I'm assuming most of you know this but just in case
1. ⌘⇥ (cmd-tab) - regular mac app switching
2. ⌘-`(cmd-grave) - "Move focus to next window"
3. ⌥⌘⇥ (opt-cmd-tab) - "Move focus to active or next window"
Wasn’t aware this is natively supported in OSX, and doesn’t seem to be working.
The hardest part for me was getting it to work on all the keyboard layouts, but that seems to be done with an update we released a couple of weeks ago.
Without it alt-tabbing is near useless for me on macOS.
You get per-window switching, with the normal picker modal (so you bring only your desired window to the front, and not every window you cycle through like Cmd-`).
As a bonus, Contexts has an option to only choose from windows on your current "space", which is really important for me.
MacOS' ⌘-dependent (CMD?) shortcuts are much more ergonomic. I use my thumb to trigger shortcuts, vs on Windows having to use my pinky's knuckle.
On Linux you can emulate this same behavior by switching ctrl/alt/win keys (gnome-tweaks has this option). One thing I am unable to emulate, however, is ALT+left/right arrow for home/end.
On the other hand, the Win + (number) shortcuts I can’t live without and there are very few solutions on macOS which surprises me, because those min/max/switch shortcuts ate incredibly simple and intuitive.
On mine I do: - A button to show desktop at the top left, so I can tap it, start dragging something, and tap again to drag things into windows
- some common function keys for editing
- links to work webpages and note files I use frequently
- Some shortcuts to system stuff: play/pause media, silence notifications, take a screen shot, etc.
- swiping with 2 fingers controls volume, 3 for screen brightness, 4 for keyboard backlight.
All of these have become second nature, and turned the touchbar from a nuisance to disappointment future macbooks won't have them anymore.
Obviously it still may not be useful to you, but it might be worth trying the demo as long as you're stuck with it for now.
I think the parent refers to MacOS/Gnome treating alt-tab as a "switch program" shortcut, not a "switch window" shortcut. I find it very convenient to press "alt-tab" to go to the previously-focused window, or "alt-tab-tab" to the even-previously focused window.
It's much easier for me to think in terms of context switches (go back to my N-previous activity) than have to consciously evaluate whether i want to switch window of the same app or switch app.
That sounds like a total nightmare to have the same keyboard shortcut do 2 different things. Cmd-Tab switches app, Cmd-` switches windows in an app. I just don't understand how that is difficult. Then again, some people find math hard, others find it easy. To each their own.
This difference almost certainly has its roots back in the dawn of the original Macintosh, which could only run one application at a time and context-switching or Multi-Tasking had to be explicitly added to the OS after the fact[0]. Windows, which was developed later, was designed as an inherently multi-application OS from the beginning. Today, it's pretty much only in the windows management where you still see the vestiges of those original differences.
It's not difficult, but why do they make it difficult to "just go to the previous window", whose default shortcut was alt-tab on almost all systems (windows + gnome + kde)?
Maybe you have a specific workflow with a specific set of apps you use in a specific order in which case your brain is hard-wired to know whether you'd like to switch app or window within an app. I personally find it much easier when i don't have to think about it and can just "go back" to what i was doing previously.
Way to be condescending. The presented opinion is clearly reasonable, as is yours.
Next, you want to show all of the windows from a single task, each one at the highest focus relative to all other windows of the same application.
Only being able to switch applications, rather than individual windows, makes this a tedious, manual process.
I hear you say, "just use..."
- Multiple workspaces: does not play well with changing multi-monitor setups. Does not persist across restarts. (Last time I tried anyway)
- Expose: this is not a keyboard-shortcut friendly interface. Windows-style alt-tab lists are predictable and linear, Expose window arrangements are not.
I just want the interface I already know, that works perfectly for this situation.
So it seems to me that Cmd-Tab is less of the offender to you than the app not behaving as you prefer when there are no active windows. Seems like your ire is slightly misdirected.
For me, windows windows tend to be for discrete tasks. E.g., on one space I have a browser for coding stuff, and on another space I'll have a browser for email/chat. So it's important that I can switch to a specific browser window, rather than my viewport being dragged over to another space because that's the last browser I looked at. Same for code editor windows.
macOS' keyboard shortcuts aren't good for this workflow. I understand Mac prefers gesture- or mouse-oriented solutions like Mission Control, but that's a much less ergonomic approach for my needs.
I also find the window management in Osx terrible. Thankfully a couple of third-party apps (BetterTouchTool and AltTab) fixes most of the issues.
I'm happy with my mac, but if those third-party solutions stop working, I'd switch back to linux in a heartbeat.