i3screens

A helper tool for managing i3wm workspaces on multiple monitors.

Use-case

You have a multi-monitor setup and want to have the "same" workspaces on multiple monitors at the same time. i3screens is a simple python script which listens to several i3wm-events and creates the configured workspaces on the currently focused monitor. It also allows you to apply matching rules so that new windows are automatically moved to the correct workspace.

Installation

Dependencies

Install the i3ipc python package. On most systems you should be able to use pip install i3ipc.

Clone the repository

Clone the repository somewhere into your home directory: git clone https://github.com/gehaxelt/python-i3screens ~/i3screens

Configuration

Create the configuration file config.py in ~/i3screens/. You can use config.py.sample as a template.

Make sure that the OUTPUTS are enumerated starting at 0. The regular expressions in WORKSPACES should be python re module compatible.

Systemd autostart

The tool has to run in order to work. The easiest way to have it started and ran in the background is systemd. A i3screens.service file is included in the repo. Set it up as a user-systemd file as follows:

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user/
cp ~/i3screens/i3screens.service ~/.config/systemd/user/

Now you have to edit ~/.config/systemd/user/i3screens.service and replace /home/YOURUSERNAME/i3screens/i3screens.py with the path to your i3screens.py.

Finally, reload the systemd-daemon, enable and start the service:

systemctl --user daemon-reload
systemctl --user enable i3screens
systemctl --user start i3screens