1FvwmTabs(1) Fvwm Modules FvwmTabs(1)
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6 FvwmTabs - a generic tabbing module for the fvwm window manager.
7
9 FvwmTabs is spawned by fvwm, so no command line invocation is possible.
10
12 The FvwmTabs module is capable of swallowing any fvwm window & treating
13 it as a tab in a tab-manager window. A tab-manager is sometimes called
14 a tabber.
15 Each tab-manager can store any number of windows, each in its own tab.
17 The number of tab-managers is limited only by system resources. Tab-
18 managers can even be nested/swallowed within other tab-managers. (ie. a
19 tab-manager can be added as an individual tab to another tab-manager.)
20
22 FvwmTabs can be invoked by inserting the line "Module FvwmTabs" in your
23 .fvwmrc file. This can be placed on a line by itself, if FvwmTabs is to
24 be spawned during fvwm's initialization, or can be bound to a menu or
25 mouse button or keystroke to invoke it later.
26
28 FvwmTabs requires 2 CPAN modules (that are NOT distributed with fvwm)
29 to be installed on your system. They are Tk and X11::Protocol.
30 They are available at:
32 <http://search.cpan.org/CPAN/authors/id/N/NI/NI-S/Tk-804.027.tar.gz>
33 and <http://search.cpan.org/~smccam/X11-Protocol-0.56/>.
34 To install either package:
36 tar zxvf $name.tar.gz ; cd $name ; perl Makefile.PL ; make install
38 FvwmTabs will tell you if you do not have these packages installed when
40 you (try to) start it.
41
43 FvwmTabs reads the same config file as fvwm when it starts up.
44 The following options are recognised by FvwmTabs:
46 *FvwmTabs: activeFG color
48 The text color of the button for the visible tab. The default color
49 is yellow.
50 *FvwmTabs: activeBG color
52 The backgound color of the button for the visible tab. The default
53 color is MidnightBlue.
54 *FvwmTabs: inactiveFG color
56 The text color of the buttons for the invisible tabs. The default
57 color is antiquewhite.
58 *FvwmTabs: inactiveBG color>
60 The backgound color of the buttons for the invisible tabs. The
61 default color is royalblue.
62 *FvwmTabs: titleFG color
64 The text color used in the titlebar. The default color is black.
65 *FvwmTabs: titleBG color
67 The background color used in the titlebar. The default color is
68 antiquewhite.
69 *FvwmTabs: activeRelief style
71 The relief style to use for active buttons. style can be either
72 raised, flat or sunken. The default style is sunken.
73 *FvwmTabs: inactiveRelief style
75 The relief style to use for inactive buttons. style can be either
76 raised, flat or sunken. The default style is flat.
77 *FvwmTabs: buttonYPadding pixels
79 How much padding to use around top and bottom of tab buttons. The
80 default value is 3 pixels.
81 *FvwmTabs: pollRate ms
83 Specifies how often to check for X events. ms is time in millisec‐
84 onds. The default value, 250, should be fine for most users. If you
85 are on a very slow machine you may wish to increase this.
86 *FvwmTabs: buttonFont font
88 The font to use on the tab buttons. The default font is Helvetica
89 -12 bold.
90 *FvwmTabs: titleFont font
92 The font to use on the titlebar. The default font is Helvetica -12.
93 *FvwmTabs: menuFont font
95 The font to use on the menus. The default font is Helvetica -12.
96 *FvwmTabs: fontSelector fontProgram
98 The external font chooser program to launch when dynamically chang‐
99 ing fonts. The default fontProgram is gfontsel --print -f "%f".
100 Anti-gnome users might try xfontsel -print -pattern "%f". If set to
101 none, no font menu options will appear.
102 *FvwmTabs: autoSwallowClass className [tabManagerId], ...
104 *FvwmTabs: autoSwallowResource resourceName [tabManagerId], ...
105 *FvwmTabs: autoSwallowName name [tabManagerId], ...
106 Specify windows to swallow automatically. These are comma-separated
107 lists that specify the class/resource/name of a window & an
108 optional tab-manager id into which the window should be swallowed.
