fluxbox

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

Fluxbox provides configurable window decorations, a root menu to launch applications and a toolbar that shows the current workspace name, the focused application name and the current time. There is also a workspace menu to add or remove workspaces. The `slit' can be used to dock small applications, e.g. most of the bbtools can use the slit.

Fluxbox will iconify windows to the toolbar, in addition to adding the window to the `Icons' submenu of the workspace menu. One click and they reappear. A double-click on the titlebar of a window will shade it (i.e. the window will disappear, only the titlebar stays visible.)

Fluxbox uses its own graphics class to render its images on the fly. By using style files, you can determine at a great level how your desktop looks like. Fluxbox styles are compatible with those of Blackbox, so users migrating can still use their current favourite themes. Currently KDE WM hints are not supported, but Fluxbox is already prepared to support the new window manager specification that is now being developed for both Gnome and KDE2.0.  

OPTIONS

-help

Display command line options and compiled-in features, then exit.

-version

Display version info and exit.

-rc rcfile

Use another rcfile than the default ~/.fluxbox/init.

-display display

Start Fluxbox on the specified display. Programs started by Fluxbox will have the DISPLAY environment variable set to this value, too.

RUNNING FLUXBOX

exec fluxbox

as the last executed command of the script. When Fluxbox terminates, the X session will terminate too.

When started, Fluxbox will try to find a default menufile in /usr/local/share/fluxbox/menu. You can provide a system-wide menu for your users here.

On exit or restart, Fluxbox will save user defaults in the file ~/.fluxbox/init in the user's home directory. Some resources in this file can be edited by hand.  

USING FLUXBOX

Root window (background):

Left clicking (button 1) on an application in the Workspaces menu will bring you to that workspace and raise/focus that application; middle clicking (button 2) will warp the application to the current workspace.  

Toolbar:

Using this menu you can enter a name for the current workspace (when finished, press Enter). Also you can choose the toolbar's position, whether or not it should be always on top (i.e. it cannot be obscured by other windows), and whether it should hide itself when the mouse moves away.  

Window Titlebar and Borders:

Send To...

Send window to another workspace. When you select the workspace with the middle button, Fluxbox will send you along with the application to the selected workspace

Send Group To...

Sends a window, along with all windows currently grouped with it, to another workspace. Follows the same rules as Send To...

Shade

Shade the window (display titlebar only)

Iconify

Iconify window. The `icon' can be found in the `Icons' submenu of the workspace menu as well as in the toolbar.

Maximize

(Un)Maximize window. When you click the middle button on this item, the window will maximize only vertically

Raise

Raise window

Lower

Lower window

Stick

(Un)Stick window. A stuck window will always be displayed in the current workspace

Kill Client

Kill (-SIGKILL) owner of window

Close

Close the application cleanly

When you doubleclick on the titlebar of a window, it will `shade', so that only the titlebar stays visible. Another double click will redisplay the window contents.  

Window Buttons:

Right: minimize maximize close
Left: sticky

Clicking the minimize button with any button causes the window to be iconified. Clicking the close button with any button closes the application. The maximize button (if present) maximizes the window in three ways: Button 1 causes full screen maximization, button 2 maximizes the window only vertically, and button 3 only horizontally. The Sticky button sets has the same meaning as the (Un)Stick window menu option.  

Any menu:

Miscellaneous:

MENU FILE

session.menuFile:       ~/.fluxbox/menu

For this change to take effect, Fluxbox has to be restarted. Be sure that your menu is usable, then choose `Restart' from the default Fluxbox root menu.  

Menu syntax

[tag] (label or filename) {command or filename}

The supported tags are as follows:

[begin] (label for root menu)

This tells Fluxbox to start parsing the menu file. This tag is required for Fluxbox to parse your menu file. If it cannot find it, the system default menu is used instead.

[end]

This tells Fluxbox that it is at the end of a menu. This can either be a submenu or the main root menu. There must be at least one of these tags in your menu to correspond to the required [begin] tag.

[exec] (label for command) {shell command}

Inserts a command item into the menu. When you select the menu item from the menu, Fluxbox runs `shell command.'

[exit] (label for exit)

Inserts an item that shuts down and exits Fluxbox. Any open windows are reparented to the root window before Fluxbox exits.

