9 ms·

Windows 10 Virtual Desktop Enhancer

135 points by edgartaor 10y ago

ZenoArrow 10y ago
Looks like it could be useful. For anyone who wants to play with Windows 10 virtual desktops, just FYI, can use the keyboard shortcut Win + Ctrl + Left Arrow/Right Arrow to move between virtual desktops (might have to create a second virtual desktop before this works, I can't remember).
- Moogs 10y ago
  And to quickly create a 2nd virtual desktop: Win+Tab and there's a "New Desktop" button in bottom right
  - iamlukesky 10y ago
    Or ctrl+win+D
- edgartaor 10y ago
  With this tool you can move a window to a different virtual desktop with a customizable shortcut.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    Yes I can see that, I was just pointing out a standard Windows shortcut that was worth knowing (for those with an interest in using virtual desktops).
- antaviana 10y ago
  Does it also work if I have a Remote Desktop RDP session at full screen? In my Mac configuration where I have several RDP sessions, I can switch from full screen RDP to full screen RDP with Ctrl+Alt+Left/Right, which is a joy (I have an IBM Model M without Win key). I have not managed to do something similar with W10.
hs86 10y ago
Independent virtual desktops per monitor would be my most missing feature in Windows 10's implementation. Just something similar to the "Displays have separate Spaces" feature from macOS.
- wiiittttt 10y ago
  Xmonad has a similar feature as well.
- nizmow 10y ago
  This was the #1 thing I was hoping this would provide when I clicked on the link. Basically stops me from even bothering to use virtual desktops on Windows, I got so used to having my laptop screen as a "persistent" desktop with stuff I always wanted to see on it.
- pzone 10y ago
  Pinning stuff across all desktops is an OK solution for me. I just put Emacs up on my left monitor and it stays there.
ChuckMcM 10y ago
One of the interesting things that Apple seems to do in MacOS is to remember specific screens. Plugging into them recalls a previous display arrangement setup. I noticed this when I had two external screens at work, and one at home, and when I moved my Macbook between work and home the arrangement would stay correct, even though they were on either side at work and above at home. Sadly this is something Windows 10 does not do well. When I plug my Surface Pro into an external monitor my app moves from the laptop screen to the external screen and stays 'full screen'. Here is a simple example of what I would appreciate if it existed: I am at work, I am connected to two large screens. I put Outlook on my right screen at about 1/4 the size of the screen. I disconnect, all my windows jump to the laptop screen (great) and I have outlook in full screen mode. Now I reconnect my dual monitors. I'd love Outlook to jump back to where it was, and the size it was, on that right screen when I unplugged. Now I get home and plug into a 2K screen (rather than the 4K screen at work) and I want Outlook to be a bit larger on that screen. When I unplug I want it back on my laptop full screen, when I plug in at work, back to the right monitor quarter size, when I get home back to the monitor about half size. Remember which screens I plug into, remember what the app settings were when I last plugged into that screen. Restore them when I re-attach.
- nxc18 10y ago
  I think part of the challenge might be related to adapter use. On my MBP, I connect either through HDMI or a displayport->VGA adapter. My MBP exhibits the behavior you mention if the displays are on difference adapters, but it doesn't recognize different displays plugged into the same port/adapter (e.g. all HDMI displays are the same to it, all VGA displays are the same to it). My Surface only has a minidisplayport port, and I suspect the adapter I'm using isn't fancy enough to tell the Surface that the attached displays are in fact different. Definitely a bummer though. and 4k support in general on Windows 10 (and macOS, but less so) is a little iffy. Issues really start to show when remoting into a session on a device hooked up to a 4k monitor.
  - ChuckMcM 10y ago
    The question is fingerprinting the monitor. In the HDMI world you can get the serial number from the EDID record usually. If you're in an adapter which is interposing as a 'virtual' monitor between you and the real monitor all bets are off. We had an old Matrox unit that would take 3 DVI monitors and make them appear as one monitor for example. On the surface dock the dual monitors connect to the dock's DP connectors.
xjwm 10y ago
These looks like some nice additions to the Windows 10 virtual desktop. I remember playing with Compiz (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compiz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compiz) on SUSE Linux back when Windows Vista was still in beta, and thinking how futuristic the multi-desktop functionality was.
joezydeco 10y ago
Got excited for a minute when I saw "Virual Desktop" on Win10 and then saw it changes nothing about the desktops themselves. Unless I'm totally missing something, is there a way to make Win10 believe the desktop size is larger than the video screen size? With or without device resolution indepdence, I don't care. Let it scroll or something. It's just really sucky when I'm trying to debug an application that expects a large monitor (ala 1280x960 or something) and my laptop only has 1366x768. Qt literally says "screw it, I'm clipping your window" in these cases.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  This may be what you're looking for, though I've not tried it myself: https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/5990-dpi-scaling-level-displays-change-windows-10-a.html https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/5990-dpi-scaling-level-d...
  - joezydeco 10y ago
    No, this only works in the positive direction (making pixels bigger so vision-impaired people can read text, for example). What I need is this setup, but be able to go lower than 100%. So if I chose 50% for example, my 1366x768 LCD actually looks like a 2732x1536 desktop to Windows. Win10 won't go lower than 100%.
    - ZenoArrow 10y ago
      Looks like there may be a way around it with a registry change: http://superuser.com/a/80154/591014 http://superuser.com/a/80154/591014 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/hardware/commercialize/manufacture/desktop/dpi-related-apis-and-registry-settings https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/hardware/commercial...
