SUSE & openSUSE » Compiz/Compiz-Fusion

Compiz Fusion in openSUSE 11.0

admin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 15:27:31 +0000

Compiz is a compositing window manager that uses 3D graphics acceleration via OpenGL. It provides various new graphical effects and features on any desktop environment, including Gnome and KDE. Compiz Fusion is a collection of plugins and a configuration system for the Compiz compositing window manager. It was created from the remerging of Beryl into Compiz.

Compiz truely and honestly redefines user desktop experience and desktop/window management.

With openSUSE 11.0 Compiz-Fusion comes pre-installed and any system with reasonable performance level should be able to benifit from the Compiz-Fusion desktop experience. Needless to say, better the hardware better is the experience.

Here we look at various aspects Compiz on your openSUSE 11.0 (most discussed here should work on openSUSE 10.3).

Pre-Requisites

In order to make life easy, let us go through a few pre-flight checks to ensure all is well once we enable Compiz/Desktop Effects and start using it.

The Pre-requisites include

1. Proper drivers installed for your ATI or nVidia or Intel Graphics card.

2. Enable Composite for Xorg and the rendering engine that you want to use like AIGLX,nVIDIA native for nVIDIA or XGL. Composite is enabled by default in openSUSE 11.0

Intel Video/Display cards

AIGLX

nVIDIA Display/Video cards

nVIDIA Native Rendering platform

AIGLX

ATI Display/Vide Cards

AIGLX

Enable Compiz/Desktop Effects

Enable/Configure and use Desktop Cube

Temporarily Disable/Enable Compiz Fusion / Desktop Effects

Watchout!!! more to come…

Temporarily Disable/Enable Compiz Fusion / Desktop effects in openSUSE

admin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 15:09:59 +0000

There may be instances when you need to disable Desktop Effects (Compiz Fusion) temporarily in openSUSE. A best example, is when I enabled “Reflection” plugin, my screen hung with blank grey windows, reboot didn’t help as the reflection plugin was still in action and Intel 965 GM don’t very well support this effect.

To disable Desktop Effects temporarily,

Press + F2 and type “metacity — replace”

This should let compiz to start but disables later on. This will replace metacity as the new Window Manager.

To re-enable Desktop Effects

Press + F2 and type “compiz-manager –replace”

This will let you make compiz-manager as the Window Manager again.

This should help!

Enable/Configure & use Desktop Cube for Compiz-Fusion in openSUSE

admin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 14:54:54 +0000

Now, that we have installed and enabled Desktop Effects (Compiz) in our openSUSE, how do we use it?

Compiz Fusion / Desktop Effects enables a bunch of plugins by default and one of them is the Desktop Cube. The Destop Cube shows the multiple workspace on your desktop as a Desktop Cube. Imagine your Desktop as your cube and each side of the cube is a workspace in your multiple worlspace desktop and thats exactly is a desktop cube. This cube can also be unfolded and shown as a strip of slides where each slide is a desktop workspace.

Prior to enabling and using Desktop Cube, the most important aspect of the Desktop Cube are your keyboard and mouse (or touchpad in case of a laptop)

Apart from the standard special keys on your keyboard like keys there are few others, you need to familiarise with. They are

Super Key – “Windows Key” on your keyboard (if found)

Mouse Key mappings

Button1 – Left-click button on your mouse
Button2 – Right-Click button on your mouse
Button3 – Middle click button or clickable wheel on your mouse
Button4 – Forward scroll on the wheel of your mouse
Button5 – Backward scroll on the wheel of your mouse

Enable Desktop Cube

Let’s first see how to enable the Desktop Cube and the Rotation. The Desktop Effects or Compiz Fusion plugins can be enabled from CompizConfig Settings Manager (ccsm). This can be started from Applications – Applications – CompizConfig Settings Manager or can be started from the terminal as follows:

opensuse11:~ # ccsm

This should launch the CompizConfig Settings Manager

Here, select the checkboxes for “Desktop Cube” and “Rotate Cube”. This enables the Compiz Desktop Cube.

Start Desktop Cube

Lets have a preview, to start the Desktop Cube,

1. Press and hold the keys + on the keyboard.
2. While holding the keys, click, hold and drag the Button1 (left click button on mouse). Drag in any direction to view the cube

You should see the cube in action, each side of the cube is a desktop workspace. How is that for a start????

Almost everything about the cube is customizable, from the image on top of the cube or the background image of the cube (Skydome as in Compiz). To customize the Desktop cube, from the CCSM, click the Desktop cube to open the properties.

In the properties window,

the General tab allows you to change the key mapping

the Appearence tab allows to customize the appearence, change images for cube top and background (SkyDome)

the Behaviour tab allows to change the cube behaviour. For instance, to view the cube from the inside

the Transparent Cube tab allows to change the transparency setting.

