Do any window managers allow me to snap windows to the sides of the display?
https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/850
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16-10-2019 - |
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Can you recommend a Window Manager for the Mac? I would like to have a keyboard shortcut that would snap a windows to the left or right half of my screen.
Solution 3
After testing SizeUp and Breeze, I've decided that Breeze fits my needs the best. Both allow you to position windows on the left, right, or Fullscreen. The feature that sold it for me was setting a default size & position for an application and assigning it a shortcut key.
OTHER TIPS
SizeUp is exactly what you need:
SizeUp allows you to quickly position a window to fill exactly half the screen (splitscreen), a quarter of the screen (quadrant), full screen, or centered via the menu bar or configurable system-wide shortcuts (hotkeys). Similar to "tiled windows" functionality available on other operating systems.
Divvy
Divvy is a little menubar app that allows you to automatically resize any active window. Divviy virtually divides your screen into a 6x6 grid. When invoked, Divvy brings up a little HUD in the middle of the screen with this 6x6 grid. Depending on what part of your screen you want to resize your active window, just drag and select those squares on the HUD and the window does the rest. It’s that simple.
Moom
I've heard some people talk this one up too:
Do you spend a lot of time moving and zooming windows, so you can better see and work with all the content on your Mac? Instead of doing that work yourself, let Moom handle the task for you.
If you have a magic mouse or magic trackpad, BetterTouchTool is better as you can set specific gestures to manage the windows. Like a four finger left swipe can be to resize the window to the left 50% of the screen.
Moom is great. You can snap windows to: full screen, half screen, quarter screen. You can also resize with a grid. It supports custom keyboard shortcuts, too.
I personally use SizeUp and Divvy on a daily basis. If I had known about ShiftIt earlier, I probably wouldn't have paid for SizeUp. Another one to check out that hasn't been mentioned yet is BetterTouchTool, which has a lot of other features, but hidden in the advanced options is a nice feature they call "Window Snapping" which snaps the window to the left or right of the screen when you drag it to the side. Doesn't have keyboard shortcut functionality included, but it is a nice supplement to SizeUp and Divvy.
I found here from an off topic question on Stack Overflow:
There were two Open Source mangers mentioned there that did not show up on this list:
- Spectacle -> http://spectacleapp.com/
- Slate -> https://github.com/jigish/slate (setup requires work on the command line)
Another from the App Store
Here is an Applescript that will tile all of the open windows in the frontmost application. Add to ~/Library/Scripts and call from the Applescript menu in the menu bar. Add salt to taste (and free).
--tile windows of frontmost applications in a grid
--this script is useful for
--multiple window chatting
--working side by side of several windows of the same app
--make need to make it as a stay open application later
--for now assume that it is opened and closed per invokation
property horizontalSpacing : 10 -- sets the horizontal spacing between windows
property verticalSpacing : 10 -- sets the vertical spacing between windows
property maxRows : 2
property maxCols : 2
on run {}
local a
set userscreen to my getUserScreen()
--display dialog (getFrntApp() as string)
try
set applist to getFrntApp()
if length of applist = 0 then
return
end if
set a to item 1 of getFrntApp()
on error the error_message number the error_number
display dialog "Error: " & the error_number & ". " & the error_message buttons {"OK"} default button 1
end try
try
tileScriptable(a, userscreen)
on error the error_message number the error_number
--display dialog "Error: " & the error_number & ". " & the error_message buttons {"OK"} default button 1
try
tileUnscriptable(a, userscreen)
on error the error_message number the error_number
display dialog "Error: " & the error_number & ". " & the error_message buttons {"OK"} default button 1
end try
end try
end run
on tileScriptable(a, screen)
local i, c
set i to 1
tell application named a
set theWindows to every window of application a whose visible is true and floating is false and ¬
modal is false -- and miniaturized is false
set c to count theWindows
if c = 0 then
return
end if
set tiles to calTileBounds(c, screen, 1)
repeat with theWindow in theWindows
my tileScriptableWindow(a, theWindow, item i of tiles)
set i to i + 1
end repeat
end tell
end tileScriptable
on tileUnscriptable(a, screeninfo)
-- unscriptable app
local i, c
set i to 1
tell application "System Events"
set theWindows to (every window of application process a)
--set theWindows to my filterUnscriptableInvisible(theWindows)
set c to count theWindows
if c = 0 then
return
end if
--display dialog screeninfo as string giving up after 5
set tiles to my calTileBounds(c, screeninfo, 1)
repeat with theWindow in theWindows
--display dialog (class of visible of theWindow)
my tileUnScriptableWindow(a, theWindow, item i of tiles)
set i to i + 1
end repeat
end tell
end tileUnscriptable
on filterUnscriptableInvisible(ws)
-- filter out from ws windows that are docked
set newws to {}
set docklist to getNamesDocked()
--display dialog (docklist as string)
repeat with theWindow in ws
if name of theWindow is not in docklist then
set end of newws to theWindow
end if
end repeat
--display dialog (count newws)
return newws
end filterUnscriptableInvisible
on getNamesDocked()
tell application "System Events" to tell process "Dock"'s list 1
set l to name of UI elements whose subrole is "AXMinimizedWindowDockItem"
end tell
return l
end getNamesDocked
on tileScriptableWindow(a, w, bound)
tell application a
set bounds of w to bound
end tell
end tileScriptableWindow
on tileUnScriptableWindow(a, w, bound)
tell application "System Events"
--display dialog (count position of w)
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to " "
set position of w to {(item 1 of bound), (item 2 of bound)}
-- why the -5?