[include] (filename)

Parses the file specified by filename inline with the current menu. The filename can be the full path to a file or it can begin with ~/, which will be expanded into your home directory (e.g.

[include] (~/fluxbox/stylesmenu)

will include /home/fluxgen/fluxbox/stylesmenu in my menu).

[nop] (label - optional)

Insert a non-operational item into the current menu. This can be used to help format the menu into blocks or sections if so desired. [nop] does accept a label, but it is not required, and a blank item will be used if none is supplied.

[style] (label) {filename}

This tells Fluxbox to insert an item that, when selected, reads style file named filename and apply the new textures, colors and fonts to the current running session.

[stylesdir] (directory name)

Reads all filenames from the specified directory, assuming that they are all valid style files (directories are ignored), and creates menu items in the current menu for every filename, that, when selected by the user, apply the selected style file to the current session. The labels that are created in the menu are the filenames of the style files.

[stylesmenu] (label) {directory name}

Creates a submenu entry with label (that is also the title of the new submenu), and inserts in that submenu all filenames in the specified directory, assuming that they are all valid style files (directories are ignored) in the same way as the [stylesdir] command does.

Both [stylesdir] and [stylesmenu] commands make it possible to install style files without editing your menu file.

[submenu] (label) {title for menu - optional}

This tells Fluxbox to create and parse a new menu. This menu is inserted as a submenu into the parent menu. These menus are parsed recursively, so there is no limit to the number of levels or nested submenus you can have. The title for the new menu is optional, if none is supplied, the new menu's title is the same as the item label. An [end] tag is required to end the submenu.

[reconfig] (label)

When selected, this item rereads the current style and menu files and apply any changes. This is useful for creating a new style or theme, as you don't have to constantly restart Fluxbox every time you save your style. However, Fluxbox automagically rereads the menu whenever it changes.

[restart] (label) {shell command - optional}

This tells Fluxbox to restart. If `shell command' is supplied, it shuts down and runs the command (which is commonly the name of another window manager). If the command is omitted, Fluxbox restarts itself.

[config] (label)

Inserts a Fluxbox native submenu item, containing numerous configuration options concerning window placement, focus style, window moving style etc.

[workspaces] (label)

This tells Fluxbox to insert a link to the workspaces menu directly into your menu. This is handy for those users who can't access the workspace menu directly (e.g. if you don't have a 3 button mouse, it's rather hard to middle click to show the workspace menu).

Any line that starts with a `#' is considered a comment and ignored by Fluxbox. Also, in the labels/commands/filenames fields, you can escape any character like so:

[exec] (\(my cool\) \{XTERM\}) {xterm -T \"cool XTERM\"}

Using `\\' inserts a literal back-slash into the label/command/filename field.  

Menu example

# Fluxbox menu file
[begin] (Fluxbox 0.5.1)
  [exec] (rxvt) {rxvt -ls}
  [exec] (netscape) {netscape -install}
  [exec] (The GIMP) {gimp}
  [exec] (XV) {xv}
  [exec] (Vim) {rxvt -geometry 132x60 -name VIM -e screen vim}
  [exec] (Mutt) {rxvt -name mutt -e mutt}
  [submenu] (mozilla)
    [exec] (browser) {mozilla -browser}
    [exec] (news) {mozilla -news}
    [exec] (mail) {mozilla -mail}
    [exec] (edit) {mozilla -edit}
    [exec] (compose) {mozilla -compose}
  [end]
  [submenu] (Window Manager)
    [exec] (Edit Menus) {nedit ~/.fluxbox/menu}
    [submenu] (Style) {Which Style?}
      [stylesdir] (~/.fluxbox/styles)
      [stylesmenu] (Fluxbox Styles) {/usr/local/share/fluxbox/styles}
    [end]
    [config] (Config Options)
    [reconfig] (Reconfigure)
    [restart] (Restart)
  [end]
  [exit] (Log Out)
[end]
# end of menu file

STYLES

The default installation of Fluxbox provides some of these style files. Usually they are put in /usr/local/share/fluxbox/styles. You can study or edit these files to grasp how the Fluxbox style mechanism works. You can use the [style], [stylesdir] and [stylesmenu] menu commands in your menu file to be able to select and change between styles on the fly.

