From: ssiny!gnohmon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU (Ralph Betza)
Newsgroups: fj.mail-lists.x-window
Subject: Re: Best WM?
Date: 11 Jan 93 22:10:21 GMT
Distribution: fj
Organization: Systems Strategies, Inc., NY, NY

Date: 11 Jan 93 16:14:39 GMT
Message-Id: <165@ssiny.UUCP>
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x

In article <JASON.93Jan8101751@ab20.larc.nasa.gov>, jason@ab20.larc.nasa.gov (Jason Austin) writes:
> In article <1ic637INNmbm@irz401.inf.tu-dresden.de> beck@irzr17.inf.tu-dresden.de (Andre Beck) writes:
> ->
> -> > One vote for olvwm, you get the virtual screens and much more, and it's
> -> > free !!!
> ->
> -> IMHO vtwm is the best one. Especially after patching it to support general
> -> AutoRaise and AutoRaiseDelay options.
> ->
> -> If mwm would have vtwm's Virtual Desktop features, it would rule.
> ->
>
> 	I vaguely remember reading something that said OSF was
> planning to add a virtual capability to mwm in a future release.  Is
> there anyone from OSF out there that can deny or affirm this?  In any
> case, I believe there has been a lot of market pressure for this
> capability, and when there's demand, someone will come up with a
> supply.
>
> 	I would put my vote for mwm.  It looks great, has tons of
> options, and is becoming standard over many different platforms.  I
> wish Sun would see the light and distribute Motif with the OS instead
> of OpenLook.
> --
> Jason C. Austin
> j.c.austin@larc.nasa.gov

mwm does not have squeezed titles, which all forms of twm offer.
I would simply never use a window manager that lacked this important
feature; nor would I use a non-virtual window manager.

What's the big deal? Simply that, after many changes in my way of
working, I have settled down to having at all times two xterm
windows visible: each is as tall as possible, and they do not
overlap. Under each of the two visible windows, I may have as many
as four others, with the squeezed title bars offering instant access
to them. I have never needed more than eight of the ten possible
windows for one task. ( I have patched my vtwm to make it possible
to move the titlebar from left to right to center without restarting
the window manager ).

Other tasks, suspended, are in other parts of the virtual screen.
Certain things are *always* done in the same areas of the virtual
screen, so I know where to find them.
I use a 5x5 virtual area, but more than half of it is empty;
occasionally, I like to look at the nice background ( usually
xmartin, but right now toutatis.gif )!

I never use icons and almost never iconify windows. I never use the
twm icon manager. In order to access windows that aren't currently
visible, I use the panner or the "TWM Windows" menu.

Oops! mwm lacks THREE important features, not just one!
The "TWM Windows" menu is important to me.

I have also hacked my vtwm to display the "TWM Windows" menu using
the colors defined for the display of each window in the panner.
( and to have proper colors and a background bitmap for the panner,
as tvtwm does ).

I don't know whether ctwm has a panner or not. If not, my vote for
best window manager must go to vtwm or tvtwm ( in a dead heat ).

mwm is at the bottom of the list, by far...

-Ralph Betza (FM),
 uunet!ssiny!gnohmon

"The question of whether a computer can swim is more interesting
 than the question of whether a submarine can think" - Lenny Dykstra