Ask HN: Why are hiding WMs standard, and not tiling?(ie. ubuntu vs. xmonad)

4 points·blintson··5 comments

Why do most modern operating systems' window managers implement a system for hiding windows behind each other instead of tiling them side by side? Was this an explicit design choice that there was a reason for? Did somebody come up with hiding first and that became the standard?

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I have 14 windows open, tiling them would make them too small to use? Windows 1.0 was tiling though and they went the other direction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager

Well, there're workspaces for this.

That said, the desktop metaphor issue mentioned below seems kind of reasonable (though it might just be a matter of preference and acquaintance).

While I use xmonad and love it, I would have a hard time teaching my spouse (or parents, or child, or even most of my co-workers) how the layout and controls work.

"Normal" window managers have a nice "physical" interaction model that is fairly easy to grasp. Click to bring a window to the front; click and drag to move it to the location and size that you want.

The desktop metaphor requires "hiding" WMs -- On a real desktop I can move stuff around, make it overlap, etc. At this point I also think the "hiding" ones are expected, and most people would freak out if they were given one.

Probably because Apple made theirs hiding, Microsoft copied it, and the X Window System copied both.

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