Multi-monitor - Panel and launcher visible on top of multimonitor non-focused fullscreen apps

That's odd, I tried with with banshee and totem and it seems to work as expected for me.

Kieran: is that even after you click on something else in the second monitor?

I've unmarked this as a duplicate, because it is very definitely a multimonitor issue.

Steps to reproduce:
1. Open an application on one monitor and put it in fullscreen (e.g. open firefox or gedit and press F11)
2. Note that clicking on Desktop background on other monitor does not cause unity panel to show on 'first' monitor
3. Now open any application on the 'second' monitor.
4. Note that the unity panel appears over the top of the fullscreen application (firefox/gedit/etc)

Expected result:
4. Unity panel remains hidden on the monitor with a fullscreen application

Note that the Unity panel displayed over the fullscreen application DOES respond to mouseclicks (it is possible to open indicators) so is not fixed by [1]

[1] https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/734908/comments/49

Greg, bug 734908 is marked as affecting both Compiz and Unity. So both variations of the issue will be fixed there (as two fixes). Including this one.

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Confirmed, this particular multimonitor bug still happens even with the regionalDamage fix.

I think the essence of this bug is best described as: Unity bug: "raising the nux windows to the top on one monitor raises the nux windows on all monitors".

Hey Andy,

Do you have an external monitor to do this work?

@Tim, of course ;)

Could you please implement a feature to optionally but completelly disable the top screen menubar on a secondary monitor?

With that bar Ubuntu with Unity becomed unusable for video art and gigs, where the secondary display output is used with projectors in live shows.

In such environments, on the unfortunate case of a problem with the application generating output on the secondary monitor, a small human error with the fader of a video mixer, or anything, showing a black background for a moment is more desiderable than showing an operating system interface for a moment.

Echoing #15, the multi-monitor spec has(had) a concept of 'projection mode', i.e. where the 2nd monitor was known to be used for projection and thus special conditions would be useful. I have long thought that one of the special conditions of a 'projection mode' would be to not have the unity top panel displaying on the projector - because you really only want fullscreen apps (as #15 says).

Unfortunately I couldn't find a way of commenting on the spec document as an ordinary member of public - so my thoughts have been confined to comments in bug reports (e.g. see comment #2 of https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/907464)

Thanks Karl, think you're right with #907464.
The case of fullscreen apps on the secondary monitor with a control window on the primary is a usual condition with many live set tools.

bumping bug priority to critical because it prevents Ubuntu being used in live video control tasks.

Good to see this issue is gaining priority.
When looking for solutions please consider that in live sets there are situations where you never want to risk projecting the OS interface on the secondary output, even when there's no fullscreen app on that.

I stress the fact that we probably need an option to completelly disable any menubar, notification or whatever on the secondary monitor.

@hantarex; I've amended the bug to also cover the notification issue. Once this is implemented, you will also need to switch off the Launcher on the secondary monitor, because even if it is hidden app icons will pop out in response to applications issuing the 'alert' alert notification.

Once these changes are made, will your use case be fixed?

@johnlea; I'm not sure the proposed bug solution is enough for live show issues. Imagine you need to restart the controlling application for some reason, a simple device change, a crash or whatever. With the proposed solution, once the fullscreen projected app is closed the OS interface would be visible to the public. In a gig you really don't want to risk this and eventually having an option 'by design' is the most desiderable solution.

About the Launcher, I know and make use of the option to switch it off and place it on monitors, it works well and I like it, thanks to the team that implemented that!

- When an app is fullscreen, no notifications (e.g. NotifyOSD or Snap Decisions) should be displayed on top of the full screen app.

Please open a different bug for this.

@andyrock; done, see bug #1065425

opened bug #1066017 secondary monitor menubar unsuitable for live shows

While I would still like to see this fixed, I have found a workaround (that at least works in 12.10):

- In compizconfig-settings, enable the 'Extra WM Actions' plugin

- in the options for this plugin, enable a bindkey for the 'Toggle always on top' option (I chose ctrl-F9)

Now you can open the application and its fullscreen window. With the fullscreen window focussed, press the chosen bindkey. Now you can focus another window or app on the other monitor, and the fullscreen window will stay on top on its monitor.

I've tested this for both libreoffice-impress presentation fullscreen window, and totem in fullscreen mode.