Lets have a look at some of the effects of the Desktop Cube

Unfold the Cube

To unfold the cube and show it as a strip of slides with each slide representing one side of a Cube

1. Press and hold +. This should bring up the strip.

2. To move the strip, while holding the above the keys, press the or the to move in that direction. You may press and hold this key (say for a running strip

Inside Cube

By default, the cube is viewed from the outside of the cube. lLets for a change look the desktop cube from the inside.

1. Bring up the properties for Desktop Cube and click Behaviour tab.
2. Select the “Inside Cube” check box.

Now bring up the cube as earlier and see the difference

Desktop Cube in Sphere or Cyclinder

Again, the Desktop Cube is by default viewed in square edges where each side is a desktop workspace. Why not view it as a cyclinder or a Sphere. Possible??? Why not?

1. Enable the “Cube Reflection and Deformation” plugin under Effects in CCSM.
2. Click on it to bring the properties and click the “Deformation” tab
3. Select Cyclinder or Spehere from the Deformation listbox.

Now, bring up the cube and see the different… mind blowing!!!

This effect will also be seen when you unfold the Desktop Cube

3D Windows

All is great so far…Why not a 3D effect onto the cube??

Enable the “3D Windows” plugin under effects.

Bring up the Desktop Cube, you should see the active windows in your cube are shown seperately as a 3D window.

Reflection

Enable the Reflection plugin under effects in CCSM and you should see the reflections on the window when the cube is evoled again. This is the reflection of the image selected. To change the image, click on “Reflection” plugin and choose the image of your choice.

NOTE: On unsupported display/video cards (say Intel 965GM), thus can crash your display.

Hope you had a great preview of your compiz/Desktop Effects. I couldn’t workout a way to capture these while in action than to use my cameras and hence no screenshots of Desktop Cube in action.

How to enable and use Desktop Effects (Compiz) in openSUSE11.0

admin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 12:45:12 +0000

openSUSE 11.0 comes preinstalled with Compiz and Compiz-Fusion 0.7.4 pre-installed. However, you may get and install the latest version of the Compiz-Fusion plugin package from here by simple 1-click installs here

Compiz-Fusion for KDE

Compiz-Fusion for GNOME

This should install the latest Compiz and Compiz-Fusion plugins on your chosen desktop environment.

Enable Compiz/ Desktop Effects

To enable Compiz, referred as Desktop Effects in openSUSE 11.0

From Applications – Configure Desktop – Desktop, tick the box for “Enable Desktop Effects” and click Apply. This should enable Desktop Effects / Compiz on your openSUSE.

Alterntaivelty, you can enable from

Application – Utilities – Desktop – Desktop Effects – select the checkbox for “Enable Desktop Effects” and close.

Here you can also, select a preset profile for your Desktop Effects ranging from minimal to Ultimate.

Once enabled, we are all set to start using desktop effects or Compiz on openSUSE 11.0.

Setup nVideo Video/Display with native nvidia rendering for Compiz

admin — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 11:27:35 +0000

We saw here to setup the nVidia drivers to use AIGLX rendering for Compiz Fusion. However, nVIDIA has its own native nvidia rendering engine which is supported on driver versions 1.0-9625 or later.

In openSUSE 11.0, composite is enabled by default. However, to confirm Compisite is enabled,

opensuse11:~ # grep Composite /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(**) Extension “Composite” is enabled
(II) Composite (RENDER acceleration)

The setting can be found in /etc/X11/xorg.conf file

opensuse11:~ # grep -i composite /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Option “Composite” “on”

Install Drivers

For newer nVidia cards, click here for 1-click installation drivers

For legacy nVidia display cards, click here for 1-click installation of legacy drivers.

The above will start YaST package manager to install the required drivers.

nVIDIA native rendering

For nVIDIA rendering to work correctly with Compiz, you must enable 32-bit ARGB GLX Visuals. These are enabled by default with nvidia driver versions 100.14.09 and later. However, for the earlier versions, run the following command:

opensuse11:~ # nvidia-xconfig –add-argb-glx-visuals -d 24

This adds the following entries into the /etc/X11xorg.conf file

Under Section Device

Section “Device”
Option “AddARGBGLXVisuals” “true”

Under Section Screen

Section “Screen”
DefaultDepth 24

That should do, we are now ready to experience the Compiz-Fusion desktop effects in openSUSE 11.0

Setup ATI Graphics with AIGLX Rendering in openSUSE 11.0 for Compiz

admin — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 21:17:06 +0000

In openSUSE 11.0, AiGLX with Compsite is enabled by default. So, if you prefer to use AIGLX rendering as against the XGL rendering engine then all you need is to install the appropriate drivers for your ATI graphics card.

Install Drivers

For newer ATI cards, click here for 1-click installation for the latest fgrlx drivers

The above will start YaST package manager to install the required drivers.

Now, make configure X to use the newly installed ATI driver.

opensuse11:~ # aticonfig –initial

Restart your X Server by typing + twice in 2 seconds or alternatively, simply logout/login or reboot your computer.

