Cycling through windows in focus order (like alt-tab) is something we don’t want to implement:

1. The order in which alt+tab switches through windows is not easily predictable (due to our internal tree layout), thus either not doing what you want or making a separate visual element necessary (like a window list).
2. Having such a visual element as discussed in 1 would need hand-eye coordination: you press a key (hand), then look at the screen, figure out what you want, then press another key.
3. Direction focus is quicker. Instead of having one shortcut to go through all windows, you have 4.

Maybe slowpoke’s window switching script (ask him on IRC) is what you are looking for.

If it’s not, maybe you can build your idea with the IPC interface. It’s not going to be in core i3, though.

[Original comment by anonymous]

Thanks for the quick response. I can see your point for not making this a core feature.

Just to clarify:
I wasn't really looking for a way to cycle through all windows, I'm quite thankful for direction focus. (So thank you :) )
I was trying to focus a specific window on a different workspace by title (as per the user guide) and didn't get the window I was expecting, but another with the same (partial) title.
Repeated calls with the same command consistently focused on the same window, which seemed to me - after some testing - to be the latest matching window created. This being consistent is why I thought there may be an easy way to cycle through a list of matching windows and thus allow me to find the window I was actually looking for.
But seeing your arguments I have to agree, this feature is best left to other window managers.

Oh and thanks for the pointer to slowpoke's script. I think this is actually way better than what I was asking for.

alttab does the job.