2 .\" Man page for Openbox
4 .\" Copyright (c) 2000 by Wilbert Berendsen <wbsoft@xs4all.nl>
6 .\" This manual page may be freely distributed and modified.
7 .\" Parts of the text are taken from website and several README's
8 .\" by His Great Hughesness himself. Why reinvent wheels?
10 .\" Created with NEdit, tested with ``man'' and ``tkman.''
11 .\" This manpage uses only standard groff and tmac.an macros.
12 .\" To all translators who didn't do manpages earlier (like me ;-):
13 .\" Read the Man-Page-Mini-HOWTO and the LDP manpage ``man 7 man''
14 .\" There's all I needed to know about these macros.
16 .\" Updated for bb 0.61 at Sat Sep 9 06:56:04 CEST 2000
18 .\" ..define sort of <blockquote><pre> macro
32 .TH openbox 1 "April 8th, 2002" "@VERSION@"
34 openbox \- a window manager for X11
36 .BR openbox " \-help | \-version"
39 .RI "[ \-rc" " rcfile " "] [ \-display" " display " ]
42 .\" First few Paragraphs taken from FILLMEINNOW
44 .\"Openbox is yet another addition to the list of window managers for the Open
45 .\"Group's X Window System, Version 11 Release 6 and above.
46 .\"Openbox is built with C++, sharing no common code with any other window
47 .\"manager (even though the graphics implementation is similar to that of Window
50 .\"From the time the first line of code was written, Openbox has evolved around
51 .\"one premise, minimalism.
52 .\"It's not meant to be Eye Candy, nor the most Featureful, nor the most Adorned
53 .\"for modelling the Widely acclaimed NeXT interface.
54 .\"It is just meant to be
57 .\"Openbox provides configurable window decorations, a root menu to launch
58 .\"applications, and a toolbar that shows the current workspace name, the focused
59 .\"application name, and the current time.
60 .\"There is also a workspace menu to add or remove workspaces. The `slit' can be
61 .\"used to dock small applications, e.g. most of the bbtools can use the slit.
63 .\"Openbox features a special kind of icon handling: When you minimize a window,
64 .\"no icon appears; instead, you can view all minimized applications in the `Icons'
65 .\"submenu of the workspace menu.
66 .\"Your desktop will never get cluttered with icons. As an alternative to icons,
67 .\"shaded windows are provided: A double click on the titlebar of a window will
68 .\"shade it (i.e. the window will disappear; only the titlebar stays visible).
70 .\"Openbox uses its own graphics class to render its images on the fly.
71 .\"By using style files, you can determine at a great level how your desktop looks.
72 .\"Openbox currently uses its own protocol to communicate with other clients such
73 .\"as the pager. Work is underway to support the new window manager specification
74 .\"that both GNOME and KDE use.
76 Openbox supports the following command line options:
79 Display command line options and compiled-in features, then exit.
82 Display version info and exit.
85 Use another rcfile than the default
88 .BI \-display \ display
89 Start Openbox on the specified display.
90 Programs started by Openbox will have the
92 environment variable set to this value, too.
94 This program is usually started by the user's startup script, most times called
96 To run openbox, modify the script by adding
100 as the last executed command of the script.
101 When Openbox terminates, the X session will terminate too.
103 When started, Openbox will try to find a default menu file in
105 You can provide a system-wide menu for your users here.
107 On exit or restart, Openbox will save user defaults in the file
109 in the user's home directory.
110 Some resources in this file can be edited by hand.
112 From version 0.60.x, Openbox does no keyboard handling by itself; instead, it
113 relies on an external program
116 So, in this section, we will discuss all mouse commands.
117 .SS Root window (background):
118 A right click (button 3) will pop up the root menu.
119 With this, you can launch your applications.
120 You can also customize this menu for your needs. See above for its location.
121 A middle click (button 2) will pop up the workspace menu.
122 You can add or remove a workspace, view
123 applications running on all workspace, inspect your iconified applications,
124 and jump directly to any workspace or application.
