Focus Follows Mouse

From WindowManagerThatActuallyManagesWindows:

Of window managers, the behaviour whereby the window which has focus is determined by the current mouse position; no clicking is required to focus a different window.

I have come to hate this behaviour, simply because it generally comes bundled with most if not all of these (IMHO) misfeatures:

- When the mouse pointer leaves the window, it unfocusses immediately. This implies that there is not necessarily any window with focus. And when you are typing in some control in a window (or just typing in a console window), and you unfocus the window, the control is suspended. It is easy enough with some physical configurations to knock the mouse out of a small window accidentally; and I'm pretty sure that not all of these systems even implement hiding the mouse pointer while you type, such that you feel compelled to move it out of the way...

Sounds like you need to apply another FocusPolicy?, either SloppyFocus or ClickToFocus should work better. I believe Xfree86 v4.3 came with TransparentMousePointer?s -- IstoYlisirkka

- The window is not brought to the front when it is focussed; it may in fact be almost completely hidden. This is already bad enough since it introduces the possibility of "blind typing" - I have been using computers for about 2/3 of my lifetime, and have been able to touch-type for a good chunk of that, and I am still not very comfortable with the idea of not seeing what you're typing. Yet it gets worse: in many cases you cannot simply click within a window to bring it to the front (as you can in any non-FocusFollowsMouse setup I've encountered), but must click on the window's title bar. This is a drastic and completely arbitrary reduction in available area for the task, and means that I often find myself moving windows around just to be able to expose a bit of the title bar of the window I'm particularly concerned with - aargh.

Many WindowManagers have AutoRaise?. Even Windows95 had AutoRaise? if you installed Xmouse (Included in the PowerToys? package).In WindowMaker you have an option called "Do not let applications receive the (first) click used to focus windows" which enables you to click anywhere in the ClientArea? without side effects -- IstoYlisirkka

In short, I like having lots of windows around, and I like having deliberate control over where they are and what's in front. I'd rather that the system not try to read my mind on this one. (For what it's worth, the Windows taskbar - my primary machine runs XP now - is useful, but I would still prefer to go back to the old Mac WindowShade behaviour.) You may suppose that I'm strange for not wanting to keep all my windows maximized, but this is just how I'm comfortable doing things. (I also deliberately keep my 17" monitor running at 800x600, just to be able to get true 72 DPI - and I'm a programmer!) For any task which is not completely immersive (like web browsing), I'd rather have a bit of desktop showing for aesthetic reasons, and have some freedom to rearrange things idly while I'm trying to compose my thoughts.

-- KarlKnechtel . EditHint: the above rant is probably quite incoherent. If you can at all sympathise with me, please help me explain just what it is that's so aggravating.

I like and use this mode often - typically when I'm testing, I'll have several windows up - a command window, a debug trace, a logfile trace, and so on. I'll have the command window hidden all but the bottom line, so I can start and stop the program easily by mousing over and typing, but I don't lose the visibility of the trace or log I'm working with. I do agree that having to click on the title bar is a pain if I want to raise a window, but I've found that a hotkey is more convenient, especially since I can have F9 raise a windoe and Alt-F9 lower it again. --PeteHardie

In Windows, I most often maximize, and use Alt+Tab to switch windows, so the clicking thing is a non-issue for me.

Back in the "X" days, I too would often have partially obscured windows, in which I would add text to the bottom few visible lines.

What really annoys me most about Windows is that the task bar is in the Z-order of the windows: It doesn't show up in the Alt+Tab list, but if you start hitting Alt+F4 to kill windows, the task bar often gains focus before all the other windows are killed. It, of course, offers to shut down Windows on an Alt+F4. Gurrr.... -- JeffGrigg

Some comments:

A friend of me always sais that he wanted FocusFollowsEyes? meaning that he wanted the input directed to the window he looked at. A funny idea, but probably nothing for touch typists.

I seem to remember that FocusFollowsMouse was the default on the AmigaComputer.

-- .gz

CategoryGui