Feature Request: Overlay that shows desktop name when switching

[romeojulietthotel]

In windowmaker ( http://repo.or.cz/w/wmaker-crm.git ) there's a nice feature that places the desktop name onto the screen momentarily when switching between desktops (workspaces in wmaker parlance).

The location can be configured but even if it only displays at the center it's enough. (in wmaker called workspace_name_display_position)

I looked around and I don't see this in JWM. Any thoughts on this?

Also website: windowmaker.org and lists: lists.windowmaker.org

[dumblob]

This is actually one of the few main motivations why I proposed the changes in https://github.com/joewing/jwm/issues/346#issuecomment-261892768 .

With that in mind I think we can close this Issue and implement the features in the linked comment (<Trigger> etc.) as the desired effect can be then be achieved using <Pager> in <Tray>. One optional missing feature would be to make the <Pager> only show the current desktop and not all. Maybe an additional attribute show="all"/show="current" for the <Pager> tag with show="all" being the default would do.

[romeojulietthotel]

This is not like #346 . This works with or without a tray. It's not something that can be interacted with in any way. It's transient (length of time it's displayed could be configurable) but it's very short. Try wmaker if you're still confused.

[dumblob]

@romeojulietthotel

This works with or without a tray.

So does my proposal :wink:. You might have got confused by the name overloading used in JWM (tray designates a way more abstract object than just a literal tray as is known from majority of other desktop environments or window managers).

It's not something that can be interacted with in any way.

My proposal is of course not interactive (refer to the proposed attribut ignoreinput of the <Tray> and <Pager> tags in https://github.com/joewing/jwm/issues/346#issuecomment-261892768 ).

It's transient (length of time it's displayed could be configurable) but it's very short.

This is covered in my proposal as well (see the proposed attribute autohidedelay of the <Tray> tag in https://github.com/joewing/jwm/issues/346#issuecomment-261892768 ).

Try wmaker if you're still confused.

Yep, I've tried wmaker at least twice in my life and found it quite interesting, but the nearly non-existent configurability unfortunately did not meet my requirements.

[Corin-EU]

This enhancement would be a most welcome addition.

If one has the key sequences and defined to change from workspace to workspace, and especially if the panel is set to "autohide" then after multiple presses, it is often not known which workspace one is on if the workspaces are not occupied by something specific to that workspace, unless one then moves the mouse pointer to bring up the panel.

It is a very helpful feature in WindowMaker, and it is also available in Openbox where both the duration of the popup and the name of each workspace can be set.

Even if it is decided that the enhancement should not allow custom naming of the workspaces (some people like named workspaces eg "Main", "Media", "Browsers", "Work", "Games", the workspace name display style tag should be configurable to a minimum of Font, Foreground, Background, Outline, and DisplayTime, and probably x,y position as well, with center of screen being the default.

[technosaurus]

• Desktop Desktop-specific data. The name attribute may be specified to name the desktop (the default is the desktop number). Within this tag, a Background tag may be specified for a desktop-specific background. See Background above for more information.

One thing that might be easy to add is a trigger for various events. Users could configure an app to run after each event: Window focused, Desktop changed, tooltip, Menu item selected, etc... If configured, jwm could just fork-exec the program with applicable arguments such as desktop name, menu label or window name, etc... On the plus side this would be extremely useful for accessibility. I think we talked about something like this in the context of tooltips, but I can't seem to find that issue.

[dumblob]

One thing that might be easy to add is a trigger for various events.

Triggers are proposed in https://github.com/joewing/jwm/issues/346 .