- cbartlett 10y ago
  Depends on your video adaptor/card, but nvidia supports Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR), and AMD supports Virtual Super Resolution, both of which essentially allow you to bump your res beyond the max. In the nvidia control panel, have a look in '3D settings' > 'Manage 3D settings' > 'DSR - Factors' and you can change the resolution multiplier. (Not sure why it's in 3D settings, as it applies to the desktop along with anything else).
itaysk 10y ago
I'm a heavy user of virtual desktops in win 10, I see how this makes my life a little better. A feature that Win 10 has and I was missing in mac (maybe they have it by now) was that desktops doesn't share taskbar and open windows states. So if you Alt+Tab you see only windows in current desktop. Same as using taskbar. A feature I'm still missing is to save the state of all opened windows, and to have different icons on taskbar and desktop per virtual desktop (like separate computers). Also there's a bug where chrome windows from all desktops just to the first desktop after waking from sleep.
Ciantic 10y ago
I happen to have written the DLL this app uses, and boy collecting that information can be time consuming. It's mind-boggling how Microsoft still can't come up simple APIs for their new features. Most annoying part for me with Windows 10's virtual desktops is simple thing: flashing task bar buttons appear on all desktops! It drove me nuts, every time I was focusing on some other desktop, some annoying program flashed it's button and it appeared on the desktop I was using. I happen to have written a in-memory patch for explorer.exe to disable flashing task bar buttons all together. AHK script also: https://github.com/Ciantic/DisableFlashingTaskbarButtons https://github.com/Ciantic/DisableFlashingTaskbarButtons
- UnoriginalGuy 10y ago
  I'd take the obnoxious flashing over applications stealing focus. If there was a single design change I'd make to Windows, it would be to make it impossible for one application to steal focus from another (without user intervention). TweakUI used to do this via the "Prevent Applications from Stealing Focus" checkbox on the General -> Focus tab. But TweakUI ended with XP/2003 Server unfortunately. To give an example, I was typing away in Word, really on a roll, and suddenly Apple's iTunes auto updater had focused ate an entire sentence and my concentration was destroyed. Thanks Windows.
  - jackhack 10y ago
    This is the one "killer feature" that keeps me on a Mac. Stealing focus is more than annoying -- it's dangerous. When a Windows dialog pops up with focus set to "OK", all it takes is a press of the space bar and poof! you've just "clicked" OK on God knows what. Even worse, now that it's dismissed, you can't go back and see what you just OKed. The next 30 seconds are sure to be spent wondering "what's about to happen? Will the system reboot? Did I just install an upgrade? Or open the firewall? or ???"
    - taneq 10y ago
      Agreed, this is probably my #1 pet hate on any modern OS, along with the "web page loads a new element somewhere above the cursor just as I click, sending my click to a new and unwanted place."
m0ngr31 10y ago
I wrote something similar a while back: https://github.com/m0ngr31/VirtualDesktopManager https://github.com/m0ngr31/VirtualDesktopManager I switched to Linux soon after though, so I'm sure this project is much better now.
matthewking 10y ago
Coming from macOS my main issues with win10 virtual desktops were 1) the inability to save and persist my desktop configuration through reboots, 2) the inability to assign specific apps to always open on a particular desktop and 3) being able to define shortcuts, I use ctrl+1-5 on my Mac and it's become muscle memory to jump directly between desktops. Having quickly scanned the link it looks like it may provide the key shortcuts so that's one step forward. The other two issues are probably closely related so I'm hopeful these will be possible in one form or another eventually.
- mariusmg 10y ago
  Try a "real" virtual desktop app, not the Windows 10 toy. http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/ http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/
RaleyField 10y ago
Why is it suddenly acceptable to post(run?) random binaries from a random anon dude? No, thanks fsb.
wluu 10y ago
One thing Windows I'd really like is to make any full screen window into a "virtual desktop" so I can switch between full screen items using the Windows 10 shortcut keys (eg: win+ctrl+left/right). Eg: * Multiple concurrent Remote Desktops running in full screen? Make them all separate virtual desktops so you can switch between and manage them like you can with virtual desktops.
withinrafael 10y ago
Plugging a Frida hook I developed to let you seamlessly CTRL-ALT-LEFT/RIGHT to have rdp-sessions-as-virtual-desktops and be able to switch back and forth. Niche but changed the way I use VMs forever. https://github.com/riverar/remotedesktop-keyfilter https://github.com/riverar/remotedesktop-keyfilter
Eun 10y ago
Reminds me on https://github.com/Eun/MoveToDesktop https://github.com/Eun/MoveToDesktop
nickjj 10y ago
Have you looked into using DexPot for Windows? It's the best virtual desktop tool I've used on any platform. http://www.dexpot.de/?lang=en http://www.dexpot.de/?lang=en
vijucat 10y ago
I've never grokked Virtual Desktops (I used to use DexPot years ago on XP). You anyway carry the list of windows open in your head in that horrible background energy-sucking way that multi-tasking does to you (not to mention the fancy wallpaper background that you set to remind yourself the purpose of each desktop, all multiplied by number of virtual desktops!). Instead, I write down all the TODOs that I need to attend to after the most important thing (or use JIRA), and just focus on that one thing. The number of windows open = what I need right now to get work done. One thing at a time + work after good rest + be good at it + love what you do = productivity. It's a narrow path. Skip any of these and you're fooling yourself, IMHO.
- mixedCase 10y ago
  In my case I keep using the same desktops for the same things. I keep the main browser instance on 1, my main work is on 3, music is on 9 and so on. With an indicator on my top bar that tells me which virtual desktop has windows open and some weeks of use, it became second nature and now cannot live without such a system without losing productivity big time. Anything else feels extremely inefficient!
  - vijucat 10y ago
    Interesting, thanks! :-)

