[compiz] window decorations explained and how to move forward

[David Reveman]

On Mon, 2006-04-03 at 12:06 +0100, Mike Hearn wrote:
> > Window decorations and the things related to that is a large thing. The
> > window decorator can do more than just decorations, e.g. taskbar, root
> > window menu. Being able to move all this out of the compositing manager
> > is really nice.
> 
> Ah OK, that makes sense I guess. So the idea is compiz can be merged 
> with existing desktops/WMs by dropping their own core X WM code and 
> putting the rest like root menus into a window decorator? Makes sense.
> 
> > Well, I think that gnome-window-decorator is currently doing better.
> > There's no rush with having a new theme system as long as we allow
> > programmatic themes like what we have in gnome-window-decorator today.
> 
> Sure, it's pretty, I was thinking of "better" in terms of new ideas. Do 
> people have any mockups of decorations that'd be hard to implement 
> without an SVG theme engine?

We really want per-pixel alpha so that edges can be anti-aliased and
parts can be translucent.

> 
> > No compression is currently used.
> 
> Is there any support in OpenGL for hardware accelerated RLE textures, or 
> something like that? If they use gradients at all most themes use 
> vertical gradients so I think simple RLE compression could help.

-David