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Comment by dmix | Hacker News Reader

I'm happy to see that Asus managed to find a way to keep the Escape key even while taking up way more space than Touchbar. Apple has no excuse.

Still I'd personally rather use efficient tiling software + tabbing between spaces than have to look down at distractions. I'm amazed no major OS developer has tried to deliver this as an advanced mode. It's the type of thing that would benefit from direct OS integration.

Most of the MacOS tiling software have occasional awkward moments with Spaces and fullscreen mode.

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I've never been more happy with a desktop environment than when I used i3.

The sloppy window management in macOS combined with the scarce selection of laptops (of which none are really good in my opinion) has led me to try win10 as my development environment.

i3-like on Windows would have been great!

Windows management in macOS is downright awful and has been that way for years.

It's come to a point where all serious productivity work I do is done on my Windows computer.

I've also recently ventured into building my own PC and realized how much power you can get for peanuts with the right configuration. My last Ryzen 3700x build is faster than any Mac I've ever owned and costs 1/3rd.

Between all this and the horrible butterfly keyboard, I might be off the Apple train for good

There was a substantial period of time in the 2000s when Apple had just released Expose, and neither Windows nor Linux had anything that was comparable and Windows management in OSX was better than Windows or major Linux distros.

Well.... I don't think I've ever used Expose. I don't use it now, that's for sure.

Win10 has all I need. Alt+tab shows me Windows, not apps. Win+arrow keys will maximize, minimize, etc. Win+alt+arrow keys moves windows between displays.

Amusing because PC user have been saying this for years and years and years.

You may want to check out FancyZones

https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/blob/master/src/modul...

Not a full feature i3-like software, but I was amazed how it implements almost all features I like about i3.

https://www.workspacer.org/

It was mentioned in a FancyZones thread a few months ago.

Thank you for pointing that out. I have to use Windows 10 often enough to wish for something like that, and had been looking, but FancyZones was the closest I'd found yet.

Related, bug.n is a DWM clone written in AutoHotkey, of all the things. I used it at work a few years ago, and I was very satisfied.

https://github.com/fuhsjr00/bug.n

DisplayFusion is one I've used for years for splitting screens into virtual displays. Plus altering what elements show on the taskbar for those screens.

(Commercial product).

I use Amethyst (like xmonad), spaces and set the dock to auto hide. Keyboard shortcuts for switching layouts and moving windows. Three finger swipe to the left or right to switch spaces or ctrl 1-4. I’m pretty happy with this setup.

https://github.com/ianyh/Amethyst

I’ve used Amethyst twice before giving up and just going back to manually doing all my adjustments. I found it extremely wonky. For example, even after a user specifies their preferences, it will still auto snap after you make your own custom adjustments. Custom adjustments should always override the default snap-to-preset rules.

Maybe you found a way around this!

I just need Plasma-like workspaces (apps in a layout that you can switch to for different work-focuses) and "always on top" (which IIRC used to be in MS Windows) ... any suggestions?

Windows has "always on top" feature, but not all software uses it.

In Win10? It's not in the right-click menu from the application bar for Office 2016 products, for example, nor for Chrome/IE. I've used it previously, where did they hide it and why isn't it in MS Office?

That's an amazing looking laptop.

Especially when WSL2 is out ~next year, that extra screen above the keyboard would be amazing for displaying eg Terminal - with VSCode or Studio in the main screen. So many options.

The top model is not afraid of its price point, sadly, but it sure is a Hero configuration.

WSL is out, and you can get installation instructions here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/wsl2-install

Cheers. I'm using WSL1 now, but am getting too old to join the Insider / Fast rings. Have done my fair share of Windows OS beta testing over the decades, starting with Win95. :)

As we're sharing links, this was a great write up: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/commandline/announcing-wsl-2/

Can't wait for it to roll out officially with 20H1.

Have you used yabai (on macOS)? It's about as close as I think we can possibly hope for.

I still pine for i3 though.

Yes, I use yabai daily. It still feels a bit awkward but far less so than the rest I've tried. I might need to improve my config though.

I’ve always found workspaces on Mac to be great, especially with swipe gestures. It’s the only laptop I’ve ever been able to sit in the couch and write reports on, which I usually need two monitors for (one for the report, the other for whatever I’m reviewing for the report).

Courage over Escapism always /s

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