But you can also create a directory named ~/.fluxbox/styles in your homedirectory and put your own style files here. Of course you may choose any name for this directory, but many downloadable themes will rely on the name styles (following the bb.themes.org naming scheme).

To understand how the style mechanism works, you should have a little knowledge of how X resources work.

X resources consist of a key and a value. The key is constructed of several smaller keys (sometimes referred to as children), delimited by a period (`.'). Keys may also contain a star (`*') to serve as a wildcard, which means that one line of typed text will match several keys. This is useful for styles that are based on one or two colors.

Fluxbox allows you to configure it's three main components: the toolbar, the menus and the window decorations.

The little window that shows the x-y position while dragging windows, borrows ite style from the window's titlebar.

Here are some quick examples:

toolbar.clock.color:    green

This sets the color resource of the toolbar clock to `green.' Another example:

menu*color:     rgb:3/4/5

This sets the color resource of the menu and all of its `children' to `rgb:3/4/5'. (For a description of color names, see X(1).) So this one also applies to menu.title.color and menu.frame.color. And with

*font:  -b&h-lucida-medium-r-normal-*-*-140-*

you set the font resource for all keys to this font name all at once. (For information about the fonts installed on your system, you can use a program like xfontsel(1), gtkfontsel, or xlsfonts(1).)

Now, what makes Fluxbox just so spectacular, is its ability to render textures on the fly. Texture descriptions are specified directly to the key that they should apply to, e.g.:

toolbar.clock:         Raised Gradient Diagonal Bevel1
toolbar.clock.color:   rgb:8/6/4
toolbar.clock.colorTo: rgb:4/3/2

Don't worry, we will explain right now! A texture description consists of up to five fields, which are as follows:

Flat / Raised / Sunken

gives the component either a flat, raised or sunken appearance.

Gradient / Solid

tells Fluxbox to draw either a solid color or a gradiented texture.

Horizontal / Vertical / Diagonal / Crossdiagonal / Pipecross / Elliptic / Rectangle / Pyramid

Select one of these texture types. They only work when also Gradient is specified!

Interlaced

tells Fluxbox to interlace the texture (darken every other line). This option is most commonly used with gradiented textures, but from Fluxbox version 0.60.3 on, it also works in solid textures.

Bevel1 / Bevel2

tells Fluxbox which type of bevel to use. Bevel1 is the default bevel. The shading is placed on the edge of the image. Bevel2 is an alternative. The shading is placed one pixel in from the edge of the image.

Instead of a texture description, also the option ParentRelative is available, which makes the component appear as a part of its parent, e.g. totally transparant.

All gradiented textures are composed of two color values: the color and colorTo resources. When Interlaced is used in Solid mode, the colorTo resource is used to find the interlacing color.

Well, here is the complete component list, also all components together with which kind of value they can contain. Comments are preceded with an exclamation sign (!), which is also used for comments in Fluxbox style c.q. X resource files.

! The toolbar itself
toolbar:                        Texture
toolbar.color:                  Color
toolbar.colorTo:                Color

! The buttons on the toolbar
toolbar.button:                 Texture or ParentRelative
toolbar.button.color:           Color
toolbar.button.colorTo:         Color

! Color of the button arrows
toolbar.button.picColor:        Color

! Buttons in pressed state
toolbar.button.pressed:         Texture (e.g. Sunken) or ParentRelative
toolbar.button.pressed.color:   Color
toolbar.button.pressed.colorTo: Color

! Color of pressed button arrows
toolbar.button.pressed.picColor:Color

! The toolbar workspace label
toolbar.label:                  Texture or ParentRelative
toolbar.label.color:            Color
toolbar.label.colorTo:          Color
toolbar.label.textColor:        Color

! The toolbar window label
toolbar.windowLabel:            Texture or ParentRelative
toolbar.windowLabel.color:      Color
toolbar.windowLabel.colorTo:    Color
toolbar.windowLabel.textColor:  Color

! The toolbar clock
toolbar.clock:                  Texture or ParentRelative
toolbar.clock.color:            Color
toolbar.clock.colorTo:          Color
toolbar.clock.textColor:        Color

! How the toolbar's text should be justified.
toolbar.justify:                center, left, or right

! Font to be used for all toolbar components
toolbar.font:                   Font (e.g. -*-helvetica-medium-r-normal-*-*-100-*)

