Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!decwrl!sgi!zok!mark
From: mark@zok.UUCP (Mark W. Snitily)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: window manager swapping (was Re: Another R5 wish)
Message-ID: <489@zok.UUCP>
Date: 25 Sep 90 07:05:16 GMT
References: <235@grapevine.EBay.Sun.COM> <9009041636.AA23617@hansen.com>
Organization: The distant planet Zok
Lines: 44

In article <9009041636.AA23617@hansen.com> jim@ncd.COM (Jim Fulton) writes:
>
>    When I move the
>    mouse pointer from an active xterm window to one of the swapped-out 
>    windows and start typing, input goes to the window that I WAS on until 
>    the new window comes in from disk.
>
>The problem is that the window manager is swapped out, not the xterm.  So,
>it takes it a while to wake up and refocus on the new window.  One way to
>avoid this is to put NoTitleFocus in your .twmrc, although it means that 
>key strokes in the title bar will be sent to the application with SendEvent
>rather than being delivered "normally".

Having seen this query (with the same answer) a number of times, I'm
surprised the suggestion of turning the window manager's "sticky" bit on
hasn't been mentioned.

Assuming you're using twm, you own it, and you're in the directory where
it resides, then

        chmod 1755 twm

with set the sticky bit on.

Quoting from the man page:
    "If an executable file is set up for  sharing  (this  is  the
     default)  then  mode 01000 (save text image after execution)
     prevents the system from abandoning the swap-space image  of
     the program-text portion of the file when its last user ter-
     minates."

In other words, it won't get swapped out.  The con is that it'll always
be there, but you'd probably want to keep the window manager in memory
anyway.

-- Mark

Mark W. Snitily                 Consulting Services:
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