Slow focus switching in Compiz - affects Unity Dash UX

[sabby7890]

Switching between focused and non-focused window works very slow. It ends up with Unity being slower than it should be.

To reproduce:

1. Minimize or close EVERY window and open Dash - opens up instantly, animation is smooth.
2. Open a single window, move it "under" Dash and try to open Dash - animation is a lot slower and it's very choppy. User might think, that it's because window is drawn under the dash and it just eats up resources.
3. Unfocus the window - by clicking on the empty space of the desktop. Notice that with the window open, animation is still smooth!
4. Open as many windows as you want and unfocus them - by clicking on the desktop. Animation is still smooth - so it doesn't matter how many windows are open, it's just changing focus.

This happens because of Unity grabbing active focus from the window. Switching focus works very slow, and because of that dash opens slowly. This affects for example switching to fullscreen in VLC or Totem.

This is not related to my older graphic card - I can run Crysis 2 smoothly, but changing focus works bad. Tried drivers from nvidia-current to nvidia-331 - works the same on every driver.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: compiz 1:0.9.11+14.04.20140328-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-20.42-generic 3.13.7
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-20-generic i686
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
.proc.driver.nvidia.gpus.0: Error: [Errno 21] Jest katalogiem: '/proc/driver/nvidia/gpus/0'
.proc.driver.nvidia.registry: Binary: ""
.proc.driver.nvidia.version:
 NVRM version: NVIDIA UNIX x86 Kernel Module 331.38 Wed Jan 8 18:44:57 PST 2014
 GCC version: gcc version 4.8.2 (Ubuntu 4.8.2-17ubuntu1)
.tmp.unity.support.test.0:

ApportVersion: 2.14-0ubuntu1
Architecture: i386
CompizPlugins: No value set for `/apps/compiz-1/general/screen0/options/active_plugins'
CompositorRunning: compiz
CompositorUnredirectDriverBlacklist: '(nouveau|Intel).*Mesa 8.0'
CompositorUnredirectFSW: true
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Tue Apr 1 19:00:22 2014
DistUpgraded: Fresh install
DistroCodename: trusty
DistroVariant: ubuntu
DkmsStatus:
 bbswitch, 0.7, 3.13.0-19-generic, i686: installed
 bbswitch, 0.7, 3.13.0-20-generic, i686: installed
 nvidia-331, 331.38, 3.13.0-19-generic, i686: installed
 nvidia-331, 331.38, 3.13.0-20-generic, i686: installed
GraphicsCard:
 NVIDIA Corporation G92 [GeForce 9800 GT] [10de:0614] (rev a2) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
   Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Device [1043:8314]
InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-03-14 (18 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Alpha i386 (20140313)
MachineType: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. Q35M-S2
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.13.0-20-generic root=UUID=713977ac-a79b-4f72-9834-253bbc96a3db ro quiet splash
SourcePackage: compiz
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 04/20/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: Award Software International, Inc.
dmi.bios.version: F7
dmi.board.name: Q35M-S2
dmi.board.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.board.version: x.x
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAwardSoftwareInternational,Inc.:bvrF7:bd04/20/2009:svnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:pnQ35M-S2:pvr:rvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:rnQ35M-S2:rvrx.x:cvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:ct3:cvr:
dmi.product.name: Q35M-S2
dmi.sys.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
version.compiz: compiz 1:0.9.11+14.04.20140328-0ubuntu1
version.libdrm2: libdrm2 2.4.52-1
version.libgl1-mesa-dri: libgl1-mesa-dri 10.1.0-1ubuntu1
version.libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental: libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental N/A
version.libgl1-mesa-glx: libgl1-mesa-glx 10.1.0-1ubuntu1
version.nvidia-graphics-drivers: nvidia-graphics-drivers N/A
version.xserver-xorg-core: xserver-xorg-core 2:1.15.0-1ubuntu7
version.xserver-xorg-input-evdev: xserver-xorg-input-evdev 1:2.8.2-1ubuntu2
version.xserver-xorg-video-ati: xserver-xorg-video-ati 1:7.3.0-1ubuntu3
version.xserver-xorg-video-intel: xserver-xorg-video-intel 2:2.99.910-0ubuntu1
version.xserver-xorg-video-nouveau: xserver-xorg-video-nouveau 1:1.0.10-1ubuntu2
xserver.bootTime: Tue Apr 1 18:32:30 2014
xserver.configfile: default
xserver.devices:
 input Power Button KEYBOARD, id 6
 input Power Button KEYBOARD, id 7
 input USB OPTICAL MOUSE MOUSE, id 8
 input Dell Dell USB Keyboard KEYBOARD, id 9
 input UVC Camera (046d:0825) KEYBOARD, id 10
xserver.errors: open /dev/fb0: No such file or directory
xserver.logfile: /var/log/Xorg.0.log
xserver.outputs:

xserver.version: 2:1.15.0-1ubuntu7

[micheal (macnis365)]

Even faced this problem.

[Paweł Wilk (siefca)]

Same problem here.

Video Card: nVidia GeForce 8200 (same bug with any driver)
CPU: AMD Phenom (4-core)
kernel: 3.13.0-30-generic #54-Ubuntu SMP

Disabling Unity helps.

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

Thanks, I can't really see those difference on a intel based laptop with recent versions though...

[Jonah Bron (jonahbron)]

Definitely seeing this problem, and the underlying issue of slow focus change affects me as well.

nVidia GeForce GTX 970, driver 358

[Julie Brandon (jewelie)]

Seeing the same thing on 16.04.2 32bit with i5-4460 8Gb and a GTX 960.

Present with all NVidia proprietary drivers (up to 381.13), not present with nouveau driver (but that has other issues.)

Restarting unity with "unity --replace" on the command line usually makes it go (may sometimes take a couple of tries.)

NVidia GPUs are extremely common and the Nouveau driver is terribly buggy and crash prone, if this is genuinely a unity bug then I don't think it's reasonable to triage this as low as it makes the desktop essential unusable for work purposes and I suspect an awful lot more people are experiencing this bug than realise it's cause. (It took me far too long to find this bug report myself and I've been battling with this for months.)

[wheelerlaw (wheelerlaw)]

I am seeing this as well. 16.04 with a Quadro K610M.