Note that other windows showing on the same monitor as the fullscreen window will NOT now show, even if you focus them (e.g. using an Alt-Tab sequence). This is to be expected, as the fullscreen window is now marked as always on top. However if you arrange for the other window to also have the always-on-top attribute, then you can then use Alt-Tab to flip between them.

When fixing this bug please also look at bug #856892

andyrock, another solution for this problem would be to automatically make Fullscreen-windows be "Always On Top". When toggling fullscreen this status should be reverted to the previous state...

To test this solution, simply start a video with your favorite player, turn "Always On Top" on for your videoplayer window and fullscreen it afterwards. Now click somewhere into your second monitor. Normally in this case the panel would show up on-top of the running video on your first monitor, but not if the player has been set to be on top first...

WORKAROUND FOR THIS BUG:
Turn "Always On Top" on via right-clicking the titlebar of your window, before making it go fullscreen.
This will prevent the Unity panel from rendering on top of this fullscreen-window, when using the other screen.

Fix committed into lp:unity at revision None, scheduled for release in unity, milestone backlog

Fix committed into lp:unity at revision 3170.

This bug was fixed in the package unity - 6.12.0daily13.02.26-0ubuntu1

---------------
unity (6.12.0daily13.02.26-0ubuntu1) raring; urgency=low

  [ Andrea Azzarone ]
  * Multi-monitor - Panel and launcher visible on top of multimonitor
    non-focused fullscreen apps (LP: #748539)
  * unity.tests.launcher.test_icon_behavior.LauncherIconsTests.* fails
    randomly (LP: #1131679)

  [ Xiao-Long Chen ]
  * Add timeout before removing launcher (LP: #1119801)

  [ MC Return ]
  * cppcheck reports true positives (LP: #1131152)

  [ Automatic PS uploader ]
  * Automatic snapshot from revision 3171
 -- Automatic PS uploader <email address hidden> Tue, 26 Feb 2013 04:02:40 +0000

Fix Released in Unity Unity 7.0.0 "R series".

The gnome terminal also stays visible as if on top (full screen and lock screen). I use LTSP with Unity 2d. When working directly on the server lock screen works as expected. Will this fix be available for 12.04?

This bug is not a duplicate of bug #853865.

Is this supposed to have been fixed for the lock screen in 12.04.3 ?

Because I've accepted all recommended updates, but the top and bottom taskbars are still visible for me when I lock my screen (I'm using two monitors).

Random,

It is fixed in unity 7. And it is not decidied on unity 6, which is in 12.04.

May please I request that it's put into unity 6 as well?

The issue means terminal windows as well as a list of running applications is visible from the lock screen.
For 12.04 LTS, which is likely to be installed in large companies, this could be a security risk.

I see people saying that this is fixed in Unity 7?

I am using Unity 7.2.4 in trusty and it's definitely not fixed.

In fact, it has been a problem for such a long time that I'm perfectly confident it will never be fixed.

Reporting same big. Running a fully patched install of Ubuntu 15.04 AMD64, still happens. Fullscreened Virtualbox VM on left monitor has the Unity menu bar pop up as soon as I take focus away from it on either center or right monitors. Same thing with a fullscreened video in VLC, which is really annoying since it cuts the top off the video.

I can relate to #38, having exactly the same setup with the same hassle. Why not simply add the functionality to set the Unity top bar in the screen settings. There is an option for the Launcher Position (either Screen A or B or both) why not the same for Unity?
I hope this will be fixed with Unity 8.

I am confirming the same problem as in #38 and #39. The bug still persists and it is very annoying. I am running Ubuntu 14.04.3 with VMware Workstation.

When I have a VM running full-screen on one monitor and I switch focus to a different window, the Unity top bar appears over the full-screen VMware Workstation. Switching the focus back to the Workstation does not resolve the problem. Only switching it from full-screen and then back helps.

Still occurs in 15.10...

The fix works for me at first, but the problem come back after a while.

Here is a case scenario :
- New session, I open a full screen app on one screen and nautilus on the other one (everything is fine)
- I drag a folder or a file in nautilus
- The problem comes back and I have to restart the session to get rid of it, otherwise it will not go away

still happens on on 16.04!!

same bug as here?
https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/734908

the workaround listed above does not work on 16.04.
The bug is still present

I still have the issue. 16.04 Ubuntu LTS.