Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

i3wm.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

411–420 of 454 posts

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#411

Post by webmaven »

ruste wrote: post #222
krebs_liebhaber wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont like Microsoft operating systems and wanted to try something different. I installed Linux. The installation process was very painful. Getting it to cooperate with the hardware was worse, and of course there is no real support. I finally got it halfway working. At that point, I found it was hard to learn, harder to get used to, and hardest to do anything useful since none of the programs were familiar. Two days…

I've been using linux for over a decade and never even _heard_ of this or something similar happening. AFAIK the only typical way to configure these things is through the BIOS, well below the OS level. It sounds like something got borked and the computer repair shop decided it was easier to blame linux than to figure out or explain what happened.

> [T]he computer repair shop decided it was easier to blame linux than to figure out or explain what happened.

Or they decided this was an opportunity to make an easy sale of some replacement hardware.

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#412

Post by webmaven »

zxexz wrote: post #228
krebs_liebhaber wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont like Microsoft operating systems and wanted to try something different. I installed Linux. The installation process was very painful. Getting it to cooperate with the hardware was worse, and of course there is no real support. I finally got it halfway working. At that point, I found it was hard to learn, harder to get used to, and hardest to do anything useful since none of the programs were familiar. Two days…

It would be truly impressive if the thousands of developers of the Linux kernel had, over the course of 30 years, managed to create an operating system that physically destroys your computer. I've half a mind that this comment is meant to be humorous. Anyway, sounds like your computer repair place was looking for a quick buck. At the very least, they have no idea what they're talking about.

> It would be truly impressive if the thousands of developers of the Linux kernel had, over the course of 30 years, managed to create an operating system that physically destroys your computer.

It used to be possible for malware to damage CPU, RAM, hard-drives, and CRTs deliberately, but the relevant techniques were fairly hardware-specific to begin with, and modern hardware is (for the most part) no longer vulnerable to these classes of attack[0].

But, I guess we don't really know what year this anecdote supposedly occurred.

[0] The one modern exception I'm aware of would be flash memory (aka SSDs), which can still be deliberately worn out with a little effort.

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#413

Post by siraben »

MarcScott wrote: post #315
siraben wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ooh, another NixOS user! I'm curious about your setup; Do you use the same NixOS configuration across machines? Do you use i3 with another desktop environment or by itself?

Same configuration across different machines (apart from hardware.nix). I have a configuration.nix, networking.nix and packages.nix that pretty much covers everything. Then there's my .emacs, bashrc and my i3/config files. There's probably a way to get those last three into my NixOS config, but I haven't really investigated that. I only use i3. Haven't found a reason to install another WM yet. I tend to use xrandr, p…

I see. I keep my Emacs configuration non-nixified but otherwise I use home-manager + stow for shell config and config dir stuff.

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#414

Post by qmmmur »

eeskildsen wrote: post #91

One of my favorite things about i3 is that it doesn't force itself on you when it's not needed. You can keep it "in the background" in tabbed mode, effectively using it like a non-tiling WM, as long as you want. Just let your windows pile up and switch between them with fuzzy search (rofi/Switcheroo). Then, once usage patterns emerge, you can tile to take advantage of spatial memory. Example: - Start i3 in tabbed mod…

Okay you'll need to enlighten me because this is exactly what I want. Currently I use keybinds on my Mac to snap windows to halves of the screen. I3 on my desktop does this automatically but I'd love if I could also have the freedom to let the windows stack up. What is the tabbed mode?

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#415

Post by arjunbajaj »

qmmmur wrote: post #414
eeskildsen wrote: post #91

One of my favorite things about i3 is that it doesn't force itself on you when it's not needed. You can keep it "in the background" in tabbed mode, effectively using it like a non-tiling WM, as long as you want. Just let your windows pile up and switch between them with fuzzy search (rofi/Switcheroo). Then, once usage patterns emerge, you can tile to take advantage of spatial memory. Example: - Start i3 in tabbed mod…

Okay you'll need to enlighten me because this is exactly what I want. Currently I use keybinds on my Mac to snap windows to halves of the screen. I3 on my desktop does this automatically but I'd love if I could also have the freedom to let the windows stack up. What is the tabbed mode?

Try `$mod+s` for stacking and `$mod+w` for tabbed.

