mate-system-monitor is in the Ascii repos.

Yes, I checked and saw it there.  It wasn't when I installed that VM several months ago.  AntoFox must have updated some pkgs.

The default Xfce compositor works fine here so I've never experimented with other options.  I did resort to using compiz to address deficiencies in gnome2 maybe 10 years ago.  Really more trouble than it's worth.  The rotating cube was kind of neat though.  Choice is a good thing . . .

I like both Mate and Xfce but as of late slightly prefer Mate. Everybody has his/her preference but making compton work in Mate or in Xfce is just the same. The problem is using a preconfigured compton.conf and probably the default compositor at the same time.

golinux wrote:

Long before Mate, gnome2 got very long in the tooth for me.

So I'm curious,  what DE do you use now?

Xfce since wheezy.   I actually tried Mate on wheezy too but it still had all the annoyances of gnome2 so that was the end of it.  I do use some Mate apps - pluma, atril etc..  Several of those aren't available for ascii - mate-system-monitor, mate-system-tools - which is a bit of a bummer.

Long before Mate, gnome2 got very long in the tooth for me.

So I'm curious,  what DE do you use now?

[To be honest, Mate is starting to get long in the tooth for me.  ]

There should be a line for fade-in...or fade-in-step

It's probably something like...

fade-in-step = 0.03

...or something similar.

Edit it to a lower number (0.00 would be no fade in) and see if that helps.

Also, depending on which compton.conf I included in the Miyo you're using, there may be a line for no fading at all (opening or closing windows), if it's there, edit the line...

fading = true

to...

fading = false

There should be several options available for fading that you can play around with until you find what works best for you.

EDITED TO ADD: I posted this after you found the line.

EDIT
There is one weird thing. Now when opening a new window, instead of it immediately appearing, it kind of fades in instead. I think I can live that though.

EDIT #2
I found a line in compton.conf that read fading = true;. I changed it to false and that seems to have taken care of the fade in.

I would suggest you remove the compton config you made or have, will be easier for me.

Firstly go to the Mate Control Center, to Windows and disable the built-in compositor, that could also be what was interfering.

Then start compton from the terminal with OpenGL:

compton -b --backend glx

That's it.

Do you see the appended -b, that makes an application running from terminal even if you close that terminal, so you do not kill the process.

Now take that command from above and put it into your autostart. Open again the control center and go to start programs and add it there.
It should look like this:

Report back.

Edit: One more thing. If compton was or is already running, kill it like mentioned, killall compton, before proceeding with my solution.

It is not a driver problem btw, at least not really, it is a vsync issue on Intel cards that is not present if you use a compositor that uses OpenGL by default like Mutter, Muffin, KWin or Compiz. Xfce has the same problem. Mate 1.20 fixed that finally.

Here a nice read from the compton dev:

https://github.com/chjj/compton/wiki/vsync-guide

Yes, running things like compton from the terminal is done basically to test to see how it works. Once you close the terminal, you effectively kill whatever you were running.

As I'm unfamiliar with Mate, I can only assume there's a way to add items to autostart as golinux said. Perhaps someone more familiar with Mate can intercede here. All that I can tell you is that if you find where to add it, the command should simply be compton...unless Mate is different than what I'm used to.

I'm glad that worked, and I do hope you can get it added to autostart soon. Wish I still had my Mate version to figure it out for you. I'm so sorry.

EDITED TO ADD: Until the autostart situation is figured out, and if Mate has a "Run command" (or something similar), you can use that to run compton too. Same thing...just type compton in the Run command, and compton will continue running until you log out, reboot, etc...

Question: Why wasn't compton already running? Does that mean some other compositor was running? How can I check? And if I close the terminal, it says that will kill compton. How do I get compton running from boot?

EDIT
Closed the terminal and obvious screen tearing is back.

killall compton

...if compton is already running. Then run...

compton

The compton.conf file that I supply is pretty basic. It may or may not work well on some machines. I have one machine that I have to use a completely different compton.conf file on.

Ron, I've never used Compiz, so I can't be of any assistance as to how to use it.

If ivanovnegro is willing to help as he indicated (thank you ivanovnegro), that may be your best route since I have such limited experience with Mate. I didn't even use my miyo-mate long enough to know there's a built-in compositor.

MiyoLinux wrote:
In looking at the compton.conf file, what does it show for "backend"... glx or xrender?

Here's what it reads:

backend = "xrender";
#backend = "glx";

So I take it that I should change it to this . . .?

#backend = "xrender";
backend = "glx";

It is available in Synaptic. If I need to download it, how do use it in place of the others?

FTR, I don't recall having this issue in Jessie. But it could have been that I just missed it then, but I don't think so.