126 Left clicking (button 1) on an application in the Workspaces menu will bring
127 you to that workspace and raise/focus that application;
128 middle clicking (button 2) will warp the application to the current workspace.
130 The toolbar consists of three fields: a workspace name, the name of the
131 window that currently has focus, and a clock.
132 A left click on the toolbar will bring it to the foreground, a
133 middle click will hide it behind other windows (if AlwaysOnTop is not set), and
134 the right button will bring up a little menu.
136 Using this menu, you can enter a name for the current workspace (when finished,
138 Also, you can choose the toolbar's position, whether or not it
139 should be always on top (i.e. it cannot be obscured by other windows),
140 and whether it should hide itself when the mouse moves away.
142 Note: In Openbox versions below 0.60.0, a right click on the toolbar
143 immediately entered workspace name edit mode.
144 .SS Window Titlebar and Borders:
145 A left click on any part of the window's border will raise it.
146 Dragging then moves the window.
147 Dragging the resize grips at the bottom left and bottom right
148 corners resizes the window.
149 Middle clicking will immediately lower the window.
150 Right clicking on the border or titlebar pops up the window menu,
151 containing these commands:
154 Send window to another workspace.
155 When you select the workspace with the middle button, Openbox will
156 send you, along with the application, to the selected workspace.
159 Shade window (display titlebar only).
163 The `icon' can be found in the `Icons' submenu of the workspace menu. It will
164 *NOT* appear on screen otherwise.
168 When you click the middle button on this item, the
169 window will maximize only vertically.
179 A stuck window will always be displayed in the current workspace.
182 Kill (-SIGKILL) owner of window. Only use this if the client refuses to close.
185 Close the application cleanly.
187 When you double click on the titlebar of a window, it will `shade', so
188 that only the titlebar stays visible.
189 Another double click will redisplay the window contents.
191 The button at the left upper corner of a window is the Minimize button.
192 Clicking with any button causes the window to be iconified.
193 The rightmost button (with the X) closes the application.
194 The other button on the right (if present) maximizes the window in three ways:
195 Button 1 causes full screen maximization, button 2 maximizes the window only
196 vertically, and button 3 only horizontally.
198 Clicking button 3 in a menu will popdown the menu.
199 Clicking button 1 on the titlebar of any (sub)menu and then dragging it somewhere
200 else will cause the menu to stay visible, and not disappear when you click on
203 When you want to drag a window, but cannot see either the bottom handle or its
204 titlebar, you can press Alt + button 1 anywhere in the window and then
206 You can also use Alt + button 1 to raise a partially visible window.
207 Finally, Alt + button 2 lowers a window, and Alt + button 3 resizes the window.
209 A default menu file is installed in
211 Of course, this system-wide menu can be customized for all users at once.
212 But it is also possible to create a personal menu.
213 It is a convention to use the directory
215 in your home directory, and to create a menu file, e.g.
217 in this directory, or copy the system-wide menu file to this location.
218 Next, we have to tell Openbox to load our menu file instead of the default.
219 This is accomplished by adding (or changing) a resource value in the
223 session.menuFile: ~/.openbox/menu
225 For this change to take effect, Openbox has to be restarted.
226 Be sure that your menu is usable, then choose `Restart' from the default
229 The menu syntax is very simple and very effective.
230 There are up to three fields in a menu line.
231 They are of the form:
233 [tag] (label or filename) {command or filename}
235 The supported tags are as follows:
237 .B [begin] (label for root menu)
238 This tells Openbox to start parsing the menu file.
239 This tag is required for Openbox to parse your menu file.
240 If it cannot find it, the system default menu is used instead.
243 This tells Openbox that it is at the end of a menu.
244 This can either be a submenu or the main root menu.
245 There must be at least one of these tags in your menu to correspond to the
246 required [begin] tag.
