10.10.10 VisibilityNotify Events

The X server can report VisibilityNotify events to clients wanting any change in the visibility of the specified window. A region of a window is visible if someone looking at the screen can actually see it. The X server generates this event whenever the visibility changes state. However, this event is never generated for windows whose class is InputOnly .

All VisibilityNotify events caused by a hierarchy change are generated after any hierarchy event (UnmapNotify, MapNotify, ConfigureNotify , GravityNotify , CirculateNotify) caused by that change. Any VisibilityNotify event on a given window is generated before any Expose events on that window, but it is not required that all VisibilityNotify events on all windows be generated before all Expose events on all windows. The X protocol does not constrain the ordering of VisibilityNotify events with respect to FocusOut, EnterNotify, and LeaveNotify events.

To receive VisibilityNotify events, set the VisibilityChangeMask bit in the event-mask attribute of the window.

The structure for this event type contains:

typedef struct {
	int type;		/* VisibiltyNotify */
	unsigned long serial;	/* # of last request processed by server */
	Bool send_event;	/* true if this came from a SendEvent request */
	Display *display;	/* Display the event was read from */
	Window window;
	int state;
} XVisibilityEvent;

The window member is set to the window whose visibility state changes. The state member is set to the state of the window's visibility and can be VisibilityUnobscured, VisibilityPartiallyObscured, or VisibilityFullyObscured. The X server ignores all of a window's subwindows when determining the visibility state of the window and processes VisibilityNotify events according to the following:

When the window changes state from partially obscured, fully obscured, or not viewable to viewable and completely unobscured, the X server generates the event with the state member of the XVisibilityEvent structure set to VisibilityUnobscured.
When the window changes state from viewable and completely unobscured or not viewable to viewable and partially obscured, the X server generates the event with the state member of the XVisibilityEvent structure set to VisibilityPartiallyObscured.
When the window changes state from viewable and completely unobscured, viewable and partially obscured, or not viewable to viewable and fully obscured, the X server generates the event with the state member of the XVisibilityEvent structure set to VisibilityFullyObscured.

Next: Structure Control Events

Christophe Tronche, ch@tronche.com