A lightweight bar written in golang
vbar
is very new, and we're looking for help working out new features.
If you're using vbar
, please let us know if anything is broken, or you need a new feature, by creating an issue.
- Blocks can be clickable
- Blocks can have drop down menus
- Support for Font Awesome
- Style anything in the bar with CSS
- Update blocks with an interval
You'll need a working golang
.
go get github.com/AndrewVos/vbar
AUR: vbar-git
It's probably best to start from the example configuration:
mkdir -p ~/.config/vbar
cp /usr/share/doc/vbar/examples/vbarrc ~/.config/vbar
All configuration is done in the command line, which means
that vbar
is very hackable.
Your vbarrc
will just be executed by vbar
when it launches,
to make things easier.
Blocks are added with the add-block
command.
For example:
vbar add-block --left --name my-block --text hello
This will add the block named my-block
with the text
hello
.
Adds a block to the left/right/center of the bar.
The name of the block.
Command will be executed once when creating the block and the text that comes back from the command will be used as the block text.
Works just like command, but it doesn't wait for the command to finish executing. The command is expected to write lines to stdout every time you want the block text to change. Each line output from the command will be used as the new block text.
A command to execute when you click on the block.
Use this to cause --command
to be executed every N
seconds, for blocks that need to be updated on a
schedule.
Blocks can have drop down menus that pop up when the block is clicked.
Menus are added to blocks with the add-menu
command.
Here's an example power off icon that shows an option to shut down when you click it.
vbar add-block --name power-off-icon --text "POWER"
vbar add-menu --name power-off-icon --text "Shutdown" --command "systemctl poweroff"
The menu text.
Command that will be executed once when clicking the menu.
External scripts can trigger a block update
with the update
command. This will
cause the block the execute command
as usual.
For example, let's say we want a block that displays the currently active window title. First, we add the block:
vbar add-block --name title --command "xprop -id $(xprop -root _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW | cut -d ' ' -f 5) WM_NAME | sed -e 's/.*\"\\(.*\\)\".*/\\1/'"
That command will be executed once, so our window title will only be the window that was active when vbar
launched. Pretty useless.
To make the window title update as soon as you change windows, we can use xprop
and tell vbar
when the active window has changed.
Run the following on startup inside your window manager:
xprop -root -spy _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW | while read -r LINE; do vbar update --name title; done &
A block can be removed with the remove
command. The arguments are the same as the update
command. For example, if you add a block like this:
vbar add-block --name time --command "date"
you can remove it like so:
vbar remove --name time
Everything in vbar
can be styled with css.
To do this, we use the add-css
command.
Styling the whole bar:
vbar add-css --class "bar" --css "font-family: Hack;"
vbar add-css --class "bar" --css "color: blue;
Styling each block:
vbar add-css --class "block" --css "padding-top: 5px;"
vbar add-css --class "block" --css "padding-bottom: 5px;"
Styling the menu:
vbar add-css --class "menu" --css "background-color: green;"
Styling the menu on hover:
vbar add-css --class "menu :hover" --css "background-color: purple;"
Styling the block called wireless
:
vbar add-css --class "wireless" --css "background-color: orange;"
It is possible to use transparent
as a colour in css
(maybe you want your wallpaper to shine through your bar).
To do this you will need a compositor, for example compton
.