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  • Suggestion on How to Improve the Windows Switcher/Alt+Tab

Image below is mock-ups for my idea on how to improve the windows switcher/alt + tab. Please note that I'm not a programmer so I can't really do this. I'm just throwing the idea out there if someone wanted to do so. Please someone make this.
There is 2 feature that I wanted to suggest. The 1st follows 1-2-3-4. The 2nd follows 1-2-3a-4a.
I can't upload the picture to the forum for some reason so I'm going to leave an imgur link.

  1. Below I have 3 windows, Firefox, Spotify, and Inkscape. All of them are stacked covering one another on the desktop.
    https://imgur.com/3mfvQlh
  2. And then I press Alt+Tab. The windows will the repositioned and resized themselves in a way where all of them can fit in the desktop. This is toggled, pressing Alt+Tab again will make it return to the 1st picture above. After first pressing Alt+Tab, I could just use my pointer to click my desired windows that I wanted to get into.
    https://imgur.com/IQ9DccK
  3. Alternatively, I could press Alt+Tab again and it will create this outline surrounding one of the Windows. Pressing enter will "transport" ourself to the outlined windows in this case Firefox. If I decided to press enter, the windows will return to the 1st picture but Firefox is now on top.
    https://imgur.com/vWy2u5C
  4. Again, I could press Alt+Tab again and it will create this outline surrounding one of the Windows. Pressing enter will "transport" ourself to the outlined windows in this case Spotify. If I decided to press enter, the windows will return to the 1st picture but Spotify is now on top.
    https://imgur.com/5gLDnGc
    3a. Alternatively, I could press Alt+Tab again and it will highlight one of the Windows by darkening everything else. Pressing enter will "transport" ourself to the highlighted windows in this case Firefox. If I decided to press enter, the windows will return to the 1st picture but Firefox is now on top.
    https://imgur.com/T9Hu75A
    4a. Alternatively, I could press Alt+Tab again and it will highlight one of the Windows by darkening everything else. Pressing enter will "transport" ourself to the highlighted windows in this case Spotify. If I decided to press enter, the windows will return to the 1st picture but Spotify is now on top.
    https://imgur.com/QsOwWlh

Reason why this should be in Budgie:

  1. It's cool and neat
  2. It will really helps people with small screen space like laptop users which is the majority of people
  3. Adheres by Budgie philoshopy of minimalistic where with this, you don't need an annoying rectangle with symbol suddenly showing up on the middle of your screen, therefore decluttering your screen.

Ps. This is a GIMPed pictures of windows screenshots made by the screenshot applet. The ugly outline in picture 4 is caused by GIMP inability to make shapes or outline.

1-2-3-4 is just Expose style window management. That's something we've wanted to do for awhile, but is more a WM thing. We would not however use the Alt-Tab keystroke by default because it serves a different purpose. Expose is for mouse driven input typically. Alt-Tab is for keyboard selection.

1-2-3a-4a is mostly there already with active vs inactive window styling. That's really up to the theme though.

    Fatih19 iirc the CSS attributes are there so say which window should be highlighted, but the theme is not taking advantage of them.

      Is it possible to force them to utilize it through the desktop environment? Because this feature, IMO really differentiates Budgie from Gnome.

        Fatih19 Not really. We don't control the theme when the built-in Budgie theme is turned off.

            DataDrake If the built-in Budgie theme is turned on how do I activate this feature?

              You can't. We don't have the extra theming either, just the CSS attributes.

              If possible, could this be an addition to Budgie 11? Would be epic and refreshing to the eyes of newcomers that just came to Solus and tried it out. Would this be a hard feature to develop knowing that, as you said, the foundation is already there?

                If roadmap predictions/goals are met, it looks like an exciting year (at least infrastructure wise) for Solus. Exactly how much of a visible change on the desktop isn't clear yet. However, it's best to build on a solid underpinning structure.