FAQ

$Id: FAQ 6 2007-05-23 07:34:01Z eg1981 $

General
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Q: How do I split frames?
A: First make sure, that your clients are maximized (through click on
maximize button or invoking toggle-client-mode action).
Second make sure, that at least two clients are running within the
focussed frame. If so, just use one of the split-frame-* actions.
Btw. the opposite of split-frame-* is join-frame-*.

Q: It seems that the actions don't work? Nothing happens if I try to use
exec action?
A: Simply answer: you've to press RETURN after each action in input
mode.

Q: How can I directly select workspaces?
A: You can use select-workspace action, but you can also define some
shortcuts to select a specific workspace fast through chains. Just
define following lines in your $HOME/.ncwm/actions.conf file:
chain.selws1.seq="select-workspace+workspace 1"
chain.selws1.keys=alt+1
chain.selws2.seq="select-workspace+workspace 2"
chain.selws2.keys=alt+1
This enables alt+1 and alt+2 for direct workspace selection.

Q: How could I determine all installed Xft fonts?
A: Use 'fc-list ""' command.

Q: How could NCWM be minimalist if it has hundreds of actions and
is highly customizable?
A: Compared to other window managers NCWM is minimalist because it
concentrates on basic internal actions which can be extended through
chains or ncwmremote scripts, but wether supports menus and icons  nor
built-in dialogs for various things which may be found in conventional
window managers.
But NCWM is not as minimalist as evilwm, larswm or failsafewm.

Q: Why is NCWM compared with vim?
A: When NCWM was specified, the author was much oriented on the vi-like
approach of usage. First, it is designated to make it possible to control
everything from input mode, similiar to vim. But you can control
everything also via shortcuts, if you've configured any, also similiar
to vim mappings. Second, you've only one input mode where the statusbar
is located, this is similiar to vim. In opposite the emacs approach
is to provide input bars under each buffer. And third, the splitting
concept of NCWM is pretty much oriented on the buffer splitting concept 
of vim.
To sum up: The NCWM input mode is for window manipulation, the vim
command mode is for file manipulation.


Configuration
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Q: The Xft fonts appear large, what can I do?
A: Have a look at 
http://pdx.freedesktop.org/~fontconfig/fontconfig-user.html, this should
help you configure the fonts to a size and style you'd prefer.

Q: Ion is more powerful than NCWM, because NCWM lacks of Lua support.
A: Really? Who bars you from using Lua in conjunction with ncwmremote?

Q: Why is Lua not used as Ion does?
A: I'm not against Lua in general, it's a simple Turing-complete
procedural language as many others. You may like it or not.
I think that the Lua integration in NCWM would be adverse.
First, it's double-complexity, because the time you invest in learning
Lua could be invested to enhance your knowledge of C++ to implement
native window manager improvements. Second, it's a bottleneck, because
you're going to control fast native C++ code with interpreted Lua logic.
Third, Lua would be an additional build- and runtime dependency, but NCWM
is designed to be a minimalist window manager.
If you really need Lua 'integration' anyway, just use it in
conjunction with ncwmremote.

Q: How do I undefine the default key bindings?
A: Insert some dummy action to your actions.conf and bind the keys you
want to make avaliable for applications to it (eg. alt+q since some
browsers use that one to quit):
extern.dummy.cmd=""
extern.dummy.cmd=alt+q


Development
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Q: Why X resource management isn't used for configuration files?
A: Several reasons:
   - the self-made settings behavior is more simple
   - iteration over user defined keys is no problem/very simple
   - configuration is homogetic
   - the self-made settings behavior performs better