Table of Contents
In the upper part of this control module you can see several tabs: Focus, Titlebar Actions, Window Actions, Moving and Advanced. In the Focus panel you can configure how windows gain or lose focus, i.e. become active or inactive. Using Titlebar Actions and Window Actions you can configure how titlebars and windows react to mouse clicks. Moving allows you to configure how windows move and place themselves when started. The Advanced options cover some specialized options involving moving windows between desktops and “window shading”.
Please note that the configuration in this module will not take effect if you do not use KDE's native window manager, KWin. If you do use a different window manager, please refer to its documentation for how to customize window behavior.
The “focus” of the desktop refers to the window which the user is currently working on. The window with focus is often referred to as the “active window”.
Focus does not necessarily mean the window is the one at the front — this is referred to as “raised”, and although this is configured here as well, focus and raising of windows are configured independently.
There are four methods KDE can use to determine the current focus:
A window becomes active when you click into it.
Moving the mouse pointer actively over a normal window activates it. New windows such as the mini command line invoked with Alt+F2 will receive the focus, without you having to point the mouse at them explicitly.
In other window managers, this is sometimes known as “Sloppy focus follows mouse”.
The window that happens to be under the mouse pointer becomes active. If the mouse is not over a window (for instance, it's on the desktop) the last window that was under the mouse has focus. New windows such as the mini command line invoked with Alt+F2 will not receive the focus, you must move the mouse over them to type.
Similar to Focus Under Mouse, but even more strict with its interpretation. Only the window under the mouse pointer is active. If the mouse pointer is not over a window, no window has focus. New windows such as the mini command line invoked with Alt+F2 will not receive the focus, you must move the mouse over them to type.
Note that Focus Under Mouse and Focus Strictly Under Mouse prevent certain features, such as the Alt+Tab walk-through-windows dialog, from working properly.
Once you have determined the focus policy, there are the window raising options.
By placing a mark in front of Auto raise, KDE can bring a window to the front if the mouse is over that window for a specified period of time. This is very useful with the Focus Follows Mouse option. You can determine the delay by using the slider bar/spin box combination.
Setting the delay too short will cause a rapid fire changing of windows, which can be quite distracting. Most people will like a delay of 100-300 ms. This is responsive, but it will let you slide over the corners of a window on your way to your destination without bringing that window to the front.
If you do not use Auto raise, make sure the Click raise active window option has a mark in front of it. You will not be happy with both Auto raise and Click raise active window disabled, the net effect is that windows are not raised at all.
In the Navigation frame you can configure the way switching between applications or desktops using Alt+Tab or Ctrl+Tab.
Switching applications using Alt+Tab, i.e. holding down Alt while repeatedly pressing the Tab key, can take place in KDE mode or in CDE mode: in KDE mode you will see a box in the middle of the screen showing you the currently selected application while you are still holding down the Alt key. In CDE mode focus goes to each new window as it's selected.
Next there is an option where you can choose to Traverse windows on all desktops or not. With this enabled, switching windows with Alt+Tab will show all windows, on all desktops, and take you to the appropriate desktop for the window you select. With it disabled, only windows on your current desktop are selectable with Alt+Tab, and you must use Ctrl+Tab to switch to other desktops yourself.
If you check the Desktop navigation wraps around checkbox, then after you reach the “last” desktop, pressing Tab again will select the first desktop again.
Many people name their virtual desktops according to their purpose or some other naming scheme. You may find it convenient to select the Popup desktop name on desktop switch, so you can quickly tell that you have switched to the right one.
In this panel you can configure what happens to windows when a mousebutton is clicked on their titlebars.
In this drop down box you can select either Shade, several variations of Maximize or Lower.
Selecting Maximize causes KDE to maximize the window whenever you doubleclick on the titlebar. You can further choose to maximize windows only horizontally or only vertically.
