[SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

B15HOP · 2016-03-22 03:53:20

I want to run an application, such as firefox, maximised in full screen mode: eg F11, but only on one screen. And say run scite, (again F11) on the other screen.

Here is my xorg.conf

# nvidia-settings: X configuration file generated by nvidia-settings
# nvidia-settings:  version 358.16  (buildmeister@swio-display-x64-rhel04-12)  Mon Nov 16 19:58:01 PST 2015

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "Layout0"
    Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
    Option         "Xinerama" "1"
EndSection

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "Module"
    Load           "dbe"
    Load           "extmod"
    Load           "type1"
    Load           "freetype"
    Load           "glx"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    # generated from default
    Identifier     "Mouse0"
    Driver         "mouse"
    Option         "Protocol" "auto"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/psaux"
    Option         "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    # generated from default
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "kbd"
EndSection

#Section "Monitor"
#    # HorizSync source: edid, VertRefresh source: edid
#    Identifier     "Monitor0"
#    VendorName     "Unknown"
#    ModelName      "Samsung SyncMaster"
#    HorizSync       30.0 - 81.0
#    VertRefresh     56.0 - 75.0
#    Option         "DPMS"
#EndSection

Section "Monitor"
	Identifier	"Dell_1"
	VendorName	"Dell"
	Option		"DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
	Identifier	"Dell_2"
	VendorName	"Dell"
	Option		"DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device0"
    
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
    BoardName      "GeForce GTX 460"
	Option		""
	Option		""
	Option		""
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen0"
    Device         "Device0"
    Monitor        "Monitor0"
    DefaultDepth    24
    Option         "Stereo" "0"
    Option         "nvidiaXineramaInfoOrder" "CRT-0"

    # Option         "metamodes" "HDMI-0: 1440x900_75 +0+0, DVI-I-3: 1440x900_75 +1440+0"
    Option         "metamodes" "DVI-I-2: 1440x900_75 +1440+0, HDMI-0: 1440x900_75 +0+0"

    Option         "SLI" "Off"
    Option         "MultiGPU" "Off"
    Option         "BaseMosaic" "off"
    SubSection     "Display"
        Depth       24
    EndSubSection
EndSection

And here is .xinitrc

#!/bin/sh
#
# ~/.xinitrc
#
# Executed by startx (run your window manager from here)

#if [ -d /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d ]; then
#  for f in /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d/*; do
#    [ -x "$f" ] && . "$f"
#  done
#  unset f
#fi

# exec gnome-session
# exec startkde
exec startxfce4
# ...or the Window Manager of your choice

# set mouse accel to zero
xset m 0 0 &

#start media auto disk mounter
#udiskie --tray &

#urxvt &
#urxvt &
#fvwm

#exec startxfce4

#exec startlxqt
#exec ck-launch-session compiz ccp

exec gnome-shell &
#exec feh --bg-scale /home/b15hop/media/b15hop/archive/graphics/desktop\ backgrounds/agua-3840x2400.jpg
#xfdesktop --quit

So you know I have two screen setup on nvidia which works really well. I am using

I have tried googling the answer to this, and searched the forums but had no luck.

PS: Ignore the 3rd screen, It was another issue I had trying to get a 3rd screen with my old nvidia 460gtx, which now I know won't work.

Last edited by B15HOP (2016-03-30 11:22:51)

B15HOP · 2016-03-22 03:58:56

I found something for flash but have not tried it yet.

http://al.robotfuzz.com/workaround-for- … -desktops/

ewaller · 2016-03-22 04:09:53

Duel screens? The screens stand 10 paces apart and shoot at one another?

Docbroke · 2016-03-22 05:36:21

Never had such issue on i3. If you are willing to try some other wm.

EDIT: not even with xfce4 in my another laptop (with radeon drivers), while i3 is using intel.

Link you provided is quite old, should have been fixed by now??

