which takes more memory (and is slower)? LISP interpreter or v8/node?
Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
61–70 of 73 posts
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cmd+Backtick (next to 1 key) lets you swap between windows of the same application. Is that what you're looking for?
That's as close as it gets, but it's not enough. I mapped it to cmd-shift-right so it does go to the next window. But there's no way that I could find to map going to the previous window... So for example I might have two windows tiled side by side. I want to go cmd-shift-right to focus on the right one, and cmd-shift-left to focus on the left...
Hammerspoon can change focus by relative direction. Can be a bit iffy sometimes but between that and HyperSwitch I'm never really at a loss.
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#63I have two links related to tiled window management:
The links are for WM configurations that let you move or resize windows keeping the corners on a configurable grid:
[1] https://github.com/luigirizzo/lrtile-chrome (chrome extension) Ctrl+Shift+Arrow move the current window, Ctrl+Search+Arrows resize it
This works for all Chrome windows so it platform independent.
(I have a similar Javascript configuration for Spectacle, I can post it if there is interest. I believe the javascript is easily portable to other scriptable window managers.)
My rationale for developing lrtile is the following:
I like having window corners on a grid because it helps locating information.
However, in many tiled WMs, resizing one window causes resizing of nearby ones (very distracting) _and_ windows generally do not overlap (a severe limitation especially on small screen). Finally, shortcuts to place windows on half or a quarter of the screen are often built-in (in chrome, windows, spectacle default...) but very few WMs have larger, configurable grids suitable for large monitors (I use a 40" 4K screen).
lrtile addresses the above problems as follows:
- the grid is configurable; - movement/resize only affect the current window, allowing overlap if user wants; - commands are arrows + 1/2 modifiers, and try to be intuitive - screen borders act as hard stops, also making behavior more intuitive.
In detail, I typically use a 6x6 grid on small screens (so I can have halves or thirds) and 12x10 or even bigger on large screens. Each window side must be at least two units, and resize extends or reduces one dimension at a time and by one unit.
My typical workflow is to make windows visible with a comfortable size and no overlap, and occasionally expand the window I care about (e.g. make the browser wider when a page does not render well; or expand the editor window vertically when I want to see a larger chunk of code), reverting back when done. The fact that move and resize commands are very similar to other cursor movements makes the operation very quick.
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#64Sloppy mouse focus? It’s the one feature I can never seem to find in macOS window managers. That and “highlight-to-copy” “middle-click-to-paste” are two things I really miss from an X11 environment.
Focus-follows-mouse is sorely needed, at least as an option, in OSX.
I used to achieve FFM, circa snow-leopard, with the excellent "mondomouse" from AtomicBird, but it is no longer maintained and will not work with modern OSX versions.
Looking ahead, it appears that there is some new capability buried deep inside the accessibility section of Preferences that actually enables FFM, but I do not have a new enough (Mojave ?) version of OSX to verify this ...
EDIT: I think it is actually High Sierra that this new accessibility feature appeared in, but again, not sure ...
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#65Sloppy mouse focus? It’s the one feature I can never seem to find in macOS window managers. That and “highlight-to-copy” “middle-click-to-paste” are two things I really miss from an X11 environment.
Focus-follows-mouse, even sloppy, is problematic on macOS due to the menu bar. Moving the mouse up to the menu bar means covering space which can belong to a different window, which would change the meaning of the menu item when you got there.
"Focus-follows-mouse, even sloppy, is problematic on macOS due to the menu bar. Moving the mouse up to the menu bar means covering space which can belong to a different window, which would change the meaning of the menu item when you got there."
This is true, but easily surmountable.
Mondomouse, which is the last bona-fide focus-follows-mouse add-on that existed for OSX (circa snow leopard) had a switch timer that was user-definable.
So you could set the switch timer to .5 seconds or 1 second or something which would allow you to run the mouse across other windows without changing focus. That solved the menu bar problem that you are, correctly, pointing out.
