Window Management

Halves, thirds, quarters, maximize, center, the other display and restore, applied to the focused window from the keyboard.

palv0.1.0Productivitybundled

Install in pal

Ships inside pal. Installing puts an editable copy ahead of the bundled one.

Window Management: One row per layout; Enter applies it to the focused window
One row per layout; Enter applies it to the focused window
Window Management: Typing narrows by name and keyword: quarter, third, screen
Typing narrows by name and keyword: quarter, third, screen
Window Management: Arrange Window: pick a window first, then the layout for it
Arrange Window: pick a window first, then the layout for it
Window Management: The layouts again, with the picked window as the subtitle
The layouts again, with the picked window as the subtitle
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What it does

Window Management

Move and resize windows from the keyboard, Raycast's set: one row per layout, Enter applies it to the window you were in. pal hides its panel first, so the window with focus is the one behind the panel, not pal; the HUD then names the layout, or says why it did not happen ("Restore: nothing to restore", "Next Display: only one display").

layout id what
Left Half, Right Half, Top Half, Bottom Half left_half right_half top_half bottom_half half of the screen
Left Third, Center Third, Right Third left_third center_third right_third a third
Left Two Thirds, Right Two Thirds left_two_thirds right_two_thirds two thirds
Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right Quarter top_left_quarter top_right_quarter bottom_left_quarter bottom_right_quarter a quarter
Maximize maximize the whole screen
Almost Maximize almost_maximize almost_maximize_percent of the screen, centred
Center center the same size, centred
Reasonable Size reasonable_size reasonable_size_percent of the screen, centred
Next Display, Previous Display next_display previous_display the same place and proportions on the other display; refused with one
Restore restore back to where the window was before pal moved it

"The screen" is the display the window's centre is on, minus the menu bar, Dock or bars, minus gap on every side; the halves, thirds and quarters are equal cells with gap between them. Restore remembers, per window and in memory until pal quits, the frame a window had before a run of layouts started: moving the window by hand in between starts a new run, so Restore goes back to where you had put it.

Two palettes:

  • Window Management (window-management) is the layouts, indexed, so left half or quarter finds one from the root (each row carries keywords: split, corner, zoom, monitor, undo).
  • Arrange Window (arrange) is the same thing the other way round: an input palette of the open windows (minimised ones left out); Enter on one lists the layouts with that window's title as the subtitle, and Enter on a layout applies it there.

Keyboard

keys action
enter Apply the layout to the focused window
cmd+enter Apply to…: pick a window from the open ones, then the layout goes on that one
enter in Arrange Window Arrange: the layouts for the picked window

Per-layout global hotkeys, which move the focused window without showing pal at all, are item_hotkeys under the palette in the config file:

[palettes.window-management.item_hotkeys]
left_half = "ctrl+alt+left"
right_half = "ctrl+alt+right"
maximize = "ctrl+alt+enter"
restore = "ctrl+alt+backspace"

Setup

On macOS the frame is set through the window's AXPosition and AXSize, so it needs the Accessibility permission: without it Enter shows the same toast as paste and asks once. The displays are NSScreen's frames with visibleFrame for the usable part, so an auto-hidden menu bar or Dock gives the whole screen. Apps keep their minimum size and may round.

On Linux nothing to configure: Hyprland (movewindowpixel exact and resizewindowpixel exact; a tiled window is floated first, since an exact frame means nothing inside the tiling layout), Sway (floating enable, move absolute position, resize set) or X11 (wmctrl -i -r <id> -e, xrandr --listmonitors for the displays, xprop for the focused window).

Settings, [extensions.window-management]:

key type default what
gap number (px) 0 Pixels between a window and the screen edge, and between two windows of a split.
almost_maximize_percent number (%) 90 How much of the screen Almost Maximize fills.
reasonable_size_percent number (%) 60 How much of the screen Reasonable Size fills.

What it does not do

  • No custom layouts: the twenty above are the set; gap and the two percentages are the knobs.
  • No tiling or snapping as you drag; every move is a pick or a hotkey.
  • Restore forgets when pal quits: the frames are kept in memory only.
  • Sway and X11 are written to the tools' documented shapes and unit-tested on fixtures, not run against a live session yet.

Platforms

macOS (Accessibility API) and Linux (Hyprland, Sway, or X11 with wmctrl).

Palettes 2

  • Window Managementwindow-managementlist

    One row per layout; Enter applies it to the window you were in.

    • ↵Apply to the focused window
    • ⌘↵Apply to a window you pick
  • Arrangearrangeinput

    Pick a window first, then the layout.

    • ↵Pick the window, then its layout

Actions

  • ApplyThe layout on the focused window.↵
  • Apply to…Pick a window from the open ones, then the layout goes on that one.⌘↵
  • ArrangeIn Arrange Window: the layouts for the picked window.↵

Settings

Extension, [extensions.window-management]

gap
0px number

Pixels between a window and the screen edge, and between two windows of a split.

almost_maximize_percent
90% number

How much of the screen Almost Maximize fills, centred.

reasonable_size_percent
60% number

How much of the screen Reasonable Size fills, centred.

Defaults shown. Change them in pal's settings window or in the config file.