Action fails on 'application_terminated' event

[noib3]

I'm using the following code to automatically destroy an empty space

read -r -d '' destroy_space_if_empty <<- 'EOF'
active_space_index=$(yabai -m query --spaces --space | jq .index)
if $(yabai -m query --windows --space ${active_space_index} | jq 'length == 0'); then
    yabai -m space ${active_space_index} --destroy
fi
EOF

yabai -m signal --add event=window_destroyed action="${destroy_space_if_empty}"
yabai -m signal --add event=application_terminated action="${destroy_space_if_empty}"

the action associated to the window_destroyed event works without problems, but the one associated to the application_terminated event doesn't seem to do anything.

I've tested different actions with the same event and they all work, for example

read -r -d '' destroy_space_if_empty <<- 'EOF'
active_space_index=$(yabai -m query --spaces --space | jq .index)
echo ${active_space_index} >> ~/spaces
EOF

yabai -m signal --add event=application_terminated action="${destroy_space_if_empty}"

creates the file spaces in the home directory and cat returns the correct space.

Any ideas?

[dominiklohmann]

window_destroyed always triggers before application_terminated does for applications that have own a window and are thus relevant to yabai.

You can verify this easily using these two signals:

yabai -m signal --add event=window_destroyed action="osascript -e 'display notification \"window_destroyed\"'"
yabai -m signal --add event=application_terminated action="osascript -e 'display notification \"application_terminated\"'"

[noib3]

@dominiklohmann if I quit a program with cmd-q instead of closing one of its windows (be it the last one or not, doesn't matter) with cmd-w, only application_terminated triggers, window_destroyed doesn't.

In theory this shouldn't be a problem: if I link the action destroy_space_if_empty to both application_terminated and window_destroyed I should cover both cases:

a) I close the last window of a space without quitting the program -> window_destroyed is triggered;

b) I quit a program and there are no more windows left on that space -> application_terminated is triggered.

In practice, it seems that the space is only destroyed if I close the last window without quitting the program.