Left dock is blazing fast, but bottom dock is crawling slow.

[Matthew Pirocchi]

I just downloaded and installed the latest bzr version of Docky. On my laptop, a dock on the left side of the screen runs very fast, but the default bottom dock is very slow. I gave both docks the same set of launchers (terminal, firefox, calculator, chrome, banshee). I even gave the left dock all the plugins except bookmarks, to try to slow it down, but it was still fast.

I've attached two files:
left.txt is the output of "mono --profile /usr/local/lib/docky/Docky.exe", with me running my mouse over the left dock for a little while.
bottom.txt is the same thing, but running the mouse over the bottom dock.

If it helps you to know, Docky 1 (in Gnome Do 0.8.2) is slow, just like the bottom dock in Docky 2.

Ubuntu 9.10
xorg 1:7.4+3ubuntu7
Intel Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller
Docky r480 from bzr
Mono 2.4.2.3

[Jason Smith (jassmith)]

Mathew, can you provide more complete information about your screen setup. Window manager, resolution, dpi, things like that.

[Jason Smith (jassmith)]

Ok this is forward progress again. Can you test the other dock positions too please?

[Jason Smith (jassmith)]

I have pushed up revision 481 for you to do some testing with.

Please run docky as "docky --disable-polling". This *will* cause docky to display somewhat glitchy behaviour with hide/unhide/hover events. However I am more interested to see how it effects performance on the bottom dock.

[Jason Smith (jassmith)]

Ok further updates, I got my hands on the girlfriends hardware to do testing with. It seems that if you launch docky (latest) as "docky --max-size 1008" it will run smoothly. If you launch it as "docky --max-size 1009" it will run slow as hell. This HAS to be a driver issue, and I have zero idea how we can fix it. Docky will get cut off at the edges if you let its max size be less than your screen resolution, fair warning.

We need to interview us some intel driver developers

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

Window Manager: compiz 1:0.8.4-0ubuntu2
Resolution: 1024x768 (my monitor's max resolution)
DPI: 86x86 dots per inch, according to "xdpyinfo | grep -b1 dot"
Refresh rate: 60 Hz
Color Depth: I think it's 32 bit (that's what it was in Windows), but I'm googling around to try to find out how to check (I have no xorg.conf, which is what most google results say to look at).

"docky --disable-polling" doesn't seem to have any effect on performance.
"docky --max-size 1008" gives me a fast dock
"docky --max-size 1009" gives me a slow dock

A dock on the right behaves the same as a dock on the left (fast regardless of the max size).
A dock on the top behaves the same as a dock on the bottom (slow with no max-size/max-size 1009, fast with max-size 1008).

I used r485 to test these things.

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

Yep, docky's depth is 32 bits, according to xwininfo.

[Jason Smith (jassmith)]

please test "docky --netbook-hack-mode"

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

This works perfectly. Thanks for the quick work! It's not just for netbooks, though, my laptop is a 4:3 1024x768, still a fairly common resolution among older computers/monitors. Maybe change the name to something that reflects this?

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

Note to anyone reading this: "docky --netbook-hack-mode" is now "docky --netbook".

[Chris S. (cszikszoy)]

or -n

On Fri, Nov 13, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Matthew Pirocchi
<email address hidden> wrote:
> Note to anyone reading this: "docky --netbook-hack-mode" is now "docky
> --netbook".
>
> --
> Left dock is blazing fast, but bottom dock is crawling slow.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/480267
> You received this bug notification because you are a member of Docky
> Core, which is the registrant for Docky.
>
> Status in Docky: Fix Committed
>
> Bug description:
> I just downloaded and installed the latest bzr version of Docky. On my laptop, a dock on the left side of the screen runs very fast, but the default bottom dock is very slow.  I gave both docks the same set of launchers (terminal, firefox, calculator, chrome, banshee). I even gave the left dock all the plugins except bookmarks, to try to slow it down, but it was still fast.
>
> I've attached two files:
> left.txt is the output of "mono --profile /usr/local/lib/docky/Docky.exe", with me running my mouse over the left dock for a little while.
> bottom.txt is the same thing, but running the mouse over the bottom dock.
>
> If it helps you to know, Docky 1 (in Gnome Do 0.8.2) is slow, just like the bottom dock in Docky 2.
>
> Ubuntu 9.10
> xorg 1:7.4+3ubuntu7
> Intel Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller
> Docky r480 from bzr
> Mono 2.4.2.3
>

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

Did a bug report ever get filed for the intel driver? I can send one, but you probably have a better grasp of the problem to explain it to them.

[José Gálvez (jgalvez21)]

yeah i am experiencing same problem

on T5300 core 2 duo 1.73ghz 2mb l2.
1gb DDR2 667mhz
120gb 5400rpm
intel GMA 945.
on a compaq 7500 1024x768 85hz monitor
doing
max-size 1008 or netbook works fast.

default setting it's slow

[Matthew Pirocchi (matthew-pirocchi)]

I'm getting this behavior again in various animations (I assume because they set their width between 1009-1024).

Examples:
- Clicking on the weather plugin to activate it
- Clicking on the dock after the weather plugin has been activated, to deactivate it
- Dragging docks around in Preferences mode

There are probably other situations, too. I'll add them if I notice any.

[semon (simon-renard)]

To the devs : will this new option be activated by default or should we wait for a fix of the intel driver ?

[nh2 (nh2)]

This seems to be fixed in xf86-video-intel-2.11 while it is not fixed in 2.10.