i3 FAQ - Individual question feed

application switcher?

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 16:35:59 +0000

I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next. TIA Albert

Comment by bruno.braga for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 14:02:11 +0000

awesome question!

Answer by Mario Sandler for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 02:25:12 +0000

Comment by bruno.braga for

echo -ne "i3-ipc\x0\x0\x0\x0\x4\x0\x0\x0" | 
    socat STDIO UNIX-CLIENT:`i3 --get-socketpath` | 
    tail -c +15 |
    sed -e 's/"id":/\n"id":/g' | 
    sed -ne 's/.*"name":"\([^"]\+\)".*"window":\([0-9]\+\).*/\1 \2/p' |
    dmenu -i -l 7 -b |
    sed -ne 's/.* \([0-9]*\)/[id=\1] focus/p' |
    (read cmd; i3-msg "$cmd")

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 14:03:19 +0000

neat... but neither this nor the simpleswitcher can grab a window from scratchpad... (not sure how should be the behaviour though)... they are in the list, but nothing happens.

Comment by Mario Sandler for

echo -ne "i3-ipc\x0\x0\x0\x0\x4\x0\x0\x0" | 
    socat STDIO UNIX-CLIENT:`i3 --get-socketpath` | 
    tail -c +15 |
    sed -e 's/"id":/\n"id":/g' | 
    sed -ne 's/.*"name":"\([^"]\+\)".*"window":\([0-9]\+\).*/\1 \2/p' |
    dmenu -i -l 7 -b |
    sed -ne 's/.* \([0-9]*\)/[id=\1] focus/p' |
    (read cmd; i3-msg "$cmd")

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 13:31:14 +0000

yes that one was a joke. i'm currently using this https://gist.github.com/anonymous/5152046

Comment by Michael for

echo -ne "i3-ipc\x0\x0\x0\x0\x4\x0\x0\x0" | 
    socat STDIO UNIX-CLIENT:`i3 --get-socketpath` | 
    tail -c +15 |
    sed -e 's/"id":/\n"id":/g' | 
    sed -ne 's/.*"name":"\([^"]\+\)".*"window":\([0-9]\+\).*/\1 \2/p' |
    dmenu -i -l 7 -b |
    sed -ne 's/.* \([0-9]*\)/[id=\1] focus/p' |
    (read cmd; i3-msg "$cmd")

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 10:37:28 +0000

Parsing JSON in shell is really fugly and fragile. I recommend not using this solution (or any other shell solution).

Answer by chilicuil for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Mon, 08 Jun 2015 21:50:51 +0000

I reworked Rasi solution to avoid python and bash, it behaves exactly the same but with less dependencies (dmenu and sh) https://github.com/minos-org/minos-tools/blob/master/tools/dmenu-i3-window-jumper

Answer by sml for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Sat, 10 May 2014 17:54:45 +0000

I'm using a ruby script, with this map: bindsym $mod+g exec ~/.i3/window-jump The advantages of this script are that it only requires dmenu, finds windows in the scratch space, and focuses by unique ID rather than title.

#!/usr/bin/ruby
require 'json'

# recursively walk tree to find all containers
# return an array of names followed by [id]
def get_containers tree
    containers = []
    # try to return only useful containers
    if (tree['nodes']+tree['floating_nodes']).empty? && tree['type'] == 2 &&
        !(tree['name'] =~ /^i3bar for output/)
        containers << tree['name'] + " [#{tree['id']}]"
    end
    (tree['nodes'] + tree['floating_nodes']).each do |node|
        containers += get_containers(node)
    end
    containers
end

IO.popen(['dmenu', '-i', '-p', 'window jump'], 'r+') do |dmenu|
    dmenu.puts(get_containers(JSON.load(`i3-msg -t get_tree`)))
    dmenu.close_write
    id = dmenu.read.split(/\[|\]/).last
    exec "i3-msg [con_id=#{id}] focus"
end

Answer by Rasi for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 16:39:38 +0000

#!/bin/bash #source ~/.config/teiler/config DMENU_OPTS="-fn "Source\Code\Pro-12" -nb #000000 -nf #a0a0a0 -sb #0c73c2 -sf #ffffff -l 18 -p $(basename $0)" # Present a menu with all windows TITLE="$(i3-msg -t get_tree | python -mjson.tool | sed -n -e 's/^ \{35\}[ ]\+\"name\": \"$.*$\", $/\1/p' | sed '/^#[a-F0-9]\{6\}$/d' | dmenu $DMENU_OPTS)" if [ -z "$TITLE" ] ; then exit 1 fi # Escape some characters to prevent i3 to interpret them as a pattern # "(" and ")" replaced with "$" and "$" TITLE="$(echo "$TITLE" | sed 's/$[()]$/\\\1/g')" # Focus window i3-msg "[title=\"$TITLE\"] focus"

Comment by thuswa for

#!/bin/bash
#source ~/.config/teiler/config
DMENU_OPTS="-fn "Source\Code\Pro-12" -nb #000000 -nf #a0a0a0 -sb #0c73c2 -sf #ffffff -l 18 -p $(basename $0)"

# Present a menu with all windows
TITLE="$(i3-msg -t get_tree | python -mjson.tool | sed -n -e 's/^ \{35\}[ ]\+\"name\": \"\(.*\)\", $/\1/p' | sed '/^#[a-F0-9]\{6\}$/d' | dmenu $DMENU_OPTS)"

if [ -z "$TITLE" ] ; then
   exit 1
fi

# Escape some characters to prevent i3 to interpret them as a pattern
# "(" and ")" replaced with "\(" and "\)"
TITLE="$(echo "$TITLE" | sed 's/\([()]\)/\\\1/g')"

# Focus window
i3-msg "[title=\"$TITLE\"] focus"

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 22:18:50 +0000

thanks for your reply. I'll maybe try that approach as well in the near future.

Answer by lkraav for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 17:40:52 +0000

Not sure if this isn't a duplicate of my question: https://faq.i3wm.org/question/228/how-do-i-find-an-app-buried-in-some-workspace-by-its-title/ Anyway, the i3-py solution there works great for me.

Answer by badboy_ for
I find my self lost among all workspaces and application windows. Is there an application switcher that can be used with i3? Or is there a way to get something similar. All I want is a list of the active application widows which I can tab through to switch to the window i want to go to next.

TIA

Albert

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 16:39:05 +0000

I use [quickswitch](https://github.com/badboy/quickswitch-for-i3) (or the original one in python: [quickswitch.py](https://github.com/proxypoke/quickswitch-for-i3)). There is also a more fancy version: [simpleswitcher](https://github.com/DaveDavenport/simpleswitcher)

Comment by badboy_ for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Mon, 16 Dec 2013 10:29:04 +0000

@oldos2er: It simply uses dmenu, with the python version you can specify the command using the `-d` (or `--dmenu`) switch to quickswitch.py, my ruby version has the command hardcoded in the source.

Comment by oldos2er for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Tue, 10 Dec 2013 20:02:51 +0000

quickswitch works well, but does anyone know how to enlarge its font?

Comment by thuswa for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Sat, 02 Mar 2013 22:17:34 +0000

thanks for that one, I settled with quickswitch.py it works as expected.

i3 FAQ - Individual question feed

application switcher?

Comment by badboy_ for I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py). There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Comment by oldos2er for I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py). There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Comment by thuswa for I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py). There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Comment by badboy_ for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Comment by oldos2er for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher

Comment by thuswa for
I use quickswitch (or the original one in python: quickswitch.py).

There is also a more fancy version: simpleswitcher