Linux – Focus on application when changing workspaces in awesome-wm

awesome-wmlinuxlua

I am using archlinux in combination with awesome-wm for quite a while now. I still haven't figured out how to automatically grab the focus on an application when changing workspace through Mod+number.

For example, I have firefox running on workspace 2 and some terminals on workspace 1. If I am in workspace 2 and press Mod+1 to go to workspace 1, no terminal is focussed. I can ofcourse click on a terminal to grab focus, or press Mod+j or Mod+k, but I would like this to happen automatically.

How can I make this possible? Thanks in advance!

Best Answer

I figured it out so I will answer my own question. This might not be the best or most efficient way, but it gets the job done. This question might fit more on stackoverflow since it is more focussed on programming.

I wrote this function, which grabs focus on the first client on screen (except for Conky, the system monitor I use).

-- Grab focus on first client on screen
function grab_focus()
    local all_clients = client.get()
    for i, c in pairs(all_clients) do
        if c:isvisible() and c.class ~= "Conky" then
            client.focus = c
        end
    end
end

I now call this function in rc.lua where the numbered keys are mapped:

-- Bind all key numbers to tags.
...
if tags[screen][i] then
    awful.tag.viewonly(tags[screen][i])
    grab_focus()
end

Related Solutions

Awesome WM – Match ‘Other’ Applications to a Tag

I found following solution, that works so far:

awful.rules.rules = {

-- All clients will match this rule.
{ rule = { },
  properties = { border_width = beautiful.border_width,
                 border_color = beautiful.border_normal,
                 focus = true,
                 keys = clientkeys,
                 buttons = clientbuttons,
                 tag = tags[1][9]         } },

This is placed before the other rules, matching specific applications.

Assign Programs to Tags in Awesome Window Manager

I'm just going to paste my excerpts here. These are confirmed working as of 3.4.10+.

...
 62 -- {{{ Tags
 63 -- Define a tag table which will hold all screen tags.
 64 tags = {                                                                                                                                                                                      
 65     names  = { "1www", "2 @ ", "3trm", "4off", "5msg", "6vmr", 7, "8tom", "9log" },
 66     layout = { layouts[1], layouts[2], layouts[3], layouts[2], layouts[3],
 67                layouts[3], layouts[3], layouts[3], layouts[3] }
 68 }
 69 for s = 1, screen.count() do
 70     -- Each screen has its own tag table.
 71     tags[s] = awful.tag(tags.names, s, tags.layout)
 72 end
 73 -- }}}
...
408 -- {{{ Rules
409 awful.rules.rules = {
410     -- All clients will match this rule.
411     { rule = { },
412       properties = { border_width = beautiful.border_width,
413                      border_color = beautiful.border_normal,
414                      focus = true,
415                      keys = clientkeys,
416                      buttons = clientbuttons } },
417     -- Set Firefox to always map on tags number 1 of screen 1.
418     { rule = { class = "Firefox" },
419        properties = { tag = tags[1][1] } },
420     { rule = { class = "Gvim" },
421       properties = { size_hints_honor = false } },
422     { rule = { class = "KeePass.exe" },
423        properties = { maximized_vertical = true, maximized_horizontal = true } },
424     { rule = { class = "Mirage" },
425        properties = { maximized_vertical = true, maximized_horizontal = true } },
426     { rule = { class = "Navigator" },
427        properties = { tag = tags[1][1], maximized_vertical = true, maximized_horizontal = true } },
428     { rule = { class = "pinentry" },
429       properties = { floating = true } },
430     { rule = { class = "Skype" },
431       properties = { tag = tags[1][5] } },
432     { rule = { class = "Thunderbird" },
433        properties = { tag = tags[1][2] } },
434     { rule = { class = "Tomboy" },
435        properties = { tag = tags[1][8] } },
436     { rule = { class = "URxvt" },
437       properties = { size_hints_honor = false } },
438     { rule = { class = "Vncviewer" },
439        properties = { maximized_vertical = true, maximized_horizontal = true } },
440     { rule = { class = "XMind" },
441        properties = { maximized_vertical = true, maximized_horizontal = true } },
442     { rule = { class = "XTerm" },
443       properties = { size_hints_honor = false } },
444     { rule = { instance = "XTerm-logs" },
445        properties = { tag = tags[1][9] } },
446 }
447 -- }}}

I have no idea how Lua deals with whitespace, I do notice your curly braces and whitespaces are inconsistent.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Awesome WM – Match ‘Other’ Applications to a Tag

Assign Programs to Tags in Awesome Window Manager

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