248 .B [exec] (label for command) {shell command}
249 Inserts a command item into the menu.
250 When you select the menu item from the menu, Openbox runs `shell command.'
252 .B [exit] (label for exit)
253 Inserts an item that shuts down and exits Openbox.
254 Any running programs are not closed.
256 .B [include] (filename)
257 Parses the file specified by
259 and includes it with the current menu. The filename can be the full path to a
260 file, or it can begin with
262 which will be expanded into your home directory (e.g.
264 [include] (~/.openbox/stylesmenu)
267 .I /home/bhughes/.openbox/stylesmenu
270 .B [nop] (label - optional)
271 Insert a non-operational item into the current menu.
272 This can be used to help format the menu into blocks or sections
275 does accept a label, but it is not required, and a blank item will be used
278 .B [style] (label) {filename}
279 This tells Openbox to insert an item that, when selected, reads the style file
282 and applies the new textures, colors, and fonts to the current
285 .B [stylesdir] (directory name)
286 Reads all filenames (directories are ignored) from the specified directory and
287 creates menu items in the current menu for every filename. Openbox assumes
288 that each file is a valid style file. When selected by the user, Openbox
289 applies the selected style file to the current session.
290 The labels that are created in the menu are the filenames of the style files.
292 .B [stylesmenu] (label) {directory name}
293 Creates a submenu entry with
295 (that is also the title of the new submenu), and inserts in that submenu all
296 filenames in the specified directory, in the same way as the
300 .RB Both\ [stylesdir] \ and\ [stylesmenu]
301 commands make it possible to install style files without editing your menu file.
303 .B [submenu] (label) {title for menu - optional}
304 This tells Openbox to create and parse a new menu.
305 This menu is inserted as a submenu into the parent menu.
306 These menus are parsed recursively, so there is no limit to the number of levels
307 or nested submenus you can have.
308 The title for the new menu is optional; if none is supplied,
309 the new menu's title is the same as the item label.
312 tag is required to end the submenu.
314 .B [reconfig] (label)
315 When selected, this item rereads the current style and menu files and
317 This is useful for creating a new style or theme, as you don't have to
318 constantly restart Openbox every time you save your style.
319 However, Openbox automagically rereads the menu whenever it changes.
321 .B [restart] (label) {shell command - optional}
322 This tells Openbox to restart.
323 If `shell command' is supplied, it shuts down and runs the command (which is
324 commonly the name of another window manager).
325 If the command is omitted, Openbox restarts itself.
328 Inserts a Openbox generated submenu item containing numerous configuration
329 options concerning window placement, focus style, window moving style, etc.
331 .B [workspaces] (label)
332 This tells Openbox to insert a link to the workspaces menu directly
334 This is handy for those users who can't access the
335 workspace menu directly (e.g. if you don't have a 3 button mouse).
337 Any line that starts with a `#' is considered a comment and ignored by Openbox.
338 Also, in the labels/commands/filenames fields,
339 you can escape any character like so:
341 [exec] (\\(my cool\\) \\{XTERM\\}) {xterm -T \\"cool XTERM\\"}
343 Using `\\\\' inserts a literal back-slash into the label/command/filename field.
345 Now let's put together some things.
346 Here is a short example of a menu file:
350 [begin] (Openbox @version@)
351 [exec] (rxvt) {rxvt -ls}
352 [exec] (Mozilla) {mozilla}
353 [exec] (The GIMP) {gimp}
354 [submenu] (Window Manager)
355 [exec] (Edit Menus) {nedit .openbox/Menu}
356 [submenu] (Style) {Which Style?}
357 [stylesdir] (~/.openbox/styles)
358 [stylesmenu] (Openbox Styles) {@pkgdatadir@/styles}
360 [config] (Config Options)
361 [reconfig] (Reconfigure)
369 Openbox enables you to use specialized files that contain
371 resources to specify colors, textures, and fonts and therefore
372 the overall look of your window borders, menus, and the toolbar.
374 The default installation of Openbox provides some of these style files.
375 Usually they are put in
376 .IR @pkgdatadir@/styles .
