Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!amdcad!sun!pitstop!sundc!seismo!uunet!mcvax!ukc!acorn!john
From: john@acorn.co.uk (John Bowler)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: What number of windows is reasonable?
Keywords: windows, server resources
Message-ID: <690@acorn.co.uk>
Date: 31 Jan 89 18:53:30 GMT
Organization: Acorn Computers Limited, Cambridge, UK
Lines: 29

It is very clear from the design of the protocol and from examples
such as Xt that windows are intended to be used not just for 
display and input but also for window layout and general programming
convenience, but what limits should be placed on such use of windows?

For example, if I am writing a bitmap image manipulation program
I presumably should not allocate a window for every pixel - but if
I am writing a directory browser should I avoid allocating a window
for every file?  Bear in mind that I may make the mistake of looking
at the release 2 doc/Xlib/Xsrc directory... 937 files = 937 windows,
about 300 bytes/window minimum in the server - I doubt an Acer Xebra
would allow that.  Of course this is under user control - the
application writer has no way of limiting the number of files in
a directory, or the number of pixels in an image, or the number of
lines in a text file.

So I would have thought that using windows in a way which means that
the number in existence at any one time is limited only by the
actions of the user is unreasonable.  Of course the user is free
to start up as many applications as he/she wants...

for i in doc/Xlib/Xsrc/*; do xedit $i &; done

...but the windows created by this and the effects on the system are
obvious - whereas inserting lines into a file, or innocently opening
a large directory seems quite benign.  Is this contrary to ``the
X philosophy''?

John Bowler		jbowler@acorn.co.uk