microsoft/PowerToys

Fine-tune multi-monitor positioning tool

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#2,652 opened on May 4, 2020

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 (5 comments) (3 reactions) (0 assignees)C# (7,978 forks)batch import
Help WantedIdea-New PowerToy

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Description

Summary of the new feature/enhancement

The current way to position monitors is via Display Settings, but this does really bad snapping as one can see in the following example for a Dell XPS 4k laptop monitor and 2 Dell 1080p external monitors:

image

(for the record, I've actually raised a Feedback Hub issue on this problem: https://aka.ms/AA6rwp7)

Proposed technical implementation details (optional)

Ideally, I would like this screen with a more powerful interface, that would allow me to even specify coordinates on the monitors positioning.

DisplayFusion does provide a tool to do this, but it is a paid utility to fix a Windows problem, and I believe this should be natively provided (or via PowerToys)

Contributor guide

Research direction
Investigate Windows Display Settings API (e.g., EnumDisplayDevices, SetDisplayConfig) and explore how to create a WPF UI for precise monitor positioning with coordinate input.
Tech stack
csharp
Domain
desktoptooling
Issue type
Feature
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
3
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
1-2 days
Activity statusHow available the issue appears right now: fresh, active, stale, blocked, or waiting on maintainer input.
Active
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
Clear
Prerequisites
C#Windows APIWPF
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.
50