Xfwm

Related articles
Desktop environment
Window manager
Xfce
Xorg
xfwm
is the window manager for the
Xfce
environment.
Installation
Install
the
xfwm4
package.
Starting
Run
xfwm4
with
xinit
.
Configuration
Most xfwm settings can be accessed through
xfwm4-settings
, for window behavior and shortcuts,
xfwm4-tweaks-settings
, for advanced settings and compositing, and
xfwm4-workspace-settings
, for the number of workspaces and their names.
Composite manager
Note
This compositor may cause video tearing in applications, see
#Video tearing
.
From Xfwm 4.12 onward, the compositor is enabled by default.
To enable or disable the Xfwm compositor and adjust its settings, go to
Window Manager Tweaks
:
$ xfwm4-tweaks-settings
Alternatively, it can be enabled with
--compositor
or using
xfconf
. For example:
~/.xinitrc
exec xfwm4 --compositor=on
$ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -s
true
Window roll-up
Double clicking the titlebar, or clicking
roll window up
in the window menu, causes the window contents to disappear leaving only the titlebar. To disable this functionality with
xfconf
, run:
$ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/mousewheel_rollup -s false
Window tiling
Xfwm can "tile" a window automatically when it is moved to an edge of the screen. It does so by resizing it to fit the top half of the screen. To enable or disable this behaviour with
xfconf
, run:
$ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/tile_on_move -s false
$ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/tile_on_move -s true
Alternatively, (un)check
Window Manager Tweaks
>
Accessibility
>
Automatically tile windows when moving toward the screen edge
.
Extra settings provided by the Xfce settings manager
Install
the
xfce4-settings
package.
Note
Installing
xfce4-settings
may change the default applications for certain tasks. See
xdg-open
to set the default applications to your liking.
Additional themes
Install
the
xfwm4-themes
AUR
package.
The themes installed will be shown in the
xfwm4-settings
window.
Tips and tricks
Hide the titlebar when window is maximized
Go to
Accessibility
and check
Hide title of windows when maximized
.
Note
Install
xfce4-windowck-plugin
if you want to put the titlebar of the currently maximized window on your panel.
Troubleshooting
No icons shown in browser for downloaded items
This is fixed by
installing
the
xfce4-settings
package.
Number of workspaces changes unexpectedly
Keep in mind
Xfwm
assigns shortcuts to adding and removing workspaces. By default these are
Alt+Delete
and
Alt+Insert
, respectively.
If the number of workspaces resets at login, change the amount
after
Xfwm is started. This is ensured by the
sleep
command.
[1]
~/.xinitrc
(sleep 3 && xfconf-query -v -c xfwm4 -p /general/workspace_count -s
number
) &
exec xfwm4
or, from
xfce4-session
:
~/.config/autostart/workspace.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Exec=sh -c "sleep 3 && xfconf-query -v -c xfwm4 -p /general/workspace_count -s
number
"
See also:
Logout alters workspaces
Video tearing
If you experience video tearing, you could try to change the
--vblank
mode option of xfwm (
glx
,
xpresent
or
off
), try it with this command
[2]
:
$ xfwm4 --replace --vblank=glx &
in order to save it:
$ xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/vblank_mode -s glx
If you use Intel graphics and you have already enabled "TearFree" option in Xorg as described in
Intel graphics#Tearing
, then disable
Synchronize drawing to the vertical blank
option.
If this does not fix the tearing, consider disabling Xfwm's compositor and using an alternative
composite manager
.
Horizontal line above dock windows
Xfwm may incorrectly render shadows above some dock windows (e.g.
Plank
). This would result in a horizontal line across the screen. A workaround is to disable
Show shadows under dock windows
under
Settings > Window Manager Tweaks > Compositor
.
See also
Xfwm - Introduction