Comment 22 for bug 1307144

When I first started testing, one way to confirm that a window was being unredirected was that Alt-Tab would not show a window switcher (I use Static Application Switcher). However, after I had tested different options and video players (particularly ones in Workarounds), this stopped being accurate and always worked. I tried changing all options back but could not replicate this behaviour.

I had left Unredirect Fullscreen Windows to disabled for a long time, at random, when I was testing how options affected video playback in ways unrelated to tearing. In the past I experienced issues where eog, or eye of gnome, the image display program, would not display the application switcher when in fullscreen. This doesn't seem to be an issue for me but it seems like it might be related this particular option, unredirect fullscreen windows.

I don't know why I had this issue with application switcher not showing up while in fullscreen video, after I had enabled Unredirect Fullscreen Windows but before I started messing with other settings, but if other people experience, or can replicate the same issue maybe they could comment on it or create a new bug report.

At the moment, I have no strong reason to turn the option off, even though it causes tearing. In marginal cases, it seems it can be the difference between a video player dropping frames and being able to continue (when these players aren't excluded through matching). But if other programs or drivers are bugged to the point where they have tearing, and people dislike tearing, it may be better to have this option off by default.

So: does "Allow Flipping" in nvidia-settings prevent tearing in games when this compiz option is at its default setting of on?

*My testing result is that with both totem and vlc, when the fullscreen output isn't being redirected, even Allow Flipping doesn't prevent tearing. But when I changed vlc's video output method from XVideo, which works the best, to OpenGL, which is slightly slower, the tearing is almost, but not completely, eliminated. Sync to VBlank in nvidia-settings still doesn't seem to do anything, but turning Allow Flipping back on does bring tearing back to zero. The other output methods also don't eliminate tearing by themselves.