Can Xfce plugins work outside of the xfce panel -- or a better way to compiz?

[Henk Boom]

On 26/03/2008, Roberto Dohnert <rjdohnert at gmail.com> wrote:
> Why is it desirable?  What technical functionality do you get out of it
> besides that it looks cool.  Nothing at all.   I have never run across
> anyone that has told me that Compiz makes them more productive.

Compiz makes me more productive.

There is a lot of junk in Compiz, and the features people show off
tend to be the eye-candy ones, but it does also have features that
increase productivity and usability.

The Scale plugin completely obsoletes the taskbar. I see all of the
windows at once, rather than me having to read all the titles on the
taskbar, letting me switch between windows much faster.

The Desktop Wall/Expo plugins give you proper workspaces (much nicer
than the cube, which is pretty useless). You can zoom out to see all
your workspaces at once. I find it much easier to keep track of many
workspaces (6 or 9 usually) when I can see visually how they are laid
out and can "feel" (through the sliding effect) how they correspond
spatially to each other.

The Negative plugin is useful when a program doesn't let you specify a
light-on-dark theme.

In my experience it uses more memory, but is _faster_, than using a
regular WM. I agree, though, that Compiz is fairly buggy, and is not
always supported well. I had to stop using because I was developing
OpenGL programs, and Compiz does not interoperate well with OpenGL
applications on my integrated graphics card (For other OpenGL
applications I get redirected drawing _or_ hardware acceleration, but
not both).

Sorry for branching a little off-topic, but it aggravates me when
people say that compiz has no practical advantage.

    Henk