377 You can study or edit these files to grasp how the Openbox style mechanism
380 .BR [style] ", " [stylesdir] " and " [stylesmenu]
381 menu commands in your menu file to be able to select and change between styles
384 You can also create a directory in your home directory (usually named
385 .I ~/.openbox/styles)
386 and put your own style files there.
387 Of course, you may choose any name for this directory, but many downloadable
388 themes will rely on the name
390 (following the bb.themes.org naming scheme).
392 To understand how the style mechanism works, you should have a little knowledge
393 of how X resources work.
395 X resources consist of a key and a value.
396 The key is constructed of several smaller keys (sometimes referred to as
397 children), delimited by a period (`.').
398 Keys may also contain a star (`*') to serve as a wildcard, which means that one
399 line of typed text will match several keys.
400 This is useful for styles that are based on one or two colors.
402 Openbox allows you to configure its four main components: the toolbar, the
403 slit, the menus, and the window decorations.
405 The little window that shows the x-y position while dragging windows borrows
406 its style from the window's titlebar.
408 Here are some quick examples:
410 toolbar.clock.color: green
412 This sets the color resource of the toolbar clock to `green'. Another example:
414 menu*color: rgb:3/4/5
416 This sets the color resource of the menu
417 .I and all of its `children'
419 (For a description of color names, see
421 So this one also applies to
422 .IR menu.title.color " and " menu.frame.color .
425 *font: -b&h-lucida-medium-r-normal-*-*-140-*
427 you set the font resource for all keys to this font name all at once.
428 (For information about the fonts installed on your system, you can use a program like
429 .IR xfontsel "(1), " gtkfontsel ", or " xlsfonts "(1).)"
431 Now what makes Openbox just so spectacular is its ability to render textures
433 Texture descriptions are specified in a similar way to the colors shown above
435 .ta \w'toolbar.clock.colorTo:\ 'u
437 toolbar.clock: Raised Gradient Diagonal Bevel1
438 toolbar.clock.color: rgb:8/6/4
439 toolbar.clock.colorTo: rgb:4/3/2
441 Don't worry; we will explain right now!
442 A texture description consists of up to five fields, which are as follows:
444 .B Flat / Raised / Sunken
445 gives the component either a flat, raised, or sunken appearance.
448 tells Openbox to draw either a solid color or a texture with gradient.
450 .B Horizontal / Vertical / Diagonal / Crossdiagonal / Pipecross / Elliptic / Rectangle / Pyramid
451 Select one of these texture types. They only work when
456 tells Openbox to interlace the texture (darken every other line).
457 This option is most commonly used with gradiented textures, but, from Openbox
458 version 0.60.3 on, it also works in solid textures.
461 tells Openbox which type of bevel to use.
462 Bevel1 is the default bevel.
463 The shading is placed on the edge of the image.
464 Bevel2 is an alternative.
465 The shading is placed one pixel in from the edge of the image.
467 Instead of a texture description, the option
469 is also available, which makes the component appear as a part of its parent, i.e.
472 All gradient textures are composed of two color values: the
473 .IR color " and " colorTo " resources."
474 color represents the initial color, colorTo represents the final color of the
482 resource is used to specify the interlacing color.
484 Well, here is the complete component list; also, all components together with
485 which kind of value they can contain.
486 Comments are preceded with an exclamation sign (!), which is also used for
487 comments in Openbox style c.q. X resource files.
489 .ta \w'window.button.unfocus.picColor:\ 'u
492 .\" The comments also to be translated!
494 ! The toolbar itself.
497 toolbar.colorTo: Color
499 ! The buttons on the toolbar.
500 toolbar.button: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
501 toolbar.button.color: Color
502 toolbar.button.colorTo: Color
504 ! Color of the button arrows.
505 toolbar.button.picColor: Color
507 ! Buttons in pressed state.
508 toolbar.button.pressed: Texture \fI(e.g. Sunken)\fR or \fIParentRelative\fR
509 toolbar.button.pressed.color: Color
510 toolbar.button.pressed.colorTo: Color
512 ! Color of pressed button arrows.
