Script for placement of windows on virtual desktops.
At the time of this writing, I am using a Debian Jessie stable system and the corresponding Iceweasel (i.e. Firefox) package. My laptop has been a bit unstable lately due to a hardware fault and I find myself recovering my Iceweasel session every day or so. When I do, it restores the all of the windows I had opened to their correct URLs and sizes, but it does not place them on the correct virtual desktop. This is a known bug that hasn't gotten much attention since it was reported many years ago, in part because it's a bit tricky to solve in a cross-platform manner.
This script is a makeshift, platform-specific solution to that problem. It stores a JSON database of mappings from application names (e.g. /usr/lib/iceweasel/iceweasel) to window data dictionaries. Upon execution, it can either (1) examine a running application and add to this database or (2) use the database to move an application's windows to different virtual desktops (which it does by window title).
I wrote this application to solve my short-term problem with Iceweasel, but it is not Iceweasel-specific. Feedback and suggestions are, of course, welcome.
This script relies upon the ability to call wmctrl as a subprocess. That binary can be found in the wmctrl Debian package.
- Store window data for an application with PID 9876:
vdr --save 9876 - Use window data to set virtual desktops of an appication with that PID:
vdr --load 9876 - Store window data for the application using a fixed name (rather than
/proc/self/exe):vdr --save --name "Iceweasel Default Profile" 9876