! The menu titlebar
menu.title:                     Texture
menu.title.color:               Color
menu.title.colorTo:             Color
menu.title.textColor:           Color
menu.title.font:                Font
menu.title.justify:             center, left, or right

! The menu frame
menu.frame:                     Texture
menu.frame.color:               Color
menu.frame.colorTo:             Color
menu.frame.textColor:           Color
menu.frame.disableColor:        Color
menu.frame.font:                Font
menu.frame.justify:             center, left, or right

! Bullets for submenu items
menu.bullet:                    empty, triangle, square, or diamond
menu.bullet.position:           right or left

! The highlighted menu item
menu.hilite:                    Texture (e.g. Raised)
menu.hilite.color:              Color
menu.hilite.colorTo:            Color
menu.hilite.textColor:          Color

! A focused window
window.title.focus:             Texture
window.title.focus.color:       Color
window.title.focus.colorTo:     Color

! An unfocused window
window.title.unfocus:           Texture
window.title.unfocus.color:     Color
window.title.unfocus.colorTo:   Color

! Window label
window.label.focus:             Texture or ParentRelative
window.label.focus.color:       Color
window.label.focus.colorTo:     Color
window.label.focus.textColor:   Color

window.label.unfocus:           Texture or ParentRelative
window.label.unfocus.color:     Color
window.label.unfocus.colorTo:   Color
window.label.unfocus.textColor: Color

! Handlebar
window.handle.focus:            Texture
window.handle.focus.color:      Color
window.handle.focus.colorTo:    Color

window.handle.unfocus:          Texture
window.handle.unfocus.color:    Color
window.handle.unfocus.colorTo:  Color

! Resize grips
window.grip.focus:              Texture
window.grip.focus.color:        Color
window.grip.focus.colorTo:      Color

window.grip.unfocus:            Texture
window.grip.unfocus.color:      Color
window.grip.unfocus.colorTo:    Color

! Window buttons
window.button.focus:            Texture or ParentRelative
window.button.focus.color:      Color
window.button.focus.colorTo:    Color
window.button.focus.picColor:   Color

window.button.unfocus:          Texture or ParentRelative
window.button.unfocus.color:    Color
window.button.unfocus.colorTo:  Color
window.button.unfocus.picColor: Color

window.button.pressed:          Texture (e.g. Sunken)
window.button.pressed.color:    Color
window.button.pressed.colorTo:  Color

! Frame around window
window.frame.focusColor:        Color
window.frame.unfocusColor:      Color

! Tab settings
! if these are unset, some reasonable defaults will be picked.
window.tab.justify:                     Right
window.tab.label.unfocus:               Texture
window.tab.label.unfocus.color:         Color
window.tab.label.unfocus.textColor:     Color
window.tab.label.focus:                 Texture
window.tab.label.focus.color:           Color
window.tab.label.focus.textColor:       Color
window.tab.borderWidth:                 1
window.tab.borderColor:                 Color
window.tab.font:                        fixed

! Font and justification for window labels
window.font:                    Font
window.justify:                 center, left, or right

! Miscellaneous resources

! A border can be drawn round all components
borderWidth:                    a number of pixels, e.g. 1
borderColor:                    Color

bevelWidth:                     a number of pixels > 0
handleWidth:                    a number of pixels > 0

! Width of the window frame
! When not specified, frameWidth defaults to the value of bevelWidth
frameWidth:                     a number of pixels >= 0


! This command is executed whenever this style is selected.
! Typically it sets the root window to a nice picture.
rootCommand:                    Shell command, e.g. bsetroot -mod 4 4 -fg rgb:5/6/6 -bg grey20

! Some of the bbtools read these old 0.51 resources
menuFont:                       Font
titleFont:                      Font

Now, this seems a long list, but remember, when you create your own style, you can easily set lots of keys with a single command, e.g.

*color:             slategrey
*colorTo:           darkslategrey
*unfocus.color:     darkslategrey
*unfocus.colorTo:   black
*textColor:         white
*unfocus.textColor: lightgrey
*font:              lucidasans-10

This sets already nice defaults for many components.  

KEYS FILE

<modifier> <key> [...] :<operation>

In the example below, Mod1 is the 'Alt' key on the PC keyboard and Mod4 is one of the three extra keys on a pc104 branded with a sickening corporate logo.

