Compiz - does it have a purpose?

[Zill]

Never having had a PC with a spec good enough to run clever stuff like Compiz, I am wondering what the point of this app is.

I know you can show your desktops on a cube and then rotate it, along with other tricks such as transparency, but how does this actually improve productivity? I find the standard multiple desktops invaluable but cannot see any advantage with the cube system.

Are there any real advantages with Compiz, or is it just more eye-candy bloatware to slow the PC down - something we despise about Windows!

[kenono]

Some of the things are useful, although, personally I don't use many of them at all.

If you use multiple desktops, then you could find the cube effect useful as well as pretty cool.

The scale feature is like the macs, and I use this quite a bit.

I don't hate windows for it's bloating eye candy, I don't even hate windows at all but compiz shows that Linux isn't ugly as some people presume and that it can be made to look better than OSX with the right settings.

[koleoptero]

Never having had a PC with a spec good enough to run clever stuff like Compiz, I am wondering what the point of this app is.

I know you can show your desktops on a cube and then rotate it, along with other tricks such as transparency, but how does this actually improve productivity? I find the standard multiple desktops invaluable but cannot see any advantage with the cube system.

Are there any real advantages with Compiz, or is it just more eye-candy bloatware to slow the PC down - the very thing we despise about Windows!

I don't know if that's the thing you despise about windows, but not for me.

Compiz makes the desktop have a more solid feel. I don't use the cube, I use the desktop plane plugin. But it has many good things.

One I like is the plugin that turns a window or all the desktop negative. Helps a lot when reading a long pdf that is black on white, turns it to white on black which for me is much easier to the eyes. Plus the shadows under menus and windows are a very nice addition.

EDIT: and the desktop zoom is an extremely useful tool. You can zoom in on anything.

[Mazza558]

Compiz makes the desktop have a more solid feel. I don't use the cube, I use the desktop plane plugin. But it has many good things.
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Exactly. Whereas individual windows feel like you're using a machine, when you begin to use something with swooping/fading windows and a 3d cube, the PC seems a lot more realistic and fluid. I'm going to guess that perhaps one subconscious reason why Macs are popular with the arty types is due to the way you can really visualize your desktop, something that is much preferred for right-brained people (like me! ). It is also obviously to do with Macs having great creative programs, but I think the visualization is an important factor. Let's also not deny that Compiz makes computing brilliantly fun.

One other benefit of Compiz is that it is a 3D compositing layer for X. This opens the door to a massive variety of plugins and similar things, and I think we have only really scraped the surface of what a 3D interface can do. Look at Looking Glass - this is a prime example.

[NightwishFan]

Compiz is not really bloated when compared to AERO. I do not really like the cube, but the water effect is great. The expo plugin allows you to drag windows between workspaces with all of them in view. Also my sight is strangely bad when reading LCD screens so zoom plugin helps alot while reading something long so I do not lose my place. I also use zoom to make Youtube videos bigger.

[keykero]

True transparency in terminal windows is nice when you have to read commands and instructions off of another document underneath. Other than that I leave most of the effects off, and I have a system far, far more powerful than necessary to run Compiz well.

[SZF2001]

I dunno, Compiz is awesome and stuff but it just might be for the more relaxed person looking for an escape from a boring desktop. And don't get me wrong, I think all desktops are boring - even OSX... Once you get past the bouncing and the glossy icons, it's just another desktop. But with Compiz you can screw around even more than OSX or Aero.

And I do like it to show my friends when they are all "DUDE AERO IS TEH FUTURE". I can show them I've been to the future, apparently, and the future was here years before Aero. But that's just them.

[Zill]

Thanks for all the quick responses - all very informative but I am still having great difficulty seeing the advantages highlighted

It seems that one popular effect is to present several open apps on one virtual desktop and then move around it - surely this is regressing back to the bad old MS days of a single desktop?

I think I would find transparency more confusing than helpful

So, I am still waiting for the "killer" Compiz feature that will improve my productivity if I invest in a suitable PC. Please keep the ideas coming

[John T. Monkey]

I am not using it as the slight reduction in performance did my head in, but I would argue that if we were trying to spread the adoption of Ubuntu/Linux in general then both the eye candy and the more useful features are very important.

[chrisccoulson]

The Enhanced Zoom plugin is good - allowing me to use the scroll wheel to zoom in on the entire desktop (or press a key combination to zoom-fit the current window), and then pan around.

I like the fact that I can group and tab windows also.

With Compiz enabled, moving windows around the desktop just appears much more fluid and feels faster (with or without the wobbly windows).

I find the window previews with alt-tab useful as well. The Shift switcher and Ring switcher also provide useful alternatives to alt-tab.

The various effects you get when minimising, restoring, opening and closing windows just makes the whole desktop look more professional and the desktop experience more positive.

I like the fact that my graphics hardware isn't going to waste when I am not playing games.

So while some of Compiz is just eye-candy, I find a lot of it useful and I enjoy using my computer much more because of it. If I switch back to Metacity, it just feels like I've taken a step back in to the dark ages. I have to use Windows XP at work, and I find that I miss some Compiz features. I find XP much less productive when there are lots of windows open.