Dual Monitor Dual Workspace

[creporiton]

Hi all.
I have a Dell 14.1 inch widescreen laptop with nvidia graphics card and a 15 inch tft monitor.
What I want is to set it up as dual monitor display such that I have two workspaces with one workspace on each display. Can anyone point me out to the right tutorial to get this set up.

I am sorry if this has been already discussed but I am a newbie to ubuntu and these forums.

Thanks

[sillyxone]

perhaps this is what you're looking for:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=826717

Basically, from that thread, I'd edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf, and modify the "Screen" section (add red text):

Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Default Screen"
        Monitor         "lcddisp"
        Device          "Configured Video Device"
        DefaultDepth    24

        SubSection "Display"
                Virtual 3120 1050
        EndSubSection

EndSection

3120 is the sum of both monitor's resolution width (1680 + 1280), 1050 is the max of the resolution's height (1050 > 800).

Restart X (Ctrl-Alt-Backspace), then go to System > Preferences > Screen Resolutions. From there, you can turn on/off one of your monitor, or turn on both cloned, or turn on both side by side (as in dragging windows from one to another).

The only downside to me is that my Intel 965 has a 3D buffer size of 2048x2048 so 3D Compiz looks weird if I have two monitors in side-by-side mode (3120px is way too big to fit on 2048px buffer).

Read that post for more detail.

[creporiton]

Thanks for the reply but it isnt exactly what I am looking for. I have managed to set up a dual monitor display with nvidia-config.
My problem is that I do not want the two monitors to be an extension of each other but two different workspaces. That is to say that if the number of workspaces I choose in gnome be 2, I want one workspace on each display with its own set of desktop icons and panels.

[lesbianpenguin]

any luck?... i was looking for this solution too

[airtonix]

on my nvidia 8800gt, nvidia-settings lets me choose an option called twinview. does exactly what you want.

[creporiton]

hi airtonix.
I have an 8400 gs card.
nvidia-settings offers twinview but I can only stretch the same workspace across the two screens, not different workspace on each of the screens which is what I want.

Still looking for an answer

[creporiton]

hello guys.
still looking for a solution

[ad_267]

Exactly why do you want this?

I can't see what the difference is between this and twinview. I use twinview and I have added a second panel to the bottom of the other screen and added a window list to that. You can also add a menu and have the panels set up exactly the same if you want.

How is that different to having another workspace?

[doas777]

ok, there are 2 ways to do dual monitors, one uses Twinview, and the other uses sepperate X screens, which sounds like exactly what you want. be warned however, you cannot drag apps from one screen to the other.

you can configure these with nvidia-settings, though be sure to run with sudo. there are lots of tutorials available, so I would google it which ever way you want to go.
I have a copy of an nvidia xorg set up for seperate x screens posted here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=851626

check it out, but please don't just copy it in blindly and expect it to work. for instance this one is geared toward a TV out.

hope that helps, and good luck.
franklin

[richbl]

Hello all,

Has a solution to this question been found?

I see some discussion around the original posters question, but no specific solution (or, if it's there, I don't see it).

To restate the question:

--I have two monitors (one laptop LCD and one external LCD)
--I want to assign one workspace to the laptop LCD, and one workspace to the external LCD

Is this possible?

This is not the same as twinview, xinerama, et. al., which "glue" together two displays into one very large display.

Rather, I want to keep the monitors separate, and switch to them via X workspaces.

Thanks much.

rich