Your monitor is on the left. Now the pointer knows it.

Screen Side tells your computer which side of the laptop your external screen stands on, so the pointer leaves through the edge that faces it. Pick a side with one click, from the tray, with a hotkey or from the command line. At each desk, the layout you saved comes back when you plug in.

Download Other downloads

Windows 10 and 11, macOS 12 and newer, and Linux (GNOME, KDE Plasma, Sway, Hyprland, X11). Free and open source, MIT licence.

The pointer leaves the left edge of the laptop and enters the right edge of the monitor.

Install

Windows macOS Linux Command line

Download ScreenSide_x64-setup.exe and run it. It installs for your account only, with no admin prompt. The installer is not code-signed, so SmartScreen asks once: choose More info, then Run anyway. An MSI of the same build is there for managed machines.

Download ScreenSide_universal.dmg (Apple silicon and Intel) and drag Screen Side to Applications. The app is not notarised, so the first time macOS refuses to open it: go to System Settings, Privacy and Security, and choose Open Anyway.

Debian and Ubuntu:

sudo apt install ./screen-side_amd64.deb

Fedora and openSUSE take the .rpm, and anything else the AppImage (chmod +x it and run it). Download the .deb first for the command above. Sway, Hyprland and other wlroots desktops also need wlr-randr.

The screen-side command, without the app. macOS and Linux:

curl -LsSf https://danieltyukov.github.io/screen-side-switcher/install.sh | sh

Windows, in PowerShell:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy ByPass -c "irm https://danieltyukov.github.io/screen-side-switcher/install.ps1 | iex"

Or with Rust: cargo install --git https://github.com/danieltyukov/screen-side-switcher screen-side. You can read install.sh and install.ps1 first.

What it does

Several screens: Pick which monitor moves, or move them all. Two on the left line up outward in order.
A layout per desk: Save the arrangement at each desk. Mark it Auto and it comes back when that monitor is plugged in.
Tray and hotkey: Swap sides from the tray or with a keyboard shortcut, without opening a window.
Command line: screen-side left, toggle, apply office, with JSON output for scripts.
Alignment and primary: Line screens up at the top, centre or bottom, and choose which one is primary.

The Screen Side window: a drawing of a monitor left of a laptop with a second monitor above it, the edge between the monitor and the laptop lit in yellow, and buttons for the side, the alignment and the primary screen.

Works on

Desktop	How Screen Side talks to it	Tested so far
GNOME (Wayland and X11), Pantheon, Budgie	Mutter display configuration over D-Bus	Reading and checking on GNOME 46
KDE Plasma 5 and 6	`kscreen-doctor`	Against its documented output; reports welcome
Sway, Hyprland, niri, river, labwc	`wlr-randr`	Against its documented output; reports welcome
Xfce, MATE, i3 and other X11	`xrandr`	Against its documented output; reports welcome
Windows 10 and 11	Display configuration API	Reading in CI; reports welcome
macOS 12 and newer	Quartz Display Services	Reading in CI; reports welcome

If your desktop is missing or misbehaves, tell us what it reports. Adding a desktop is one file; BACKENDS.md shows how.

From the command line

screen-side                     show the screens and where they are
screen-side left                put the external screen on the left
screen-side toggle              swap left and right (for a keyboard shortcut)
screen-side left --screen dell  move one screen of several
screen-side align end           line up the bottom edges
screen-side save office --auto  remember this desk
screen-side watch               put saved layouts back as screens connect
screen-side doctor              what to paste into a bug report

Help make it better

Report a problem, with the output of screen-side doctor.
Suggest an idea or ask a question in Discussions.
Add support for your desktop.
Package it for Homebrew, winget, the AUR or Flathub. CONTRIBUTING.md has the details.