FvwmIconMan(1)FvwmIconMan(1)NAMEFvwmIconMan - an Fvwm Icon Manager
SYNOPSISFvwmIconMan is spawned by fvwm, so no command line invocation will
work.
DESCRIPTIONFvwmIconMan is an icon manager modeled after the TWM icon manager. The
user may have multiple icon managers, each of which armed with a list
of window types which it manages. For example, the user may have one
manager which lists only emacs windows, and another which lists
everything else. You may also specify what resolution each icon manager
uses, for example, one icon manager may manage windows on all desks,
and another may manage only those on the current desk, or page. If you
have applied the MiniIcons patch to fvwm2, then FvwmIconMan can display
the miniature icons for its managed windows. The managers may have a
maximum number of columns (and so grows vertically), a maximum number
of rows (and then grows horizontally), or stay at a fixed size, and
adjust the size of the window buttons to fit (think win95's Taskbar).
And when support is compiled in for the X Shape extension, then the
manager windows may be shaped.
You can specify actions to be run when mouse, or key events are
received. For example, you could bind the first mouse button to iconify
the selected window, and make bindings for the arrow keys to navigate
the manager window without the mouse.
FvwmIconMan can be set to display which window currently has the
keyboard focus, and by binding the select event (see below) to the fvwm
Focus function, you can emulate the TWM icon manager's behavior.
INITIALIZATION
During initialization, FvwmIconMan searches though the fvwm
configuration file for the options which are described below. It is
highly recommended that you make FvwmIconMan be a sticky window. And if
you want to make use of the followfocus option, and/or binding an
action to Focus, then you should make FvwmIconMan clicktofocus. Also,
when using the Shape option, it's recommended that the FvwmIconMan
window not be decorated at all by fvwm.
INVOCATIONFvwmIconMan can be invoked by inserting the line 'Module FvwmIconMan'
in the .fvwmrc file. If FvwmIconMan is to be spawned during fvwm's
initialization, then this line should be placed in the InitFunction and
ResetFunction declarations, or it can be bound to a menu, mouse button,
or keystroke to invoke it later. FvwmIconMan should be placed in the
ModulePath (defined in the .fvwmrc file) in order for fvwm to find it.
If you wish to run FvwmIconMan in a transient mode, such as with the
built in window list, then pass Transient as an argument. The
invocation "Module FvwmIconMan Transient" will do nicely. In this mode,
FvwmIconMan will pop up one manager window directly under the cursor.
When the mouse button is released, it will execute the appropriate
action, and then exit. Things are somewhat complicated by the fact
that you can specify that FvwmIconMan create multiple manager windows,
behavior which is unsuitable when running transiently. So, when running
transiently, FvwmIconMan will only create one manager window. Use the
manager id 'transient' to specify options for this manager window.
CONFIGURATION OPTIONS REFERENCE CHARTFvwmIconMan has acquired quite a few options. I assume others share my
dislike of paging though a long manpage, so here is a terse reference
chart describing the available options. They are described in more
detail in the next section.
Name Description Default
action binds command to event Mouse 0 N sendcommand Iconify
background default background gray
buttongeometry size of button in pixels 100x17
dontshow list of windows to ignore
drawicons use miniicons false
focusandselectbutton flat grey black
focusbutton style for focused buttons up grey black
followfocus show which win has focus false
font 8x13
foreground default text color white
format describes button label "%c: %i"
iconname manger icon name FvwmIconMan
managergeometry size of manager in buttons 0x1
nummanagers number of managers 1
plainbutton style for normal buttons up black grey
resolution global, desk, or page global
selectbutton style for selected buttons flat black grey
shape use shape extension false
show list of windows to show
sort keep managers sorted name
title manager title FvwmIconMan
titlebutton style for title button raisededge black grey
usewinlist honor WinListSkip? true
CONFIGURATION OPTIONS
With the exception of the nummanagers option, all of the options may be
defined on a per-manager basis. So, for example, the user may have his
emacs manager with a red foreground, and his xterm manager with a blue
one. A configuration line may therefore have one of two forms:
*FvwmIconMan*optionname optionvalue
To specify that the optionname takes the value optionvalue for
all managers.
