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advice1010

Member

Registered: 2023-02-19

Posts: 134

Window Manager - Close all open windows (SOLVED)

I was wondering if anyone knew of a way to setup a hotkey that would close all windows at the same time?
XWM only has a hotkey that allows one window to be closed at a time.
I was not sure if maybe there was a hidden way to achieve this?
Imagine this would require some kind of Bash script?

Would be for all programs "window buttons" opened in panel, I guess in current workspace?
Not sure if there are more specific ways?
-Only current Workspace
-All programs opened in all Workspaces

Thank You

Last edited by advice1010 (2025-08-16 17:16:02)

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 12,123

Re: Window Manager - Close all open windows (SOLVED)

You can use the following script (it requires wmctrl). Make it executable and assign it to keyboard shortcuts:

Keyboard Shortcut #1: Close all windows

/path/to/script all

Keyboard Shortcut #2: Close only windows on current workspace

/path/to/script current

Script

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# 	script to close windows
#	requires: wmctrl
#	parameters: all = all open windows
#				current = only on current workspace

case $1 in
	all)
		for w in $(wmctrl -lv | grep -v " -1 " | awk '{print $1}')
		do 
			wmctrl -ic $w
		done
	;;
	current)
		CURRENT=$(wmctrl -d | grep "*" | awk '{print $1}')
		for w in $(wmctrl -lv | grep -v " -1 " | grep " $CURRENT " | awk '{print $1}')
		do 
			wmctrl -ic $w
		done

	;;
	*)
		echo "You need to specify either "all" (to close all windows) or "current" to close only the windows on the current workspace."
	;;

esac

exit 0

Note that the "wmctrl -ic" command will try to gracefully close windows - not force close them.

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advice1010

Member

Registered: 2023-02-19

Posts: 134

Re: Window Manager - Close all open windows (SOLVED)

@ToZ
Thank you so much for providing this script.
I was not able to test the Workspace part yet because I am still working on Workspace setup, but was able to test the ALL version, which works great.

I am really glad I asked for two things in this case.
I do not think I have ever seen a Bash script that had the capability of using options when running the script like this.
I generally have only seen options within the Bash script files.  Did not even know this was possible, wow thank you also for bringing this to my attention