Comment Re:Damn, this feels like Firefox. (Score 1) 209
XComposite is a X server extension, so is GLX, so is XRender.
And all of this stuff would be completely useless if there wasn't client side code (mutter/compiz/kwin for XComposite, mesa for GLX, cairo for XRender) using it. The fact that the X server supports an extension says nothing about the effective usage of that extension: you need a compositor if you want a composited desktop. If you keep using metacity (or kwin) with compositing disabled, XComposite will have no effect, even if supported by the server.
An app doesn't use XComposite: the whole point of that extension is being completely transparent to applications. It works by redirecting all code drawing to windows so that instead it happens on a pixmap (which then someone will use to draw on another window, usually with GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap). In fact, there is no XComposite code anywhere in cairo, GDK or Qt.
And by the way, you are forgetting wayland :D
And all of this stuff would be completely useless if there wasn't client side code (mutter/compiz/kwin for XComposite, mesa for GLX, cairo for XRender) using it. The fact that the X server supports an extension says nothing about the effective usage of that extension: you need a compositor if you want a composited desktop. If you keep using metacity (or kwin) with compositing disabled, XComposite will have no effect, even if supported by the server.
An app doesn't use XComposite: the whole point of that extension is being completely transparent to applications. It works by redirecting all code drawing to windows so that instead it happens on a pixmap (which then someone will use to draw on another window, usually with GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap). In fact, there is no XComposite code anywhere in cairo, GDK or Qt.
And by the way, you are forgetting wayland
