How to keep programs from launching maximized?

Just to flag up that the auto-maximize percentage is now configurable in 11.10 in ccsm (the CompizConfig Settings Manager). Idiotically, it's hard-coded in 11.04 despite there having been issues with what the percentage should be early on (originally it was 60%, people complained, and the answer was to change the value rather than do the obvious thing of making it configurable as this is clearly going to be user- and system-specific). I haven't found a convenient way to back-port the fix to 11.04. (You can always upgrade, of course.)

But on 11.10:

• Install ccsm if you don't already have it (bizarrely, it's not installed by default)
• Run it
• Go to Desktop
• Click Ubuntu Unity Plugin
• Go to the Experimental tab and you should see this: Set the Auto-maximize value to 100% to completely disable it, or just to a higher percentage if you like the behavior but the default 75% is the wrong value for you.

Sources:

• Bug 754214 (incorrectly -- IMHO -- marked as a duplicate)
• This blog post

To fix this with Unity 2d, do this on the command line:

gconftool -s /apps/metacity/general/auto_maximize_windows -t bool false

Or, launch gconf-editor and change that key to false.

This annoyed the heck out of me, too. :( The fix is different for unity 2d than for 3d unity,

Unity was designed to auto-maximize windows if they take up a certain amount of screen space. To my knowledge not every single window does this, but most of them will. Currently there is no way to disable this in Unity 2D, but you can disable grid in ccsm, or you can edit the values to your liking, to avoid this maximization.

Basically, you can disable the top edge (set it to none) to avoid windows auto maximizing.

Found this in this thread, tested it, and it seems to be true.

You need to open the app, resize the window so it is below 75% of the screen size, then close the app. By default any window over 75% will be maxed when opening. - mc4man

Also, according to the same thread, this behavior can only be changed by editing unity source and recompiling. Not the answer we'd like to hear...

Install "Advanced Desktop Effect Settings" (ccsm) through the software center and launch it.

Scroll down to "Window Management" and deselect "Snapping Windows" and "Grid". This will disable snapping to the edges of the screen and maximize when you reach the corners.

Further you can decide whether to start windows centered, smart-positioned or if they should always be maximized etc. in "Place Windows" which is also under "Window Management"