1xdesktopwaves(1) General Commands Manual xdesktopwaves(1)
2
6 xdesktopwaves - simulation of water waves on the X Windows desktop
7
9 xdesktopwaves [option]...
10
12 xdesktopwaves is a cellular automata setting the background of your X
13 Windows desktop under water. Windows and mouse are like ships on the
14 sea. Each movement of these ends up in moving water waves. You can
15 even have rain and/or storm stirring up the water (-rain 0-10, -storm
16 0-10).
17 In shaped mode, which is enabled by default, xdesktopwaves usually
19 works good together with other desktop background programs like xfish‐
20 tank, xpenguins, xsnow and xearth. They are all under water.
21 xdesktopwaves has many options. The most important ones are -quality
23 0-9 and -colortheme 0-9. The first one is for adjusting the balance
24 between display quality and system load. And the other option is for
25 selecting a set of colors for visualization. Choose a color theme
26 suitable for your background picture. There are even options for fine-
27 tuning.
28 Window Managers
30 If you are using the KDE window manager, please enable "Allow programs
32 in desktop window" in the KDE desktop configuration (right-click on the
33 desktop and choose "Configure Desktop"). Otherwise xdesktopwaves may
34 not be visible. If you are using Enlightenment 0.16 with "Multiple
35 Desktops" instead of "Virtual Desktops", xdesktopwaves appears always
36 on the first desktop. A solution is -wmbackdrop, but read the comments
37 on that option. With most other window managers xdesktopwaves should
38 work without difficulties. If not, try -root, -wmbackdrop or -window,
39 and/or -opaque.
40 If supported by the window manager, you should decide to enable opaque
42 moving and resizing of windows ("display content in moving windows" or
43 something like that), instead of displaying just a frame. This may
44 result in very dynamic wave effects - try to pile up a big wave by mov‐
45 ing a window slowly. But: unfortunately some window managers seem to
46 be very CPU-intensive while moving a window opaque. In that case
47 xdesktopwaves does not perform very smooth.
48 Starting and stopping
50 For a first try, open a shell and type xdesktopwaves followed by
52 desired options. Example:
53 xdesktopwaves -quality 4 -colortheme 3
55 Just press CTRL-C for stopping.
57 Now, if you want to create menu entries in your desktop environment,
59 window manager or wherever: For starting, create an entry containing a
60 command like the example above. And for stopping, create an entry con‐
61 taining this command:
62 xdesktopwaves -end
64 Hint: Whenever xdesktopwaves is starting, it automatically tells other
66 instances of xdesktopwaves to terminate. So there cannot be more than
67 one instance.
68 xdesktopwaves every day?
70 Depending on the quality settings, xdesktopwaves can be very CPU-inten‐
72 sive. To get along with this, the program goes into an idle mode if
73 there are no waves on the water or if the output window is obscured.
74 The cellular automata stops computing in that mode. Additionally, you
75 can give a lower priority to the xdesktopwaves process (see -nice).
76 If you want to have xdesktopwaves automatically started when starting X
78 Windows, insert the start command in the file $HOME/.xinitrc (see
79 startx(1)). But don't forget to append & to the command. This way,
80 xdesktopwaves is started before the window manager (may or may not
81 work, depending on the type of window manager).
82
84 -h or -help
85 Print a short help and exit.
86 -V or -version
88 Print version and exit.
89 -v or -verbose
91 Print some information about what's going on.
92 -vv or -veryverbose
94 Print much information (for debugging).
95 -d name or -display name
97 Connect to the display named name.
98 -e or -end
100 Exit after terminating a possibly already existing instance of
101 xdesktopwaves.
102
104 -r or -root
105 Do not create any window, draw the waves to the (virtual) root
106 window. This option implies -stippled if not -opaque.
107 -b or -backdrop (default)
109 Create an override-redirect backdrop window on the (virtual)
110 root window.
111 -wmb or -wmbackdrop
113 Create a backdrop window using the extended window manager
114 hints. This is not supported by every window manager. And if
115 it is, there's still the problem that it may not be possible to
116 activate icons or menus on the desktop background (possibly just
117 at every second scan-line in shaped mode).
118 -w or -window
120 Create an ordinary normal window. For some window managers
121 you'll even have to give -opaque.
122
124 -o or -opaque
125 Have no transparency at all.
126 -t or -stippled
128 Have faked transparency. This lets the desktop background pic‐
129 ture shine through. Other desktop background programs and desk‐
130 top icons may not be visible. The window of xdesktopwaves
131 inherits the background from the root window, and the waves are
132 drawn in stippled mode. This option implies -nodoublebuffer.
133 -s or -shaped (default)
135 Have better transparency. Everything behind xdesktopwaves
136 shines through. The window of xdesktopwaves is shaped by every
137 second scan-line, using the XShape extension. This option is
138 ignored if -root, otherwise this option implies -doublebuffer.
139 -wmo percent or -wmopacity percent
141 Have best transparency. This is still highly experimental! It
142 sets the window property _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY, which is a hint
143 for the window manager respectively composite manager to render
144 the window with alpha blending. This option is ignored if
145 -root.
146
148 -q number or -quality number (default: 5)
149 Set overall quality of the waves. number can be 0 to 9. The
150 higher the quality, the higher the CPU/network load. This
151 option is a comfortable alternative for -framerate, -simsper‐
152 frame, -eventsperframe, -resdivision, -cellsize and -maxcolors.
