When the Toolchest Owns the Zone

Documentation / Contents - Dock Area

• Overview of Desktop Breathing Space
  • What the Zone Is For
  • The Controls
• Choosing an Edge
• Setting the Size
  • The Fifty Percent Limit
• Reading the Preview
  • The Hazard Stripes
  • The Five Windows
• Applying the Change
• When the Toolchest Owns the Zone
• From the Command Line
• Where the Settings Live
• Copyright Information

When the Toolchest Owns the Zone

The Toolchest has a preference of its own called Auto-adapt Desktop Exclusion Zone. Turn it on and the Toolchest claims the zone: the reserved band becomes the strip the Toolchest is actually sitting in, wherever you have put it, and it moves when the Toolchest moves.

While that is on, this tool steps out of the way.

What You See

• A notice under the controls, reading exactly: overridden by CyChest prefs
• The edge buttons, the size wheel, the percentage readout and Apply all greyed
• The preview showing the strip the Toolchest is claiming, read only, with the Toolchest's own footprint outlined inside it

Close stays live.

Nothing Is Lost

Your own edge and size are untouched on disk. They are simply not in effect. Turn the Toolchest's Auto-adapt preference off and the controls come back with your settings exactly as you left them, and the preview goes back to showing them.

It Follows the Toolchest Live

The panel watches for the claim appearing, moving and going away, so it greys and un-greys as it happens. Move the Toolchest with Auto-adapt on and the previewed band follows it. There is nothing to restart and no refresh button.

A Crashed Toolchest Cannot Strand You

The claim carries the identity of the window that made it, and that window is checked on every read. If the Toolchest has gone away without withdrawing its claim, the claim is ignored and the controls come back. A stale claim cannot leave this panel disabled forever, even with no window manager running to tidy it up.

Which To Use

• Auto-adapt, if the reason you want a reserved band is the Toolchest. Then the band is exactly the Toolchest's strip, by construction, and it cannot get out of step when you move it.
• This panel, if you want a band for something else: minimized icons, desktop icons, or simply room to breathe.

They are not meant to be used together, which is why one of them shuts the other off rather than both writing to the same setting.

See Applying the Change for the ordinary case.