Something different appears to be happening with the focus prevention mechanism. An application, say Rekonq or KGet, opens a file dialog. The file dialog appears behind the application window, and the icon for that window in the task switcher begins to flash. I have been vaguely aware of the Focus Stealing Prevention setting, but have never had the need to change this from whatever the default has been. That is, until now.

The only way I could "fix" this odd behavior was to change the level from Low to None. So now I'm wondering -- has something changed in KWin's code? Or did the default change in KDE 4.10? The reason I ask about a possible default change is because I've never had to twiddle this setting, so I don't know what the default might have been in prior KDE versions.

Currently, I notice this on both Kubuntu and Arch, KDE version 4.10.3.

The default is "low" - do you use the appmenu menubar? (ie. in a panel)

luebking wrote:do you use the appmenu menubar? (ie. in a panel)

No, I don't.

At least one other Kubuntu user has reported this problem, and my workaround fixed it for him, too.

That's no "workaround" - "none" is actually the plain NETWM behavior and will just let any client that shows up or wants it have the focus.

Is your issue limited to certain applications and the open/save dialog?
(This particular dialog is a modal transient and whatever happens it should *never* appear behind its leader)

Can you please post the output of "xprop" of the "failing" dialog and its mainwindow?
(xprop turns the pointer into a cross and you can just click the window)

"xprop > dialog.props; xprop > main.props" will redirect that output into textfiles "dialog.props" and "main.props"

Well, I agree that "workaround" is probably not the best term

I can do this later for you. Got a meeting I'm already late for right now.