How do I change the orientation of an existing container?

answered Jul 30 '13

vandannen
752 ●8 ●18 ●25

In order to toggle between vertical and horizontal split layout in the currently focused container, you could just use the i3 command layout toggle split.

answered Jun 7 '12

bruno.braga
836 ●13 ●21 ●39 http://brunobraga.net/

If you have a container with 2 windows A and B split vertically (B under A), and you want to change it to horizontally, just:

• focus on A
• mod+h
• move focus to B
• mod+Shift+Arrow (move B "into" A)

this should do the trick.

Sometimes, when I want to move a window into different containers, I usually move them to floating mode, go to the new container (and set the mode h/v) and focus back on the floating window and move it to tiled again. Very cool the things you can do with these simple commands!

answered Jul 30 '13

denten
3 ●1 ●1 ●2

Use mod + shift + j|k|l|; to switch the orientation dynamically once you have a split.

answered Jul 5 '14

Hibou57
273 ●8 ●14 ●26

updated Jul 5 '14

You can use the layout command with a splitv or splith argument (here, without a space before H or V!). You can bind a keystroke to these commands if you wish, in your i3's configuration file.

As an example, here is what stands in my configuration (I got ride of $mod+e):

bindsym $mod+v layout splitv
bindsym $mod+h layout splith
bindsym $mod+s layout stacking
bindsym $mod+w layout tabbed

bindsym $mod+Shift+h split h
bindsym $mod+Shift+v split v

With this, $mod+h and $mod+v acts for the tilling orientation like $mod+w and $mod+s act for the overlapping orientation (not toggling, directly specifying an orientation instead), and creation of a split container is as before, except it needs a shift modifier.