Dynamically switch ServerLayout - is it possible ?

[Waldo Bastian]

On Tuesday 25 October 2005 09:47, Alan Hourihane wrote:
> On Tue, 2005-10-25 at 18:31 +0200, Joe Ammann wrote:
> > Hm, I'm not so sure. In my case, the internal laptop LCD would have to be
> > turned off also, because it can not display the full size mode of the
> > external display. So even if the new monitor would be detected correctly
> > on the fly, the driver would have to reconfigure its pipes.
> >
> > I'm not sure if RandR is enough to manage it (assuming the display could
> > be detected)
>
> There still needs to be policy decisions, but the resolution change is
> all manageable by RandR. That's my point.
>
> For example,
>
> In a single LCD situation running at 1024x768. You then plug the laptop
> into an external CRT which can do 1600x1200. The driver shouldn't change
> anything at this point, apart from maybe cloning the display to the CRT
> (but this is policy again). Now, new modes would be exported by RandR
> that could manage 1600x1200. So, if you requested a resolution change
> via RandR and it was 1280x1024 or 1600x1200 the driver would
> automatically turn off the LCD or revert to panning the display.

I think the policy decision should be made by the user in this case through 
some sort of GUI. Such a GUI should be able to express to the user that he 
can get either 1280x1024 on LCD + external CRT, or 1600x1200 on external CRT 
only. For a GUI to do so RandR should include the active output ports along 
with the resolution.

Cheers,
Waldo
-- 
Linux Client Architect - Channel Software Operation - Intel Corporation