But copy&paste between different desktops is not something X has had for 15 years (at least afaik)
Not by default, but it has pretty much always been possible with a little bit of code if you wanted it.
Probably 7 or 8 years ago I had two X-based workstations sitting next to each other on my desk, running different brands of Unix. For convenience I wrote two little Xlib programs:
The first let me join the selections of multiple displays together, so for example I could highlight text on one display and then paste on another.
The second let me hook displays together for pointer and keyboard events. For example I could choose one keyboard and mouse that I liked and make that the master, then just move the pointer right across the edge from one display to to another. This worked just like a dual-head system except that I'm talking about moving the pointer between completely separate workstations. The biggest problem I ran into with this were applications that detect/ignore forged events by default (like xterm), but XFree86 has an extension that could probably fix that as well.
This is all basic Xlib, and the selection stuff in particular should work with all clients and servers transparently. These programs could be started/stopped at any time during a session as needed.
I suppose moving the pointer between displays could get hairy with recent window managers that treat the edge of the screen as a request to switch virtual desktops:-)
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Not by default, but it has pretty much always been possible with a little bit of code if you wanted it.
Probably 7 or 8 years ago I had two X-based workstations sitting next to each other on my desk, running different brands of Unix. For convenience I wrote two little Xlib programs:
The first let me join the selections of multiple displays together, so for example I could highlight text on one display and then paste on another.
The second let me hook displays together for pointer and keyboard events. For example I could choose one keyboard and mouse that I liked and make that the master, then just move the pointer right across the edge from one display to to another. This worked just like a dual-head system except that I'm talking about moving the pointer between completely separate workstations. The biggest problem I ran into with this were applications that detect/ignore forged events by default (like xterm), but XFree86 has an extension that could probably fix that as well.
This is all basic Xlib, and the selection stuff in particular should work with all clients and servers transparently. These programs could be started/stopped at any time during a session as needed.
I suppose moving the pointer between displays could get hairy with recent window managers that treat the edge of the screen as a request to switch virtual desktops