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Windows and workspaces

How the split is chosen

A new window splits the space of the window that had focus. Whether it splits beside or below depends on which way that space is longer, which usually matches what you were about to do anyway.

When it does not, Super + Ctrl + G flips the split of the focused window, and Super + Ctrl + Z and Super + Ctrl + V decide the direction the next window will take before you open it.

Resizing

Super + Shift plus Y, O, B, M adjusts width; I, U, N and comma adjust height. These are inverted from what their letters suggest, on purpose, and the reason is written in config/dot/hypr/keybinds.lua next to the binds.

For anything finer, hold Super and drag with the right mouse button.

Fullscreen and floating

Super + U makes the focused window fullscreen. Super + Ctrl + C lifts it out of the layout to float, and Super + Ctrl + Shift + C pins it so it follows you between workspaces. A floating window can be moved by holding Super and dragging with the left button.

Workspaces

Ten you can jump straight to, on Alt + 1 through Alt + 0, though they are created and destroyed as you use them rather than sitting there empty. Alt + H and Alt + L step between neighbours — right past the last one makes a new one, left from the first stays put — and Alt + Shift plus a number sends the current window somewhere without following it.

On a machine with more than one display, workspaces belong to whichever screen has focus. If you would rather pin workspaces one through ten to your main display and give the second screen its own, that is a switch on the Displays settings page.

How windows share the space — the layout, the master area, gaps and window edges — is Shell Tiling. The workspace switches themselves, and the projects below, are Shell Workspaces.

The touchpad

Three fingers sideways moves between workspaces and follows your fingers as it goes; three fingers up opens the overview and three down closes it. Those are GNOME's gestures, reproduced, and they do not move.

Four fingers are yours. Each of the four directions can be given a job — a shell action, a window or workspace move — from the same list your own shortcuts pick from, on Input Mouse & Touchpad. Assigning one reloads the compositor, so expect a beat of black before it works. Unassigned directions are left alone rather than bound to nothing.

Rules for one application

Some windows want the same treatment every time: the password manager should float, chat should open on workspace four, a picture viewer should not be resized to fill half the screen. Application window rules on Shell Tiling is where that is written down. You pick an application and tick what should happen to it — float, center it, pin it to every workspace, give it a fixed size or a workspace to open on — rather than writing a match pattern. Panama's own surfaces cannot be targeted, and a rule with nothing ticked is refused rather than saved as a row you would wonder about later.

Projects

A project is the set of windows you open together: which applications, which workspace each was on, and for a terminal, which directory it was in.

Arrange things the way you want them, then run Save Layout as Project from the launcher. Open Project lays it out again on free workspaces, so it never lands on top of what you are already doing. An application that refuses to open twice is moved into place rather than launched again.