Check out 2.2. Changing the container layout here: https://i3wm.org/docs/userguide.html

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#416

Post by Pumafied »

Steltek wrote: post #327
stfwn wrote: post #66

I used to be all in on Apple. On macOS I had a little program called Magnet to snap windows to sides and corners, and on my iPad (with external keyboard) I SSH’d into a VPS to write and run code there. I used Alfred and had all kinds of workflows in there. I thought it was great. But then during my AI studies I wanted some beefier hardware, which was just not affordable for me within Apple’s ecosystem, plus they only…

I'm jealous of you and others in this thread that shared this path. I've unfortunately been dragged in the other direction: I was a happy i3/Linux user and now I'm coping with a multi-monitor Mac setup which stubbornly refuses to support workflows which I find to be very fast and efficient. There are some tools (all $$) for Mac which attempt to replicate a tiling WM but Apple's support for it is extremely poor, affec…

It’s not full tiling but penc https://github.com/dgurkaynak/Penc meets my needs for tiling

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#417

Post by jsilence »

dugmartin wrote: post #356
jsilence wrote: post #206

For those wanting to try this without building a sane config from scratch regolith might be a nice option. Very easy install on Ubuntii, well thought out and built-in cheat sheet. https://regolith-linux.org/

I've been using regolith for a year or so now on both my work laptop (Dell XPS 13) and personal dev box (System 76 Meerkat) hooked to the same 44" TV monitor. Overall it has been a good experience. Once you get muscle memory for the shortcuts to move between windows and workspaces, resize and toggle fullscreen windows you can start really flying. The built-in cheatsheet mentioned by the parent poster helps to get the…

Totally agreeing on the reordeing windows topic. Usually I keep my windows fulls screen and only have two windows side by side when copying stuff.

In addition to that I have a semi transparent terminal and emacs in a floating window that I can move to the scratchpad with a global hotkey. This is much alike the visor console in Quake. Terminal has tmux. Very handy for a quick ping or htop without messing up the main window layout.

i3 config snippet for reference:

  # Visor terminal
  exec "st -c visor"
  bindsym $mod+a [class="visor"] scratchpad show
  for_window [class="visor"] move scratchpad;
  for_window [class="visor"] scratchpad show;
  for_window [class="visor"] floating enable;
  for_window [class="visor"] resize set width 100 ppt;
  for_window [class="visor"] sticky enable
  for_window [class="visor"] move position center;
  for_window [class="visor"] scratchpad show;

  # Visor style emacs window toggled by Meta+ "less than key"
  exec emacs -name emacs-server
  bindsym $mod+less [instance="emacs-server"] scratchpad show
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] move scratchpad
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] floating enable
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] move position 450px 0px
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] sticky enable
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] scratchpad show
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] resize set 950 1055
  for_window [instance="emacs-server"] scratchpad show

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#418

Post by miku86 »

abetlen wrote: post #279

My brand new laptop was stolen while I was in school and I had to finish the year with a used 10-inch netbook I borrowed from a friend. Because of the tiny display and underpowered processor I had to get creative, I installed Arch plus i3 and it worked like a charm. In fact, I noticed my productivity actually went up. Eventually I got a new laptop, I switched off Arch to Ubuntu but I've been using i3 ever since. If y…

To manage different layouts: https://github.com/klaxalk/i3-layout-manager.

Workflow:

1. Arrange your windows how you like

2. Save the layout

3. Open the windows

4. Load the layout

Repeat 3 and 4.

Nicely done with rofi/dmenu.

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#419

Post by SJetKaran »

SxC97 wrote: post #399
SJetKaran wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I moved from linux to mac for work stuff. Really miss the I3 functionality; yabai fills that gap mostly but not all the way.

Do you mind expanding a bit on that thought? What gaps aren’t filled with yabai?

I3's scratchpad would be one. And title bars when windows are stacked or tabbed is another nice touch.

Re: I3: Improved Tiling Window Manager

#420

Post by new23d »

chrismorgan wrote: post #141
new23d wrote: post #21

> Implement multi-monitor correctly, that is by assigning each workspace to a virtual screen. Especially make sure that attaching and detaching new monitors like video projectors works during operation and does the right thing. Also provide support for rotated monitors. My wishlist would be to have this go further and be aware of inter-monitor, relative positioning as well. For example, I use the ⊢ layout (one rotate…

What you’re asking for feels like the antithesis of each workspace being assigned to a virtual screen, which says “these are physically disjoint spaces”. You seem to be seeking a move command that’s willing to violate this abstraction, penetrating workspace boundaries. (Or if not, I’m not sure what you could mean; floating windows are the only other case I can think of that could be affected in any way.) The only pri…

Your assessment is accurate. I have realised I may be asking for something that is indeed the _antithesis_ for this project.

For me though, the two monitors are just one screen which I should have total flexibility over. And workspaces are a way to switch context -- to a different set of tasks.

The ⊢ shaped arrangement is the result of a tendency towards more squarish (than wide-screen) canvas. I still manage to find 16:10s (as opposed to 16:9s) in that vain.

Post reply on HN