SmallWindows: Open source Exposé clone for Windows

Filed under: Utilities, Windows, Productivity, Open Source

SmallWindows: Open source Exposé clone for Windows

by Jordan Running Feb 1st 2006

For the uninitiated, Mac OS X has a cool feature called Exposé whereby a particularly keyboard shortcut makes all of your windows arrange themselves into small versions of themselves displayed all at once for easy task-switching. In the past we've covered a couple of Exposé clones for Windows, but neither was free. SmallWindows is another Exposé clone, but this one is free and, even better, open source. It works pretty well, too. You activate SmallWindows by pressing Win-F12 or holding the mouse at the top-center of the screen. It pops up quickly and smoothly, and rolling the mouse over any of the "mini" windows shown will zoom in on it a bit. It's not seamless, nor does it have much in the way of frills, but it works as advertised and is fast and fun to use. It could use a snappier name, though.

Tags: expose, open source, smallwindows, task manager, topdesk, windows, winplosion

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Tom said 3:13PM on 2-01-2006

Wow, I'm suprised how well it works, sure I've only been using it for a couple minutes, and I've already come across a few bugs, but I'm impressed.

Dan said 5:53PM on 2-01-2006

I have just tried to use it and all it did was turn my screen grey with a few black blotches....?

Christian said 4:00AM on 2-02-2006

Cool.
Unfortunately, it does not not work in my two-screen mode

Jens Egeblad said 4:16PM on 11-09-2006

I have stopped working on Smallwindows but check out http://www.mexircus.com

Here you will find the Admiral which contains many of the features of SmallWindows + a lot more!!!

- Jens Egeblad (Author of SmallWindows)

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