Window positioning in Plasma 6

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1

Back when using Plasma 5, most programs opened their windows where I closed them. “Most programs” include Dolphin, Kate, KWrite, Firefox… basically all except Thunderbird (f*** you, Thunderbird).

After upgrading to Plasma 6 (afaik Manjaro only introduced it with 6.1 and is now somewhere in 6.2), this is no longer the case. Some programs still put their windows where they were before (Steam, Skype, Signal… maybe because they start with “S”?), but all the abovementioned do not - where they open even depends on the “active” monitor.

Example: I have the task bar with the Application Launcher on the right screen. If I open a program using any of these, the program opens on the right screen. So each time I open one of those programs, I have to move them to the left screen where I want them. Kate even goes the extra mile and makes its window narrower to fit the narrow screen (it’s in portrait mode), so in addition I have to resize it.

If, however, I have a Dolphin window on the left screen and use it to open a text file in Kate, Kate opens on the left screen (but centered* so I still have to move it to where I want it).

*) I guess that depends on this setting: System Settings → Window Management → Window Behavior → Advanced → Window placement; but that has no option “where they were before”.

I used X11 until recently, and it’s basically the same with Wayland now.

Is there a setting that I can use to make programs open their windows where I closed them?

And don’t tell me it’s the programs’ job because
a) it worked on Plasma 5 and I don’t think all programs suddenly ditched this feature at the same time
b) apparently they all get it wrong (and frankly I would prefer a window manager to manage windows instead of windows managing themselves)
Thunderbird hasn’t gotten it right ever (though it did on Microsoft Windows™ so I guess it theoretically could).

PS: I tried searching this isssue but as soon as “window[s]” appears in the query the search results are full of Microsoft Windows™ mentions that aren’t helpful.

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It’s a known bug.

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=15329

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24 years old bug

whoa

Thanks for the info.

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There was a clue to how to do what you wanted, cumbersome though some might find it as it has to be done for each application, in Comment 14 of the KDE bugs page.

  1. Open the application; position the window in the desired location and adjust the size of the window as necessary
  2. In the upper left corner of this window is the application’s icon, right click and come down to More Actions
  3. Select Configure Special Windows Settings
  4. In lower left corner, click the Add Property button
  5. Scroll down to the Size & Position category - click Position (you’ll probably come back to this in a moment to click Size as well)
  6. If you want the size of the window to be remembered, click the Add Property button again to select the Size property
  7. When you’ve set the Position (and Size), click the Apply button and the OK button
  8. The current size and location of the window should be remembered now.

On a side note, back when I was distro hopping, this specific ability to set size and position of windows was the very reason I decided on KDE as the DE for any distro I wound up on. Any other DE I tried insisted on opening windows in the center of the screen and I had to reposition the window each and every time I started anything.

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