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Looking Glass Beta Released
cereal3825 writes "Well Sun Microsystems Looking Glass has been released for testing. The Project can be found here. Though remember this is beta and a quote from the Getting Started Doc says 'This mode is still very much a work in progress. To date, only a few X11 applications run bug-free in this mode.' so dont expect a work of art."
there are applications that run bug-free?
Where can I get me some of that?
Looks like Cube for Windows. http://www.infinite-3d.com/
Nice thing about cube, it looks like its all realtime, so all windows still have animation and updates. Not like those cheap 3d-desktops that just use static images of the appliation.
A terminal window would still update, a shockwave would still run, a movie would still play.
Too bad its still beta and no download, the example videos look great.
I try to run the terminal and it just opens up another window all together. Why is this?
Isn't this bookended side-ways toolbar stacking just the same thing as the current windows toolbar? I find it a bit confusing myself to have to turn my head to the side and quickly read off the window titles. Also, while I'm at work and haven't downloaded the beta just yet, I'm wondering how this custom shell will screw up my games... I know I haven't had much luck with ObjectDock/Litestep.
-Christopher Wu
http://www.christopherwu.net/
Is this at all related to the Visix Looking Glass desktop manager for UNIX?
3-D perspective displays could provide more information density if they are able to provide shrunken 3-D like views that allowed you to fit more onto the screen. From the sample images, it does look like there is some screen space savings, by showing windows vertically rotated. But lots of space is wasted elsewhere. As a work in progress, it doesn't look like it would be a more productive environment yet.
I am not a Java Programmer (yet) and its just second time I was abt to use a Java Program on Linux.
Just followed their instructions for getting the Looking Glass up and Running and Yo!. That was a Fantastic Experience. Check out my Snapshots captured using KSnapShot tool when the looking Glass was running over the TWM Window Manager. This was on a Dell Optiplex Gx260 having onboard Intel845 Video Card running Fedora Core2. When it really gets full fledged, believe me, all the desktops is going to be like playing a 3D game. Whole new features and a good extension to the present desktops. So Sun, I forgot what the business-men are saying, Kudos for your Technology!!!
Senthil
If I wanted fancy 3D effects, I would play a game. I don't see how twirling a window around could be more efficient than just switching to the other window normally.
De Paciencia
"When it really gets full fledged, believe me, all the desktops is going to be like playing a 3D game."
In other words, just another "toy" for geeks to play with. While the "working" world at best finds it a distraction, and at worst a bigger time waster than Quake3, Slashdot or Solitaire.
...it won't work if the X server doesn't support it. AFAIK XFree doesn't though I haven't been keeping up recently. Perhaps X.org will add the functionality? You can simulate transparent windows at the Xlib layer but by god its slow if done this way especially if the X server and client are on different machines if you want the window to be transparent when being dragged around the screen in realtime then forget it.