135 points by edgartaor 10y ago

Looks like it could be useful. For anyone who wants to play with Windows 10 virtual desktops, just FYI, can use the keyboard shortcut Win + Ctrl + Left Arrow/Right Arrow to move between virtual desktops (might have to create a second virtual desktop before this works, I can't remember).

Moogs 10y ago
And to quickly create a 2nd virtual desktop: Win+Tab and there's a "New Desktop" button in bottom right
- iamlukesky 10y ago
  Or ctrl+win+D
edgartaor 10y ago
With this tool you can move a window to a different virtual desktop with a customizable shortcut.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  Yes I can see that, I was just pointing out a standard Windows shortcut that was worth knowing (for those with an interest in using virtual desktops).
antaviana 10y ago
Does it also work if I have a Remote Desktop RDP session at full screen? In my Mac configuration where I have several RDP sessions, I can switch from full screen RDP to full screen RDP with Ctrl+Alt+Left/Right, which is a joy (I have an IBM Model M without Win key). I have not managed to do something similar with W10.

hs86 10y ago

Independent virtual desktops per monitor would be my most missing feature in Windows 10's implementation. Just something similar to the "Displays have separate Spaces" feature from macOS.

wiiittttt 10y ago
Xmonad has a similar feature as well.
nizmow 10y ago
This was the #1 thing I was hoping this would provide when I clicked on the link. Basically stops me from even bothering to use virtual desktops on Windows, I got so used to having my laptop screen as a "persistent" desktop with stuff I always wanted to see on it.
pzone 10y ago
Pinning stuff across all desktops is an OK solution for me. I just put Emacs up on my left monitor and it stays there.

