GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 661119
Merge behavior of Alt+Tab and Alt+`
Last modified: 2012-11-02 17:05:04 UTC
PRELIMINARY NOTE: I am NOT looking for the existing alternate-tab extension. PLEASE READ my whole problem description. After using the GNOME Shell for a while to get used to it, I find the default Alt+Tab task switcher extremely frustrating. The main issue with issue with it is its grouping of windows by application and having to navigate the windows within a particular application using Alt+` rather than Alt+Tab. I do find the visual aspect of the grouping appealing, however. What causes me to run into problems is that I often have multiple GVIM and/or Chrome windows open, along with a Terminal. If I run some commands in my Terminal, then edit some text in GVIM, pressing Alt+Tab easily switches me back to the last window I was using---the Terminal. However, say I use my terminal to pipe something into a new GVIM instance, look at that GVIM instance, then switch to another GVIM window that I have open in order to edit some source code. I want to switch to the previous window I was looking at, which was a GVIM instance. By muscle memory, I'll press Alt+Tab. But instead, oops! I'm looking at the terminal. I forgot I had to press Alt+`. I don't want to have to keep mental note of whether the last window I focused was within the same application or not. This totally kills my workflow, and I'm constantly pressing the wrong shortcut. There is an extension available at https://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/Extensions that does not group windows by application. However, it also does away with the grouping of windows by workspace, and I do like the grouping by workspace. Why have workspaces at all if they don't separate your windows? Other problems with this extension include the window previews being too small, the window list being just plain ugly, and the window list being difficult to use once you get too many windows. As a result, I've had to resort to using the Activities window for any task switching, which is still a pain because I have to hunt for the window I want every time. This is a real drain on my productivity. In order to fix what I think is a very disruptive error in usability, I think that there should at least be an option to give Alt+Tab the combined ability of Alt+`, as well. An idea I had would be to add this combined switcher as a third global keybinding after switch_group and switch_windows. To clarify what I mean by combined ability, currently Alt+Tab switches through applications (but not the windows within an application), and Alt+` is needed to switch through the windows within an application. The combined switcher would switch through windows regardless of which application they belong to, ordered by the time they were last focused.
Can you try a combination of the patches in bug #660367 and bug #660502 and see if they help your productivity?
Sure. I've never compiled my own version of Gnome before, so please forgive me if it takes a while to give you some feedback regarding those patches.
If you back up what you patch, you can apply the patches directly on your system. I believe the JS files are in /usr/share/gnome-shell/, so: $ patch -p1 /usr/share/gnome-shell/ should do it.
erm. $ curl -L http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=197796 | patch -p1 /usr/share/gnome-shell and do so for the other attachments.
I'm not certain I have a complete understanding of all the changes you made in those patches yet, but here's my feedback based on the behavior I've grasped so far. To use a similar example to the one I described above, let's say I have one terminal window open and two gvim windows. It used to be that while focused on the terminal windows, pressing Alt+` would do absolutely nothing. Now it switches to the last focused gvim window. This is great! However, pressing Alt+` a second time focuses the second gvim window, which is not the behavior I'd expect. Instead, I believe it should return to the terminal window. This is progress, though! Thank you for paying attention to this issue.
Using alt+` for moving between windows of the current application is a fine extension to the standard alt+tab behavior. But this should *not* change the behavior of alt+tab. At the very least, add an option for alt+tab to move between every open window equally (within the current workspace). This is the behavior I expect from every other environment I've used, and it is the behavior I desire since if I have multiple windows of an application open (for example a web browser or terminal) then they are NOT related.
(In reply to comment #0) > PRELIMINARY NOTE: I am NOT looking for the existing alternate-tab extension. > PLEASE READ my whole problem description. > > After using the GNOME Shell for a while to get used to it, I find the default > Alt+Tab task switcher extremely frustrating. The main issue with issue with it > is its grouping of windows by application and having to navigate the windows > within a particular application using Alt+` rather than Alt+Tab. I do find the > visual aspect of the grouping appealing, however. > > What causes me to run into problems is that I often have multiple GVIM and/or > Chrome windows open, along with a Terminal. If I run some commands in my > Terminal, then edit some text in GVIM, pressing Alt+Tab easily switches me back > to the last window I was using---the Terminal. However, say I use my terminal > to pipe something into a new GVIM instance, look at that GVIM instance, then > switch to another GVIM window that I have open in order to edit some source > code. I want to switch to the previous window I was looking at, which was a > GVIM instance. By muscle memory, I'll press Alt+Tab. But instead, oops! I'm > looking at the terminal. I forgot I had to press Alt+`. > > I don't want to have to keep mental note of whether the last window I focused > was within the same application or not. This totally kills my workflow, and I'm > constantly pressing the wrong shortcut. > > There is an extension available at https://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/Extensions > that does not group windows by application. However, it also does away with the > grouping of windows by workspace, and I do like the grouping by workspace. Why > have workspaces at all if they don't separate your windows? Other problems with > this extension include the window previews being too small, the window list > being just plain ugly, and the window list being difficult to use once you get > too many windows. > > As a result, I've had to resort to using the Activities window for any task > switching, which is still a pain because I have to hunt for the window I want > every time. This is a real drain on my productivity. > > In order to fix what I think is a very disruptive error in usability, I think > that there should at least be an option to give Alt+Tab the combined ability of > Alt+`, as well. An idea I had would be to add this combined switcher as a third > global keybinding after switch_group and switch_windows. > > To clarify what I mean by combined ability, currently Alt+Tab switches through > applications (but not the windows within an application), and Alt+` is needed > to switch through the windows within an application. The combined switcher > would switch through windows regardless of which application they belong to, > ordered by the time they were last focused. You could ask the extension developer to include the missing features you desire, or request/make another extension to preform such function.
Jeremy Newton, that's sort of what this ticket is... You'll notice that it's filed under the extensions component of Gnome-Shell... Anyway, I don't really care *how* it gets done as long as it gets done eventually.
(In reply to comment #8) > Jeremy Newton, that's sort of what this ticket is... You'll notice that it's > filed under the extensions component of Gnome-Shell... Anyway, I don't really > care *how* it gets done as long as it gets done eventually. Oh I see, sorry bout that, I misinterpreted your request.
I should point out that the AlternateTab extension (https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/15/alternatetab/) now behaves as I'd expect. It has definitely improved since the last time I looked at it. I'm fine with marking this bug as fixed if no one else objects.
(In reply to comment #10) > I should point out that the AlternateTab extension [...] now behaves as I'd > expect. [...] I'm fine with marking this bug as fixed if no one else objects. Sure, let's do this then.