Nick wrote:

That behavior has been changed for 4.10. http://git.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-panel/co … 99e3682d21

Would it be possible to have the old behaviour as an configuration option?  I really, really, REALLY seriously hate it when the plugins I have to the right of the window buttons jump back an forth whenever I close old or open new windows.

Aha! Just found out I can insert a separator, and set it to 'expand'.  Problem solved - no need for bringing old features back after all.

That behavior has been changed for 4.10. http://git.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-panel/co … 99e3682d21

Would it be possible to have the old behaviour as an configuration option?  I really, really, REALLY seriously hate it when the plugins I have to the right of the window buttons jump back an forth whenever I close old or open new windows.

First: install build tools and dependencies for xfce4-panel.

sudo apt-get install build-essential fakeroot dpkg-dev devscripts
sudo apt-get build-dep xfce4-panel

Make build directory and download package source. Please note that the last two numbers of the version might be different.

mkdir build && cd build
apt-get source xfce4-panel
cd xfce4-panel-4.8.3

Optional: set email address and increase version number. This also allows you to write a line or two about the change.

EMAIL=your@e.mail dch -i

Make changes to xfce4-panel-4.8.3/plugins/tasklist/tasklist.c: Remove/comment line 147:

144:  xfce_panel_plugin_menu_show_configure (XFCE_PANEL_PLUGIN (plugin));
145:
146:  /* expand the plugin */
147:  /* xfce_panel_plugin_set_expand (panel_plugin, TRUE); */
148:
149:  /* bind all properties */

Build package:

dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -b

Now you can install the package with dpkg -i. If the panel looks wierd after logging out and in again, just add a separator right after the Window Buttons item and make the separator expand.

I hope someone will find this useful. Thanks to Sleeksorrow for a short guide to rebuilding debs.

Very small font: I'm not and Xfce developer and I don't know whether this change causes system instability or security issues.

Why does Window Buttons push B all the way to the right, even though the actual buttons on the Window Buttons item only occupy a fraction of the available space? Is it possible to disable this auto-fill/auto-expand?

This picture shows what I'm talking about (look at the green rectangle).