Move an off-screen window back on-screen on Mac OS X

Move an off-screen window back on-screen on Mac OS X It seems that Mac OS X 10.6.1 Snow Leopard has a tendency to leave some windows off-screen at times, especially when I disconnect an external monitor from my MacBook. How can I move the window back on-screen when it's not possible to grab the title bar and drag it back onto the screen?
Asked by: Guest \| Views: 378

Total answers/comments: 5

Comments display order:

Guest [Entry]

This method seems to work: click on the Window menu, then click Zoom

Guest [Entry]

"Three ideas:

CmdF1 (or CmdfnF1 if you've configured your MacBook's keyboard to use normal function keys) toggles your displays between mirror mode and extended desktop. A side effect is that windows get moved around somewhat unpredictably. This might move the missing window to somewhere visible. This likely requires the external monitor to be connected though.
Turn on Spaces, hit the hot key to displays the spaces overview and see if your missing window outline is visible there. If so, drag it to where you want it to be.
Quit the application and relaunch. Definitely a non-ideal solution and not practical if there's unsaved work."

Guest [Entry]

"None of the above worked for me, but I managed a fix by changing:

System Preferences
Hardware
Displays

Then go to the 'Arrangement' 'tab' and drag the external window on top of the internal one (instead of side-by-side)."

Guest [Entry]

"If Window/Zoom option from menu won't help (as suggested in 1st answer):

(this could happen when application has it's own non-standard implementation of the Window menu like Adobe Photoshop),

you've to go to Displays Settings and select 'More Space' (Scaled) option.

See:

If you'd like to have some permanent solution, please install BetterTouchTool, which provides extra options (gestures) for moving the windows. In example:"

Guest [Entry]

"I had this problem with Parallels desktop 6 in OS X Lion, whereby the VM's actual window was hidden off-screen, and only visible in Mission control, and when you swiped between spaces.

So for those with the same problem, and hopefully this is applicable elsewhere: The solution is to right click on the Application's icon in the Dock, then go to the 'Options' menu item, and under 'Assign To' choose 'This Desktop'. That should move the app window back on to the current desktop. Still preferred the old spaces pref pane for this sort of thing - much faster.

Hope that helps those stumbling upon this post, with the same problem with Parallels (as I did)

Note that on Lion, there is no Assign To option in this position."