@marco-lackovic; In 12.04, by default Alt-tab will only switch between
windows on the currently visible workspace(s).
** Description changed:
The new Unity alt-tab switcher aggregates windows from all workspaces and
groups them by application.
This replaces the old default, which would switch through windows on the
current workspace only.
The omission of the ability to switch between windows only on the current
workspace removes some core functionality of workspaces.
It creates impracticalities for using workspaces in a keyboard-driven
workflow. I will illustrate these below.
For this discussion I presume that the user has more than one window on
some or all workspaces, since otherwise much of the point of workspaces
becomes moot.
Previous keyboard driven alt-tab workflow:
User moves to relevant workspace with ctrl-alt-[arrow]. They alt-tab to
select the desired window on that workspace.
If the user has grouped windows together on a workspace because they want to
use them together, for example a word processor and some open PDFs, switching
quickly between them while typing is straightforward and fast. If they tab to
the wrong window it will gain focus and they will quickly tab to the new one.
Keyboard driven workflow using new alt-tab:
Ctrl-alt-[arrow] becomes redundant, since alt-tab will take the user to
whichever workspace the application is on, so the user is no longer directly
using the spacial workspace concept. Alt-tab may take longer to navigate
because it contains all windows on all workspaces.
Switching between windows intentionally grouped onto one workspace becomes
more laborious because there are many erroneous windows. Furthermore, if the
user accidentally selects the wrong window it can be quite dizzying since they
are unexpectedly whisked away to another workspace, then back again when they
select the right one.
This raises the question: why use the spacial concept of workspaces at
all, when the window must be selected from a single long list anyway?
The solution is to add a new shortcut for cycling between windows on a
single workspace (and without grouping them by application). That is,
the old behavior but on a new key combination.
I propose that the most elegant keybinding for this would be ctrl-alt-
tab, because this links well with the keys for moving between
workspaces, enabling a smooth flow for selecting a workspace and then a
window on it.
Proposed ctrl-alt-tab workflow:
User moves to relevant workspace with ctrl-alt-[arrow]. Continuing to hold
ctr-alt down, they may use tab to select the desired window on that workspace.
Moving between windows intentionally grouped onto a workspace is again fast
and efficient.
+
+ --------------------------------------------
+
+ Desired Solution:
+
+ - In 12.04, by default Alt-tab should only switch between windows on the
+ currently visible workspace (or workspaces in the case of multiple
+ monitors).
** Changed in: unity
Status: Fix Committed => Confirmed
** Changed in: unity (Ubuntu)
Status: Fix Committed => Confirmed
** Changed in: ayatana-design
Status: Fix Released => Triaged
** Changed in: ayatana-design
Assignee: (unassigned) => John Lea (johnlea)
** Changed in: ayatana-design
Importance: Undecided => High
** Tags added: udp
** Changed in: unity
Milestone: None => backlog
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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/863399
Title:
Unity needs a way to switch (tab) between windows on current workspace
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