CUSTOMX(7)

NAME

customx — customization X

DESCRIPTION

First, read about The X Window System in FAQ. The simplest ~/.xsession file can look like this.

# Set background color
xsetroot -solid darkgrey &

# Start window manager
exec cwm

The & at the end of the line ensures that the program runs in the background. After running xenodm(1), the login form will appear. After successful login, the window manager will be displayed.

Add status bar

The status bar is a panel that displays current information about the computer, network, etc. We will use xterm to display the bar and write the information to the terminal using a shell script.

# Launch status bar
exec xterm -geometry 191x1+0+0 -fa "monaco" -fs 10 -bg "black" -fg "white" \
-name termbar -class termbar -T termbar -e ~/bar.sh &

The ~/dev/dotfiles/sh/bar.sh script for displaying information can look like this.

#!/bin/sh
# status bar for X

# Restart itself
trap 'exec $0' HUP
trap 'tput cnorm; exit 1' INT QUIT TERM

# Hide cursor
tput civis

# Get keyboard layout
function kbd {
  echo -n "$(setxkbmap -query | awk '/^layout:/ {print $2}')"
}

while true; do
  BAT=$(apm -l)
  NET="em0"
  HOST=$(hostname)
  DATE=$(date +"%a %b %e %H:%M")

  # Move cursor to left
  tput cup 1 1
  printf "$HOST"
  # Move cursor to right
  tput cup 1 96
  printf "$NET $BAT%% $(kbd) $DATE"
  sleep 2
done

And .cwmrc file look like this.

# Set font name and size
fontname "monaco:pixelsize=14:regular"

# Remove border
borderwidth 1

# Autogroup
autogroup 3 "xterm,XTerm"

ignore termbar
autogroup 0 termbar

# Add top gap due status bar
gap 20 0 0 0

Customizing reousrces

Add these lines to ~/.xsession configuration file.

# Load configuration file
xrdb -merge ~/.Xresources

Create ~/.Xresources file and put these lines.

XTerm*faceName: Monaco*
XTerm*faceSize: 10
XTerm*scrollBar: false
XTerm*internalBorder: 20

! Load ~/.profile file
XTerm*loginShell: true

Copy and paste

XTerm*selectToClipboard: true
XTerm*VT100*translations: #override \n\
  Ctrl Shift <Key>V: insert-selection(CLAIPBOARD) \n\
  Ctrl Shift <Key>C: select-end(CLIPBOARD)

Keyboard switcher

Add following lines to ~/.cwmrc.

# Key bindings
bind-key CMS-p "/home/puffy/kbd.sh"

And shell script for switching keyboard layout.

#!/bin/sh
# Switch keyboard script

_uskbd="us"
_czkbd="cz"

[[ "$(setxkbmap -query | awk '/^layout:/ { print $2 }')" == "$_uskbd" ]] \
  && setxkbmap -layout $_czkbd \
  || setxkbmap -layout $_uskbd