Last edited by Docbroke (2016-03-22 06:14:32)

B15HOP · 2016-03-22 07:18:49

ewaller wrote:

Duel screens? The screens stand 10 paces apart and shoot at one another?

Yes my screens are shooting at each other. ~jokes~

Multihead, where you have two screens active, eg side by side. I simply want to press F11 and make whatever application go fullscreen ONLY on that monitor. Not both at the same time. I think it might be a limitation of xfce4 though. Since after some more research, seems possible with KDE.

V1del · 2016-03-22 08:19:41

You are using Xinerama which has the explicit purpose of handling multiple monitors as one big screen, and your metamodes suggest as much. What happens if you remove that Xorg conf/the Xinerama parts and use xrandr for the configuration instead?

B15HOP · 2016-03-22 09:57:44

V1del wrote:

You are using Xinerama which has the explicit purpose of handling multiple monitors as one big screen, and your metamodes suggest as much. What happens if you remove that Xorg conf/the Xinerama parts and use xrandr for the configuration instead?

I found xrandr or randr quite hard to grasp. I did manage to get it working at one point but went back to nvidia's twinview because I was hoping for better performance. Is there any quick way to get xrandr up and running without too much effort?

V1del · 2016-03-22 14:20:41

There are various GUIs which should be relatively easy to use, xfce should have one as of 4.12 (and afaik nvidia-settings should be using randr as well if you don't explicitly set the twin view checkmark)

Last edited by V1del (2016-03-22 14:28:36)

B15HOP · 2016-03-23 00:46:10

V1del wrote:

There are various GUIs which should be relatively easy to use, xfce should have one as of 4.12 (and afaik nvidia-settings should be using randr as well if you don't explicitly set the twin view checkmark)

Do I just set Xinerama to 0 and then what?

Docbroke · 2016-03-23 04:28:52

There are some readymade examples of easy to use xrandr scripts for dual screens at xrandr arch-wiki page. That should stop the duel.

V1del · 2016-03-23 13:34:05

The best approach would be to start from a clean slate remove that config completely (as in delete the file), restart X, follow docbroke's advice, then either create a new xorg conf according to the randr specification, or put the xrandr command that was successfull in an autostart script somewhere (where and how exactly depends on a few different factors, most of which are covered quite well in the previously mentioned wiki).

Last edited by V1del (2016-03-23 13:39:46)

B15HOP · 2016-03-30 08:56:52

You wouldn't believe what fixed the problem.

I updated the driver using the nvidia website. I had a similar issue once before where the nvidia binary blob from nvidia worked better than the arch driver blob. Unsure why...

Basically now I can full screen firefox on the right screen, and have the desktop on the left screen. Except this is now with the driver from the nvidia website... I even use the old xorg.conf file. But I did modify it slightly because for some reason the screens were swapped left to right. Anyway all good, working now.

Note: I was using a nvidia 340.xx driver before because I tried to use three screens with onboard video doing the 3rd screen. But since I could not get that working well (slow and chuggy), I went back to two screens. But since not using the onboard Nvidia 8300m, I went into the bios and disabled the onboard gpu... Because the GTX 460 should work with the new driver, I upgraded to the later 361.28 driver from pacman, ended up with an issue where startx would boot, then shutdown. I checked the /var/log xorg log files, but there were no (ee) just some warning about ACPI which never caused an issue before... So instead I went to the nvidia website, downloaded the 361.28 driver, installed that... and it worked perfectly. Really strange issue... And yes, still using the same (but modified to swap left / right screens) xorg.conf file.

Phillip Kilby.

V1del · 2016-03-30 10:52:20

I still don't really believe that, are you absolutely sure that the nvidia driver install hasn't created other Xorg files that override or alter your original configuration? What does the xorg log say now? Afaik there were some notions that Xinerama got borked in newer nvidia versions, so if you have the newer driver it might be that it implicitly ignores Xinerama settings.