*FvwmIconMan*managerid*optionname optionvalue
To specify that the option optionname takes the value
optionvalue for manager managerid. Mangerid may either be a
positive integer, or the string "transient". An integral id
refers to managers which FvwmIconMan creates when running
normally, and an id of "transient" refers to the single manager
which FvwmIconMan creates when running transiently.
The following options may be specified:
*FvwmIconMan*nummanagers num
num is a positive integer specifying the total number of icon
managers. Since FvwmIconMan would like to know how many
managers there are before handling any manager specific options,
this should come first. The default is 1.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]action type binding
Binds an FvwmIconMan command to an event. Type may be one of the
values: Key, Mouse, or Select. Actions are described in the
following section ACTIONS.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]background background
Specifies the default background color.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]buttongeometry geometry
Specifies the initial geometry of an individual button in
pixels. If the specified height is 0, then the button height is
determined from the font size. X and Y coordinates are ignored.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]drawicons value
If your version of fvwm2 is capable of using MiniIcons, then
this option determines if FvwmIconMan displays the MiniIcons.
Otherwise, it generates an error message. "true" means that
MiniIcons are shown for iconified windows, "false" that
MiniIcons are never shown, and "always" that MiniIcons are shown
for all windows.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]focusbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of
buttons whose windows have the keyboard focus.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]focusandselectbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of
buttons which are both selected, and have the keyboard focus.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]font font
Specifies the font to be used for labeling the buttons. The
default is 8x13.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]foreground foreground
Specifies the default foreground color.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]format formatstring
A printf like format string which describes the string to be
printed in the manager window for each managed window. Possible
flags are: %t, %i, %c, and %r for the window's title, icon,
class, or resource name, respectively. The default is "%c: %i".
Warning: m4 reserves the word format, so if you use m4, take
appropriate action.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]iconname iconstring
Specifies the window icon name for that manager window.
Iconstring may either be a single word, or a string enclosed in
quotes. The default is "FvwmIconMan".
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]managergeometry geometry
Specifies the initial geometry of the manager, in units of
buttons. If height is 0, then the manager will use width
columns, and will grow vertically once it has more than width
windows. Likewise, if width is 0, it will use height rows, and
grow horizontally. If both are nonzero, then the manager window
will be exactly that size, and stay that way. As columns are
created, the buttons will narrow to accommodate. If the
geometry is specified with a negative y coordinate, then the
window manager will grow upwards. Otherwise, it will grow
downwards.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]plainbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
Specifies how normal buttons look. style may be one of flat, up,
down, raisededge, or sunkedge, and describes how the button is
drawn. The color options are both optional, and if not set, then
the default colors are used. If on a monochrome screen, then the
style option is ignored, but must still be set.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]resolution resolution
Specifies when the manager will display an entry for a certain
window. resolution may take one of the following values: global,
desk, or page. If global, then all windows of the appropriate
type (see the show and dontshow options below) will be shown. If
desk, then only those windows on the current desk will be down.
And if page, then only those windows on the current page will be
shown. The default is global.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]selectbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of
buttons when the mouse is over them.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]shape boolean
If True, then use make the window shaped. Probably only useful
if you have multiple columns or rows. If FvwmIconMan wasn't
compiled to support the Shape extension, this generates an error
message. When using shaped windows, it's recommended that a fvwm
style is made for FvwmIconMan that has no borders. Otherwise,
fvwm will get confused.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]title titlestring
Specifies the window title string for that manager window.
Titlestring may either be a single word, or a string enclosed in
quotes. The default is "FvwmIconMan". This will be drawn in the
titlebar of the manager window, if any, and in the title button,
which is the button drawn when the manager is empty.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]titlebutton style [forecolor backcolor]
Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of the
title button (the button drawn when the manager is empty). The
manager's title is drawn in the title button.
