3D X

[Deron Johnson]

Russell Shaw wrote On 03/31/06 21:28,:
> Hi,
> To get everything to tilt at an angle, you just add an X protocol to
> set a server transform to give whatever zoom or rotation to be applied
> to everything on the X screen. Also, XCreateWindow would take a "z"
> dimension for its distance "above" its parent. The total work to do that
> in the X server would be pretty straight forward.

One could add 3D effects to the X protocol piece meal, but it is much
more effective to have composite managers use OpenGL. This opens up a
wide variety of interesting visual effects, both 3D and 2D.

With the composite extension and OpenGL it is relatively straightforward
to implement a system which will let you slant windows. But if you want
to interact with the window while it is slanted, that is where the true
complexity comes in. Fortunately, we have a plan for an X standard
method of dealing with this. The Coordinate Transform Redirection
extension will place the X server's event transforms under the control
of the composite manager, who will be able to convert between X's
2D coordinate space and the 3D desktop coordinate space.