Conference bulova::decw_jan-89_to_nov-90

310.0. "What's happening with Input focus & the Window Manager?" by CASEE::CLARK (Ward Clark) Mon Feb 27 1989 12:15

    Back in the days when input focus had to be manually assigned to windows
    and lots of keystrokes went into the bit bucket, our cluster was one of
    the internal test sites for the "Window Manager with Improved Focus".

    Although this new Window Manager was a big improvement, there were a
    number of bugs.  For example, window focus is lost after dismissing
    some dialog boxes (e.g., Calendar timeslot).

    As far as I can tell, the SDC VMS V5.1 DECwindows Window Manager has
    most/all of the bugs that I reported last summer.

    To complicate issues, some of the DECwindows applications are not
    handling input focus correctly (e.g., grabbing focus away from another
    application).

    As I become more facile with moving among multiple applications, I'm
    encountering more and more problems with input focus winding up in the
    wrong window, sometimes even a totally occluded window.  This is
    resulting in increasing errors and frustration, enough that I'm ready
    to move into QAR mode.

    Before I do that, it would be helpful to have more information about
    Window Manager input focus bugs, features, future plans, ...  It's often
    difficult to point the QAR finger in the right direction given the
    not-so-obvious interaction between the Window Manager and the
    applications.

    Can someone summarize the Window Manager's input focus situation?

    -- Ward