OpenSolaris screenshots

 
A couple of screenshots from the plain desktop, I specially enjoy the one on the right.
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ImageShack link

 
The Desktop Effects at its best, with the Desktop Wall on the spotlight
The Atheros WiFi and the plain vanilla ethernet adapter do not work out of the box, you need to install drivers for both of them.
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ImageShack link

 
The codecs for mp3, as well as for DVD playing are not included on the default install, patent issues, business as usual... Just like on a plain vanilla Ubuntu install.
You access CompizConfig Settings Manager thru the Visual Effect tab of Appareance
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ImageShack link

Ring Switcher & Compiz multiplicity (II)

A little sort of heads up on this "Ring Switcher + Evolution multiplicity".

Found out that the same thing happens on the all other window circling plugins that Compiz has, specifically, I mean on these: "Application Switcher", "Ring Switcher" (doh!) & "Shift Switcher"; all of those show those little pesky "Alarms" window (or windows) when circling thru the other opened Windows on your box.

Also (to put sort of a scientific patina to this whole thing :p ) I have found is that:

- The "Alarms" window show up only if the Evolution "main" window is minimized.
- If you disable the "circling thru minimized windows" the "Alarms" window don't show up.

This is cool, a solution of sorts...
But, it really throws the whole purpose of a window switcher, I mean, if you cannot switch to only the windows which are not minimized; yeah, it could be nice to be able to do, after being able to switch to any of the opened windows as well.

Another thing I came across is another pesky window, this one called "Add signature script", it is really tiny, it looks like the same icon from the "Alarms", but without escalation.
It is the tiny, tiny icon inside the yellow box on the screenshot.

Vanishing plugin

On Thursday had to disable the Desktop Effects for a while to test something; not much problem, went to:

"System -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Visual Effects"

And clicked on "None", naturally the effects died right there.

The thing, after I'm done, when I wanted to enabled the effects once again, lo and behold, I wasn't able to start them up again, the screen flickered a few times, the window manager's borders vanished, but after all of that, I got the message "Desktop effects could not be enabled".

When I tried to execute compiz from a Terminal, got this:

esteban@tango:~$ compiz
Checking for Xgl: not present. 
Detected PCI ID for VGA: 00:12.0 0300: 10de:0533 (rev a2) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Checking for texture_from_pixmap: present. 
Checking for non power of two support: present. 
Checking for Composite extension: present. 
Comparing resolution (1280x800) to maximum 3D texture size (4096): Passed.
Checking for nVidia: present. 
Checking for FBConfig: present. 
Checking for Xgl: not present. 
/usr/bin/compiz.real (core) - Error: Could not acquire compositing manager selection on screen 0 display ":0.0"
/usr/bin/compiz.real (core) - Fatal: No manageable screens found on display :0.0

After Googling like a mad man (I wanted, most than any whooping effect I could use, my border-less windows back, dude!!!) found a script called "compiz-check" (excellent name, BTW); which checks if your system is able to run Compiz or not, and eventually, helps you to set it up (if you want to do such thing).

Executed it on my beloved Tango, and got this:

esteban@tango:~$ ./compiz-check
Gathering information about your system...

 Distribution:          Ubuntu 8.04
 Desktop environment:   GNOME
 Graphics chip:         nVidia Corporation GeForce 7000M (rev a2) (rev a2)
 Driver in use:         nvidia
 Rendering method:      Nvidia

Checking if it's possible to run Compiz on your system...

 Checking for texture_from_pixmap...               [ OK ]
 Checking for non power of two support...          [ OK ]
 Checking for composite extension...               [ OK ]
 Checking for FBConfig...                          [ OK ]
 Checking for hardware/setup problems...           [FAIL]

There has been (at least) one error detected with your setup:
 Error: Another compositing manager in use. 

Would you like to know more? (Y/n) y

 The default window manager of GNOME has its own compositing manager to
 provide basic desktop effects.
 If this one is in use, Compiz will not be able to run. 

