[openbox] sloppy focus "stealing"

Anthony Thyssen A.Thyssen at griffith.edu.au
Sun May 22 21:22:20 EDT 2011


On Sat, 21 May 2011 10:40:02 -0700
Ian Zimmerman <itz at buug.org> wrote:
| On Fri, 20 May 2011 12:09:17 +1000
| Anthony Thyssen <A.Thyssen at griffith.edu.au> wrote:
| 
| > |      <keybind key="W-S-Tab">
| > |        <action name="PreviousWindow"/>
| > |        <finalactions>
| > |          <action name="Focus"/>
| > |          <action name="Unshade"/>
| > |        </finalactions>
| > |      </keybind>
| > | 
| 
| Anthony> Niffy, though I prefer the mouse to always indicate the current
| Anthony> window.
| 
| I think that's a separate issue.  Openbox could really use a "warp
| pointer when tabbing" option to force the pointer over the focussed
| window after a switch.  Sawfish has that and I've got so used to it that
| I'm considering patching openbox to add it.  Would such a patch be
| considered?  I would not make it the default of course.
| 
| Beyond that, openbox only has "sloppy" focus policy, which means there
| will always be at least one situation where pointer and focus are
| incoherent - namely, when the pointer is over the root window.  Of
| course I;d like to have that fixed as well (i.e. add a "strict mode) ;-)
| 

Actually there are a low of situations where focus fails to follow mouse.

Here are a few known situations....

  *  window mouse was in resizes so mouse is no longer in window
     The resize is typically caused by key input of some kind.
     In my case a image display window with shrink image key presses.
     The focus remains attached to original shrinking window
     This is sometimes a good thing.

  * Window closers or non-window manager moves of windows.

  * External program (event popup) forces a focus change.
    Window management tools like xwit, xdotool etc can do this!
    (again sometimes a good thing, other times not)


Typically when the mouse-focus is wrong it remains wrong until the mouse
moves across a window border.  As such I find myself 'jiggling' the mouse
back and forth to recover desired focus.


  Anthony Thyssen ( System Programmer )    <A.Thyssen at griffith.edu.au>
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   "Brigadier, a straight line may be the shortest distance between two
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