How do I revert Alt-tab behavior to switch between windows on the current workspace?

Question

Enabling Bias alt-tab sorting to prefer windows on the current viewport as described here made no difference. How can I get back the exact same behavior as 11.04, so that alt-tab only switches between windows on the current workspace?

Simply disabling the alt-tab and shift-alt-tab keybindings on the unity switcher seems to have helped, but it still switches workspaces on me sometimes. For example, if I give a terminal window focus then press alt-tab, it switches to another terminal window on any workspace before trying to switch on the same workspace. Also, the Unity switcher still shows up when I alt-tab then hold alt even though I removed its alt-tab keybinding.

Answer 1

You can revert back to the older style of window switcher by enabling the Static Application Switcher plugin in CompizConfig Settings Manager:

• Warning: What are some of the issues with ccsm and why should I not use it?

  1. Disable the keyboard shortcuts for Unity's switcher by unchecking CompizConfig Settings Manager ▸ Desktop ▸ Ubuntu Unity Plugin ▸ Switcher ▸ Key to start the switcher ▸ Enabled and Key to start the switcher in reverse ▸ Enabled
  2. Enable the Static Application Switcher by checking CompizConfig Settings Manager ▸ Window Management ▸ Static Application Switcher ▸ Enable Static Application Switcher

Answer 2

You should install CompizConfig Settings Manager. From there you can find the Unity plugin

and disable the switcher, by clicking on each of the key bindings and unchecking 'Enabled'

Then you can enable one of the other window-switcher plugins under Window Management.

• Warning: What are some of the issues with ccsm and why should I not use it?

Answer 3

It is not the exact answer you are looking for but a viable alternative.

Ring-switcher serves the purpose of just switching between windows in an active workspace.

It is not available in default. But enabling ring-switcher is not that hard either. Install CompizConfig Settings Manager either through passing this command through the terminal:

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

or by searching for it in the Ubuntu Software Center.

After you have installed the software, search for ring-switcher and enable it. By default Super+Tab triggers ring-switcher, but you can also customize the keys that trigger the ring-switcher. Seriously, give it a try.

You can also try scale plugin to achieve the desired result. Press Shift+ Alt+↑ and you will end up with windows in the active workspace.