Notes from Gran Canaria

Lots of happy buzz about window managers here at the desktop summit.  Some things people have said:

• Someone asked about implementing window matching.  It’s always been our policy that it should be done with an external tool, but policies can of course be rethought.  We might implement it in a branch and see whether anyone likes it.
• People are very excited about Mutter.
• Some concern was expressed by distros about whether enough machines will be capable of running gnome-shell: not just rather old machines but new ones which don’t have drivers yet.  Some interest in a version that uses software rendering.
• Owen Taylor’s work on the git migration and on gnome-shell got a standing ovation at the AGM.
• Several patches got reviewed and committed at last in hack sessions.
• Some discussion of the use of CSS in theming.
• Someone raised the idea of a generalised EWMH testing suite that can be used with Metacity or Mutter.  This sounds like a sterling idea.

In addition,

• the rpnparser branch (which is a simpler and faster theme expression parser) is still viable, but since the theme format for Mutter isn’t decided, it doesn’t really make sense to merge it.  But perhaps it still belongs in Metacity 2.  What are your thoughts, gentle reader?
• the squib of the day section in the blog only deals with enhancements, and since enhancements in Metacity are less likely and moving things to Mutter is more likely, this section may be on hiatus for a bit.

Photo © jcorrius, cc-by.