Be aware that you will now have to stay on top of kernel updates yourself and you might need to reinstall/rebuild the nvidia module by hand.

But well whatever works for you, don't forget to mark the thread as solved, by editing your iniial post.

B15HOP · 2016-03-30 11:21:56

V1del wrote:

I still don't really believe that, are you absolutely sure that the nvidia driver install hasn't created other Xorg files that override or alter your original configuration? What does the xorg log say now? Afaik there were some notions that Xinerama got borked in newer nvidia versions, so if you have the newer driver it might be that it implicitly ignores Xinerama settings.
Be aware that you will now have to stay on top of kernel updates yourself and you might need to reinstall/rebuild the nvidia module by hand.
But well whatever works for you, don't forget to mark the thread as solved, by editing your iniial post.

I am guessing you are right. The reason why I say that. My old desktop was stretched across two screens. The NEW desktop, has the left monitor with a task bar (xfce4) and the right screen as a blank screen with just a different background. That's perfect! Because before if I used full screen, it would stretch across the two screens. Now F11 is just on the screen I have the window already in. It could well be that the nvidia driver updated other xorg files. At the top of the xorg.conf it says that it's auto generated by nvidia-xconfig but it looks identical to my older xorg.conf. ~shrug~

Otherwise I did manually add a file inside xorg.conf.d/ called 20-nvidia-.conf which is very basic:

Section		"Device"
	Identifier	"Device0"
	Driver		"nvidia"
	VendorName	"NVIDIA Corporation"
	Option		"NoLogo" "true"
EndSection

But I doubt that did much...? It didn't fix my earlier woes with the arch driver loading x then shutting down immediately.

Otherwise it's coming up with warnings about hot-plugging now that never existed before.

cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep "EE"
[    99.077] Current Operating System: Linux USS-ENTERPRIZE-C 4.4.5-1-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Thu Mar 10 07:38:19 CET 2016 x86_64
	(WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
b15hop@USS-ENTERPRIZE-C # cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep "WW"
	(WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
[    99.211] (WW) Hotplugging is on, devices using drivers 'kbd', 'mouse' or 'vmmouse' will be disabled.
[    99.211] (WW) Disabling Keyboard0
[    99.211] (WW) Disabling Mouse0
[    99.217] (WW) Open ACPI failed (/var/run/acpid.socket) (No such file or directory)

I personally think Nvidia should work closer with the desktop managers because things like that are difficult to find information on. Most people would not be bothered if their system was working fine to check for potential problems in their log files. They just want something that works and not worry about the inner workings of the system. The forums here are a life saver because people that reply don't expect anything in return. The community is what keeps arch alive and powerful. Cheers for all your help guys.

V1del · 2016-03-30 18:35:43

You shouldn't just filter for errors, there's a lot of info to be found if one has the whole context available to them. Your mentioning of the stretched taskbar furthers my assumption that you are now using a normal randr setup instead of Xinerama. Most of the desktop environments have a possibility to configure randr, so if you wouldn't be using an old, self defined xorg configuration, most desktop environments would be able to provide you with an integrated solution (in general using nvidia-xconfig generated files is mostly unnecessary and often leads to problems nowadays)

Arch Linux

#1 2016-03-22 03:53:20

[SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#2 2016-03-22 03:58:56

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#3 2016-03-22 04:09:53

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#4 2016-03-22 05:36:21

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#5 2016-03-22 07:18:49

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#6 2016-03-22 08:19:41

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#7 2016-03-22 09:57:44

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#8 2016-03-22 14:20:41

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#9 2016-03-23 00:46:10

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#10 2016-03-23 04:28:52

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#11 2016-03-23 13:34:05

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#12 2016-03-30 08:56:52

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#13 2016-03-30 10:52:20

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#14 2016-03-30 11:21:56

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

#15 2016-03-30 18:35:43

Re: [SOLVED] Full screen on twin screen setups.

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