, that a program has to tell the windows manager, where to place the window. In KDE it is an option of the windows manager, so you can manipulate placement of windows or programs in different ways as needed. This functionality is surely better placed in the WM, and not the individual programs.

Spider.007 wrote:

1 > Worked fine here yesterday; but since the upgrade to 4.4 its broken here as well. I am not sure if this is a bug or an upgrade-issue?

Which version of XFCE4 did you have installed before the upgrade? And it really did store session entries for other programs, like firefox and terminal, as well? I did not do an upgrade, but a fresh installation, so if this is supposed to work as mentioned, it seems to be a bug in XFCE4.4.0. Maybe a dev can comment on that?

Spider.007 · 2007-01-25 09:32:03

Master One wrote:

[...]
Spider.007 wrote:
1 > Worked fine here yesterday; but since the upgrade to 4.4 its broken here as well. I am not sure if this is a bug or an upgrade-issue?
Which version of XFCE4 did you have installed before the upgrade? And it really did store session entries for other programs, like firefox and terminal, as well? I did not do an upgrade, but a fresh installation, so if this is supposed to work as mentioned, it seems to be a bug in XFCE4.4.0. Maybe a dev can comment on that?

Firefox never worked but Terminal worked just fine; just like workrave, gaim, nautilus I ran 4.2.3 before upgrading

[01/24/07 11:24] upgraded xfce4-session (4.2.3-2 -> 4.4.0-1)

xerverius · 2007-01-25 09:44:23

Master One wrote:

I don't think think, that's the proper way, because I don't know any program, that does it by itself, and it does not seem logical, that a program has to tell the windows manager, where to place the window. In KDE it is an option of the windows manager, so you can manipulate placement of windows or programs in different ways as needed. This functionality is surely better placed in the WM, and not the individual programs.

I don't think you understand how hard it is no make this work 100% inside a window manager. Because an application has no default id, it not secure to detect the application by app name or command. There are also no specs a window manager should do this.
Anyway there are a couple of application that do save their last window size: Thunar and Mousepad for example.

Master One wrote:

Which version of XFCE4 did you have installed before the upgrade? And it really did store session entries for other programs, like firefox and terminal, as well? I did not do an upgrade, but a fresh installation, so if this is supposed to work as mentioned, it seems to be a bug in XFCE4.4.0. Maybe a dev can comment on that?

AFAIk no changes have been made in xfce4-session since the rc's (regarding this subject). You can try it with a fresh configuration (run 'mv ~/.config ~/.config.bak' after you've logged out), this might help with some weird sometimes. Anyway if it really b0rked, feel free to report a bug here.

But remember application like firefox do ablolutely not follow any of the freedesktop spec (startup notification, WM flags), nor does it communicate with xorg the way it should (read: xdamage and composite). And because there are no hacky implementations in xfce to 'catch' these applications, it might break sometimes.

Master One · 2007-01-25 10:13:49

xerverius wrote:

Master One wrote:
I don't think think, that's the proper way, because I don't know any program, that does it by itself, and it does not seem logical, that a program has to tell the windows manager, where to place the window. In KDE it is an option of the windows manager, so you can manipulate placement of windows or programs in different ways as needed. This functionality is surely better placed in the WM, and not the individual programs.
I don't think you understand how hard it is no make this work 100% inside a window manager. Because an application has no default id, it not secure to detect the application by app name or command. There are also no specs a window manager should do this. Anyway there are a couple of application that do save their last window size: Thunar and Mousepad for example.

Surely it's quite some work to implement this feature. I am not a dev, nor a programmer, I only know it's been working when I used KDE. It's not a "must-have", I only wanted to be sure, if such feature is supposed to work in XFCE4, or not.

xerverius wrote:

Master One wrote:
Which version of XFCE4 did you have installed before the upgrade? And it really did store session entries for other programs, like firefox and terminal, as well? I did not do an upgrade, but a fresh installation, so if this is supposed to work as mentioned, it seems to be a bug in XFCE4.4.0. Maybe a dev can comment on that?
AFAIk no changes have been made in xfce4-session since the rc's (regarding this subject). You can try it with a fresh configuration (run 'mv ~/.config ~/.config.bak' after you've logged out), this might help with some weird sometimes. Anyway if it really b0rked, feel free to report a bug here. But remember application like firefox do ablolutely not follow any of the freedesktop spec (startup notification, WM flags), nor does it communicate with xorg the way it should (read: xdamage and composite). And because there are no hacky implementations in xfce to 'catch' these applications, it might break sometimes.

I have a fresh installation here, so deleting .config will not change anything. I am just not sure, what's supposed to work, and what not. Spider.007 wrote, that terminal was stored in a session in XFCE 4.2.3, but that does not seem to be the case in XFCE4.4.0 any more (when I open thunar + terminal, logout, login, only thunar is back automatically, but not terminal). Is this correct, or is there something wrong with my installation?

qlus · 2007-01-25 19:14:50

I have the same problem with terminal and session saving. Fresh install also.

Spider.007 · 2007-02-25 19:50:30

I've added a bug for this one: http://bugs.archlinux.org/task/6487

yentz · 2007-04-13 19:31:38

Master One wrote:

1. Session Manager: Configured to automatically store sessions on logout, when I open thunar + terminal + firefox, logout, login, only tunar comes back automatically, but not terminal & firefox. The ~/.cache/sessions folder has a Thunar file, a thumbs folder, and xfce4-session-....:0, xfce4-session-....:0.bak and xfwm4-.... files, but nothing else. So I wonder, is the session manger not that advances as in GNOME / KDE, or is there something else wrong (in KDE I got about everything restored when loging in again, including firefox)?