ChuckMcM 10y ago

One of the interesting things that Apple seems to do in MacOS is to remember specific screens. Plugging into them recalls a previous display arrangement setup. I noticed this when I had two external screens at work, and one at home, and when I moved my Macbook between work and home the arrangement would stay correct, even though they were on either side at work and above at home. Sadly this is something Windows 10 does not do well. When I plug my Surface Pro into an external monitor my app moves from the laptop screen to the external screen and stays 'full screen'. Here is a simple example of what I would appreciate if it existed: I am at work, I am connected to two large screens. I put Outlook on my right screen at about 1/4 the size of the screen. I disconnect, all my windows jump to the laptop screen (great) and I have outlook in full screen mode. Now I reconnect my dual monitors. I'd love Outlook to jump back to where it was, and the size it was, on that right screen when I unplugged. Now I get home and plug into a 2K screen (rather than the 4K screen at work) and I want Outlook to be a bit larger on that screen. When I unplug I want it back on my laptop full screen, when I plug in at work, back to the right monitor quarter size, when I get home back to the monitor about half size. Remember which screens I plug into, remember what the app settings were when I last plugged into that screen. Restore them when I re-attach.

nxc18 10y ago
I think part of the challenge might be related to adapter use. On my MBP, I connect either through HDMI or a displayport->VGA adapter. My MBP exhibits the behavior you mention if the displays are on difference adapters, but it doesn't recognize different displays plugged into the same port/adapter (e.g. all HDMI displays are the same to it, all VGA displays are the same to it). My Surface only has a minidisplayport port, and I suspect the adapter I'm using isn't fancy enough to tell the Surface that the attached displays are in fact different. Definitely a bummer though. and 4k support in general on Windows 10 (and macOS, but less so) is a little iffy. Issues really start to show when remoting into a session on a device hooked up to a 4k monitor.
- ChuckMcM 10y ago
  The question is fingerprinting the monitor. In the HDMI world you can get the serial number from the EDID record usually. If you're in an adapter which is interposing as a 'virtual' monitor between you and the real monitor all bets are off. We had an old Matrox unit that would take 3 DVI monitors and make them appear as one monitor for example. On the surface dock the dual monitors connect to the dock's DP connectors.

xjwm 10y ago

These looks like some nice additions to the Windows 10 virtual desktop. I remember playing with Compiz (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compiz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compiz) on SUSE Linux back when Windows Vista was still in beta, and thinking how futuristic the multi-desktop functionality was.

joezydeco 10y ago

Got excited for a minute when I saw "Virual Desktop" on Win10 and then saw it changes nothing about the desktops themselves. Unless I'm totally missing something, is there a way to make Win10 believe the desktop size is larger than the video screen size? With or without device resolution indepdence, I don't care. Let it scroll or something. It's just really sucky when I'm trying to debug an application that expects a large monitor (ala 1280x960 or something) and my laptop only has 1366x768. Qt literally says "screw it, I'm clipping your window" in these cases.

ZenoArrow 10y ago
This may be what you're looking for, though I've not tried it myself: https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/5990-dpi-scaling-level-displays-change-windows-10-a.html https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/5990-dpi-scaling-level-d...
- joezydeco 10y ago
  No, this only works in the positive direction (making pixels bigger so vision-impaired people can read text, for example). What I need is this setup, but be able to go lower than 100%. So if I chose 50% for example, my 1366x768 LCD actually looks like a 2732x1536 desktop to Windows. Win10 won't go lower than 100%.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    Looks like there may be a way around it with a registry change: http://superuser.com/a/80154/591014 http://superuser.com/a/80154/591014 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/hardware/commercialize/manufacture/desktop/dpi-related-apis-and-registry-settings https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/hardware/commercial...
cbartlett 10y ago
Depends on your video adaptor/card, but nvidia supports Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR), and AMD supports Virtual Super Resolution, both of which essentially allow you to bump your res beyond the max. In the nvidia control panel, have a look in '3D settings' > 'Manage 3D settings' > 'DSR - Factors' and you can change the resolution multiplier. (Not sure why it's in 3D settings, as it applies to the desktop along with anything else).

itaysk 10y ago

I'm a heavy user of virtual desktops in win 10, I see how this makes my life a little better. A feature that Win 10 has and I was missing in mac (maybe they have it by now) was that desktops doesn't share taskbar and open windows states. So if you Alt+Tab you see only windows in current desktop. Same as using taskbar. A feature I'm still missing is to save the state of all opened windows, and to have different icons on taskbar and desktop per virtual desktop (like separate computers). Also there's a bug where chrome windows from all desktops just to the first desktop after waking from sleep.

