How can a client identify the window manager version?

[Markus Kuhn]

James Cloos wrote on 2005-11-02 19:17 UTC:
> > Is there a standardized way, by which an X11 client application can
> > identify the product name and version of the window manager with with it
> > interacts?
> | :; xprop -root|egrep ^_NET_SUPPORTING_WM_CHECK
> | _NET_SUPPORTING_WM_CHECK(WINDOW): window id # 0x80003b
> | :; xprop -id 0x80003b
> | _NET_WM_NAME(STRING) = "IceWM 1.2.23 (Linux 2.6.14-lug2-g9f75e1ef/i686)"

Thanks, that's exactly what I was hoping for. Although, including a
version number is not yet universal practice:

$ xprop -id `xprop -root _NET_SUPPORTING_WM_CHECK | sed -e 's/.*# //'` WM_NAME
WM_NAME(STRING) = "FVWM"

Jim Gettys wrote on 2005-11-02 13:55 UTC:
> The danger Carsten points out is very real: we'd end up with code that
> says "if this window manager, then do the following"

So do you think the ability to query the X protocol and server version
in the X protocol was a mistake, too?

Shall support staff waste a lot of time asking people about their
configuration, just because the authors of automatic bug-reporting tools
have been prevented from automatically querying and reporting the used
configuration?

And what happened to the old X-protocol doctrine of remaining policy free?

The argument that a feature is bad because we could image an unwise
usage is IMHO a *far* more slippery slope. It sounds adventerous to me
to even contemplate that we could prevent naive use of an API by
restricting the functionality of that API. Developer naivity is not that
easily controlled ...

Markus

-- 
Markus Kuhn, Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ || CB3 0FD, Great Britain