i3 ipc script to allow breadth-first movement for moving focus between highly nested containers.

README.md

i3-focus-skip-tabs

This parses the i3 workspace tree from the i3 IPC to execute focus commands on the outermost tabbed container that has 1+ siblings. If such a container is not found in the hierarchy up from the focused window to the root container then this will call a regular focus command. In theory this script can take any valid arguments that the i3 command focus takes (e.g. prev and next, etc.), however it has only been tested with leftandright.

The idea is this will move focus between the highest level containers without requiring several focus parent commands if working with highly nested containers.

Demo

The following video demo is running with the following keybinds, i.e. the "normal" keybind to change focus instead runs this script with super+alt+(left/right) being a fallback to normal focus (left/right.

set $super Mod4
set $alt Mod1
bindsym $super+Left exec i3-focus-skip-tabs left
bindsym $super+$alt+Left focus left
bindsym $super+Right exec i3-focus-skip-tabs right
bindsym $super+$alt+Right focus right

_{Keystrokes recorded with the screenkey utility}

i3-focus-skip-tabs

#!/usr/bin/python3

import i3ipc    # pip install i3ipc   or   pacman -S python-i3ipc
import json
import sys

i3 = i3ipc.Connection()
try:
  direction = sys.argv[1]
except IndexError:
  direction = 'right'

focused = i3.get_tree().find_focused()
primogeniture = focused.id

while focused.type == 'con':
  p = focused.parent
  if len(p.nodes) > 1 and 'tabbed' in [n.layout for n in p.nodes]:
    primogeniture = focused.id
  focused = p

i3.command(f'[con_id={primogeniture}] focus; focus {direction}')