desktop-arrange

name

desktop-arrange

description

Arrange open WibWob-DOS windows into named layout presets: golden, magazine, cinema, triptych, diagonal, spotlight, asymmetric. Use when: "arrange windows", "lay out the desktop", "golden ratio layout", "magazine layout", "cinema mode", "triptych", "diagonal cascade", "spotlight hero window", "asymmetric layout", "Swiss grid", "arrange like a magazine", "make it look nice", "layout preset". Ports the arrange.py presets from wibandwob-dos-tvision. Each preset is a pure math function over window positions — no blessed, no SDK, just batch move/resize.

desktop-arrange

Arrange open WibWob-DOS windows into a named layout preset using POST /windows/batch.

Quick start

# List available presets and current windows
bash .pi/skills/desktop-arrange/scripts/arrange.sh --list

# Apply a preset (uses canonical wibwob instance)
bash .pi/skills/desktop-arrange/scripts/arrange.sh golden
bash .pi/skills/desktop-arrange/scripts/arrange.sh cinema --hero 3
bash .pi/skills/desktop-arrange/scripts/arrange.sh magazine --hero 7

# Verify result visually (screenshot via Ghostty AppleScript)
bash .pi/skills/desktop-arrange/scripts/arrange.sh triptych && \
  screencapture -x -D 1 /tmp/arrange-$(date +%s).png

Presets

Preset	Description
golden	Hero 61.8% (φ) left, remaining windows stacked right
magazine	Feature 65%×65% top-left, sidebar right, footer strip bottom
cinema	Hero 16:9 centred, supporting windows fill 4 margins
triptych	3 equal columns, overflow as footer row
diagonal	Cascade growing larger bottom-right
spotlight	Hero 60% centred, others orbit the edges
asymmetric	Alternating 70/30 and 30/70 rows (Swiss grid)

How it works

1. wibwob health → get port
2. wibwob state → get windows + desktop size
3. Apply preset math → compute [{id, left, top, width, height}]
4. POST /windows/batch → move+resize all in one call
5. screencapture → visual verification

Verification loop

After applying a preset:

# Text verification — check windows moved
wibwob windows | jq -r '.[] | "\(.id) \(.title) \(.left),\(.top) \(.width)×\(.height)"'

# Visual verification — screenshot the TUI
screencapture -x -D 1 /tmp/arrange-check.png
# Or via Ghostty AppleScript (see ghostty-control skill)
bash .pi/skills/ghostty-control/scripts/ghostty-windows.sh

Done criteria

• Windows are repositioned (positions changed from before)
• No window has negative or zero width/height
• Screenshot shows non-overlapping or intentionally overlapping layout
• wibwob windows | jq '.[].width' | sort -n | head -1 > 0

Gotchas

Arrange with 0 or 1 windows does nothing. Check wibwob windows | jq length before calling. Presets need ≥ 2 windows.

Hero ID not found — falls back to first window. If --hero N refers to a closed window, the first open window becomes hero silently. Verify with wibwob windows | jq -r '.[] | "\(.id) \(.title)"' first.

Windows snap back after arrange. Some microapps call autoSizeWindow() on resize. Open figlet banners may resize themselves. Workaround: arrange first, then open content-aware windows.

Desktop size wrong — windows overflow. wibwob health reports screen cols×rows. Preset math uses these as dw/dh. If the TUI window was recently resized, health may be stale by one render frame. Add sleep 0.3 after resize before arranging.

References

• Source presets: ~/Repos/wibandwob-dos-tvision/tools/arrange.py
• Plan: .planning/epics/e055-tui-applescript-control/arrange-presets-plan.md
• Visual verification: .pi/skills/ghostty-control/SKILL.md
• Batch API: POST /windows/batch — [{id, left?, top?, width?, height?, close?}]