In "Beryl settings manager", make sure your "Number of Desktops" is 1, and your "Horizontal Virtual Size" is how many sides to the cube you want
you can disable the "Wobbly Windows" via Beryl settings manager I followed the guide at http://liquidweather.net/howto/index.php?id=92 to make beryl bearable
I receive around 60 fps using beryl but not using its "enhancements", and I receive from 15 to 30 fps when using the "enhancements"; the thing is i do not notice the change (except for using certain features)
I get
the laptop I am using with beryl Specs: Dell Inspiron 1501 AMD Turion 64 x2 TL-60 (2.0 GHz), 2GB RAM, ATI RADEON(r) Xpress1150 256MB HyperMemory, Fedora 7
I've been working with Ubuntu 7.10 recently and compiz-fusion is far better than Beryl as represented in 7.04. The Fire plugin no longer crashes things, and the organization of plugin packages is smarter, with a hierarchy of quality and reliability. Fire effects on a fullscreen window still harm performance, but this can be worked around with saner defaults (fewer particles). That Compiz Fusion is generally better than Beryl should make sense -- it's essentially the latest version of Beryl (which is still maintained for posterity's sake). From a stability standpoint, the software itself hasn't been a problem. Customization can be troubling, as something (probably CCSM) loses settings in gconf, and I haven't pinpointed when that occurs. I generally receive 60 fps excepting the aforementioned fire effect. Specs: Toshiba Tecra M7 Intel Core Duo 2.0 GHz 1GB RAM NVIDIA Quadro NVS 110M Ubuntu 7.10
To me, the bigger point is the little details in usability. The default application switcher will zoom out the entire desktop. If you're using a fullscreen window of firefox, this becomes visually weird, as in certain instances, only the menu bar zooms out. Ideally, a filter should be done to only zoom away program windows, and not gnome-panel and the desktop. But in the meantime, turning zoom off completely exposes a flicker bug in the switcher. That turns what would otherwise be a visually neat feature into a visual annoyance. I can point out several other similar flaws, but my point is that desktop usability is about attention to minor details, and it doesn't appear that anyone's paying attention to them.
Compiz is great for a technology preview, and highly impressive to bystanders and people sitting behind you in class / meetings, but I think if Ubuntu really wants to deploy compiz by default, someone needs to step up and pay attention to those details. The Technical Board takes the opposite viewpoint, that until they ship by default nobody will pay attention to details large or small, and I guess that's the definition of a community distribution.
Justin Dugger
On 10/3/07, Justin Dugger jldugger@gmail.com wrote:
I just "discovered" a nice feature in 7.10. Hove the mouse over any window, hold Alt and scroll the mouse wheel - the window will shift to varying levels of transparancy. This is actually a useful productivity feature, as you don't have to change window focus to do it. It even works on the panels.
On 10/6/07, Jonathan Hutchins hutchins@tarcanfel.org wrote:
Gee, wouldn't it be great if these things were all documented somewhere, so you could set up a real demo for people?
Yeah, we get to hear about all the "gee whiz" features but all the useful ones get the cold shoulder. I like sticky and snapping window borders too. It's actually a bit useful to get a visual notice that you've hit an edge before you actually keep pushing the window over or off of it.
On 10/6/07, Jon Pruente jdpruente@gmail.com wrote:
At least with Compiz Config Setttings Manager (CCSM) you can browse the various plugins and dig into what you want. Each plugin has a tab that informs you what the keybindings are. There's just so many plugins at this point that I'm not sure their "each plugin gets a unique key combo" can work feasibly. Last I saw however, Sticky windows is available, as is snapping. CCSM is in universe, because it's hardly a gem of UI.
I think it's important to remember that no matter how much Ubuntu leadership wants it by default, compiz is still unfinished. Its probably a bit pointless to put the finishing usability touches on code that may be radically changed later. And as always, community driven projects benefit more from actions taken than words spoken. As in, writing documentation instead of declaring someone at fault for not doing so earlier.
And metacity is still installed by default, with all the functionality you love.
Justin Dugger
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Philip Dorr