Kwm started as a simple project to get true focus-follows-mouse support on OSX through event tapping.
It is now a tiling window manager that represents windows as the leaves of a binary tree.
Kwm runs a local daemon to read messages and trigger functions.
Kwmc can be used to write to Kwm's socket, and the included hotkeys.cpp uses this program to define
a mapping between keys and these functions. The config file ".kwmrc" also uses Kwmc to apply initial
settings upon startup. Because of this, Kwmc needs to be placed in your path to ensure that everything
works as expected. For information, check the readme located within the kwmc folder.
Kwm uses the event taps API (Quartz Event Services) to observe, filter and alter user input events prior
to their delivery to a foreground application.
This allows for functionality such as focus-follows-mouse, remapping keys, and most importantly global hotkeys
for interacting with Kwm, and so hotkeys.cpp can and should be customized by the user.
The user may use an external program for running a specific command on keypress instead.
Both autofocus and autoraise is available, however autofocus only redirects key input to the window below the cursor, the menubar is not accessible. By default Kwm is set to use autoraise as it is meant to be used alongside the tiling functionality, and so windows should not overlap unless a window is specifically made floating.
Multiple monitor support (in progress):
There are two supported ways to move a window between monitors.
The first one is by using kwmc screen -m prev|next|id.
The other option is to make the window floating and manually move it with the mouse, then un-float it.
Moving a window directly with the mouse WILL BREAK the window-trees of both monitors.
The first time a monitor is connected, the user may have to click several times on the screen for it to register.
After this step, moving the mouse to a different monitor should activate the monitor automatically.
Kwm requires access to osx accessibility. Creating a certificate and codesigning the binary works as well.
Tested on Osx El Capitan (10.11.1 / 10.11.2).
To compile Kwm, simply run the included build.sh script.
Because there is no app bundle, Kwm has to be started from a terminal.
By default, debug prints are enabled, and these can be turned off by opening the build.sh script
and getting rid of the -DDEBUG_BUILD flag.
In addition to this, for Kwm to work properly, the user also has to compile Kwmc and place it in
the path. Simply run the build.sh script located in the kwmc folder, and move / symlink the binary.
If Kwm is added to the path, a launcher script is necessary because it tries to load hotkeys.so from
the executables working-directory.
Example launcher script to be placed in the path instead of the Kwm binary.
#!/bin/bash
pushd /path/to/kwm
./kwm
popd
The reason for this is that hotkeys.cpp can edited and rebuild separately, and Kwm will reload this
library without having to be restarted and so hotkeys can be edited live.
If changes have been made to hotkeys.cpp, run the sobuild.sh script to recompile this file separately.
The default configuration file is $HOME/.kwmrc and is a script that contains Kwmc commands
to be executed when Kwm starts. This file can be used to blacklist applications and specify
other settings, as well as run any command not restricted to Kwmc.
A sample config can be found within the examples directory.
When Kwm starts, it will automatically tile the windows of the current space, using binary space partitioning.
This will also happen once for any other space the user might switch to.
When Kwm detects a new window, it inserts it into a window tree at the specified point using the split-mode specified.
When a window is closed, it will be removed from the window tree and the tree will be rebalanced.
By default, the insertion point is the focused window, but the user can mark a temporary insertion point to be used instead for the next insertion.
There are 3 types of split-modes available, these are optimal (width/height ratio), vertical and horizontal.
The default split-mode is set to optimal (width/height ratio).
Example:
a a a
/ \ --> / \ --> / \
1 2 1 b 1 b
/ \ / \
2 3 c 3
/ \
2 4
--------------------- --------------------- ---------------------
| | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | 2 | | | 2 | 4 |
| | | | | * | | | | |
| 1 | 2 | | 1 |---------| | 1 |---------|
| | * | | | | | | |
| | | | | 3 | | | 3 |
| | | | | | | | |
--------------------- --------------------- ---------------------
Kwm mainly consists of three panes so to speak. The main pane being the entire screen.
After at least 1 window insertion has occurred, the screen will consist of either a left and right pane,
or an upper and lower pane.
The width of the left/right pane can be changed, as well as the height of the upper/lower pane.
Currently these cannot occur simultaneously, and the type of panes created is decided by the main pane split-mode.
If the main pane is split using vertical mode, a left and right pane is created.
If the main pane is split using horizontal mode, an upper and lower pane is created.
- ctrl+alt+cmd:
- t: toggle focus-mode (autofocus -> autoraise -> disabled)
- r: manually resize window to its containersize
- q: Quit Kwm
- m: mark the container to use for next window split
- o: use width/height ratio to determine optimal split (default)
- 7: use vertical split-mode
- -: use horizontal split-mode
- s: toggle split-type of existing container
- h: move vertical-splitter left (increase width of right-pane containers)
- l: move vertical-splitter right (increase width of left-pane containers)
- j: move horizontal-splitter down (increase height of upper-pane containers)
- k: move horizontal-splitter up (increase height of lower-pane containers)
- f: toggle window fullscreen
- p: toggle window parent container
- w: toggle window floating
- enter: opens a new iTerm window
YTD player controls:
- <: toggle playback mode (fav / default)
- x: toggle play/pause
- v: stop player
- a: increase volume
- d: decrease volume
- z: play previous video
- c: play next video
- larrow: seek backward
- rarrow: seek forward
- ctrl+alt:
- p: send window to previous screen
- n: send window to next screen
- 1: send window to screen id 0
- 2: send window to screen id 1
- 3: send window to screen id 2
- x: increase horizontal gap
- y: increase vertical gap
- larrow: increase screen padding-left
- rarrow: increase screen padding-right
- uarrow: increase screen padding-top
- darrow: increase screen padding-bottom
- alt+cmd
- t: toggle tiling mode of current space (float|tile)
- r: rotate window-tree by 180 degrees
- h: focus previous window
- l: focus next window
- p: swap with the previous window
- n: swap with the next window
- m: swap with the marked window
- x: decrease horizontal gap
- y: decrease vertical gap
- larrow: decrease screen padding-left
- rarrow: decrease screen padding-right
- uarrow: decrease screen padding-top
- darrow: decrease screen padding-bottom