153 -fr rate or -framerate rate
155 Set maximum frame rate in hertz. This option is overridden by
156 -quality.
157 -sf count or -simsperframe count
159 Set number of simulation steps per frame. Hereby you can adapt
160 the speed of the waves. This option is overridden by -quality.
161 -ef count or -eventsperframe count
163 Set number of event processings per frame. This can improve the
164 trails of fast moving objects (mouse and windows), but it can
165 even incur a sensible higher CPU load, because of a worse cache
166 utilization. Maximum is the number of simulation steps per
167 frame. This option is overridden by -quality.
168 -rd rdx rdy or -resdivision rdx rdy
170 Set overall division of resolution in x and y direction. These
171 values have dramatic influence on the CPU usage on both sides,
172 the client and the server. This option is overridden by -qual‐
173 ity.
174 -cs cw ch or -cellsize cw ch
176 Set width and height of the cells of water. These values have
177 dramatic influence on the CPU usage on the client side. The
178 water surface is made of rectangular cells. This is a kind of
179 an image, where each pixel is a cell. For each frame, that
180 image is scaled up to the screen size in two steps. In the
181 first step it is scaled by (cw, ch) with bi-linear interpola‐
182 tion, and in the second step it is scaled by (rdx, rdy) without
183 interpolation. This option is overridden by -quality.
184 -mc count or -maxcolors count
186 Set maximum number of colors for drawing the waves. The higher
187 the color count, the more rectangles may be sent to the X
188 server. count can be 2 to 128. This option is overridden by
189 -quality.
190 -db or -doublebuffer (default)
192 Draw with double buffering. This option is ignored if -stip‐
193 pled.
194 -ndb or -nodoublebuffer
196 Draw without double buffering. This option is ignored if
197 -shaped.
198 -n increment or -nice increment (default: 0)
200 Increment nice value of the xdesktopwaves process. The higher
201 the nice value, the lower the process priority. A typical value
202 for increment is 10.
203 -i or -idle (default)
205 Go idle if there are no waves or if the output window is
206 obscured. This can spare CPU cycles.
207 -ni or -noidle
209 Never go idle.
210 -mo number or -maxoptimization number (default: 2)
212 Set maximum optimization by CPU instruction set. If compiled
213 with GCC for x86 (32 or 64-bit), 1 means MMX and 2 means SSE2.
214 0 means to have no special optimization.
215
217 -c number or -colortheme number (default: 0)
218 Select a color theme. number can be 0 to 9. Just try them
219 through. This option is a comfortable alternative for -water‐
220 color, -skycolor and -lightcolor.
221 -wc color or -watercolor color
223 Set color of water. This option is overridden by -colortheme.
224 -sc color or -skycolor color
226 Set color of sky reflections. This option is overridden by
227 -colortheme.
228 -lc color or -lightcolor color
230 Set color of light reflections. This option is overridden by
231 -colortheme.
232
234 -wm or -wavesbymouse (default)
235 Produce waves by mouse pointer movements.
236 -nwm or -nowavesbymouse
238 Ignore the mouse.
239 -ww or -wavesbywindows (default)
241 Produce waves by client windows.
242 -nww or -nowavesbywindows
244 Ignore client windows.
245 -rn intensity or -rain intensity (default: 0)
247 Simulate raindrops falling on the water. intensity can be 0 (no
248 rain) to 10 (cloudburst).
249 -st intensity or -storm intensity (default: 0)
251 Simulate a storm blowing on the water. intensity can be 0 (no
252 wind) to 10 (strong storm).
253 -vs value or -viscosity value (default: 3)
255 Set viscosity of the fluid. value can be 1 to 5. The higher
256 the viscosity, the shorter the lifetime of waves.
257 -si intensity or -skyintensity intensity (default: 5)
259 Set intensity of sky reflections. intensity can be 1 to 10.
260 -li intensity or -lightintensity intensity (default: 5)
262 Set intensity of light reflections. intensity can be 1 to 10.
263 -lal degrees or -lightaltitude degrees (default: 30)
265 Set altitude of the source of light. degrees can be 0 to 90.
266 -laz degrees or -lightazimuth degrees (default: -35)
268 Set azimuth of the source of light. degrees can be -360 to 360.
269
271 xdesktopwaves -quality 6 -colortheme 1 -verbose
272 Increased quality. Blue color theme. Print information about
273 settings and performance.
274 xdesktopwaves -q 6 -c 1 -v
276 Short cut of the previous example.
277 xdesktopwaves -c 2 -rn 8 -r -o
279 Dark night with flashy lights. It's raining. Draw to the root
280 window without any transparency.
281
283 xfishtank, xpenguins(1), xearth(1), xsnow(1), xlife(1x), xsetroot(1),
284 startx(1)
285
287 http://xdesktopwaves.sourceforge.net/
288
290 Oliver Hamann (olha@users.sourceforge.net)
291
293 xdesktopwaves is copyrighted (C) 2004 by Oliver Hamann
294 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
296 under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
297 Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your
298 option) any later version.
299 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
301 WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MER‐
302 CHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General
303 Public License for more details.
304 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along
306 with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
307 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
308xdesktopwaves 1.3 18 December 2004 xdesktopwaves(1)