I use neovim in kitty. I often need to work across multiple projects. I used to just open new os windows, kitty tabs, or kitty windows ad hoc. No good: hard to find things, often in the wrong directory, often the wrong environment variables, clashing neovim instances, and so on.

There must be a better way!

Here’s what I’ve settled on.

I use one os window per project. I open a new os window via, say, c payments. That calls

c () {
    zi "$1" || return
    kitty @ launch --type os-window --cwd current --os-window-title $(sed "s;$HOME/;;" <<< "$PWD") /bin/zsh
    z - >/dev/null
}

defined in my functions.zsh.

zi is zoxide’s interactive cd, so I get a menu like

zi

I select my target project via fzf and hit enter. (The || return is so that I can safely bail by hitting escape instead.)

kitty then launches zsh in a new os window. The working directory is the selected project (--cwd current). So is the window’s title, but with the pointless /Users/cosmo.grant prefix removed (the sed).

c function

And I’m off to the races.

(Implementation detail: zi changes the working directory of the shell where I run c. That’s so --cwd current makes the new os window open at the selected project. z - >/dev/null then quietly changes back to whatever it was before.)

In addition, in my kitty.conf I have:

map kitty_mod+enter new_window_with_cwd
map kitty_mod+t new_tab_with_cwd

so my working directory remains the project root when I open more kitty windows and tabs, and also

enabled_layouts tall:bias=70;full_size=1;mirrored=false,all

so that by default I keep a big window (bias=70) on the left.

My setup often ends up something like:

window setup

nvim in the big window, and two shells alongside.

To switch between projects, I cycle through the os windows using ⌘+`, looking at the window titles. It would be nicer to select a window using fzf, but I normally only have a few windows open, so cycling is nice enough.