# Fluxbox keys file.
# Any line starting with a # is a comment.
Mod1 Tab :NextWindow 
Mod1 F1 :Workspace1 
Mod1 F2 :Workspace2 
Mod1 F3 :Workspace3 
Mod1 F4 :Workspace4 
Mod1 F5 :Workspace5 
Mod1 F6 :Workspace6 
Mod1 F7 :Workspace7 
Mod1 F8 :Workspace8 
Mod1 F9 :Workspace9 
Mod1 F10 :Workspace10 
Mod1 F11 :Workspace11 
Mod1 F12 :Workspace12 
Mod4 b :PrevWorkspace 
Mod4 c :Minimize 
Mod4 r :ExecCommand rxvt 
Mod4 v :NextWorkspace 
Mod4 x :Close 
Mod4 m :RootMenu 
Control n Mod1 n :NextTab

As you can see from the last line, keybinds can be chained in a fashion similar to emacs keybindings. Here is a list of possible Operations:

Minimize
Raise
Lower
Close
RootMenu
Workspace N (where N is positive integer)
Workspace1
Workspace2
Workspace3
Workspace4
Workspace5
Workspace6
Workspace7
Workspace8
Workspace9
Workspace10
Workspace11
Workspace12
NextWorkspace
PrevWorkspace
LeftWorkspace
RightWorkspace
KillWindow
NextWindow
PrevWindow
NextTab
PrevTab
ShadeWindow
MaximizeWindow
StickWindow
ExecCommand
MaximizeVertical
MaximizeHorizontal
NudgeRight
NudgeLeft
NudgeUp
NudgeDown
BigNudgeRight
BigNudgeLeft
BigNudgeUp
BigNudgeDown
HorizontalIncrement
VerticalIncrement
HorizontalDecrement
VerticalDecrement
ToggleDecor

TITLEBAR

session.titlebar.right: minimize maximize close
session.titlebar.left: sticky

THE SLIT

Most dockable applications use the -w option to run in the slit. For example, you could put in your ~/.xinitrc:

bbmail -w &
bbpager -w &
exec fluxbox

Of course to use the slit you must have slit support compiled in.  

CONFIGURATION MENU

Tab Placement

The Tabs can be placed almost anywhere on a window. Again, these are mostly self-explanatory. however, using the Relative options will make the total width of all tabs be equal to the total width of the window. The Rotate Vertical Tabs option makes tabs that are placed on the Right or left side of the window be turned on their sides.

Sloppy Window Grouping

This option allows you to drop a tab anywhere on the target window to group it, instead of only on the target window's tab.

Maximize Over Slit

This option makes maximized windows cover the Slit when they get maximized. Turn this option off if you want your slit to stay visible at all times.

RESOURCE FILE

session.menuFile:

This tells Fluxbox where to look for its menu file.

session.menuFile: /home/myself/.fluxbox/menu

session.keyFile:

This tells Fluxbox where to find the file describing the keybindings.

session.keyFile: /home/myself/.fluxbox/keys

session.styleFile:

This tells Fluxbox where to find the style (theme) file for this session.

session.styleFile: /usr/local/share/fluxbox/styles/Flux

session.screen0.toolbar.widthPercent:

This determines the amount (in %) of space the toolbar will take. Default value is: 66.

session.screen0.strftimeFormat:

This adjusts the way the current time is displayed in the toolbar. The strftime(3) format is used. The default value is: %I:%M %p.

session.screen0.rootCommand:

This overrides the style's rootCommand. When this value is set, it will keep your background the same, regardless of what any style would like your background to be.

session.autoRaiseDelay:

Adjusts the delay (in ms) before focused windows will raise when using the Autoraise option. The default value is: 250.

session.doubleClickInterval:

Adjust the delay (in ms) between mouse clicks for Fluxbox to consider a double click. Default value is: 250.

session.screen0.edgeSnapThreshold:

When moving a window across your screen, Fluxbox is able to have it `snap' to the edges of the screen for easy placement. This variable tells Fluxbox the distance (in pixels) at which the window will jump to the egde. Default value is: 0.

session.cacheMax:

This tells Fluxbox how much memory (in Kb) it may use to store cached pixmaps on the X server. If your machine runs short of memory, you may lower this value. Default value is 200.

