Compton configuration issue

Support & Help Requests
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#1

Now that Compton has been integrated in Ubuntu Mate 16.04, I just noticed an issue.

In Mate Tweak, I’ve set Compton as the compositor but I also have my own ~/.config/compton.conf because I want to set specific options for my system.

The problem is that if I start my session, Compton seems to use different options than when I kill it and restart it from a terminal. I noticed it because of a software that sets an overlay that apparently gets a shadow from Compton and displays fine when killing/restarting Compton manually.

I assume than when launching it manually, it gets its options from my config file, so when started by Mate (I don’t know how) it uses its own options. Is that correct?

EDIT: someone pointed out to me that Mate in fact can use a file named marco-compton.conf. Shouldn’t it use the usual compton.conf instead? It’s a bit misleading to have a specific config file.

What is the difference between the built in compositor with Marco and Compton?
#2

If you want to use your own compton.conf file, do the following:

Ensure compton is installed. It should be by default, as it happens

Go to make tweak and select “marco (simple desktop effects)”. Make sure “compositing” is not selected. Then close Mate tweak

Open Caja and press ctrl/h when it is open on your home folder. You should now see all your hidden folders. Put your compton.conf file in the .config folder.

Now open system/preferences/personal/startupapplications

Add compton as a startup program

Log out and then back in. You should find you are now running marco together with your version of compton compositor

#3

That’s what I did previously. But finally, I’ve setup a symlink between compton.conf and marco-compton.conf, so that selecting Compton in Mate Tweak loads the config as expected.

I still don’t understand the reason why Mate uses a config file with a custom name, as it’s the regular Compton that it just preinstalls ans allows to select in an easy way. Why not use the regular config file?

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#4

It must be something to do with the way Compton has been integrated into Mate Tweak. Which is why I always use Mate Tweak just to set Marco and then run Compton independently as described.

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