There was an issue identified with ATI Radeon Express cards. Once, installed run the following:

opensuse11:~ # glxinfo

will show that the direct acceleration/fglrx driver is not being used. To workaround the problem switch to Runlevel 3 (Text mode with Network support)

opensuse11:~ # init 3

Once in Run level 3, login as root and run the following:

Rename the xorg.conf file

opensuse11:~ # mv /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf_orig

Re-initiaize and configure X server to use ATI drivers

opensuse11:~ # sax2 -r -m 0=radeon
opensuse11:~ # aticonfig –initial –input=/etc/X11/xorg.conf
opensuse11:~ # sax2 -r -m 0=fglrx

This should help.

AIGLX rendering is faster because of using hardware rendering for OpenGL and Xvideo.

Eedit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and check the following entries are already in the configuration file, if not found then add them as required:

Under Section Device

Section “Device”
Option “XAANoOffscreenPixmaps” “true”

Under Section ServerLayout

The following option enables AIGLX rendering. Enabled by default in openSUSE 11.0.

Section “ServerLayout”
Option “AIGLX” “true”

Under Section Extensions

Section “Extensions”
Option “Composite” “Enable”

Once any of the missing entries are added, restart your X Server by typing + twice in 2 seconds or alternatively, simply logout/login or reboot your computer.

This gets your ATI Graphics card ready for the Compiz-Fusion desktop experience.

Setup nVidia Graphics card with AIGLX rendering for openSUSE 11.0

admin — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 20:36:15 +0000

In openSUSE 11.0, AIGLX with Compsite is enabled by default. So, if you prefer to use AIGLX rendering as against the XGL drivers. All you need is to install the appropriate drivers for your nVidia graphics card.

Install Drivers

For newer nVidia cards, click here for 1-click installation drivers

For legacy nVidia display cards, click here for 1-click installation of legacy drivers.

The above will start YaST package manager to install the required drivers.

AIGLX rendering is faster because of using hardware rendering for OpenGL and Xvideo. However, issues with Frament Environment Variables mean Compiz-Fusion plugins Water, Blur and Reflection may not work correctly.

To confirm, Compisite is enabled,

opensuse11:~ # grep Composite /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(**) Extension “Composite” is enabled
(II) Composite (RENDER acceleration)

The setting can be found in /etc/X11/xorg.conf file

opensuse11:~ # grep -i composite /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Option “Composite” “on”

The above indicates that composite is enabled. Now, edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and check the following entries are already in the configuration file, if not found then add them as required:

Under Secition Module

Section “Module”
Load         “dri”
Load         “glx”
Load         “dbe”

Under Section Device

Section “Device”
Option “XAANoOffscreenPixmaps” “true”

Under Section ServerLayout

The following option enables AIGLX rendering. Enabled by default in openSUSE 11.0.

Section “ServerLayout”
Option “AIGLX” “true”

Under Section Extensions

Section “Extensions”
Option “Composite” “Enable”

Once any of the missing entries are added, restart your X Server by typing + twice in 2 seconds or alternatively, simply logout/login or reboot your computer.

This gets your nVidia Graphics card ready for the Compiz-Fusion desktop experience.

Setup Intel Graphics card with AIGLX Rendering for Compiz-Fusion

admin — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 19:06:52 +0000

In openSUSE 11.0, AIGLX with Compsite is enabled by default for Intel Display Devices.AIGLX rendering is faster because of using hardware rendering for OpenGL and Xvideo. However, issues with Fragment Environment Variables mean Compiz-Fusion plugins Water, Blur and Reflection may not work correctly in which case, you have use XGL Rendering to get the above to work or work properly.

To confirm, Compisite is enabled,

opensuse11:~ # grep Composite /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(**) Extension “Composite” is enabled
(II) Composite (RENDER acceleration)

The setting can be found in /etc/X11/xorg.conf file as follows:

opensuse11:~ # grep -i composite /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Option “Composite” “on”

The above indicates that composite is enabled. Now, edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and check the following entries are already in the configuration file, if not found then add them as required:

Under Secition Module

Section “Module”
Load         “dri”
Load         “glx”
Load         “dbe”

Under Section Device

Section “Device”
Option “XAANoOffscreenPixmaps” “true”
Option “DRI” “true”

If yours is a Intel Mobile Chipset then, it is also better to disable the FrameBufferCompression here.

Option “FramebufferCompression” “false”

Under Section ServerLayout

Section “ServerLayout”
Option “AIGLX” “true”

Under Section DRI

Section “DRI”
Group “video”
Mode 0660

Under Section “Extensions”

Section “Extensions”
Option “Composite” “Enable”

Once the missing entries are added, restart your X Server by typing + twice within 2 seconds or alternatively, simply logout/login or reboot your computer.

This gets your Intel Graphics card ready for the Compiz-Fusion desktop experience.

SUSE & openSUSE » Compiz/Compiz-Fusion

Compiz Fusion in openSUSE 11.0

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