[the_gipsy]

No, you're using the computer wrong. See, you should use a tiling window manager with several workspaces and shortcuts without having to look at your keyboard, e.g. Meta+4 to go to workspace 4 where you have your chat apps.

[kitsunesoba]

I've tried tiling WMs several times and they inevitably drive me nuts because on normal computer screen sizes, windows frequently end up awkwardly-sized adding scrolling requirements that wouldn't be present with overlapping windows that are sized to fit the content…

If I were to commit to a tiling WM I think I'd have to replace my main monitor with a 4k TV large enough to run at 1x UI scale without the UI elements being tiny so each window gets the virtual real estate required without effectively making the "tiling" part of the tiling WM moot by maximizing every window.

This probably boils down to the type of programs one uses though… someone living in chromeless text editors and terminals all day will probably fare better with tiling than someone who spends all their time in IDEs, graphics editors, and web browsers.

[the_gipsy]

> each window gets the virtual real estate required without effectively making the "tiling" part of the tiling WM moot by maximizing every window.

The tiling part is just there to making your windows manageable without the mouse and in a predictable way. Out of my 5 preassigned workspaces, 3 are fullscreen windows, 1 is split in 2, and 1 is split in 3 usually.

When I want a new program running big, then I either 1) close and make space in some workspace I'm not using right now, 2) send it to one of the empty "non-preassigned" spaces, or 3) change the current space layout into "all windows fullscreen" temporarily (with the new window on front, obviously).

[neilv]

Or, use tiling window manager, but also have symbolic mnemonics for the apps (not have to remember on which desktop it's on, nor change your muscle memory if you change what desktop it's on).

For example mnemonic "M" for mail/email, so my xmonad.hs has something like:

    , ((mod3Mask, xK_m), raiseNextMaybe (spawn "/usr/bin/someemailprog") (className =? "Someemailprog"))

Anytime I hid modifier+M, it will either go to the desktop and window with the mail program, or start the mail program if it's not yet running.

Personally, my mail program is usually on desktop 1, but some of the other program, like Web browser, I move between desktops as needed for tasks. Hitting modifier+W always gets to it.

[theelous3]

Yep. Came to say this. Having say, meta+4 for "chat" is far better than having f4 for "a chat app".

You arrive to your chat workspace, your works slack side by side with your favorite irc and matrix clients, all positioned and scaled perfectly every time. Adding more / fewer / swapping apps in is just a matter of invocation, and there the new configuration sits waiting.

The concept is expanded greatly. Shoutout to i3 and xmonad, for my personal setups.

[deafpolygon]

I do this as well, but on KDE. (I flip between KDE and Sway depending on my mood)

[TacticalCoder]

> See, you should use a tiling window manager with several workspaces and shortcuts without having to look at your keyboard, e.g. Meta+4 to go to workspace 4 where you have your chat apps.

That's basically what I do. A tiling WM and then one modifier key (Super in my case but whatever) and then keys to go to any workspace/virtual desktop I want.

And most of my workspaces are always organized in exactly the same manner, so I know exactly where is what.

[wutbrodo]

Ha, this was my first thought, though I've got a built-in damper on being that annoying guy who brings up tiling WMs in every workspace conversation.

It is a little amusing to see such a dramatic headline supported by the extremely elementary thesis that you should have kbd shortcuts for your favorite applications.

On top of that, numbered shortcuts for arbitrary apps is way worse than using Super+[arbitrary key].

[nine_k]

My mind works differently. I need to put together a set of apps I'm using for a task, say, editor + browser + terminal for software development, or DAW + bunch of instruments + browser + player to work with music, or, say, GIMP + Krita + Inkscape for graphics.

Tiling helps, but I just have a bunch of shortcuts that tile a particular window just so under xfwm4.

[perihelions]

That's not unique to tiling WM's. In Gnome too, you can just assign the keyboard shortcuts "Switch to workspace <n>" to Meta+<n>.

[PurpleRamen]

Is your tiling-manager also automatically focusing a window on that workspace? And are workspaces limited to a single screen, or do all screen simultaneously change state? Because those are the main reasons why I switch to specific apps instead of desktops/workspaces/tags/whatever you call it. Apps are reliable, but desktops seem too heavy and pointless for me.

[rashkov]

It should automatically focus a window on that workspace yeah.

You can assign workspaces to different monitors, if I understand the question correctly

[iambateman]

Any recommendation for Mac?

[grincho]

I've been doing this for >10 years with https://manytricks.com/butler/. Works great! You can also bind snippets of text, scripts, etc.

I can't overstate how important it is to have a keyboard that groups function keys into "islands" of (generally) 4 so you can touch-type them. An ergonomics consultant once observed that the source of my neck pain was that I looked at the keyboard while typing. As a touch-typist, I found this puzzling—until we realized it was just the function keys. :-)

Btw, LaunchBar (https://obdev.at/products/launchbar/index.html) makes an excellent 2nd-level util for things not common enough to merit a single keychord.

[rootix]

Never tried it myself, but https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai comes to mind

[galoisscobi]

As others have mentioned yabai +skhd is excellent. I think using this guide to set it all up went a long way for me: https://cbrgm.net/post/2021-05-5-setup-macos/

Yabai is my daily driver and I really like it.

[phneutral26]

Yabai is quite decent.

[interroboink]

Or, do that stuff but without a tiling window manager (:

That's what I do. I use fluxbox, but even Windows 10 has pretty decent built-in multi-desktop functionality.

[anthk]

s,tiling,floating like CWM.

Same keybindings.

win+a = app launcher

win+s = search windows

win+m = rename window

win+1-4 = wspace 1-4

shift+win+1-4 move to wspace 1-4

win + q = close window

win + r = reload cwm

Also, if you are a programmer and use non-ASCII punctuation (Spanish, French, German, Nordic):

        setxkbmap us -option ctrl:swapcaps -option compose:menu -option compose:rwin 

The US layout it's the best for programming, and with that setkbmap trick you can compose á-ú/ñ letters with ease.

[mcbishop]

> without having to look at your keyboard

Function keys are faster / more direct for people that do 100% touch typing, right?