Multiple Workspace rows in XFCE without xfce-panel?

Solution 1:

It's possible to manually set the _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT property using the xprop command.

For example, to get 4 columns x 2 rows, issue this:

xprop -root -f _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT 32cccc -set _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT 0,4,2,0

And to change the number of workspaces/desktops to 8:

xprop -root -f _NET_NUMBER_OF_DESKTOPS 32c -set _NET_NUMBER_OF_DESKTOPS 8

Further information regarding the _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT property (among others) can be found here

Solution 2:

Since one of the comments above suggested that this feature was removed I searched through the settings and found a way without doing it manually. I am currently using Ubuntu 16.04.4LTS .

With a Rightclick on the the Workspace Switcher in one of the panels (see screenshot below) you can open the respective contex menu. From there you can choose Properties. The window is shown in the second screenshot below. Here you can choose a number of rows to be used for the workspaces. The number of workspaces will then be distributed from top to bottom.

Solution 3:

Building off of Pierre's answer, once you've found the right layout, you should add the line to the end of your ~/.profile.

For instance, I prefer to have a 2x2 grid of workspaces, so I added this line to the end of my .profile:

xprop -root -f _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT 32cccc -set _NET_DESKTOP_LAYOUT 0,2,2,0

Now the grid should persist between logins.

I'm running Xubuntu 14.04, and I've got to say it's so frustrating that they've removed easy access to this feature from the workspace settings.