513 toolbar.button.pressed.picColor: Color
515 ! The toolbar workspace label.
516 toolbar.label: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
517 toolbar.label.color: Color
518 toolbar.label.colorTo: Color
519 toolbar.label.textColor: Color
521 ! The toolbar window label.
522 toolbar.windowLabel: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
523 toolbar.windowLabel.color: Color
524 toolbar.windowLabel.colorTo: Color
525 toolbar.windowLabel.textColor: Color
528 toolbar.clock: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
529 toolbar.clock.color: Color
530 toolbar.clock.colorTo: Color
531 toolbar.clock.textColor: Color
533 ! How the toolbar's text should be justified.
534 toolbar.justify: \fIcenter\fR, \fIleft\fR, or \fIright\fR
536 ! Font to be used for all toolbar components.
537 toolbar.font: Font \fI(e.g. -*-helvetica-medium-r-normal-*-*-100-*)\fR
541 menu.title.color: Color
542 menu.title.colorTo: Color
543 menu.title.textColor: Color
544 menu.title.font: Font
545 menu.title.justify: \fIcenter\fR, \fIleft\fR, or \fIright\fR
549 menu.frame.color: Color
550 menu.frame.colorTo: Color
551 menu.frame.textColor: Color
552 menu.frame.disableColor: Color
553 menu.frame.font: Font
554 menu.frame.justify: \fIcenter\fR, \fIleft\fR, or \fIright\fR
556 ! Bullets for submenu items.
557 menu.bullet: \fIempty\fR, \fItriangle\fR, \fIsquare\fR, or \fIdiamond\fR
558 menu.bullet.position: \fIright\fR or \fIleft\fR
560 ! The highlighted menu item.
561 menu.hilite: Texture (e.g. \fIRaised\fR)
562 menu.hilite.color: Color
563 menu.hilite.colorTo: Color
564 menu.hilite.textColor: Color
567 window.title.focus: Texture
568 window.title.focus.color: Color
569 window.title.focus.colorTo: Color
571 ! An unfocused window.
572 window.title.unfocus: Texture
573 window.title.unfocus.color: Color
574 window.title.unfocus.colorTo: Color
577 window.label.focus: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
578 window.label.focus.color: Color
579 window.label.focus.colorTo: Color
580 window.label.focus.textColor: Color
582 window.label.unfocus: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
583 window.label.unfocus.color: Color
584 window.label.unfocus.colorTo: Color
585 window.label.unfocus.textColor: Color
588 window.handle.focus: Texture
589 window.handle.focus.color: Color
590 window.handle.focus.colorTo: Color
592 window.handle.unfocus: Texture
593 window.handle.unfocus.color: Color
594 window.handle.unfocus.colorTo: Color
597 window.grip.focus: Texture
598 window.grip.focus.color: Color
599 window.grip.focus.colorTo: Color
601 window.grip.unfocus: Texture
602 window.grip.unfocus.color: Color
603 window.grip.unfocus.colorTo: Color
606 window.button.focus: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
607 window.button.focus.color: Color
608 window.button.focus.colorTo: Color
609 window.button.focus.picColor: Color
611 window.button.unfocus: Texture or \fIParentRelative\fR
612 window.button.unfocus.color: Color
613 window.button.unfocus.colorTo: Color
614 window.button.unfocus.picColor: Color
616 window.button.pressed: Texture (e.g. \fISunken\fR)
617 window.button.pressed.color: Color
618 window.button.pressed.colorTo: Color
620 ! Frame around window.
621 window.frame.focusColor: Color
622 window.frame.unfocusColor: Color
624 ! Font and justification for window labels.
626 window.justify: \fIcenter\fR, \fIleft\fR, or \fIright\fR
628 ! Miscellaneous resources.
630 ! A border can be drawn around all components.
631 borderWidth: a number of pixels, e.g. \fI1\fR
634 bevelWidth: a number of pixels > 0
635 handleWidth: a number of pixels > 0
637 ! Width of the window frame (from version 0.61 on).