set size of w to {(item 3 of bound) - (item 1 of bound) - 5, ¬
(item 4 of bound) - (item 2 of bound) - 5}
--display dialog (count properties of w)
end tell
end tileUnScriptableWindow
on calTileBounds(nWindows, screen, direction)
-- return a list of lists of window bounds
-- a simple tile algo that tiles along direction (current only 1=horizontal)
local nrows, nColumns, irow, icolumn, nSpacingWidth, nSpacingHeight, nWindowWidth, nWindowHeight
set {x0, y0, availScreenWidth, availScreenHeight} to screen
set ret to {}
set nrows to (nWindows div maxCols)
if (nWindows mod maxCols) ≠ 0 then
set nrows to nrows + 1
end if
if nrows < maxRows then
set nSpacingHeight to (nrows - 1) * verticalSpacing
set nWindowHeight to (availScreenHeight - nSpacingHeight) / nrows
else
set nSpacingHeight to (maxRows - 1) * verticalSpacing
set nWindowHeight to (availScreenHeight - nSpacingHeight) / maxRows
end if
repeat with irow from 0 to nrows - 1
if nrows ≤ maxRows and irow = nrows - 1 then
set nColumns to nWindows - irow * maxCols
else
set nColumns to maxCols
end if
set nSpacingWidth to (nColumns - 1) * horizontalSpacing
set nWindowWidth to (availScreenWidth - nSpacingWidth) / nColumns
set nTop to y0 + (irow mod maxRows) * (verticalSpacing + nWindowHeight)
--display dialog "Top: " & nTop buttons {"OK"} default button 1
repeat with icolumn from 0 to nColumns - 1
set nLeft to x0 + (icolumn) * (horizontalSpacing + nWindowWidth)
set itile to {¬
nLeft, ¬
nTop, ¬
nLeft + nWindowWidth, ¬
nTop + nWindowHeight}
set end of ret to itile
--display dialog item 3 of itile as string
--set itile to {x0 + (icolumn - 1) * wgrid, y0, wgrid, hgrid}
--set item 3 of itile to ((item 1 of itile) + (item 3 of itile))
--set item 4 of itile to ((item 2 of itile) + (item 4 of itile))
end repeat
end repeat
return ret
end calTileBounds
on getFrntApp()
tell application "System Events" to set frntProc to ¬
name of every process whose frontmost is true and visible ≠ false
return frntProc
end getFrntApp
on getUserScreen()
-- size of the menubar
tell application "System Events"
set {menuBarWidth, menuBarHeight} to size of UI element 1 of application process "SystemUIServer"
--display dialog "Menubar width: " & menubarWidth & ", height: " & menubarHeight
set dockApp to (application process "Dock")
set {dockWidth, dockHeight} to size of UI element 1 of dockApp
--display dialog "Dock width: " & dockWidth & ", height: " & dockHeight
set dockPos to position of UI element 1 of dockApp
--display dialog "Dock x: " & (item 1 of dockPos) & ", y: " & (item 2 of dockPos)
end tell
-- size of the full screen
(*
{word 3 of (do shell script "defaults read /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver | grep -w Width") as number, ¬
word 3 of (do shell script "defaults read /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver | grep -w Height") as number}
*)
tell application "Finder"
set screenSize to bounds of window of desktop
set screenWidth to item 3 of screenSize
set screenHeight to item 4 of screenSize
end tell
--display dialog "Screen width: " & screenWidth & ", height: " & screenHeight
-- by default, set the available screen size to the full screen size
set availableWidth to screenWidth
set availableHeight to screenHeight - menuBarHeight
set availableX to 0
set availableY to menuBarHeight
--determine the userscreen origin and size
-- case 0: hidden dock
-- if (item 1 of dockPos < 0 or item 1 of dockPos ≥ screenHeight) then
-- no need to change anything
-- end if
-- case 1: bottom dock
if ((item 2 of dockPos) + dockHeight = screenHeight) then
set availableHeight to availableHeight - dockHeight
end if
-- case 2: left dock
if (item 1 of dockPos = 0) then
set availableWidth to availableWidth - dockWidth
set availableX to dockWidth
end if
-- case 3: right dock
if ((item 1 of dockPos) + dockWidth = screenWidth) then
set availableWidth to availableWidth - dockWidth
end if
return {availableX, availableY, availableWidth, availableHeight}
end getUserScreen
Source: MacScripter via Google
From what I've seen and heard, Cinch is a great application for bringing the window management of Windows 7 to Mac OS X.
First of all, if free is important to you, get ShiftIt.
If convenience from a mouse is important to you, get Cinch. It's in the Mac App Store.
Finally if you have a Macbook or a Magic Trackpad, get JiTouch. It will allow you to assign a gesture to many, many things; one of which is full screen, half-left, half-right. Seriously check it out if you like gestures even a little. It's like having a mouse with 100+ buttons. JiTouch
MercuryMover
You might also look at MercuryMover, which gives you a range of window moving tools under a series of keyboard mappings. I used to use this a lot when struggling with a small laptop screen, and you can get it to flip a window to the edge of a screen etc. It most closely maps the 'move' system menu functionality that you get in normal Windows 'windows'.
As far as I understand you question, you want to stick the window to the edge of the screen, so that the side of the window is directly on the edge of the screen. This is now possible on macOS Sierra (10.12) natively.
All you need to do is to move the window you want to position (by clicking and dragging the top of the window) to the side that you want it to stick to. You need to do this slowly, or else it won't work. After you drag the window over to the edge, it will stick a while and that's when you should stop.
