setwin

A Gnome shell extension to place and size windows with a single click

This extension adds a button to the status bar. When you click the button, the extension sets the size and location of each window according to rules you specify in a Json file.

setwin.json

The extension looks for the Json file as ~/.config/setwin.json.

The file is an array of Json objects like the following:

{
    "wmclass": "^Emacs$",
    "title": "@porcupine|@ursine",
    "workspace": 0,
    "x": 0,
    "y": 0,
    "width": 920,
    "height": -60
},

wmclass and title are regular expressions (Perl style). These fields are optional. Typically you'd specify one, or the other, or both.

If wmclass matches the window's class and if title matches the window's title, then this rule is applied.

workspace tells setwin to move the window to the specified workspace. The value is a 0-based index of the workspace, or -1 to make the window "sticky" (on all workspaces).

x and y set the window's position. If x is negative then it is calculated relative to the right side of the monitor. A negative y is relative to the bottom of the monitor.

width and height set the window's size. A negative width is relative to the monitor width. A negative height is relative to the monitor height. A 0 value means to maximize the width/height of the window.

If any of the fields workspace, x, y, width or height are missing, then the window is left unchanged regarding that setting. For example, if workspace is missing, then the window is left on whatever workspace it was originally on.

See the setwin.json file in this repository for an example.

Changing setwin.json

Each time you click the button, the extension re-reads setwin.json. You can experiment with rules by editing setwin.json using your favorite text editor and then click the button to see the effects immediately.

Installing & enabling the extension

Install the extension:

gnome-extensions pack [email protected]
gnome-extensions install --force [email protected]

Logout and log back in.

Enable the extension:

gnome-extensions enable [email protected]

Troubleshooting

If you make mistakes in the setwin.json file, the extension will log errors. Look for errors like this:

journalctl -f | grep gnome-shell

To check the Json syntax:

jq . ~/.config/setwin.json

To validate against the schema:

python3 -m jsonschema --instance setwin.json schema.json