Hey,
Does anybody know how, in a dual head configuration, to view different desktops on each of the different screens? Thanks in advance.

Mike.

as long as you're not using xinerama or equivalent then the two will be seperate displays, :0.0 and :0.1 you can usually load a WM e.g. fluxbox --display :0.1 but many window managers will instantly take over both screens, and you're pretty much stuffed in that case i believe.

so xinerama is the key here?

well no, i mean Xinerama explictly takes multiple displays and merges them into one single one. this is naturally bad if you want a different WM on each screen as logically there will noly be one single screen in the first place.

Sorry I missunderstood your first post. What I am looking to do isn't put a diff WM on each display, but have the desktops that are available under KDE for example, be available independantly on each display. So, on display one, I am currently in desktop 1, and on display 2, I'm using desktop 2.

I have mine setup in a similiar way I think, but it doesn't quite work like you want it to.

I heavily modified my xorg.conf to add in another display, and have it load the extra display if it is detected on boot. In this way, I can run both of my 19" LCD screens, have the cursor move seemless thru them, yet run 2 seperate KDE instances at once. Also, it allows me to run different resolutions if I wanted too, while having 3D on both heads.

I cannot click on display 2 while on screen1 and have it switch to screen2. This doesn't seem to be a problem though, it works so good now I wouldn't change it.

Let me know if you need help with the xorg.conf, it's not hard...just alot of editing and checking.

Can you post your config? Thanks for the help!

that's basically what i was suggesting, an unadulterated dual head layout. what do you mean by detecting on boot though? that sounds handy...

I'll post up my config as soon as I get home from work. I use an ATi setup, but it should work for nvidia too.

Thanks

Here is the main part that I added, the whole config is pretty long.

*I guess I was a little misleading on the bootup selection. The way the file is, if another display is detected, it will start the second display at a predetermined resolution once my fglrx driver has been loaded. If the system boots without a secondary display, then it just skips over it and runs the one display without 1.

First under Section "Monitor" you need to add the second or third display:

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor1"
HorizSync 31.5 - 91.1
VertRefresh 60 - 100
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

*You can name it whatever, I just name mine monitor0, monitor1, etc..

If you use an ATi card with the correct drivers, after the

# === ATI device section ===

Section "Device"
Identifier "ATI Graphics Adapter connector 0"
Driver "fglrx"
# ### generic DRI settings ###
# === disable PnP Monitor ===
#Option "NoDDC"
# === disable/enable XAA/DRI ===
Option "no_accel" "no"
Option "no_dri" "no"
# === misc DRI settings ===
Option "mtrr" "off" # disable DRI mtrr mapper, driver has its own code for mtrr
# ### FireGL DDX driver module specific settings ###
# === Screen Management ===
Option "DesktopSetup" "Horizontal"
Option "HSync2" "31.5 - 91.1"
Option "VRefresh2" "60 - 100"
Option "ScreenOverlap" "0"
Option "GammaCorrectionI" "0x06419064"
Option "GammaCorrectionII" "0x06419064"
# === OpenGL specific profiles/settings ===
Option "Capabilities" "0x00000000"
Option "CapabilitiesEx" "0x00000000"
# === Video Overlay for the Xv extension ===
Option "VideoOverlay" "on"
# === OpenGL Overlay ===
# Note: When OpenGL Overlay is enabled, Video Overlay
# will be disabled automatically
Option "OpenGLOverlay" "off"
# === Center Mode (Laptops only) ===
Option "CenterMode" "off"
# === Pseudo Color Visuals (8-bit visuals) ===
Option "PseudoColorVisuals" "off"
# === QBS Management ===
Option "Stereo" "off"
Option "StereoSyncEnable" "1"
# === FSAA Management ===
Option "FSAAEnable" "yes"
Option "FSAAScale" "6"
Option "FSAADisableGamma" "no"
Option "FSAACustomizeMSPos" "no"
Option "FSAAMSPosX0" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY0" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosX1" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY1" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosX2" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY2" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosX3" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY3" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosX4" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY4" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosX5" "0.000000"
Option "FSAAMSPosY5" "0.000000"
# === Misc Options ===
Option "UseFastTLS" "0"
Option "BlockSignalsOnLock" "on"
Option "UseInternalAGPGART" "yes"
Option "ForceGenericCPU" "no"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0" # vendor=1002, device=4e50
Screen 0
EndSection

You'll want to add a section like this

Section "Device"
Identifier "ATI Graphics Adapter connector 1"
Driver "fglrx"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0" # vendor=1002, device=4e50
Screen 1
EndSection

After all that, you'll next want to add the info into the screen sections

# Any number of screen sections may be present. Each describes
# the configuration of a single screen. A single specific screen section
# may be specified from the X server command line with the "-screen"
# option.
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "ATI Graphics Adapter connector 0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
#Option "backingstore"

Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1920x1200" "1280x1024"
ViewPort 0 0 # initial origin if mode is smaller than desktop
# Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubsection
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen1"
Device "ATI Graphics Adapter connector 1"
Monitor "Monitor1"
DefaultDepth 24
#Option "backingstore"

Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024@60"
ViewPort 0 0 # initial origin if mode is smaller than desktop
# Virtual 1280 1024
EndSubSection
EndSection

Now all that's left to do is edit the ServerLayout Section

Screen "Screen0"
Screen "Screen1" RightOf "Screen0"

Now you should be able to use dual monitors at different resolutions, with different instances of KDE on each monitor, while being able to traverse each screen with your mouse

is it possible to run gnome on a display, and xfce on the other ? (where to configure that)
in fact, i'd like to have gnome on my primary, and just X on the secondary ... is it possible ?