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> Virtual Desktops For the Win There's a few things about virtual desktops on OS X (the OS I use at work) that just absolutely kill them for me: 1. OS X will
by deathanatos 10y ago
> Virtual Desktops For the Win
There's a few things about virtual desktops on OS X (the OS I use at work) that just absolutely kill them for me:
1. OS X will re-order keyboard inputs when the inputs contain virtual desktop commands. That is, if you have two terminals open, one in one desktop, and one in another, and you type ^→¹ "hi", where "hi" ends up depends on how quickly you type the command. If you know the desktop on the right has a terminal, and you know what you want to run in that terminal, you have to switch, wait for the animation to complete, and then type the command; it's an artificial limitation on your speed.
2. OS X will re-order desktops. Which means I never know where, in this virtual space, the desktop I'm seeking is. The latest version of OS X made this even more annoying, because now if you do an exposé, you don't get thumbnails by default, so you can't even see where the desktop might have gotten moved to. (You have to grab the mouse and hover over the darn things.)
Compare this to the rather simplistic multidesktop functionality in MATE: desktops don't move. The switch is instant and keyboard input order is maintained. The space is 3D, not 2D. There are small thumbnails in your tray. (I could wish for some things from MATE, in particular, I don't know how/if it's possible to reorder whole desktops.)
[1]: (change to desktop to the right)
(Also, OS X will occasionally just get stuck in the middle of a desktop switch. As in, I'll have no hands on the mouse/keyboard, and I'll be looking at the left half of one desktop and the right half of another.)
Edit: I forgot 3. OS X will combine desktops if the set of attached displays changes. I really wish I could have it just move the desktops to the laptop, not combine them. (Also, I really wish that when the external display was reattached, that the windows would restore the size and layout they had; as it is, today they all get resized to the size of the smaller laptop screen — which makes sense while they're there, but once the external is back, I want the sizes back too.) I have no idea how MATE compares here.
- crymer11 10y agoFWIW, you can disable the "Automatically rearrange Spaces based on most recent use" option in the Mission Control Preferences panel.
- popol12 10y agoThanks anon !
- nkristoffersen 10y agoI was so happy when I found that setting. Was so frustrating before. I'd imagine the default is meant to function more like iOS
- gurkendoktor 10y agoFrustratingly, when you disable this option, new fullscreen windows will always be appended to the END of the list. If you have 3 spaces and click the green pill on a Safari window on space #1, it will become space #4, after all the others, instead of space #2. Reported to Apple, "works as intended". One more reason to never use macOS' built-in fullscreen mode.
- philsnow 10y agoCompletely agreed. There's no way to make the animation delay be zero, probably because Apple wants you to switch desktops with the motion commands and they want the motion to seem natural, but I have always set them up with <modifier>-1, -2, -3, etc, so I don't think "I want to go right", I think "I want desktop #5". I don't care which direction it's in. Also virtual desktops on OS X are completely broken when you plug multiple monitors in of different sizes. I always end up with hilariously mis-placed, mis-sized windows on both screens. This was how I learned about the "Zoom" item in the "Window" menu: even if you can't find the window decorations for a window (because they're outside the dimensions of your monitor), if you can cmd-tab to it, you can "zoom" it a few times and it will sometimes show up. Also, if you have any "memory pressure" at all, hope you're ready for minutes of beach balls when you plug / unplug the external monitor.
- aj_g 10y agoSame, this absolutely kills my flow when I'm expecting a certain screen after switching desktops and then OS X seemingly arbitrarily puts it into another random desktop.
- njitram 10y agoApparently Apple has enabled a feature to reduce/remove the motion when switching, not sure if that fixes point 1 above, but worth a try: http://apple.stackexchange.com/a/255220/183228 http://apple.stackexchange.com/a/255220/183228
- mayoff 10y agoThis changes the sliding animation to a cross-fade. I don't think it's any faster than the sliding animation.
- cauterized 10y agoTry TotalSpaces. Fixes a few of these problems.