The two following options control which windows get handled by which
managers. A manager can get two lists, one of windows to show, and one
of windows to ignore. If only the show list is given, then that manager
will show only the windows in the list. If only the dontshow list is
given, then the manager will show all windows except those in the list.
If both lists are given, then a window will be shown if it is not in
the dontshow list, and in the show list. And finally, if neither list
is given, then the manager will handle all windows. Each list is made
up of patterns of the form type=pattern, where type is one of class,
resource, title, or icon, and pattern is an expression of the same
format used in the fvwm style command (minimalistic shell pattern
matching). Quotes around the pattern will be taken as part of the
expression. If a window could be handled by more than one manager, then
the manager with the lowest id gets it.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]show pattern list
If a window matches one of the patterns in the list, then it may
be handled by this manager.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]dontshow pattern list
If a window matches one of the patterns in the list, then it may
not be handled by this manager.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]usewinlist boolean
If true, then honor the WinListSkip style flag. Otherwise, all
windows are subject to possible management according to the show
and dontshow lists.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]followfocus boolean
If true, then the button appearance reflects which window
currently has focus. Default is false.
*FvwmIconMan*[id*]sort value
If name, then the manager list is sorted by name. If
namewithcase, then it is sorted by name sensitive to case. If
id, then the manager list is sorted by the window id, which
never changes after the window is created. Or it can be set to
none, which results in no sorting. Default is name.
ACTIONS
Actions are commands which may be bound to an event of the type: a
keypress, a mouse click, or the mouse entering a window manager button
- denoted by the action types Key, Mouse, and Select.
Normally, actions bound to a mouse click are executed when the button
is pressed. In transient mode, the action is executed when the button
is released, since it is assumed that FvwmIconMan was bound to some
mouse event. A tip/warning: FvwmIconMan still keeps track of the mouse
button and any modifier keys in this case, so if you bind FvwmIconMan
to say, meta-button3, then it would be wise to ensure that the action
you want to execute will be executed when the meta-button3 event occurs
(which would be the button release, assuming you kept your finger on
the meta key).
The syntax for actions are:
Key actions: Key Keysym Modifiers FunctionList
Keysym and Modifiers are exactly the same as for the fvwm Key
command.
Mouse actions: Mouse Button Modifiers FunctionList
Button and Modifiers are exactly the same as for the fvwm Mouse
command.
Select actions: Select FunctionList
A FunctionList is a sequence of commands separated by commas. They are
executed in left to right order, in one shared context - which
currently only contains a pointer to the "current" button. If a button
is selected (typically by the mouse pointer sitting on it) when the
action is executed, then the current button is initialized to that
button. Otherwise, it points to nothing.
Most of the available commands then modify this "current" button,
either by moving it around, making it become the selected button, or
sending commands to fvwm acting on the window represented by that
button. Note that while this current button is initialized to be the
selected button, the selected button does not implicitly follow it
around. This way, the user can send commands to various windows,
without changing which button is selected.
Commands take five types of arguments: Integer, Manager, Window,
Button, and String. A String is a string specified exactly as for fvwm
- either in quotes or as a single word not in quotes. Again, you may
bind a sequence of commands to an event, by listing them separated by
commas.
Window and Button types look exactly the same in the .fvwmrc file, but
are interpreted as either specifying a managed window, or a FvwmIconMan
button representing a window. They can either be an integer (which is
interpreted module N where N is the number of buttons - so 0 is the
first and -1 is the last), or one of the strings: Select, Focus, Up,
Down, Right, Left, Next, Prev. Select and Focus refer to the currently
selected or focused button or window. Up, Down, Right, and Left refer
to the button or window above, below, to the right of, or to the left
of the current button in the manager window, allowing navigation around
the manager window. Next and Prev designates the window, button, or
manager after or before the current button, allowing navigation of the
one dimensional list of windows which is drawn in the manager window.
If the manager is sorted, Next and Prev move through the windows in the
sorted order.