638 ! When not specified, frameWidth defaults to the value of bevelWidth.
639 frameWidth: a number of pixels >= 0
642 ! This command is executed whenever this style is selected.
643 ! Typically it sets the root window to a nice picture.
644 rootCommand: Shell command, e.g. \fIbsetroot -mod 4 4 -fg rgb: 5/6/6 -bg grey20\fR
646 ! Some of the bbtools read these old 0.51 resources.
651 Now, this seems a long list, but, remember, when you create your own style, you
652 can easily set lots of keys with a single command, e.g.
654 .ta \w'*unfocus.textColor:\ 'u
656 *colorTo: darkslategrey
657 *unfocus.color: darkslategrey
658 *unfocus.colorTo: black
660 *unfocus.textColor: lightgrey
663 This sets already nice defaults for many components.
665 The slit is a special Openbox window frame that can contain dockable
666 applications, e.g. the `bbtools' or WindowMaker's dockapps.
667 When applications are run in the slit, they have no window borders of their own;
668 instead, they are framed in the slit, and they are always visible in the current
670 You can click button 3 on the edge of the slit window to get a menu to
671 determine its position, whether its contained applications should be grouped
672 horizontally or vertically and whether it should hide itself when the
675 Most dockable applications use the
677 option to run in the slit.
678 For example, you could put in your
685 Of course, to use the slit, you must have slit support compiled in (this is
690 resource file is created and maintained by Openbox itself.
693 menu (from 0.60.x on), the last selected style file, your workspace names and
694 so on are saved automatically in this file.
695 However, there are some resources in it you might want to edit yourself:
698 This tells Openbox where to look for its menu file.
700 .B session.screen0.toolbar.widthPercent:
701 This determines the amount (in %) of space the toolbar will take.
705 .B session.screen0.strftimeFormat:
706 This adjusts the way the current time is displayed in the toolbar.
713 .B session.autoRaiseDelay:
714 This adjusts the delay (in ms) before focused windows will raise when using the
719 .B session.doubleClickInterval:
720 This adjusts the delay (in ms) between mouse clicks for Openbox to consider a double click.
724 .B session.screen0.edgeSnapThreshold:
725 When moving a window across your screen, Openbox is able to have it `snap' to
726 the edges of the screen for easy placement.
727 This variable tells Openbox the distance (in pixels) at which the window will
733 This tells Openbox how much memory (in Kb) it may use to store cached pixmaps on
735 If your machine runs short of memory, you may lower this value.
739 .B session.cacheLife:
740 This tells Openbox how long (in minutes) unused pixmaps may stay in the X
745 .B session.colorsPerChannel:
746 This tells Openbox how many colors to take from the X server on pseudocolor
747 displays. A channel would be red, green, or blue.
748 Openbox will allocate this variable ^ 3 colors and make them always available.
749 This value must be between 2 and 6.
750 When you run Openbox on an 8-bit display, you must set this resource to 4.
754 When running Openbox in a multiple desktop environment, the
758 etc. for any appropriate desktop.
766 file, and to resolve style file and directory names.
769 When no other display was given on the command line, Openbox will start on the
770 display specified by this variable.
771 .SH AUTHOR and CREDITS
772 All of the code was initially written and maintained as Blackbox by Brad Hughes
773 .nh \" hyphenation off
780 and then Sean 'Shaleh' Perry
785 and is now maintained as Openbox by Ben Jansens
789 with contributions and patches merged from
790 many individuals around the world.
792 The official Openbox website:
794 .B http://FILLMEINNOW/
797 The bug and feature request page, as well as current releases can be found at:
799 .B http://FILLMEINNOW/
802 Many themes and other contributions:
804 .B http://bb.themes.org/
807 This manpage was put together by Wilbert Berendsen
811 Numerous other languages will be available.
813 .IR bsetroot (1), \ bbkeys (1) \" not there, yet ;-(
projects / chaz / openbox / blob