The only thing I feel like is missing from niri is a scratch layer. There are some apps that just don’t need to be tiled and it’s nice to have access to them immediately no matter “where” you are. Perfect example is matrix client. If the wife texts me I want to become able to pop that sucker up immediately and reply, not find the “matrix client workspace”. Plus it’s tiny and doesn’t need to be tiled. Same with media players.
Yeah, I have been wanting this. The way it works on Sway is "okay", but it would be nice to have a floating workspace that can be shown or hidden on top of whatever your active workspace is. The workaround most people are using seems to be a named workspace for scratch.
In my case I've found niri's workflow quite nice for these scratch windows, since every new window opens to the immediate left of the currently focused window, and doesn't affect the size or tiling of any other windows, they're just shifted to the right.
Many of those apps minimise when closed and reopen when calling, so often it is not really an issue (although it's sometimes annoying that you have to specifically tell the apps to exit when you do want to close).
Paperwm on gnome has this.