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I'm not a fan of alt-tabbing either. I use 4 20" displays currently because I like the convenience of maximizing something on one display. Don't you miss that w

I'm not a fan of alt-tabbing either. I use 4 20" displays currently because I like the convenience of maximizing something on one display. Don't you miss that with one big desktop?

__david__ 13y ago
Forgive me for not understanding, but how does having multiple large monitors help avoid alt-tabbing? Seems to me that if you have several open apps then to type into one of them you have to either move your hand to the mouse and click it or you have to alt-tab. Even if you have "focus follows mouse" then you still have to move the mouse over to the window before you can type…
- topbanana 13y ago
  It's more for display than data entry. For example, when I'm debugging I like to be able to see the local variables, call stack, threads, modules, log entries and of course the code, without switching tabs or bringing anything to the front. But I only really need to manipulate the code.
- bhauer 13y ago
  topbanana already provided the key point in his response—visibility of a great deal of context. It's especially useful for programming, allowing for, for example, related code side-by-side. A large desktop also allows some user interface paradigms such as drag-and-drop to work more elegantly. Drag-and-drop on a small monitor is often frustrated by the need to first arrange the source and destination so that both are visible at the same time. Generally speaking, a large amount of desktop space allows you to spend less time fussing with windows to get at what you need and more time just working.
  - jgroszko 13y ago
    > Drag-and-drop on a small monitor is often frustrated by the need to first arrange the source and destination so that both are visible at the same time. At least in Windows and KWin, drag to the destination window's icon in the task bar and it should come to the front... But yes, still not as convenient.
dragonwriter 13y ago
> I'm not a fan of alt-tabbing either. I use 4 20" displays currently because I like the convenience of maximizing something on one display. Don't you miss that with one big desktop? There's no fundamental reason you would have to -- if you have a window manager that extends the "drag to the side to half-maximize" behavior that Windows 7 has to, say, include dragging to the corner to "quarter-maximize" (ideally, with four appropriate keyboard shortcuts, one per corner, so you could do it without dragging, as well.)
- nthnclrk 13y ago
  Tangentially related, for anyone looking for this functionality on the Mac, do yourself a favour and get Cinch. http://www.irradiatedsoftware.com/cinch/ http://www.irradiatedsoftware.com/cinch/
  - robszumski 13y ago
    Divvy is also widely used. http://mizage.com/divvy/ http://mizage.com/divvy/
    - eddyg 13y ago
      Or the extremely configurable Slate: https://github.com/jigish/slate https://github.com/jigish/slate
  - __david__ 13y ago
    Better Touch Tool also has that functionality: http://boastr.de/ http://boastr.de/ I primarily use it to map three finger click to middle mouse button, but when I discovered it also had the window-sizing-by-dragging-to-the-edge feature I turned it on and have been very happy with it..
  - taude 13y ago
    I use Spectacle because it's free and I hate having to pay for each feature on OS X that windows has by default. I miss Aero Snap so much, but Spectacle does a decent-enough job. http://spectacleapp.com/ http://spectacleapp.com/

I'm not a fan of alt-tabbing either. I use 4 20" displays currently because I like the convenience of maximizing something on one display. Don't you miss that with one big desktop?

__david__ 13y ago

Forgive me for not understanding, but how does having multiple large monitors help avoid alt-tabbing? Seems to me that if you have several open apps then to type into one of them you have to either move your hand to the mouse and click it or you have to alt-tab. Even if you have "focus follows mouse" then you still have to move the mouse over to the window before you can type…

topbanana 13y ago
It's more for display than data entry. For example, when I'm debugging I like to be able to see the local variables, call stack, threads, modules, log entries and of course the code, without switching tabs or bringing anything to the front. But I only really need to manipulate the code.
bhauer 13y ago
topbanana already provided the key point in his response—visibility of a great deal of context. It's especially useful for programming, allowing for, for example, related code side-by-side. A large desktop also allows some user interface paradigms such as drag-and-drop to work more elegantly. Drag-and-drop on a small monitor is often frustrated by the need to first arrange the source and destination so that both are visible at the same time. Generally speaking, a large amount of desktop space allows you to spend less time fussing with windows to get at what you need and more time just working.
- jgroszko 13y ago
  > Drag-and-drop on a small monitor is often frustrated by the need to first arrange the source and destination so that both are visible at the same time. At least in Windows and KWin, drag to the destination window's icon in the task bar and it should come to the front... But yes, still not as convenient.

dragonwriter 13y ago

> I'm not a fan of alt-tabbing either. I use 4 20" displays currently because I like the convenience of maximizing something on one display. Don't you miss that with one big desktop? There's no fundamental reason you would have to -- if you have a window manager that extends the "drag to the side to half-maximize" behavior that Windows 7 has to, say, include dragging to the corner to "quarter-maximize" (ideally, with four appropriate keyboard shortcuts, one per corner, so you could do it without dragging, as well.)

nthnclrk 13y ago
Tangentially related, for anyone looking for this functionality on the Mac, do yourself a favour and get Cinch. http://www.irradiatedsoftware.com/cinch/ http://www.irradiatedsoftware.com/cinch/
- robszumski 13y ago
  Divvy is also widely used. http://mizage.com/divvy/ http://mizage.com/divvy/
  - eddyg 13y ago
    Or the extremely configurable Slate: https://github.com/jigish/slate https://github.com/jigish/slate
- __david__ 13y ago
  Better Touch Tool also has that functionality: http://boastr.de/ http://boastr.de/ I primarily use it to map three finger click to middle mouse button, but when I discovered it also had the window-sizing-by-dragging-to-the-edge feature I turned it on and have been very happy with it..
- taude 13y ago
  I use Spectacle because it's free and I hate having to pay for each feature on OS X that windows has by default. I miss Aero Snap so much, but Spectacle does a decent-enough job. http://spectacleapp.com/ http://spectacleapp.com/