Gnome bars don't disappear when they are supposed to

[El Potro]

Hello folks,

I'm using Ubuntu 10.04 (LTS) and planning to use it until the next LTS is released, so I'd like to have this feature at least. Whenever I watch a .pps file (a PowerPoint presentation) on OpenOffice, there is this problem. The upper and lower Gnome bars don't disappear, so I can't see the presentation properly.

I'm sure this is a Gnome problem, because it also happens when I want to use another program (for example some apps with wine, I'm posting an example with Zdoom).

I'd appreciate any help or tips to solve this.

Thank you very much in advance. ;)

PS: I'm adding two caps to illustrate the matter.

[El Potro]

Hey people, nobody said a word here, and I still face this inconvenient.

Perhaps it has to do with Compiz?

[coffeecat]

The gnome panels are not supposed to disappear if they are not set to autohide - except when you set a video player to fullscreen.

You could try this though. Right-click on the upper panel. Select "properties" and tick the "Autohide" box. Do the same for the lower panel. When you maximise Open Office now it should fill the whole screen, but the upper and lower panels will slide back if you move the mouse cursor near to the upper or lower edge of the screen.

[El Potro]

That's an interesting trick coffeecat, thanks. It works but it is too inconvenient to set the panels to auto-hide each time I want to see a .pps, or use a full screen wine app., or play zdoom, or use MythTV, just for stating some programs affected.

The interesting thing, is that not all the programs present this problem. I use tvtime a lot, and it works perfectly, mplayer, XBMC, Firefox (if I press F11), DOSBox, just for saying some of the ones I can remember now.

Anyway still think that this shouldn't happen (it didn't happen with my previous computer, which had a different video card. But it's true I was using a different (previous LTS) Ubuntu version.

Both things can be creating the problem, the new video card drivers, which are faulty but work OK, Intel Graphics Media Accelerator(GMA 3100), or some change in Ubuntu or gnome panel that would make this kind of error with every possible video card. May be a combination of both. But I'm too ignorant to go deeper on this.

I hope someone can advise further.

Thank you very much in advance.