GNOME Shell Edge-Flipping

UPDATE

I am no longer using GNOME 3 so I have stopped developing this extension for now. However, a fellow coder, Christian Schramm has decided to take up where I left so I recommend going to his repository for more updates and instructions. Thanks.

About

GNOME Shell Edge-Flipping is a GNOME Shell extension that provides reactive screen edges to switch between different workspaces, similar to what is provided by Brightside, by some plugin in Compiz or natively in other Desktop Environments like Xfce.

Installation

GNOME Shell Extensions repository

You can find this extension at the GNOME Shell Extensions website. Using the website is the preferred method since all extensions are reviewed prior to their release and you’ll find lots of other cool extensions.

Get latest version using Git

To get the extension directly from my repository, you can use Git to clone it:

git clone https://github.com/Ed-von-Schleck/gnome-shell-edge-flipping ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/edge-flipping@aguslr.github.com

Get latest version without Git

If you don’t have Git, create and change to the directory for the extension:

mkdir ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/edge-flipping@aguslr.github.com && cd $_

And then just download the extension tarball and extract it:

wget https://github.com/Ed-von-Schleck/gnome-shell-edge-flipping/tarball/master -O - | tar -xzv --strip-components 1

Configuration

To customize the behaviour of the extension, just use the configuration button on the GNOME Shell installed extensions website or start the application gnome-shell-extension-prefs and choose Edge Fligpping from the drop-down menu.

Continuous flipping

By default, once an edge is activated, it will only switch to the adjacent workspace. To switch to the one after that, the edge needs to be reactivated. To change this, set the switch to true.

Vertical edges

Also, by default only the top and bottom edges are enabled since workspaces are laid out vertically in GNOME shell and this is less confusing. To disable them, just set the switch to false.

Remember to at least enable either the vertical or the lateral edges, otherwise the extension will have no effect.

Lateral edges

To enable lateral edges, just set the switch for horizontal edges to true.

Have in mind that, at the moment, the actions for switching left/right are mapped to up/down, therefore the left and right edges will behave exactly like the top and bottom edges.

Delay

There is a delay between activating the edge and switching to the next workspace. This is set to avoid accidentally changing workspace when we were just trying to drag the scroll bar on a maximized window. By default it is set to 300 milliseconds but it can be changed by entering another number or using the spin button.

If continuous flipping is enabled, this parameter also controls the delay between each workspace change. If it’s too fast, increase the amount.

Offset

There is an offset to prevent the whole extension of the edge from being reactive, again to avoid unintented workspace switching and overlapping other actions (i.e. activating overview or activating the message tray).

By default it is set to 5% of the length of the edge from both ends, that is, only the middle 90% of the edge is used. Again, this can be changed by entering another number or using the spin button.

Size and opacity of reactive edges

You can change the size of the edge which is 1 pixel. Also, you can change the opacity so you can a visual reference. Just enter the numbers in the corresponding fields or use the spin buttons.

License

Copyright (C) 2012 Agus Lopez and others, see AUTHORS file. Distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (see COPYING file).