In ArchLinux xfce4-session is compiled with the configure option "--disable-legacy-sm". I removed this option and now the session-management works with Terminal as well. I'm not sure, if there is a reason that "legacy-sm"is disabled.

Firefox still doesn't work but I think that's a problem of Firefox and not of the xfce session management.

moon_dog · 2007-05-13 09:27:37

how do you remove the option --disable-legacy-sm ?

janoli · 2007-12-03 14:02:12

Which version of XFCE4 did you have installed before the upgrade? And it really did store session entries for other programs, like firefox and terminal, as well? I did not do an upgrade, but a fresh installation, so if this is supposed to work as mentioned, it seems to be a bug in XFCE4.4.0. Maybe a dev can comment on that?
Firefox never worked but Terminal worked just fine; just like workrave, gaim, nautilus I ran 4.2.3 before upgrading

Workrave under xfce4? I cannot compile and i got this:

I../../plugin/distribution/gtkmm/src -I../../plugin/statistics/gtkmm/src -I../../plugin/exercises/gtkmm/src -I../../plugin/exercises/common/src  -march=i686 -mtune=generic -O2 -pipe -Os -g -DNDEBUG -MT workrave-AppletControl.o -MD -MP -MF ".deps/workrave-AppletControl.Tpo" -c -o workrave-AppletControl.o `test -f 'AppletControl.cc' || echo './'`AppletControl.cc; \
        then mv -f ".deps/workrave-AppletControl.Tpo" ".deps/workrave-AppletControl.Po"; else rm -f ".deps/workrave-AppletControl.Tpo"; exit 1; fi
In file included from AppletControl.cc:35:
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:28:34: error: sigc++/compatibility.h: No such file or directory
In file included from AppletControl.cc:35:
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:48: error: 'SigC' has not been declared
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:48: error: expected `{' before 'Object'
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:48: error: invalid type in declaration before ',' token
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:49: error: expected unqualified-id before 'public'
In file included from AppletControl.cc:39:
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:43: error: 'SigC' has not been declared
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:43: error: expected `{' before 'Object'
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:43: error: invalid type in declaration before ',' token
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:43: error: redefinition of 'int Object'
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:48: error: 'int Object' previously declared here
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:44: error: expected unqualified-id before 'public'
In file included from AppletControl.cc:46:
GUI.hh:68: error: 'SigC' has not been declared
GUI.hh:68: error: expected `{' before 'Object'
GUI.hh:68: error: function definition does not declare parameters
GUI.hh:262: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:270: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:277: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:284: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:292: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:298: error: 'SigC' has not been declared
GUI.hh:298: error: expected initializer before '<' token
GUI.hh:306: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
AppletControl.cc: In member function 'void AppletControl::init()':
AppletControl.cc:91: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GnomeAppletWindow'
GnomeAppletWindow.hh:47: error: forward declaration of 'class GnomeAppletWindow'
AppletControl.cc:95: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class X11SystrayAppletWindow'
X11SystrayAppletWindow.hh:42: error: forward declaration of 'class X11SystrayAppletWindow'
AppletControl.cc: In member function 'void AppletControl::check_visible()':
AppletControl.cc:349: error: incomplete type 'GUI' used in nested name specifier
AppletControl.cc:350: error: invalid use of incomplete type 'class GUI'
GUI.hh:65: error: forward declaration of 'class GUI'
make[5]: *** [workrave-AppletControl.o] Error 1
make[5]: Leaving directory `/home/alejandro/workrave/src/workrave-1.8.5/frontend/gtkmm/src'
make[4]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[4]: Leaving directory `/home/alejandro/workrave/src/workrave-1.8.5/frontend/gtkmm/src'
make[3]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/home/alejandro/workrave/src/workrave-1.8.5/frontend/gtkmm'
make[2]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/alejandro/workrave/src/workrave-1.8.5/frontend'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/alejandro/workrave/src/workrave-1.8.5'
make: *** [all] Error 2

Spider.007 · 2007-12-03 15:01:46

Using the AUR is easier

http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?d … =1&ID=5193

janoli · 2007-12-03 15:05:39

yes, that is the output of the AUR "not-package" (it's in CVS)

Spider.007 · 2007-12-03 20:57:48

That is strange. I'll see if I can upload the compiled package for you tomorrow. Do you have all required packages installed?

janoli · 2007-12-03 21:46:14

yes, of course I think I have.

Spider.007 · 2007-12-04 08:42:50

Does this package work for you?

janoli · 2007-12-04 13:14:10

Can I trust on a pre-compiled version of it? I'd like the AUR package.

Thanks! It worked perfectly. Waiting for the pause...

Arch Linux

#1 2007-01-24 13:57:48

XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#2 2007-01-24 14:52:29

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#3 2007-01-24 16:19:55

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#4 2007-01-24 16:38:59

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#5 2007-01-24 21:01:15

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#6 2007-01-25 09:20:48

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#7 2007-01-25 09:32:03

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#8 2007-01-25 09:44:23

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#9 2007-01-25 10:13:49

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#10 2007-01-25 19:14:50

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#11 2007-02-25 19:50:30

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#12 2007-04-13 19:31:38

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#13 2007-05-13 09:27:37

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#14 2007-12-03 14:02:12

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#15 2007-12-03 15:01:46

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#16 2007-12-03 15:05:39

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#17 2007-12-03 20:57:48

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#18 2007-12-03 21:46:14

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#19 2007-12-04 08:42:50

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

#20 2007-12-04 13:14:10

Re: XFCE4.4.0 Session Manager & Window Manager Behavior

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