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Finding your way around

Alpymist is a tiling desktop. Windows are not dragged about and stacked; each new one takes a share of the screen beside the others, and you move between them and between workspaces with the keyboard. It takes a day to get used to, and after that a stack of overlapping windows feels like a mess.

The four keys to learn first

Key	Does
`Super`+`Space`	Opens the menu. Type to search it.
`Super`+`Return`	Opens a terminal.
`Super`+`B`	Opens the web browser.
`Super`+`W`	Closes the window with the focus.

Super+Space, or a click on the mark at the left end of the bar, opens the menu. It holds everything: applications, screenshots, settings, installing and removing software, updates, and the power options.

You rarely walk through it. Type a few letters and it searches every entry in every submenu at once, applications and individual settings included: "natural" finds Settings › Touchpad › Natural scrolling. Arrows move, Enter opens, Esc goes back or closes. The same key that opened the menu closes it again.

The menu lists what is in it.

Windows

A new window splits the space of the one that had the focus. The window under the pointer has the focus, and its border is drawn in the accent colour.

Key	Does
`Super`+`←` `→` `↑` `↓`	Moves the focus to the window in that direction.
`Super`+`Shift`+`←` `→` `↑` `↓`	Moves the window that way among the others, and from the edge of a screen on to the next.
`Super`+`Alt`+`←` `→` `↑` `↓`	Takes it straight to the screen on that side, floating or not.
`Super`+`F`	Makes the window fill the screen, and back.
`Super`+`Shift`+`F`	Floats the window above the tiled ones, and back.
`Super`+`W`	Closes it.
`Super` and drag with the left button	Moves a window.
`Super` and drag with the right button	Resizes it.
Drag the edge of a window	Resizes it too: the pointer changes over an edge.
`Super`+`Ctrl`+`←` `→` `↑` `↓`	Resizes it from the keyboard, for as long as the keys are held.
`Super`+`J`	Turns two windows side by side into one over the other, and back.

Some windows float in the middle of the screen by themselves, because they are dialogs rather than somebody's work: Settings, and a terminal that a menu entry opened for one task.

Workspaces

A workspace is a screenful of windows. There are nine, and the bar shows the first five, and any others in use, at its left end.

Key	Does
`Super`+`1` … `9`	Goes to that workspace.
`Super`+`Shift`+`1` … `9`	Takes the focused window there.
`Super`+`Tab`	Shows all nine side by side.

Super+Tab is for when you have forgotten where the browser went: the nine workspaces as they are now, small, three by three. Click one to go to it, press Super and its number without reaching for the pointer, or press the key again to stay where you were.

A click on a workspace in the bar goes to it. With more than one screen, each screen has its own nine, and the keys act on the screen the pointer is on; see Screens.

The bar

Along the top: the menu and the workspaces on the left, the clock in the middle, and on the right the things you glance at, most of which open something when clicked. The top bar goes through them.

Leaving

Key	Does
`Super`+`L`	Locks the screen.
`Super`+`Esc`	Opens the System menu: lock, suspend, log out, restart, shut down.

The power icon at the right end of the bar opens the same System menu.

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