Shade, on the other hand, causes the window to be reduced to simply the titlebar. Double clicking on the titlebar again, restores the window to its normal size.
You can have windows automatically unshade when you simply place the mouse over their shaded titlebar. Just check the Enable hover check box in the Advanced tab of this module. This is a great way to reclaim desktop space when you are cutting and pasting between a lot of windows, for example.
This section allows you to determine what happens when you single click on the titlebar or frame of a window. Notice that you can have different actions associated with the same click depending on whether the window is active or not.
For each combination of mousebuttons, modifiers, Active and Inactive, you can select the most appropriate choice. The actions are as follows:
Make this window active.
Will move this window to the bottom of the display. This will get the window out of the way.
Just like it says. Nothing happens.
Will bring up a small submenu, where you can choose window related commands (i.e. Maximize, Minimize, Close, etc.).
Will bring the window to the top of the display. All other windows which overlap with this one, will be hidden “below” it.
This will raise windows which are not on top, and lower windows which are already on top.
This part of the module, allows you to configure what happens when you click on an inactive window, with any of the three mouse buttons.
Your choices are as follows:
This makes the clicked window active, raises it to the top of the display, and passes a mouse click to the application within the window.
This makes the clicked window active and passes a mouse click to the application within the window.
This simply makes the clicked window active. The mouse click is not passed on to the application within the window.
This makes the clicked window active and raises the window to the top of the display. The mouse click is not passed on to the application within the window.
This bottom section, allows you to configure additional actions, when a modifier key (by default Alt) is pressed, and a mouse click is made on a window.
Once again, you can select different actions for , and button clicks.
Your choices are:
Will move this window to the bottom of the display. This will get the window out of the way.
Allows you to drag the selected window around the desktop.
Just like it says. Nothing happens.
Will bring the window to the top of the display. All other windows which overlap with this one, will be hidden “below” it.
Allows you to change the size of the selected window.
This will raise windows which are not on top, and lower windows which are already on top.
The options here determine how windows appear on screen when you are moving them. Most of these options exact a price in performance, so if you want to streamline your desktop, you should turn them off. However, if you have a fast computer, they may make your day a little more pleasant, so leave them on.
Enable this option if you want a window's content to be fully shown while moving it, instead of just showing a window “skeleton”. The result may not be satisfying on slow computers without graphic acceleration.
Enable this option if you want a window's content to be shown while resizing it, instead of just showing a window “skeleton”. The result, again, may not be satisfying on slower computers.
Enable this option if you want a popup tooltip to tell you the size in pixels of a window as you resize it.
When enabled, this feature activates the border of maximized windows, and allows you to move or resize them just as you can normal windows.
The placement policy determines where a new window will appear on the desktop. Smart will try to achieve a minimum overlap of windows, Cascade will cascade the windows, and Random will use a random position. Centered will open all new windows in the center of the screen, and Zero-Cornered will open all windows with their top left corner in the top left corner of the screen.
The rest of this page allows you to configure the Snap Zones. These are like a magnetic field along the side of the desktop and each window, which will make windows snap alongside when moved near.
Here you can set the snap zone for screen borders. Moving a window within the configured distance will make it snap to the edge of the desktop.
Here you can set the snap zone for windows. As with screen borders, moving a window near to another will make it snap to the edge as if the windows were magnetized.
If checked, windows will not snap together if they are only near each other, they must be overlapping, by the configured amount or less.
In the Advanced panel you can do more advanced fine tuning to the window behavior.
Shading
If this option is enabled, a shaded window will un-shade automatically when the mouse pointer has been over the titlebar for some time. Use the slider to configure the delay un-shading.
Finally, you can configure Active Desktop Borders. If this is enabled, moving the mouse to a screen border will change your desktop. This is useful if you want to drag windows from one desktop to another.
You can set this option to Disabled, which is the default, to Only when moving windows, or to Always enabled in which case just pushing your mouse against the side of the screen will switch you to a new desktop.
