App Menu animation fix

[SeniorMatt]

As mentioned in the issue #506 there is some lag when you open the app menu with Mint Y theme. And I fixed it by removing one line of code, and it does not seem to affect anything else but the performance in a good way.

[echuber2]

If the box shadow was causing lag then it seems like there might be a deeper issue with the compositor performance.

[SeniorMatt]

If the box shadow was causing lag then it seems like there might be a deeper issue with the compositor performance.

Yes I think there is.

[mtwebster]

This doesn't make a noticeable impact on the menu opening to me. Unfortunately it also disables shadows on every popup menu, none of which had any issues in the first place (compared to the menu applet, at least).

edit: You need to run parse-sass.sh in the Mint-Y/cinnamon directory. This doesn't happen during the build. It will update the generated cinnamon.css file. This is why I didn't notice anything different.

[mtwebster]

Try this way instead:

The menu applet has a special selector that applies over the base menu one - so this will affect just the menu applet and not every other popup in Cinnamon.

Actually, leave it like this, just run parse-sass.sh so the real .css files get updated. We're going to have a look at the animation itself.

[clefebvre]

If the box shadow was causing lag then it seems like there might be a deeper issue with the compositor performance.

This ^^.

The issue isn't the shadow, it's the animation.

Removing the shadow makes this look worse for all users. In the meantime, the animation is disabled specifically for this applet to avoid this situation. Enabling it, even with the shadow removed, results in this issue on most hardware. I'm running this on Intel right now, it looks awful, with or without shadow.

I'm reverting this to bring back the shadow. I'd rather have it look nice for everybody by default since the animation can't look smooth for everybody anyway and it's disabled by default.

Note: If we don't manage to improve animation performance, we should probably also consider removing animations on the calendar applet.

[clefebvre]

oh man... https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxmint/comments/1phhm13/my_first_ever_contribution_to_a_linux_world_just/

Now I feel really bad. But let me tell you, I'm glad you contributed. It's not easy to say NO when people help and reject changes like this, though it is important. Don't let this revert affect that feeling. Whether your change makes it in or not, it's still a valuable contribution to the project.

The actual issue is pretty complex imo. It has to do with toolkit performance and widget complexity. I'd love to see it resolved but removing the shadow is just a workaround, and a worse one than the one already in place, which consists in disabling the animation for that specific applet.

[SeniorMatt]

oh man... https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxmint/comments/1phhm13/my_first_ever_contribution_to_a_linux_world_just/

Now I feel really bad. But let me tell you, I'm glad you contributed. It's not easy to say NO when people help and reject changes like this, though it is important. Don't let this revert affect that feeling. Whether your change makes it in or not, it's still a valuable contribution to the project.

The actual issue is pretty complex imo. It has to do with toolkit performance and widget complexity. I'd love to see it resolved but removing the shadow is just a workaround, and a worse one than the one already in place, which consists in disabling the animation for that specific applet.

Don't you worry) It's fine! At least I tried, maybe I will continue digging further in to Linux Mint's source code, 'cause I find it really interesting! Thanks for being so polite!

[echuber2]

For posterity, where is the relevant animation code that would most likely be causing this?

[HOAIAN2]

For posterity, where is the relevant animation code that would most likely be causing this?

There some thing to do with the compositor. I set to 100% scale no issue, 150% very laggy, 175% no issue, 200% very laggy. Since X11 have screen tearing when enable fractional scale and Wayland not stable right now, I would stick with 200% and disable menu animation. Note that the issue happen in both X11 and Wayland.
I have Inspiron 5310 with i5 11320h

Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics] driver: i915 v: kernel
  Device-2: Microdia Integrated_Webcam_HD driver: uvcvideo type: USB
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.11 with: Xwayland v: 23.2.6 driver: X:
    loaded: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa dri: iris gpu: i915
    resolution: 2560x1600~60Hz
  API: EGL v: 1.5 drivers: iris,swrast platforms: gbm,x11,surfaceless,device
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: intel mesa
    v: 25.0.7-0ubuntu0.24.04.2 renderer: Mesa Intel Iris Xe Graphics (TGL GT2)

[echuber2]

I noticed something similar when I tried fractional scaling on a high-DPI laptop. But if Clem has a good idea of which part of the code is causing the issues, it would be interesting if there were an issue about it on the Cinnamon repo or another place to coordinate info for anyone looking to help.