Announcement: Superswitcher 0.1

[Nigel Tao <nigel tao myrealbox com>]

It's mostly an initial announcement, and I've posted to d-d-l to spread
the word, but also in case anyone wants to discuss, for example, ideas
for libwnck, or the sort of bleeding edge X goodness needed for
composing window thumbnails instead of their mini-icons.


In a nutshell:
SuperSwitcher is a (more feature-ful) replacement for the Alt-Tab window
switching behavior and Ctrl-Alt-Left/Right/Up/Down workspace switching
behavior that is currently provided by Metacity.

But also, you can find-as-you-type windows, and create and delete
workspaces easily.  Workspaces are a killer feature that I miss when
using Microsoft Windows.  I like to keep a one-to-one mapping from
cognitive-tasks-in-progress to workspaces, and the former isn't a
pre-determined fixed number like 4 during the course of a day, so why
shouldn't the number of workspaces be *easily* changable?


Screenshot:
http://blogs.gnome.org/nigeltao


Download:
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=122136&package_id=174512 is the C source .tar.gz.  You will need libwnck-dev.


Detail:
When running, use the "Super" key (also known as the "Windows" key) to
switch between windows and workspaces.  This key is usually found
between the Ctrl and Alt keys on the keyboard. 

Super-Tab works just like Alt-Tab does (with and without Shift), but
also: 

Super-Up and Super-Down cycles through all windows in the current
workspace in a fixed order (as opposed to Alt-Tab or Super-Tab, whose
list of windows is ordered by most-recently-used first - which is good
if you want recently used windows, but it's clumsy to cycle through, for
example, all three or four windows in the one workspace).  Hold down
Shift to re-order the list instead of switching between windows. 

Super-PageUp and Super-PageDown maximize and minimize the active window
(or restores them if it was already maximized or minimized).
Super-Ctrl-PageUp and Super-Ctrl-PageDown do this to all windows on the
current workspace, not just the active one. 

Super-Left and Super-Right cycles through your workspaces.  Hold down
Shift to also bring across the active window into the new workspace.
Hold down Shift and Ctrl to bring across all windows from one workspace
to the next.  Unlike Metacity's Ctrl-Alt-Left and Ctrl-Alt-Right, this
"loops" so that, when you get to the end of the list, you cycle back to
the start. 

Super-F1 moves to workspace number 1, Super-F2 moves to workspace number
2, and so on, up to Super-F12.  Again, hold down Shift to bring across
the active window, and both Shift and Ctrl to bring across a flock of
windows, just like as described above. 

Super-Insert creates a new, empty workspace.  Again, hold down Shift to
also bring across the active window (if there is one) into the new
workspace. 

Super-Delete deletes the current workspace, if it is empty.
Super-Shift-Delete will delete all empty workspaces, down to a minimum
of one. 

Super-Escape closes the active window.  Super-Ctrl-Escape will close all
windows on this workspace. 

Whilst holding down Super, typing regular letters or numbers will show
you only those windows whose titles match that pattern.  Pressing Enter
(whilst still holding down Super) will then cycle through the matches,
regardless of which workspace you are on.  For example, if you have a
lot of windows open, and you want to get to your web browser window that
is showing planet.gnome.org, then hold down Super, then type "p" "l" "a"
"Enter" and then release the Super key. Shift-Enter goes in the other
direction than Enter (i.e., up and left with Shift, versus down and
right without Shift).  Use the Space key to enter multiple word
fragments, such as "pla gn", to further refine your search. 

Finally, when holding down Super, click on image or text representing a
window or a workspace to activate it. 

------------------------------------ 
Building, Installing, Running... 

To build (and install), the standard
   ./autogen.sh --prefix=/usr
   make
   (and optionally) sudo make install
should work.  After that, just run src/superswitcher.  This will listen
indefinitely for Super key presses, until you kill the process (e.g.,
with Ctrl-C).  SuperSwitcher is best enjoyed if you automatically start
the program whenever you log in.  To do this, from System -> Preferences
-> Sessions, go to the Startup Programs tab and add superswitcher. 

------------------------------------ 
Caveats 

This is a alpha-version release that has been tested only on my own
computer and my own keyboard, with my own preferences and my own
workflow.  This means that it may not work perfectly with: 

Multi-screen or Xinerama. 

Pinned aka "show on all workspaces" windows. 

Workspaces arranged in more than one row. 

Non en_US locales, especially non-latin and/or right-to-left languages. 

Focus-follows-mouse or any other non-default focus policy. 

Window managers other than metacity. 

Of course, ideally it should work with all of the above.  Feedback is
most welcome. 

Finally, since it is based solely on libwnck, it does not share the same
most- recently-used windows list as metacity, and metacity handles
Alt-Tab.  Thus, Alt-Tab and Super-Tab may disagree on MRU ordering.  As
a workaround, don't use Alt-Tab anymore.  :) 



------------------------------------ 
enjoy,
Nigel.