Snap Layouts & Window Power Tools

Windows' own snapping covers the basics. SlyPilot adds an 18-zone Touch Snap card that works with a finger or a pen, a zone editor for your own layouts (an ultra-wide, a portrait coding monitor, a picture-in-picture corner), and a kit of Window Power Tools you can run from the keyboard, your voice, the command line or your phone (with SlyPilot Pro): tile, swap, focus mode, dim, stash, ghost, gather, rescue.

📐 The Touch Snap Card (Ctrl+Alt+Z)

Open it from the Touch Bar's ⊞ button or the active window chip, the radial menu, Ctrl+Alt+Z, the command line (SlyPilot.exe snap) or by voice. It snaps the window you were working in, and it never takes focus from it.

 +----------------------------------------------------------------+
 |  ⊞ Snap • 🌐 Chrome - Google Docs             [ ⊞ Tile ] [ ✕ ] |
 |  [ Left 50% ]   [ Maximize ]   [ Right 50% ]                   |
 |  [ Top 50%  ]   [ Center 75% ] [ Bottom 50% ]                  |
 |  [ Left 1/3 ]   [ Mid 1/3 ]    [ Right 1/3 ]                   |
 |  [ Left 2/3 (Focus) ]    [ Right 2/3 (Focus) ]                 |
 |  [ Left 1/4 ]   [ Wide 1/2 ]   [ Right 1/4 ]  <- wide screens  |
 |  [ your own zones: up to six ]                                 |
 |  [ TL ]  [ TR ]  [ BL ]  [ BR ]                                |
 |  [ On top ✔ ] [ Ghost ] [ Mon ➔ ] [ KB ]                       |
 +----------------------------------------------------------------+

What is on the card

1. 18 zones on a landscape screen: halves, thirds, two-thirds "focus" zones, a 25 / 50 / 25 row for wide screens, four corners, a centred floating frame and maximize. On a portrait (tall) screen the card turns: the thirds run top / middle / bottom, with top and bottom two-thirds focus zones, and the 25 / 50 / 25 row is left out.
2. Hover preview. Rest the mouse or Surface Pen on any zone button and a thin outline with a faint tint shows on the monitor where the window will land, before you commit. It works for your own zones too. ([SnapAssist] HoverPreview=0 turns it off; a finger gives no hover.)
3. Undo Snap. Undo Snap (Back to Previous Size) on the chip menu, or say "undo snap" / "restore window", returns the window to where it was before its first snap: snap left, then top, then undo goes back to before the left snap. A window you moved by hand afterwards is left where you put it.
4. Four switches on the card: an Auto-Tile button in the header, Always on top, Ghost (80% opacity) and Mon ➔, which flings the window to the next monitor (right-click: the previous one) and keeps its proportional size. KB toggles the Windows touch keyboard.

🛠️ Your Own Snap Zones

Have an ultra-wide, a 49" super-ultra-wide or a vertical coding monitor? Define the zones you actually use. Either use the editor in Settings > Snap (add, update, remove and move; every row is checked before it is accepted) or write a [SnapCustomZones] section in SlyPilot.ini:

[SnapCustomZones]
; Format: ZoneNum = Name | Left, Top, Width, Height | Icon | Spoken Aliases
1 = Focus Stage | 0.20, 0.05, 0.60, 0.90 | 🎯 | focus stage, center stage
2 = Left Column | 0.00, 0.00, 0.25, 1.00 | 📑 | left column, reading dock
3 = Video PiP   | 0.70, 0.70, 0.28, 0.26 | 📺 | corner video, mini pip

• The rectangle is a share of the monitor's work area: left, top, width, height as fractions (0.20) or percentages (20%).
• Zone number 1 to 99, a name, an optional icon and optional spoken phrases (separated by commas; "snap " always works). A line that breaks a rule (a built-in zone name, a rectangle that leaves the screen) is skipped rather than half-applied.
• Up to 12 zones; the first six appear on the Snap card. Changes are picked up within a few seconds.
• Every way in, from one definition: the Snap card, the command palette (snap focus stage), voice ("snap focus stage"), the command line (SlyPilot.exe snap "focus stage") and AI agents.

📌 Window Rules: Every Window in Its Place

Tell SlyPilot once where a program's window goes, and it puts it there every time it opens.

• The quick way: put the window where you want it, then right-click the window chip on the Touch Bar > Always Open Here, or say "always open this window here". SlyPilot remembers the desktop, the monitor, the place and size (or maximized) and whether it stays on top.
• The full way: tray > Window Tools > Window Rules...: a desktop, a monitor, a snap zone (including your own) or an exact place and size, centred, maximized or minimized, on top, see-through, on every desktop, only the first window of a program, and only under conditions such as 2 monitors or weekdays. Try it now shows the rule on the open windows before you save it.
• By program or by title: zoom.exe, chrome.exe | Gmail, or any window with Invoice in its title. The most exact rule wins.
• Programs that put themselves back (browsers remember their own size) get the rule a second time two seconds later.
• "apply window rules" puts the windows that are already open in place.

zoom.exe          = on monitor 2, snap right, on top
chrome.exe | Gmail = on desktop 3, maximize
title Invoice     = on center, size 900x700 only weekdays

🪟 Window Power Tools (Keyboard, Voice & CLI)

Every tool works on the window you are working in (never on SlyPilot's own windows) and none of them steals focus. Each has a voice phrase and a command-line switch (see the command line guide), and some have hotkeys.

Tools such as "close other windows", "remove empty desktops" and "kill " ask you to say confirm first; a plain close is always polite (a "save changes?" box stays open).

🎭 Layout Scenes

Instant window staging for common situations:

• **Developer Scene (scene dev, "dev layout"):** snaps the first two windows of the current desktop side by side, 50/50 (a single window goes to the left half).
• **Meeting Scene (scene meeting, "meeting layout"):** docks the first window in the right third, kept on top, and snaps the second into the left two thirds (a single window is docked in the right third).
• **Reading Scene (scene reading, "reading layout"):** centres the first window in an 800 px reading column.

⌨️ Change Any Shortcut

Most of the hotkeys above can be moved or switched off. Tray > Help and Backup > Show Shortcuts... (or SlyPilot.exe shortcuts) opens a live, editable list: pick a shortcut, then Set key, Switch off or Use default, and use Check conflicts to ask Windows which of your shortcuts another program has already claimed. A shortcut must contain Ctrl, Alt or Win, and a key that another shortcut uses is refused. Details in Command Palette & Search.

Next Steps

• The Touch Bar and its Snap button → · Virtual desktops → · Command palette →
• Snap windows from your phone (SlyPilot Pro) →
• Command-line switches for every tool →