The Manager type can either be an integer, Next, or Prev. The meaning
is analogous to that of the Button type, but in terms of the integral
index of the managers, restricted to managers which are nonempty.
The following functions are currently defined:
bif Button Integer/String
A relative branch instruction. If Button is Select or Focus,
then take the branch if there is a selected button or a focused
button. If Button is an integer, then branch if nonzero. If it
is one of Up, Down, Right, Left, Next, Prev, then the branch is
taken when the current button can move in that direction. If the
branch is taken, then Integer commands are skipped. No backwards
branches are allowed.
bifn Button Integer/String
The complement of bif. The branch is taken if Button evaluates
to false, by the criteria listed for bif.
gotobutton Button
Sets current button to Button. If Button is an integer, then the
current button is set to Button modulo the number of buttons, in
the whichever manager contains the selected button, if any.
gotomanager Manager
Sets button to button 0 of Manager. This will only go to a
visible, nonempty manager. So an integral argument is taken
modulo the number of such managers.
jmp Integer/String
Executes a relative jump of Integer instructions. Backwards
jumps are not allowed. The jump is computed relative to the
instruction following the jmp.
label String
Provides a label that previous instructions can jump to. It will
not be visible to subsequent jump instructions, and the same
label can be used multiple times in the same instruction list
(though it would be perverse to do so.)
print String
Prints String to the console. Useful for debugging actions.
quit Quits FvwmIconMan.
ret Stop executing the entire action.
select Selects the current button, if any. If a select action has been
specified, it will then be run. Therefore, it is considered
unwise to set the select button in the select action.
sendcommand Command
Sends the fvwm command Command to the window represented by the
current button, if any.
warp Warps cursor to current button, if any.
Examples:
gotobutton select, gotobutton Down, select
Selects the button below the currently selected button. Since the
current button is already initialized to the selected button, this may
be shortened to "gotobutton Down , select".
gotobutton Up, select
Selects the button above the currently selected button.
gotobutton 0, select
Selects the first button of the current manager. If there is no current
manager, which is the case when no button is selected, then this does
nothing.
gotobutton -1, select
Selects the last button of the current manager.
gotobutton focus, select
Selects the button corresponding to the focused window.
gotobutton focus, Iconify
Sends the fvwm command Iconify to the focused window. Note that this
does not change the selected button.
bif Next 3, gotobutton 0, select, ret, gotobutton Next, select
If a button is selected, and it's the last button, go to button 0. If
it's not the last button, go to the next button. Otherwise, do nothing.
Basically, this action cycles through all buttons in the current
manager.
bif select 7, bif focus 3, gotomanager 0, select, ret, gotobutton focus, select, ret, gotobutton down, select
This is good for sending to FvwmIconMan with a SendToModule command. If
there is a selected button, it moves down. Otherwise, if there is a
focused button, it is selected. Otherwise, button 0 of manager 0 gets
selected.
bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, ret, label Select, gotobutton down, select
Same as previous, but using the label instruction.
In addition to being bound to keys and mice, actions can be sent from
fvwm to FvwmIconMan via the SendToModule command. Don't quote the
command when using SendToModule. Also, due to a bug in the current
version of fvwm2, don't quote FvwmIconMan either.
