Ubuntu – How to bring back minimize and maximize buttons in Gnome 3

First you will need to find a theme with the buttons you want and install that theme.

You can find many OS X themes at gnome-look, search gtk3 theme in the type and osx in the description, though I will recommend you, based on your question, this nice flat Yosemite theme (Developers screenshot).

This should look really nice with the Arc theme, in my opinion.

Next install

sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

When it is finished start this app from the launcher or

gnome-tweak-tool

Browse to the Appearance section and you will see this

Change the window theme to change your window declarations and gtk3 for the rest of the theme.

There are two important tools to manipulate windows from cli; xdotool and wmctrl. Both tools overlap each other in functionality, but the most important commands referring to your question:

In an (no doubt incomplete) overview, listing the commands I use most:

Closing a window

wmctrl:

wmctrl -ic <window_id>

Minimizing a window

xdotool:

xdotool windowminimize <window_id>

Un- minimizing a window

wmctrl:

effectively un- minimizing is done by:

wmctrl -ia <window_id>

I mention effectively, since the command moves to the corresponding desktop, unminimizes and raises the window, but the command also does that on windows which are not minimized.

Maximizing a window

xdotool:

xdotool windowsize <window_id> 100% 100%

wmctrl:

wmctrl -ir <window_id> -b add,maximized_vert,maximized_horz

Un- maximizing a window:

wmctrl -ir <window_id> -b remove,maximized_vert,maximized_horz

Notes

• Both xdotool and wmctrl are not on your system by default:

  sudo apt-get install xdotool wmctrl
  

• To run any of the commands on the currently active window:

  • for wmctrl commands, remove the -i option, replace <window_id> by :ACTIVE:

  • for xdotool commands: replace <window_id> by $(xdotool getactivewindow)

• In many cases, commands can be run by using either the window id or the window name. The -i option in wmctrl tells wmctrl to use the window id. I'd suggest not using the window's name as an identifier, to prevent name clashes. It happens more easily then you'd expect.

• From my own experience, using maximizing in a script; Using wmctrl to maximize / unmaximize can be a bit buggy on both Unity and Gnome, while the xdotool option works more robust in my experience. In most scripts, I end up in using a mix of both wmctrl and xdotool.

More info on man wmctrl and man xdotool (mainly the section: WINDOW COMMANDS).