Do you want to disable GNOME's compositing manager? (Y/n) y

After typing 'y' it seemed like the script simply hanged or crashed, and got my prompt back.
But, after executing:

compiz --replace ccp & emerald --replace &

I got all the Desktop Effects back and running smoothly.

But, after restaring X, and login back onto Gnome, the effects were gone once again, so, placed that onto a script, made it excutable, and then added the script to the "Startup Programs" on the "System -> Preferences -> Sessions" settings.

All is golden again.

Verdebuntu (2)

More on the Verdebuntu "theme" or whatever.

Right now, these are the global settings I'm using at the moment:

- Human-Clearlooks is the theme
- Inverted is the window border (Not totally sure that its being used, since I'm using Emerald as the window manager... See below)
- Tangerine is the icon set
- Mac4Lin_Cursors is the cursor icon set.

The settings on the theme, to acess them go to:
"System -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Customize -> Colors"

(That's a f*ckload of a path, man!)


- Windows:

background: a6db97
text: 184D13

- Input boxes:

background: b0d6ad
text: 096001

- Selected items:

background: 6db336
text: 096001

- Tooltips:

background: 66b01f
text: 096001

The settings on the Emerald theme, a very, very little modified version of the truly wonderful Human Tiger:

- Active window:

Text fill: 1E5019
Text outline: 94B291
Bottom outline: 0A270C

- Inactive window:

Text fill: 357E2F
Text outline: A6DB97

Verdebuntu

A work in progress, yadda yadda yadda, I was a little bit tired of the grey, but not totally convinced to the green hue that I'm using for the color of the windows...
Some time I like it, and others reminds me of a little puppy diarrhea.

Sort of the distant cousin, or better yet, the European and refined cousin for this old matte. Or at least, I want to believe it is more refined than the old one... Probably, if a graphic designer sees this might have a heart attack.

Ahh, gOS, those were the days!!!

Ring Switcher & Compiz multiplicity

I noticed a strange thing using Compiz' Ring Switcher (I love it) and Evolution.

When you execute the Ring Switcher, and Evolution is open with appointments created -no matter the date-, a myriad of little windows show up as well (I believe, one for each appointment you have created), with the name of "Alarms" all of them, belonging to Evolution; if I choose any of them nothing happens, and they all disappear, as I can see if I use the Ring Switcher once again.
To switch to Evolution, I have to select its window specifically.

This is really weird, and specially since I hardly use any Evolution notification, I preffer to use Evolution's Calendar (and Apple's iCal for that matter) to work sort of as a Journal, so it mostly has entries that have already passed; and on the case of Evolution, I particularly set -all- the notification off when I create a new appointment, whether "in the past" or a week ahead.

NVIDIA configuration utility

I really don't understand why this program it is not installed by default when you install/ enable the NVIDIA proprietary drivers on Ubuntu.

I was going mad trying to configure the resolution on Tango, hooked up to my external monitor, nothing worked, and was only able to clone the output from the laptop's main screen, even the resolution, which looked like sh*t on the big one.

It looks like, in order to use different resolutions (and to be able to not use the screens on clone mode) you have to install the NVIDIA configuration utility.
To do so, type:

sudo aptitude install nvidia-settings

Once opened, the configuration utility looks like this (at least, its main window):

Stackswitch: cool Compiz plugin

I was Googling for some tips on how to make the Compiz Scale plugin behave more like Expose (I miss the tab to circulate thru the minimized windows a lot...), when I found bout this rather cool looking and handy plugin: Stackswitch.

Compiz: Text plugin is a must

One thing I found out after Googling a lot, and personally, I really don't know why this plugin isn't enabled by default, really...

If you use Compiz's "Ring Switcher" to circulate thru your windows, make sure to enable the "Text plugin" as well, hell, even if you use the "Shift Switcher" one, you'll need it; if you want to know the title of the window before switching/ maximizing it ;)

If you don't enable that plugin, you won't see the window title when you are switching between them.

I effing love this effect, the only thing I find rather ugly about it (well, actually, it has nothing to do with the plugin per se) are the default icons that you see when an app is circled thru the Ring Switch and it is minimized; that is because the tiny icon from the Gnome's Window List Panel applet is rather enlarged.