Grid

Move and resize your windows to fit an imaginary grid.

Inspired by winsplit revolution http://www.winsplit-revolution.com/

Git repository http://cgit.compiz-fusion.org/~stevek/grid/

Blog http://suasol.wordpress.com/category/projects/

Install

Note that grid is now included in compiz so you're unlikely to need to fetch from git unless you've an old version of compiz.

FIXME: the git link is wrong - the plugin has moved to compiz/plugins/grid and an older version (not the head) is needed.

On a fresh install of ubuntu 8.10 you will need to

uncomment the "intrepid-backports main restricted universe multiverse" and "intrepid partner" repositories in your sources.list
update your list of available packages
install those necessary dependencies
clone the git repository
make, make install
enable and configure "grid"

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo aptitude update
sudo aptitude install git-core libtool compiz-dev compiz-fusion-bcop compizconfig-settings-manager
mkdir tmp;cd tmp
git clone git://anongit.compiz-fusion.org/users/stevek/grid;cd grid
make
make install
ccsm (to enable and configure "grid")

To update the changes when changes are committed to the repository

cd tmp/grid (for instance!)
git pull
make
make install

Apparently sudo apt-get install build-dep compiz-fusion-plugins-main does the job. -> did not work for me

Bugs / Enhancements

For some reason when i'm resizing the windows it never reaches the real bottom part of the screen, there always is a gap between the taskbar and the window itself (ie. On my Dell 2407 external monitor @ 1920x1200 resolution, the plugin appears to underestimate the desktop height slightly. On every command, the resized window is about 50 pixels short: That is, the move location is correct, but the vertical resize is just slightly short in every location. http://forum.compiz-fusion.org/showpost.php?s=6377310b9edb2af908a04df2e608307f&p=66531&postcount=16). FIXED in latest git
"Put center, top, bottom" does not have 66% nor 50% size (only 33% and 100%). That's by design - if the center used those sizes, they would not tile with windows on the edges.
If I go to a new desktop and use one of the "move window" keys, the window is brought from its desktop to the new current one.
- I can't reproduce this, can you give a more complete repro please? Perhaps you have some unusual focus setting enabled?
  - This happens to me too, but only in the case where the new desktop has no current windows. 1) Bring a window ("W") to the foreground on the current desktop. 2) Change to an empty desktop. 3) Use a "window resize" key combo. Window W is brought to current desktop (and properly resized.)

Ideas

Make the grid size reconfigurable instead of the fixed 33%,50%,66% sizes (ie. Maybe an even better option is to retain the 2x3 grid, but allow the user to specify how big the grid blocks are.)
Perhaps assign a layout per workspace or hotkey to switch between grid sizes
Keyboard shortcuts to switch focus based on window position
In addition to the horizontal 1/2 and 2/3 cycle, it would be great to have a vertical 1/3 and 2/3 cycle. -- Unfortunately that gives a cycle of length 9 when combined with the horizontal cycle. Unless you can think of better shortcut keys.
Have a way to "group" 2 (or more?) windows (and horizontally organize this group). Concrete example : i like to have 66% of my screen occupied by Firefox and then 33% split in 2 for skype+pidgin contact lists (all of these windows full height).
Sticky windows - adjacent windows to the one being tiled get resized along with the current one. We would need some way to toggle stickyness to allow a 2x1 layout to be changed into a 3x1