External monitor or projector is the 'primary' display?

Neil Woolford neil at neilwoolford.co.uk
Thu Nov 13 13:29:56 UTC 2008


I've installed Intrepid Ibex on my laptop.  Multiple screens are now handled by
the System=>Preferences=>Screen resolution (gnome-display-properties).  This is
a great improvement and works well apart from a small problem which shows up in
two ways.

Firstly, when an external screen is added (not as a mirrored screen), my Gnome
Panels automatically appear on that external screen (or projector), not the
internal panel of the laptop.  This is inconvenient;  I would expect them to
remain on the laptop screen, which I would consider to be the primary display
rather than move to the external - secondary in my opinion - display.  The quick
work-around is to drag them back to the laptop screen.  This isn't sticky, when
a new session is started the panels are back on the external display...

If I then go on to use OpenOffice Impress I have to set the presentation screen
to Primary (or 'All screens') to have it show on the external monitor;  again,
to my way of thinking, the external monitor is the secondary one.

Am I confused or is my machine misconfigured, or are others experiencing the
same behaviour?  Is there a configuration option that I've missed?  If others
are finding this a bug, where should it be reported?

Neil

Lenovo 3000 N100 with Intel graphics, clean install of Intrepid Ibex plus
OpenOffice 3 from the ppas.





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