session.cacheLife:

This tells Fluxbox how long (in minutes) unused pixmaps may stay in the X server's memory. Default value is 5.

session.opaqueMove:

When moving a window, setting this to True will draw the window contents as it moves (nasty on slow systems), if False it will only draw an outline of the window border.

session.imageDither:

True or False to, respectively, enable or disable dithering of images. Only necessary on systems with small colour depths (8bpp or less)

session.colorsPerChannel:

This tells Fluxbox how many colors to take from the X server on pseudocolor displays. A channel would be red, green, or blue. Fluxbox will allocate this variable ^ 3 colors and make them always available. Value must be between 2 and 6. When you run Fluxbox on an 8-bit display, you must set this resource to 4. Default value is 4.

session.iconbar:

True or False to enable or disable Fluxbox using the toolbar to display iconified windows.

session.tabs:

True or False to enable/disable Fluxbox's PWM-like window tabs. Tabs let you group windows together, they will take up identical desktop space (windows smaller or larger than the existing group size get resized automatically) and can be moved as a group around the desktop or to a different workspace. Default value is True.

session.screen0.tab.placement:

Tells Fluxbox where to put the tab on the window. This can be customised through Fluxbox's Configuration/Tab Placement menu. Values are Top Bottom Left Right

session.screen0.tab.alignment:

Tells Fluxbox how to align tabs to the window. Values are Top Bottom Left Right Center Relative This should also be done via the Configuration/Tab Placement menu.

session.screen0.tab.rotatevertical:

If True, will rotate text on the tab so it is readable on vertically- placed tabs. Once again, use the Configuration/Tab Placement menu.

session.screen0.tab.width:

Width of window tabs in pixels.

session.screen0.tab.height:

Height of window tabs in pixels.

When running Fluxbox in a multiple desktop environment the screen0 key can also be screen1, 2 etc. for any appropriate desktop, and you can customise the behaviour of Fluxbox on each desktop accordingly. A favourite of the man page author with a dual-head Matrox G450 was to autohide the slit and toolbar on screen0 and set it alwaysontop and not autohidden on screen1, with a larger date format on screen1

session.screen0.toolbar.onTop: False
session.screen0.toolbar.autoHide: True
session.screen0.toolbar.placement: BottomCenter
session.screen0.toolbar.widthPercent: 42
session.screen0.slit.onTop: False
session.screen0.slit.autoHide: True
session.screen0.slit.placement: TopLeft
session.screen0.slit.direction: Vertical
session.screen0.strftimeFormat: %I:%M %p
session.screen1.toolbar.onTop: True
session.screen1.toolbar.autoHide: False
session.screen1.toolbar.placement: BottomCenter
session.screen1.toolbar.widthPercent: 69
session.screen1.slit.onTop: True
session.screen1.slit.autoHide: False
session.screen1.slit.placement: CenterRight
session.screen1.slit.direction: Vertical
session.screen1.strftimeFormat: %a %d %R [%s]

This way the main workspace (screen0) has the maximum amount of space available and the secondary workspace could show the time and run some withrawn apps like gkrellm in the slit, always visible yet out of the way of real work.  

ENVIRONMENT

HOME

Fluxbox uses $HOME to find its .fluxbox/init file, and to resolve stylefile and -directory names.

DISPLAY

When no other display was given on the command line, Fluxbox will start on the display specified by this variable.

AUTHOR and CREDITS

The Official Fluxbox website: http://fluxbox.sf.net/
Many compatible themes: http://www.themes.org/themes/blackbox/

This manpage was put together by Matthew Hawkins <matt@mh.dropbear.id.au> from the original Blackbox man page by Wilbert Berendsen (wbsoft@xs4all.nl). Numerous other languages will be available.  

SEE ALSO

Index

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

OPTIONS

RUNNING FLUXBOX

USING FLUXBOX

Root window (background):

Toolbar:

Window Titlebar and Borders:

Window Buttons:

Any menu:

Miscellaneous:

MENU FILE

Menu syntax

Menu example

STYLES

KEYS FILE

TITLEBAR FILE

THE SLIT

CONFIGURATION MENU

RESOURCE FILE

ENVIRONMENT

AUTHOR and CREDITS

SEE ALSO