I think it's also worth mentioning that if you're at the point where you're demanding FFM, you're probably already doing everything with hotkeys anyway so it's not like you're running up to the menu bar often ...
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have had a pretty stable setup using yabai[0] for my wm and skhd[1] for my hotkey daemon. Both are by the same dev and I have nothing but good things to say about them. Occasionally windows will get in a wonky state, but I have a hot key to reset them. It is usually stable for a week+ [0] https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai [1] https://github.com/koekeishiya/skhd
I've been using yabai as well! I was wondering if it was possible to replicate iTerm2's dedicated hotkey window [1] for other applications (primarily firefox) using yabai/skhd? [1] https://www.iterm2.com/documentation-hotkey.html
I do not know the answer to your question but the way I solve that problem in osx is using quicksilver and triggers. You can give each app or really any quicksilver command a hotkey to switch to it directly or start it and switch if it's not running. I couldn't live without it. I have hotkeys for all my commonly used apps and generally never launch or switch apps any other way. I also have hotkeys for manual tiling to the corners, sides, center, and full screen so I don't need to use the gui for that. The fact that this isn't doable out of the box makes me question if either Apple or Microsoft has ever considered hiring a single ux expert.
On Linux I use jumpapp for the same functionality.
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#67> JavaScript Dear god, why? Don’t I have to suffer enough in my day job? For real though this is a cool project despite my own personal JavaScript fatigue.
Maybe you could write it in Haxe and compile to JS?
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's as close as it gets, but it's not enough. I mapped it to cmd-shift-right so it does go to the next window. But there's no way that I could find to map going to the previous window... So for example I might have two windows tiled side by side. I want to go cmd-shift-right to focus on the right one, and cmd-shift-left to focus on the left...
If you have two windows the order shouldn't matter? Also, Cmd+` goes to the next window, Cmd+Shift+` goes to the previous window, your mappings having a shift in them might be the issue.
> If you have two windows the order shouldn't matter?
No. But I don't think it's too much to ask to cycle through more than two, now, is it? :)
> Also, Cmd+` goes to the next window, Cmd+Shift+` goes to the previous window, your mappings having a shift in them might be the issue.
I'm not sure I understand how having a shift in my mapping affects this, but cmd-shift-` isn't ergonomic at all. To me the arrows are far more logical way to go in a certain direction. Why can I map next window to any key, but there's no way to map another key to the previous window? I find it very strange.
For the sake of comparison, i3 makes all those things trivial.
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's as close as it gets, but it's not enough. I mapped it to cmd-shift-right so it does go to the next window. But there's no way that I could find to map going to the previous window... So for example I might have two windows tiled side by side. I want to go cmd-shift-right to focus on the right one, and cmd-shift-left to focus on the left...
Hammerspoon can change focus by relative direction. Can be a bit iffy sometimes but between that and HyperSwitch I'm never really at a loss.
Thanks. I'm going to try Hammerspoon (and maybe HyperSwitch).
From other comments, it seems like yabai can also handle it, but it seems like a very "hard-core" way, including disabling some Mac security features, and I'm not sure I feel comfortable going that far yet :)
Re: Show HN: Phoenix – a macOS window and app manager scriptable with JavaScript
#70Here's my configuration for Phoenix (with gifs): https://github.com/fabiospampinato/phoenix You might find it useful as a starting point or as a source of inspiration.
I got your link from an older post about Phoenix on HN. It’s really well done (as some replies to you on the older thread said)! Have you, by any chance, tried Hammerspoon (hammerspoon.org)? That seems to be tool with a broader feature set compared to Phoenix. I was looking for some kind of well analyzed and written comparison.
I have not tried Hammerspoon but I've skimmed through their docs, I'd say ultimately it boils down to: do you want to write JS or Lua? And do you need any of the Hammerspoon-specific features? I personally don't know any Lua and actually quite like writing JS, I don't think I need any of extra features HS provides, and with Phoenix you can still run a shell script and still achieve many things HS provides explicitly.