How to play full screen video on second monitor?

I have two identical monitors, and when playing a full screen video on one of them using the default player or VLC and then working on the other monitor - the top bar and the launcher appear above the video. How can I avoid that?

btw. I'm using ubuntu 11.10

=== This is the case in Ubuntu 12.04 as well. I noticed it when connected to a TV via HDMI.

Solution 1:

If you use Totem (the default video player) or possibly others you can set the video window to be "Always on top". Right click on the title bar and select it:

I have not actually tried this in Unity, however as noted in my comment, this is a compiz thing, and I am using compiz with gnome-panel which does exactly the same thing.

Also note this might not work in all players if they open a new window when going fullscreen. I think VLC does that so may not work. I'm not sure about mplayer.

Solution 2:

Did you try using xrandr command? Type xrandron the terminal:

subo@ubuntu:~$ xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1024 x 768, maximum 4096 x 4096
LVDS1 connected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
   1024x600       60.0 +
   800x600        60.3     56.2  
   640x480        59.9  
VGA1 connected 1024x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 300mm x 230mm
   1024x768       85.0*+   75.1  
   1280x1024      60.0  
   800x600        85.1     75.0  
   640x480        85.0     75.0     60.0  
   720x400        70.1 

If you want to both monitors active use

xrandr --auto

Or if you want to active specific monitor try

xrandr --output MONITER_NAME --auto

and if you want to off the other monitor try

xrandr --output MONITOR_NAME --off