Process vs Title vs Class, exact vs RegEx

[maphew]

There are 3 window_rules methods to identify windows to manage:

match_title
match_class_name
match_process_name

Does it matter which method is used? e.g. Process is faster/cleaner/more accurate than Class, and both are better than Title.? Or is it just use whatever?

And what about exact match vs using regular expression? And multipe entries vs combining them?

match_process_name: "Taskmgr"
match_process_name: "PROCEXP64"

or:

match_process_name: "/Taskmgr|PROCEXP64/"

Thanks.

[lars-berger]

It doesn't matter which match criteria is used to target a window. They're only run when a window is initially managed, so performance isn't really a problem. Some windows might have the same class name or process name though, so it can be useful in those cases to use multiple criteria to target a window more specifically.

window_rules:
  # eg. only target Notepad windows that have the title "Untitled - Notepad"
  - command: "move to workspace 5"
    match_process_name: "notepad"
    match_title: "Untitled - Notepad"

I think the config syntax might be confusing to some. This match criteria stuff is probably the #1 thing I've been asked questions about.

Maybe a syntax like this would be better?

  - command: "move to workspace 5"
    match_by:
      - process_name: "notepad"
      - title: "Untitled - Notepad"

Or another way could be to have a property called match_any, which would trigger if any match criteria are true, and an alternative called match_all, which would combine the match criteria to be more specific (like the current behavior).

Even though it'd be more powerful, maybe it'd just be even more confusing. eg:

   # Target notepad windows like in the above example
  - command: "move to workspace 5"
    match_all:
      - process_name: "notepad"
      - title: "Untitled - Notepad"
      
  # Target windows with either title "Untitled - Notepad" or "Untitled2 - Notepad"
  - command: "move to workspace 5"
    match_any:
      - title: "Untitled - Notepad"
      - title: "Untitled2 - Notepad"

Edit: by the way, I didn't even know it was valid yaml to repeat a property multiple times. Haven't tried it out before and not sure what would happen.

[maphew]

The match_any and match_all syntax makes the most sense to me at the moment.

This probably ties into my 2nd question today too, #185. Maybe the threads should be combined(?)

[lars-berger]

I've never repeating match_process_name like you mentioned in #185, so whatever happens is unintentional.

With the way things currently behave, this way would be the correct to define your window rule:

window_rules:
  - command: "ignore"
    match_process_name: "/Au3Info|Taskmgr|PROCEXP64/"

I gotta admit i'm not a huge fan of having these big regexes like above, so that'd be an advantage of the match_any/match_all syntax. This does look better imo:

window_rules:
  - command: "ignore"
    match_any:
      - process_name: "Au3Info"
      - process_name: "Taskmgr"
      - process_name: "PROCEXP64"

[maphew]

Ok, thanks for the clarification on the correct current syntax.

Having each program on it's own line would also have the advantage of being better for version control and being able to compare [diff] changes between configs.

[jerstew]

Anyone able to target Windows 10 System Settings? I'm so far unable, so I resorted to just matching the "Settings" title. Feels iffy but works for now.

I tried several variations of match_process_name: "systemsettings" with no luck.

Side note: awesome program. Is there a way to support the project?

[Fuann-Kinoko]

probably ApplicationFrameHost or anything like that.
Or you can check the processName, class or title by Window Spy