OK, I know this is more of a window manager question, but I hope someone
can help me out....

I need to run a web browser as background. I mean that it must always be
in the back, never raised, and never have any window decoration.

It should only have focus when no other windows are open, but this is not
a real necessity.

I thought that I could run it as a root window app, but I don't know
how... Google is running dry. I did find something called bgbuddy, but
it seems to have disappeared.

So, anyone spare me the need to try all the window managers out there?

--Yan

Captain Dondo wrote:

> OK, I know this is more of a window manager question, but I hope someone
> can help me out....
>
> I need to run a web browser as background. I mean that it must always be
> in the back, never raised, and never have any window decoration.
>
> It should only have focus when no other windows are open, but this is not
> a real necessity.
>
> I thought that I could run it as a root window app, but I don't know
> how... Google is running dry. I did find something called bgbuddy, but
> it seems to have disappeared.
>
> So, anyone spare me the need to try all the window managers out there?
>
> --Yan

Most distros have multiple desktops.
You can run it in one of the other desktops.

On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 19:19:45 +0000, 7 wrote:

> Captain Dondo wrote:
>
>> OK, I know this is more of a window manager question, but I hope someone
>> can help me out....
>>
>> I need to run a web browser as background. I mean that it must always be
>> in the back, never raised, and never have any window decoration.

>
> Most distros have multiple desktops.
> You can run it in one of the other desktops.

I guess I didn't make myself clear. In this particular case, I have only
one desktop. I want a browser to appear as the background. Users click
on images in the browser, and the browser then starts a movie.

The problem I have is that I can either run the browser as the only app
with no window manager, which works but has some problems, or with a
windows manager like metacity, in which case users can click on the
browser window and the movie window 'disappears' as the browser gets
raised over it. For other reasons I cannot embed the movie in the browser.

So, I need to find a way to prevent a window from moving to the front,
even if it gets focus. I've looked at a handful of window managers, but
all seem to assume that you want the window with the focus to be raised at
some point.

I'm looking for the browser equivalent of roottail, if you're familiar
with that app.

--Yan

Bill Marcum wrote:

> On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 14:17:20 -0800, Captain Dondo
> wrote:
>
>>The problem I have is that I can either run the browser as the only app
>>with no window manager, which works but has some problems, or with a
>>windows manager like metacity, in which case users can click on the
>>browser window and the movie window 'disappears' as the browser gets
>>raised over it. For other reasons I cannot embed the movie in the browser.
>>
>
> With a window manager you might be able to arrange for the movie window
> to be "always on top".
>
>

Yes, IceWM can do this (other WM's probably also), you can have it keep
windows "on top" or "below", so just set the browser window to "below".

Berend

Captain Dondo wrote:
> On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 19:19:45 +0000, 7 wrote:
>
>> Captain Dondo wrote:
>>
>>> OK, I know this is more of a window manager question, but I hope someone
>>> can help me out....
>>>
>>> I need to run a web browser as background. I mean that it must always be
>>> in the back, never raised, and never have any window decoration.
>
>>
>> Most distros have multiple desktops.
>> You can run it in one of the other desktops.
>
> I guess I didn't make myself clear. In this particular case, I have only
> one desktop. I want a browser to appear as the background. Users click
> on images in the browser, and the browser then starts a movie.
>
> The problem I have is that I can either run the browser as the only app
> with no window manager, which works but has some problems, or with a
> windows manager like metacity, in which case users can click on the
> browser window and the movie window 'disappears' as the browser gets
> raised over it. For other reasons I cannot embed the movie in the browser.

mplayer -fs
will play the movie fullscreen.
Now, create a key definition file that turns off all/most of the controls,
and they can't get out of it.

Captain Dondo wrote:

> The problem I have is that I can either run the browser as the only app
> with no window manager, which works but has some problems, or with a
> windows manager like metacity, in which case users can click on the
> browser window and the movie window 'disappears' as the browser gets
> raised over it. For other reasons I cannot embed the movie in the browser.

Yeah, Havocs metacity ain't usefull, it don't give you much options (Havoc
don't like options, he likes it like it's in ms-windows).

Use a better window manageg, you have ctwm or/and twm, both supports quite
many things you can do with applications, like run them without the WM, this
way the user can't raise, lowe or anything with the applications (of course if
there is a close option in the application, they can sloe it).

If I would be you, I would avoid metacity and related applications.


//Aho