xfce - Compiz in XFCE4- Ubuntu-17.04: Setup progress

Compiz Rides Again on my laptop! Ubuntu 17.04 XFCE4. I'm encouraged by today's experience, enough to ask some dumb questions.

I loved Compiz back in the day, but stopped using it when it was, seemingly prematurely, declared a dead project in 2011 or so. Some frustrations with xfwm4 and openbox caused me to try Compiz again. It (mostly) works the way I remember.

Here's where I stand. I have these packages:

compiz 1:0.9.13.1+17.04.20170109-0ubuntu1 
compiz-core  1:0.9.13.1+17.04.20170109-0ubuntu1
compiz-gnome 1:0.9.13.1+17.04.20170109-0ubuntu1
compiz-plugins:amd64 1:0.9.13.1+17.04.20170109-0ubuntu1           

compizconfig-settings-manager  1:0.9.13.1+17.04.20170109-0ubuntu1 

From the terminal, I ran

ccsm

to enable some Compiz plugins/features. This is necessary because the default compiz session has no features enabled and you don't even get window decorations. If you skip that, you'll be able to start Compiz, but you just can't use it.

Then I run

compiz --repace ccp &

That replaces xfwm4 in the session with compiz. It seems to mostly work. I had to run ccsm 6 times to add in features. After a few stumbles, this does run. I love "wobbly windows", can resize windows, etc.

At the moment, I have these Compiz plugins turned on in ccsm:

OpenGL

Composite
Desktop Wall
Viewport Switcher
Animations
Window Decorations
JPEG
Compiz Library Toolbox
Regex Matching
Wallpaper
Workarounds

Application Switcher
Move Window
Place Window
Scale
Resize Window

In ccsm "General", I have "Desktop Size" set at Horizontal virtual size = 8 and Vertical Virtual Size = 1. Seems as though "Viewport", "Workspace" and "Desktop" are interchangeable today. At one point, these were vital differences, but today it seems they are interchangeable. Correct?

Here are the parts where I need help:

1. At login, and also after suspend/resume, Compiz reacts very poorly. XFCE panels show in wrong spots. If I can get a terminal, I run "compiz --replace ccp" again to restart. I guess this happens because I'm letting xfwm4 try to start, and then replace with compiz.

xfwm4 should not start at all. I found How To Set Up Compiz In Xubuntu 14.10, 14.04 Or 12.04 and How to correctly install Compiz on Xfce 4.12?. These concern Ubuntu 14.04. It mentions some XFCE config files, but I don't see same settings anymore. I don't see "xfwm4" specified as the window manager in "~/.config/xfce4/xfconf/xfce-perchannel-xml/xfce4-session.xml".

2. The XFCE "workspace switcher" panel app does not interact well with the Compiz workspaces. After fiddling with settings for a while, I am able to get the workspaces and windows to display in the panel workspace switcher. However, the panel workspace switcher is a "look, don't touch" thing. It cannot be used to move windows among workspaces.

Maybe that's as good as it gets?

3. I have the edge flipping options turned on in ccsm, but pulling a window to the edge has no effect, the window does not drag onto the next workspace.

I've found dbus still works to interact with Compiz from the shell. My old wallpaper changer programs don't work correctly any more, but it is only a matter of time before I figure out what's wrong there (power of positive thinking).

Compiz has some features you can't get anywhere else, it is fun! At least while it lasts.