Ciantic 10y ago

I happen to have written the DLL this app uses, and boy collecting that information can be time consuming. It's mind-boggling how Microsoft still can't come up simple APIs for their new features. Most annoying part for me with Windows 10's virtual desktops is simple thing: flashing task bar buttons appear on all desktops! It drove me nuts, every time I was focusing on some other desktop, some annoying program flashed it's button and it appeared on the desktop I was using. I happen to have written a in-memory patch for explorer.exe to disable flashing task bar buttons all together. AHK script also: https://github.com/Ciantic/DisableFlashingTaskbarButtons https://github.com/Ciantic/DisableFlashingTaskbarButtons

UnoriginalGuy 10y ago
I'd take the obnoxious flashing over applications stealing focus. If there was a single design change I'd make to Windows, it would be to make it impossible for one application to steal focus from another (without user intervention). TweakUI used to do this via the "Prevent Applications from Stealing Focus" checkbox on the General -> Focus tab. But TweakUI ended with XP/2003 Server unfortunately. To give an example, I was typing away in Word, really on a roll, and suddenly Apple's iTunes auto updater had focused ate an entire sentence and my concentration was destroyed. Thanks Windows.
- jackhack 10y ago
  This is the one "killer feature" that keeps me on a Mac. Stealing focus is more than annoying -- it's dangerous. When a Windows dialog pops up with focus set to "OK", all it takes is a press of the space bar and poof! you've just "clicked" OK on God knows what. Even worse, now that it's dismissed, you can't go back and see what you just OKed. The next 30 seconds are sure to be spent wondering "what's about to happen? Will the system reboot? Did I just install an upgrade? Or open the firewall? or ???"
  - taneq 10y ago
    Agreed, this is probably my #1 pet hate on any modern OS, along with the "web page loads a new element somewhere above the cursor just as I click, sending my click to a new and unwanted place."

m0ngr31 10y ago

I wrote something similar a while back: https://github.com/m0ngr31/VirtualDesktopManager https://github.com/m0ngr31/VirtualDesktopManager I switched to Linux soon after though, so I'm sure this project is much better now.

matthewking 10y ago

Coming from macOS my main issues with win10 virtual desktops were 1) the inability to save and persist my desktop configuration through reboots, 2) the inability to assign specific apps to always open on a particular desktop and 3) being able to define shortcuts, I use ctrl+1-5 on my Mac and it's become muscle memory to jump directly between desktops. Having quickly scanned the link it looks like it may provide the key shortcuts so that's one step forward. The other two issues are probably closely related so I'm hopeful these will be possible in one form or another eventually.

mariusmg 10y ago
Try a "real" virtual desktop app, not the Windows 10 toy. http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/ http://virtuawin.sourceforge.net/

RaleyField 10y ago

Why is it suddenly acceptable to post(run?) random binaries from a random anon dude? No, thanks fsb.

wluu 10y ago

One thing Windows I'd really like is to make any full screen window into a "virtual desktop" so I can switch between full screen items using the Windows 10 shortcut keys (eg: win+ctrl+left/right). Eg: * Multiple concurrent Remote Desktops running in full screen? Make them all separate virtual desktops so you can switch between and manage them like you can with virtual desktops.

withinrafael 10y ago

Plugging a Frida hook I developed to let you seamlessly CTRL-ALT-LEFT/RIGHT to have rdp-sessions-as-virtual-desktops and be able to switch back and forth. Niche but changed the way I use VMs forever. https://github.com/riverar/remotedesktop-keyfilter https://github.com/riverar/remotedesktop-keyfilter

Eun 10y ago

Reminds me on https://github.com/Eun/MoveToDesktop https://github.com/Eun/MoveToDesktop

nickjj 10y ago

Have you looked into using DexPot for Windows? It's the best virtual desktop tool I've used on any platform. http://www.dexpot.de/?lang=en http://www.dexpot.de/?lang=en

vijucat 10y ago

I've never grokked Virtual Desktops (I used to use DexPot years ago on XP). You anyway carry the list of windows open in your head in that horrible background energy-sucking way that multi-tasking does to you (not to mention the fancy wallpaper background that you set to remind yourself the purpose of each desktop, all multiplied by number of virtual desktops!). Instead, I write down all the TODOs that I need to attend to after the most important thing (or use JIRA), and just focus on that one thing. The number of windows open = what I need right now to get work done. One thing at a time + work after good rest + be good at it + love what you do = productivity. It's a narrow path. Skip any of these and you're fooling yourself, IMHO.

mixedCase 10y ago
In my case I keep using the same desktops for the same things. I keep the main browser instance on 1, my main work is on 3, music is on 9 and so on. With an indicator on my top bar that tells me which virtual desktop has windows open and some weeks of use, it became second nature and now cannot live without such a system without losing productivity big time. Anything else feels extremely inefficient!
- vijucat 10y ago
  Interesting, thanks! :-)