This morning I’ve been watching videos of the Mandriva Metisse Linux that, in my opinion, puts some amazing 3D features features at your fingertips. All of this XGL and 3D stuff is often shrugged off as merely being eye candy, but there are four video demonstrations that really show the usability that these features can really offer.
–Copy and Paste Done Right–
There is probably nothing simpler to do on your computer than copy and paste, right? Mandriva Metisse makes it a little easier to do that operation by using a “folding” desktop when copying and pasting between multiple windows.
–Side-by-Side Windows–
Putting two large windows side-by-side is not such a chore with Mandriva Metisse. It is able to place windows on an angle so that you can see both of them next to each other, and you are still able to interact with both of them.
–Multiple Desktop View–
I think this is probably the best virtual desktop manager that I have seen. You can tile your desktops and actually interact with the windows by dragging and dropping them around.
–Mirror Windows–
I think this is one of the less useful features out of the ones listed above, but it is one of those things that you can show off to your friends. Basically, you can mirror any window so that any action you perform on one window will actually show up on both.
–Overview–
I always thought that openSUSE Linux was always the furthest advanced version of Linux since they often implement the latest technology. However, Mandriva seems to be taking that crown away and I have really considered switching to it as my primary version of Linux that I use. I like the look and feel of their operating system, and it is obvious that they are exploring new ways to make it the best it can be.
Thanks for the tip Chris!
What’s all this eye candy going to cost me? What are the system requirements for this?
It uses OpenGL so it doesn’t require much, they say that it can run on a PII 450MHz machine even though it might run a little slow.
That looks very cool.
“This is not a 3D desktop.”… What the difference? It acts, looks and feels like 3D desktop, so it IS a 3D desktop for me.
BTW, all those XGL/Compiz, “Project Looking Glass”, and other 3D desktops — is it practical on daily use?
Or is it just a toys? (for example, Mandriva’s Mirror window feature really is a toy).
Looks interesting anyway.
You should edit the title, because “this is not 3D” as they say. The only use 2D transformations effects.
But looks cool and practical indeed.
Well, I think they were kinda saying that this is not your typical 3D desktop that we’ve seen. It does indeed have 3D effects when it angles the two windows so that that are side-by-side.