SAMPLE CONFIGURATIONS
This first example is of a the simplest invocation of FvwmIconMan,
which only has one manager, and handles all windows:
XCOMM##############################################################
XCOMM Load any modules which should be started during
XCOMM fvwm initialization
ModulePath /usr/lib/X11/fvwm:/usr/bin/X11
Module FvwmIconMan
XCOMM Make FvwmIconMan title-bar-less, sticky, and give it an icon
Style "Fvwm*" Icon toolbox.xpm,NoTitle,NoHandles,Sticky
Style "FvwmIconMan" HandleWidth 5, Handles, BorderWidth 5
XCOMM#############################################################
XCOMM#############################################################
XCOMM Definitions used by the modules
*FvwmIconMan*nummanagers 1
*FvwmIconMan*resolution global
*FvwmIconMan*background slategrey
*FvwmIconMan*foreground white
*FvwmIconMan*font 7x13
*FvwmIconMan*buttongeometry 100x0
*FvwmIconMan*managergeometry 1x0-0+0
This example is the Reader's Digest version of my personal
configuration. It has two managers, one for emacs and one for
everything else, minus things with no icon title. Only windows on the
current page are displayed. The use of the drawicons and shape options
requires that fvwm and FvwmIconMan we compiled with the correct
options. Note how the geometry and show options are specified per
manager, and the others are common to all:
Style "FvwmIconMan" NoTitle, Sticky, WindowListSkip, BorderWidth 0
Style "FvwmIconMan" HandleWidth 0
Key F8 A N SendToModule FvwmIconMan bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Select, gotobutton prev, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow
Key F9 A N SendToModule FvwmIconMan bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Select, gotobutton next, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow
*FvwmIconMan*numManagers 2
*FvwmIconMan*Resolution page
*FvwmIconMan*background steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*foreground white
*FvwmIconMan*font 7x13
*FvwmIconMan*usewinlist true
*FvwmIconMan*drawicons true
*FvwmIconMan*shape true
*FvwmIconMan*followfocus true
*FvwmIconMan*sort name
*FvwmIconMan*plainbutton up white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*selectbutton down white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*focusbutton up white brown
*FvwmIconMan*focusandselectButton down white brown
*FvwmIconMan*titleButton raisededge white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*1*title "Emacs windows"
*FvwmIconMan*1*iconname "FvwmIconMan: Emacs"
*FvwmIconMan*1*format "%i"
*FvwmIconMan*1*show resource=emacs resource=gemacs
*FvwmIconMan*1*managergeometry 1x0-400+0
*FvwmIconMan*1*buttongeometry 200x0
*FvwmIconMan*2*title "All windows"
*FvwmIconMan*2*iconname "FvwmIconMan: all"
*FvwmIconMan*2*format "%c: %i"
*FvwmIconMan*2*dontshow icon=Untitled
*FvwmIconMan*2*managergeometry 2x4-0+0
*FvwmIconMan*2*buttongeometry 200x0
*FvwmIconMan*transient*geometry 194x100
*FvwmIconMan*transient*dontshow icon=Untitled
*FvwmIconMan*transient*action Mouse 0 A sendcommand select select Iconify
*FvwmIconMan*action Mouse 1 N sendcommand Iconify
*FvwmIconMan*action Mouse 2 N sendcommand WarpToWindow
*FvwmIconMan*action Mouse 3 N sendcommand "Module FvwmIdent FvwmIdent"
*FvwmIconMan*action Key Left N gotobutton Left, select
*FvwmIconMan*action Key Right N gotobutton Right, select
*FvwmIconMan*action Key Up N gotobutton Up, select
*FvwmIconMan*action Key Down N gotobutton Down, select
*FvwmIconMan*action Key q N quit
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
There is one bug that I know of. A honest to goodness solution to this
would be appreciated. When an icon manager is set to grow upwards or
leftwards, on some machines it may wander occasionally.
It doesn't handle windows without resource names as gracefully as it
should.
AUTHOR
Brady Montz (bradym@cs.arizona.edu).
THANKS
Thanks to:
David Berson <berson@cs.pitt.edu>,
Gren Klanderman <greg@alphatech.com>,
David Goldberg <dsg@mitre.org>,
Pete Forman <gsez020@compo.bedford.waii.com>,
Neil Moore <amethyst@maxwell.ml.org>,
Josh M. Osborne <stripes@va.pubnix.com,
Adam Rice <wysiwyg@glympton.airtime.co.uk>,
Chris Siebenmann <cks@hawkwind.utcs.toronto.edu>,
Bjorn Victor <victor@delial.docs.uu.se>.
for contributing either code or truly keen ideas.
3rd Berkeley Distribution June 17, 1998
