[Bug 29852] Changing external monitors requires X restart

[bugzilla-daemon at freedesktop.org]

https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=29852

--- Comment #14 from tim.holy at gmail.com 2010-08-30 11:35:22 PDT ---
(In reply to comment #13)
> For the record, this is not a driver bug, but part of the general common randr
> behavior.  When you unplug a monitor, randr doesn't turn it off unless you
> explicitly tell it to turn it off since you might have disconnected the the
> monitor temporarily to adjust a cable or maybe the projector came loose, etc.
> and you don't constantly want your desktop resizing or whatever when a cable
> comes loose.

Thanks for the explanation, it helps me understand why this isn't done entirely
automatically. However, because this issue has bitten me and several others I
know, it seems like something more should be done than just me personally
learning the properly cli incantations; for the sake of the larger community
I'd like to see this resolved. So, can we discuss options?

1. Automatic handling: one scenario in which it seems like randr could safely
turn a monitor off is if one disappears AND a new one appears, and there isn't
a free crtc. (What sets the # of crtcs? Is that a hardware thing?) In that case
you are going to have to pick one or the other anyway, because there aren't
enough crtcs to drive all the displays, and so you might as well go with the
one that is connected. So to a naive person like me, automation does not really
seem to be such a hard problem, as long as it's done only with the right
alignment of conditions.

2. If you think instead that the logic should go in the xrandr cli tool, to
whom should I report that? By talking to you, am I already reporting to the
right person? :-)

3. Finally, if it gets built into the xrandr cli tool, will that automatically
cover KDE/Gnome, or do they need to work on their own implementations? I can go
visit their bugzillas and make a report, but that would be silly if the real
work needs to be done elsewhere anyway. Sorry to ask your help here, but I'm
pretty naive about the architecture, and so would probably generate a lot of
useless churn without some good guidance. Thanks for your help.

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