Workspaces / Virtual Desktops – do you use them on your laptop, desktop, or both?

featherfurl, 10 months ago

I use them like browser tabs so I’ve had like 20-30 going at once before on sway.

cow, 10 months ago

All the time on both my laptop and my 4 screen desktop. I use swaysome with sway to get awesome wm style workspaces for sway.

oldfart, 10 months ago

For me it’s all about focus. Screen #1 is general usage. #2 is client #1. #3 is client #2. #4 is camera from my door.

surrendertogravity, 10 months ago

Using it to separate work from other uses makes sense to me - I think if I worked from my desktop rather than the company laptop, I’d be more inclined to use the virtual desktops.

Ender2k, 10 months ago

I'm exactly the opposite. I use use virtual desktops when I have my MBP docked to multiple screens--and when I am just using the laptop, I don't. I have gestures enabled on my Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad--so the gestures are there whether I'm using the laptop or docked--but I just don't use them when I have the single monitor...

the_sisko, 10 months ago

I use two monitors, and also KDE’s virtual desktops for work. A killer feature for me is that KDE has a window manager option to “pin” specific windows so that they are present on every desktop. This means I can have my terminal and slack client split across one screen and pinned, and then the other screen can contain my “main focus” on each of the virtual desktops - browser, editor, or email. I always can see the chat/terminal but can easily swap the desktop to get to a different focus.

I know that I could just have everything on one desktop and use the alt-tab to change that main window. But the alt tab is slow and non-deterministic. I may have to cycle between five things before I get to the browser, for example. With virtual desktops, I know where each focus is geometrically, and I can always swap over quickly with my key shortcuts.

surrendertogravity, 10 months ago

Wanting to pin a floating window was always something I wanted on Windows, so I was excited to see that being natively supported by KDE.

Agree on disliking alt-tab because it’s non-deterministic! Cycling through a whole list of apps has always felt clunky to me so I never use it.

backhdlp, 10 months ago

I have a 3x3 desktop grid in plasma, it works great for me on my laptop, but I don’t think I could use it without touchpad gestures. I would probably have less or none if I had a big screen.

daredevil, 10 months ago

I use workspaces everyday as a context switcher for related apps and programs. An example would be a "main focus" workspace that includes whatever project I'm working along including any relevant documentation or browser windows. When it's time to take a break, I have a separate workspace for stuff like kbin or messaging platforms.

Another consideration is that I’m always using a mouse on my desktop, so switching between workspaces with the keyboard wouldn’t feel as natural.

I use hot corners for this reason. Dragging my mouse to one of the corners of the screen brings up the workspaces interface.

mhz, 10 months ago

I switched to sway on both my lapto (13" 1080p) and desktop (27" 1440) to force myself on using workspaces, and man i have to say I was missing out a lot, now I thinking of giving Hyprland a try to for dynamic tiling which sound fantastic especially for bigger screens.

surrendertogravity, 10 months ago

I really wish I could load Sway on my desktop… unfortunately I’ve got an Nvidia card and I couldn’t get the live ISO to boot with sway. :<

Very tempting to try it on my laptop though! All the setups I’ve seen using it look really clean.

Crozekiel, 10 months ago

With a 27" monitor, I feel like there’s enough space

*looks at the second monitor I bought because the 49" ultrawide "wasn't enough space"...

I might be ignoring some useful features... sips tea

surrendertogravity, 10 months ago

How far away from your monitor do you sit to see all of the 49”?! It must all be in your peripheral vision, haha. (Edit: oh, I overlooked the ultra wide mention and was picturing a 49” tv type thing, haha. Ultra wide makes more sense!)

I actually went down from two monitors on my desktop to one… nothing wrong with the second monitor now sitting in my closet, but I’m liking the extra space on my desk and it feels more ergonomic to not be swiveling my neck as much.

Crozekiel, 10 months ago

It's weird for gaming, depending on the game, because there is SO much in the periphery of your vision, but for productivity stuff its great (its basically 2 monitors stuck together with no bezel in the middle). I actually originally bought it solely for Eve Online... With one normal monitor before, you have so much stuff on your screen that you NEED to see roaming low or null space that you don't get to see your pretty space ship hardly at all. But with ultrawide, there's room for both needed UI elements as well as pretty space views.

I still can't get used to it for first person games though, and if the game isn't well setup for ultrawide the FOV can feel pretty screwy. It looks awesome, but you run around for 10 minutes and you start to wonder why you can't see anything and then realize it is because your lunch is on the screen... (at least for me, lol)

Remmy, 10 months ago

Not gonna lie. I have 5 monitors and forget the workspaces exist. It would make life so much easier if I started using the.

vtez44, 10 months ago

I use them constantly on laptop with GNOME. It makes it easier to switch windows with touchpad. On desktop I don't use them so often, because I forget about them.

fiah, 10 months ago

I work with a random jumble of windows on a single desktop, it’s about as effective as you’d think

ciko22i3, 10 months ago

Im trying to make myself use it but i usually forget it exists. I grew up using Windows XP and i still use every OS/DE like its XP.

restarossa, 10 months ago

I use them on both. I use more of them (6) on my desktop, and I use them more often, but only because I’m usually doing several tasks on my desktop while my laptop is for more casual use and I only require two or three. I mostly use Gnome and bind Win Key+Num for each workspace.

vivia, 10 months ago

I also use them on both, KDE has default bindings.

gzrrt, 10 months ago

Always, because you get to assign keyboard shortcuts to each one (and then use each one for a dedicated purpose). Much faster workflow than alt-tabbing your way through an arbitary list of programs.