Ubuntu – Unity: Switcher is not showing window previews

unity

So I just installed Ubuntu for the first time last night, so I qualify as an uber-Ubuntu noob. Anyway, the Alt–Tab switcher in unity, it just shows icons. At first I didn't think anything of it, until I saw some screenshots from someone else's machine that showed full window thumbnails.

To clarify, when I press Alt–Tab, I see a collection of icons for the various programs that I have open. If I hover over a program where I have multiple windows open, say the web browser, the view changes and it shows thumbnail images of what the windows currently look like.

Online, I've seen someone have an Alt–Tab switcher in unity that shows a window thumbnail for all open windows. This looks way nicer than the icon view, and coming from Windows I would prefer it. I just don't know how to make it that way.

I've used unity tweaks and compizconfig, but I haven't been able to get it to work. Any suggestions?

Best Answer

I accidentally stumbled on this workaround:

When ALT-TAB does not display icons of running applications, use super-d which will show your desktop.

Now try ALT-TAB and you should see the icons.

The problem re-appears soon, so I have to repeat the super-d pretty often. A tiny bit annoying I prefer it to rebooting.

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