Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!bionet!arisia!roo!parc.xerox.com From: janssen@parc.xerox.com (Bill Janssen) Newsgroups: comp.windows.x Subject: Re: WM for Motif or is R4 twm ICCCM compliant Message-ID: <221@roo.UUCP> Date: 24 Feb 90 01:05:52 GMT References: <9002231624.AA01344@devnull.sun.com> Sender: news@parc.xerox.com Reply-To: janssen@parc.xerox.com (Bill Janssen) Organization: Xerox Palo Alto Research Center Lines: 44 In-reply-to: dshr@SUN.COM (David Rosenthal) In article <9002231624.AA01344@devnull.sun.com>, dshr@SUN (David Rosenthal) writes: >...It is necessary to be very careful when you quote the ICCCM. Here are >the actual words from Section 5.1.1: > > The client communicates with the session manager by placing > two properties (WM_COMMAND and WM_CLIENT_MACHINE) on its > top-level window. If the client has a group of top-level > windows, these properties should be placed on the group > leader window. > ... >There is no implication that multiple top-level windows have to be in the >same group... I feel there is a very *clear* implication that top-level windows of a single client should be in the same group, and that a client with multiple top-level windows should create a group and place its top-level windows in that group. But I agree that ICCCM does not explicitly *say* this, but rather says something less precise. What does "the client has a group of top-level windows" mean? Perhaps it means that the client has created a window-group leader. But suppose the client has created more than one window-group leader. Should it place its WM_COMMAND and WM_CLIENT_MACHINE properties on each? Why? With that strategy, why not place them on every top-level window it creates? I'll argue that the only sensible interpretation of that sentence from the ICCCM is "If the client has created more than one top-level window, it should use one top-level window as a window-group leader, place its other top-level windows in that group, and place the WM_COMMAND and WM_CLIENT_MACHINE properties on that window-group leader window, but not on any other of its top-level windows." And since I have no wish to spend my life debating the fine points of ambiguous sentences, I propose that my interpretation of the sentence replace the original sentence in the ICCCM, or that the original sentence and related sentences be deleted from the document. Bill -- Bill Janssen janssen.pa@xerox.com (415) 494-4763 Xerox Palo Alto Research Center 3333 Coyote Hill Road, Palo Alto, California 94304