[vox] [Semi-OT] Virtual desktops on Windows

[Bill Kendrick]

On Mon, Jun 20, 2005 at 10:31:35AM -0700, Richard S. Crawford wrote:
> 
> Bill Kendrick said:
> 
> >   http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/
> 
> Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!!

After playing with it a little, I've found a few bugs, and some of the
config options could be described better (F1 or ?-arrow help, or tooltips),
but otherwise, it's the closest to FVWM/Sawfish/KWin that I've ever come to
on a Windows workstation.

I installed a few modules (one for throwing windows to the next/prev
desktop, another for throwing workspace names up on the screen for a moment,
a la WindowMaker, and one that lets me Alt+Click to drag windows),
and set it up more like my KDE desktop at home.

That is, I don't switch desktops with the mouse, but rather use
Alt+Arrow-key to move between my four desktops.

Virtuawin appears as a little grid icon in my system tray on WinXP
(with the current desktop highlighted).  The Windows PowerToy one appeared as:

  MSVDM (#) (1) (2) (3) (4)

in my taskbar, next to the systray.


The "MSVDM" didn't do anything except take up precious horizontal space!!! >:^(

The grid-shaped "#" caused all four desktops to appear at 1/4th size, and
I could click to switch to the one I wanted... but I first had to prepare
myself for all of my windows to get rearranged in the taskbar [*],
and for Visual Studio to deminimize and resize itself for no apparent reason.

The 1 thru 4 went to the various desktops.


Oh, and did I mention that Viruawin lets you make windows sticky?
I don't believe the PowerToy could.  (And even if it could, that additional
feature was STILL not worth the pain and annoyance the damned thing caused
to begin with.)

[*] I do lots of Windows Explorer junk during builds, copy-pasting, etc.,
    and like to keep my windows arranged in a particular way in my taskbar.
    This is what one has to do to work around the lack of functionality in
    Windows.  *sigh*  I should really make some bash scripts or Makefiles
    for this, some day.


Wow, I should stop ranting.  Sorry :)

-- 
-bill!                         Linux vs Windows studies can be divided into:
bill at newbreedsoftware.com        1. Studies paid for by Microsoft
http://newbreedsoftware.com/     2. Studies that conclude Linux wins