[Gaim-devel] focus-stealing & meesage notification

[Wesley M. <mo...@ch...>]

Ok I've been waiting for the "beta" so I could properly complain without 
being flamed...

Using gtk2.8 and gaim2, since the new "conversation" commits (I believe 
that is what they are called) a month or two ago, there is a ton of focus 
stealing going on. Previously, a new chat window or one with activity (via 
the notification plugin) would simply raise itself without stealing focus 
(at least, that's how I recall it!). I have always kept kwin's "focus 
stealing prevention" setting for GAIM at "none" to allow the window to be 
raised, but it never actually stole focus before. Now it does. This seems 
to be both gtk and gaim related. I honestly can't see why anyone would 
ever want the actual keyboard focus stolen to a new window...

This is the behavior I see:

gaim1.5, gtk2.8, no focus stealing prevention --
new window -- raises window, steals focus. This *might* be acceptable in 
some circumstances, but ideally would be a toggle (focus new 
conversation windows)
activity in window -- raises window, does NOT steal focus. The "raise 
window" prefs are set, of course.

gaim1.5, gtk2.8, focus stealing prevent > none --
new window -- raises window, does not steal focus. This is what I would 
prefer.
activity in window -- does not raise window, simply flashes status bar.

gaim2.0, gtk2.8, focus stealing prevent none
new window - raises, steals focus. same as 1.5
activity in window - raises, steals focus. ugh. (this is the problem!)

gaim2.0, gtk2.8, focus stealing prevent > none
new window - raises window, does not steal focus
activity in window - does not raise window, flashes status bar

Now, all of this is what happens when gaim is not the focused app. When it 
IS the focused app, I get a whole new set of focus-stealing behavior. At 
any level below kwin's "extreme", one conversation window (new or 
existing) will raise itself and steal the focus from whatever you are 
currently typing in. This is unacceptable and should NEVER occurr IMO. I 
think there is a huge difference between "raising" a window and "focusing" 
a window. Gaim 1.5 doesn't do this...

I realize some of this is the notification plugin and some is gaim itself, 
but why is there not ONE single place to set your preferences for received 
messages rather than at least two. I would almost like to see a matrix of 
check boxes that lets you select from features like "flash status bar", 
"raise window", "focus window" and whatever else you might want, e.g. --

                  raise | focus | flash
                  windw | windw | status
new window         x   |   x   |   x
existing window    x   |       |   x
buddy goes away        |       |   x
buddy signs off        |       |   x
says your name         |       |   x

And whatever other features you might want to have.

FWIW there does seem to be a difference between gtk26 and gtk28 in 
respects to this behavior, so it is not all gaim's fault.


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