Bug 164136 - configurable window title components
Summary: configurable window title components
Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME
Alias: None
Product: kwin
Classification: Plasma
Component: general (show other bugs)
Version: unspecified
Platform: Ubuntu Linux
: NOR wishlist
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: KWin default assignee
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2008-06-15 13:30 UTC by Maciej Pilichowski
Modified: 2012-03-13 22:34 UTC (History)
1 user (show)

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Description Maciej Pilichowski 2008-06-15 13:30:22 UTC
Version:            (using KDE 4.0.82)
Installed from:    Ubuntu Packages

configurable window title components

The main reason for this report is UI problem and teaching computers usage. Conclusion (of the teaching): people think app first, document later.

So please treat title as not one, but as pieces
<application>
<document>
arbitrary text

So user could set for the title:
<application>: <document>

This is very important when you have taskbar with clipped app titles.
Comment 1 FiNeX 2008-06-15 16:39:05 UTC
Maciej, is the problem "the taskbar cut out windows title" ?
Comment 2 Maciej Pilichowski 2008-06-15 16:44:42 UTC
Yes, and users cannot identify which entry is which application.
Comment 3 Mike 2008-06-15 16:49:01 UTC
This would be a very bad idea IMHO.  At the moment the icon shows you which application it is, so adding the app first would lead to duplication and make it impossible to see which window is which.

ie.  The taskbar would just become [Firefox...][Firefox...][Firefox...][Konsole...][Konsole...]
Comment 4 Maciej Pilichowski 2008-06-15 16:55:26 UTC
> At the moment the icon shows you which application it is

No, it is not, unless you can memorize 1,000,000, favicons from the Internet.

Besides, maybe you, me, can memorize some of KDE app icons, but please, do not force older people to memorize icons! They are confused enough. 

Ok, you can say, it is their fault -- but the problem is, you cannot change human nature, you cannot make older people to remember more. But you can make UI easier for people.

> ie.  The taskbar would just become [Firefox...][Firefox...][Firefox...]
> [Konsole...][Konsole...] 

This is intended behaviour. Not for everyone, but for people who have difficulties with grasping all the details of KDE.

It is funny/unfunny but when I launch _3_ apps, like Konq, OO, Kate, and load documents, so the titles are cut off, people immediatelly are confused which is which. Because for them Kmail icon is, well, not important. The name "KMail" icon is -- they don't think "icons", they think "names".

Uff :-)
 

Comment 5 FiNeX 2008-06-15 16:58:25 UTC

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 162568 ***
Comment 6 lucas 2008-06-15 17:01:35 UTC
Not a duplicate, might be a WONTFIX though.
Comment 7 Maciej Pilichowski 2008-06-15 17:05:28 UTC
Finex, it is not true duplicate, those issues are very similar and solving this other report would help this as well, but as I said before, a lot of people think in terms of apps (first), then documents.

For this reason, I will reopen this one, but I find real duplicate of mine.
Comment 8 Maciej Pilichowski 2008-06-15 17:46:15 UTC
PS. Note about other advantages, if this could be done simply as decorations:
[x] [app] [document] [^] [v]

for example, other parts of KDE could use this extra information. For example taskbar could show entries like this

ic  app_name  
on  document

with app_name bold font (other color, bigger font, you name it). This one would be useful for everyone.

In short flexibility in one place -> many benefits (more flexible KDE as whole).
Comment 9 Maciej Pilichowski 2008-10-06 11:25:27 UTC
Related report:
http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=159480
Comment 10 Martin Flöser 2012-03-13 21:10:01 UTC
I'm sorry but this report actually confuses me. Partially it talks about the task bar, but also about the window decoration.

I will only comment on the KWin part: KWin can only use in the window decoration what the window provides. This is the name which ends up in the title bar. We do not get a "document name" or an "application name". So this is with our current standard not possible. To change that first the specification has to be adjusted, then all applications and the window manager. A feature request here against KWin does unfortunately not solve the issue.
Comment 11 Maciej Pilichowski 2012-03-13 21:55:22 UTC
Well, my thinking is, you don't get what you didn't ask for. Since there is a notion of the "title", all you get is the title. Application won't set something for non-existing API, so first there should be setter for application title, for document title, and for "label title", in order the apps could use it.

After that users could rearrange the order.

Taskbar was only mentioned, because it displays what is in the titlebar.
Comment 12 Thomas Lübking 2012-03-13 22:34:58 UTC
(In reply to comment #11)
>  so first there should be setter for application title, for document title, and for "label title"

yes, this is exactly what martin said:
>> To change that first the specification has to be adjusted, then all applications and the window manager.

The window decoration doesn't provide some sort of API to the clients to set the title, you wanted to ask for this at fdo.org on top of
http://standards.freedesktop.org/wm-spec/wm-spec-1.5.html
and you want to change/split _NET_WM_NAME

An unilateral fix or trigger from a window manager is not possible, sorry.

As alternative, file a bug against at least Qt & Gtk to make title generation configurable, Qt btw supports setWindowFilePath() next to setWindowTitle() and generates the title (on X11) as:
* The file name of the specified path, obtained using QFileInfo::fileName().
* An optional * character, if the windowModified property is set.
* The 0x2014 unicode character, padded either side by spaces.
* The application name, obtained from the application's applicationName property.