Using Flockdeck

Rearranging what is already running

A layout is rarely right first time. The agent you thought was a side errand turns out to be the one you are watching, and it is in the wrong corner.

Nothing is started or stopped by moving it. A move relocates the pane in the layout tree, so the process, its conversation, its working directory and its scrollback all come along — and the new arrangement is saved, so it comes back next time.

Dragging a pane

Drag a pane by its header. The pane under the pointer shows what would happen if you let go there:

• onto the left, right, top or bottom of another pane — it goes there, joining that row or column rather than nesting a new split inside it;
• onto the middle of another pane — the two exchange places, and the layout keeps its shape and proportions exactly as they were;
• onto another tab in the tab bar — it moves into that tab;
• onto the + button — it gets a tab of its own.

Dragging a tab

Where along another tab it lands decides what happens:

• onto the left or right end — it is reordered to there;
• onto the middle — the two tabs are merged, and one tab is left holding every pane of both. Each keeps the arrangement it had, and the room is shared out a column at a time rather than half to each tab: fold five tabs in one after another and you get five even columns, not one half the width and the rest squeezed into slivers you cannot grab a divider in;
• onto the + button — it goes to the end of the bar.

A tab emptied by dragging its last pane away closes itself, and the pane is not closed with it. That is the difference between moving a pane out and closing it.

Putting a tab back in order

Every move here is relative — beside this pane, past that one — and enough of them leaves a tab with panes too narrow to grab a divider in or drop anything into. Tile these panes evenly is the way back: it lays the tab's panes out in rows of even columns, in the order they are already in, the same arrangement a fan-out starts its agents in.

From the keyboard

Ctrl+Shift+←, Ctrl+Shift+→, Ctrl+Shift+↑ and Ctrl+Shift+↓ move the focused pane past its neighbour in that direction. The neighbour is chosen by what is on screen rather than by tree order, and where two panes are equally near, the upper or the left one is taken. The opposite arrow puts a move back, whatever the sizes of the panes it passed, as long as nothing else in the tab has moved since.

The command palette carries the same moves, and Move pane to a tab of its own for the one dragging does by dropping a pane on +. It also has two that dragging cannot express as easily: Move this pane to tab: … and Merge tab into this one: … for every open tab, and Merge every tab into this one for when the agents you want to watch together are scattered across all of them. Move tab left and Move tab right move the tab on screen one place along the tab bar, as dragging it would.

Merging is the reverse of dropping a pane on +: what one splits apart, the other gathers back up.