Script KWin window management (cascade, move, close, reload config) from the command line via D-Bus
domain: develop.kde.org · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
Discover KWin's D-Bus object structure with qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin (or qdbus6 on newer Plasma) to list available methods and signals
Call built-in layout methods directly, e.g. qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin cascadeDesktop or qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin unclutterDesktop, for whole-desktop window arrangement
Target or close a specific window via its D-Bus-exposed methods, such as killWindow, where supported, rather than relying on generic X11/Wayland window tools that don't understand KWin-specific state
For automation beyond the built-in methods, write a KWin script (JS using the workspace and options globals), load and enable it, then trigger a reconfigure with qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin reconfigure
Re-run the introspection step after a Plasma upgrade before relying on a previously-working method name, since KWin's exposed D-Bus surface has changed across major Plasma versions
Known gotchas
qdbus was deprecated/renamed to qdbus6 on Qt6-based Plasma (Plasma 6), so scripts hardcoded to the qdbus binary name can silently fail to find it on newer distros
KWin's D-Bus surface differs meaningfully between the X11 and Wayland backends — some legacy methods available under X11 aren't implemented, or behave differently, under the default Wayland session in current Plasma
A KWin script loaded via D-Bus doesn't take effect until it's both enabled and the config is reconfigured with qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin reconfigure; skipping that step is a common why-isn't-my-script-running mistake
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