Multi-pointer X (MPX) is a part of

X input extension X, or x, is the twenty-fourth and third-to-last letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''"ex"'' (pronounced ), ...

and previously a modification to the existing X.Org implementation of the

X Window System The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X provides the basic framework for a GUI environment: drawing and moving windows on the display device and interacting wi ...

. MPX provides multiple independent pointers at the

windowing system In computing, a windowing system (or window system) is software that manages separately different parts of display screens. It is a type of graphical user interface (GUI) which implements the WIMP (windows, icons, menus, pointer) paradigm fo ...

level. These pointers are all connected to one computer. Unlike many other multi-pointer

applications Application may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Application software, computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks ** Application layer, an abstraction layer that specifies protocols and interface methods used in a c ...

and toolkits, MPX allows many existing X11 applications to run unmodified, whilst still providing additional input features. For instance, multiple users can simultaneously operate different applications at the same time. Some applications do not work as expected due to limitations in the toolkits they use . The limitations are caused by the assumption that only one pointer exists.

Window manager

Combined with the proof of concept window manager MPWM, MPX provides extended features such as simultaneous movement or resizing of application windows, per pointer annotation over top of an application and restricted input support ( floor control). Applications that are aware of the extra pointers are also able to make use of them, such as two handed drawing.

History

MPX was created by Peter Hutterer in 2005–2008, as part of his PhD in the Wearable Computer Lab under the supervision of Prof. Bruce H. Thomas at the

University of South Australia The University of South Australia (UniSA) is a public research university in the Australian state of South Australia. It is a founding member of the Australian Technology Network of universities, and is the largest university in South Australi ...

. MPX was merged into the current development version of X.Org on 26 May 2008. Xinput2 (XI2), which is the second official stable API release of the

, contains MPX and was merged into the current development version of X.Org on 3 June 2009, and released as part of the XServer 1.7 on 2 October 2009.

References

* Hutterer P. and Thomas B. H., "Groupware Support in the Windowing System" In ''8th Australasian User Interface Conference (AUIC2007)'', Ballarat, Vic, Australia, 30 Jan – 2 Feb 2007. W. Piekarski and B. Plimmer, Eds.

Window manager

History

See also

References

External links