109 By default, the tab-manager id increments from zero - ie. 0 is the
110 first tab-manager created, 1 the second, etc, but it may be overri‐
111 den by specifying an argument to the NewTabber function. (No white‐
112 space is allowed in tabber ids.) You can alternatively specify
113 'any' or 'lastFocus' which will put the window in the tab-manager
114 with the least number of tabs or the last focused tab-manager,
115 respectively. If no tab-manager number is specified, an implicit
116 default value of 'any' is used. Note that className/resource‐
117 Name/name can be a (Perl) regular expression.
118 *FvwmTabs: balloonBG color
120 The backgound color of the balloon popups that appear over the tab
121 buttons. The default color is #C0C080.
122 *FvwmTabs: balloonFont font
124 The font to use on the balloon popups. The default font is Hel‐
125 vetica -12.
126 *FvwmTabs: balloonWait ms
128 How long the mouse cursor must pause (in milliseconds) over a tab
129 button before the balloon pops up. The default value is 250.
130 *FvwmTabs: balloonMsg msg
132 Message to display in balloon popups. The default value is
133 %tabNo:\n%iconText\n%title.
134 *FvwmTabs: autoResize bool
136 bool can be either true or false. If true, windows in the tab-man‐
137 ager automatically resize to the dimensions of the largest window
138 in the tab-manager. The default value is false. If the user per‐
139 forms an explicit resize of a tab-manager window, all windows in
140 the tab-manager are resized to the new window size.
141 *FvwmTabs: stateFile file
143 FvwmTabs has the ability to preserve its state (ie. remember the
144 windows it has swallowed as tabs) b/w fvwm restarts. file specifies
145 the name of a temporary file to record the state in, so it can be
146 reconstructed when FvwmTabs restarts. The default file is
147 "$FVWM_USERDIR/.fvwmtabs.state".
148 *FvwmTabs: fixedSizeTabs bool
150 bool can be either true or false. If true, the tab-manager will
151 ensure each tab-button has the same dimensions. If false, the
152 selected tab is expanded so that it is fully visible. The default
153 value is false.
154 *FvwmTabs: showTitlebar bool
156 Show internal titlebar. If set to true a titlebar appears below the
157 row of tab-buttons & displays the title associated with the current
158 window. This titlebar is capable of displaying long or multi-line
159 titles. The default value is true.
160 *FvwmTabs: useTMTitlebar bool
162 Add the title associated with the selected tab to the tab-manager
163 titlebar. (ie. the titlebar at the top of the window, distinct from
164 the titlebar below the tab-buttons.) Default value is true.
165 *FvwmTabs: dragDropIcon imageFile
167 Specify the icon to display when performing a drag-&-drop operation
168 to reorder the tab-buttons. FvwmTabs will search the ImagePath for
169 this image unless an absolute filename (ie. filename begins with
170 '/') is specified. The default value is none. If none (or an
171 invalid file) is specified a * is used.
172 *FvwmTabs: bBuggyFocus bool
174 FvwmTabs tries to work around a limitation in Perl/Tk (there is no
175 way to access the timestamp associated with WM_TAKE_FOCUS events).
176 On some systems this doesn't work and sometimes tab-managers have
177 trouble acquiring the focus. If this happens to you, try setting
178 this option to true. This can lead to focussing race-conditions
179 (tab-managers temporarily "steal" focus in some situations) but
180 this is less annoying than not being able to focus at all.
181 *FvwmTabs: enableSwallowDND bool
183 Swallow windows that (are moved to) overlap a tabber. Note:
184 drag-&-drop can be enabled for individual tabbers via the menu.
185 The default value is true.
186 *FvwmTabs: swallowDNDTolerance tol
188 Determines how much a window must overlap a tabber for it to be
189 swallowed when drag-&-drop is enabled. If the value has a %-sign
190 appended to it, windows must overlap by the specified percentage of
191 the current size of the tabber. If no %-sign is present, the value
192 is treated in units of pixels. The default value is 10 (pixels).
193 *FvwmTabs: useIconsOnTabs bool
195 Show the mini icon associated with each window on its tab button.
196 Note: mini icons for apps that use EWMH icons look a bit distorted.
197 This is because of the poor image resizing algorithm used in Tk.
198 This should be rectified in the near future. The default value is
199 true.
200 *FvwmTabs: killIcon image
202 Image to use on kill toolbar button. Default is none.
203 *FvwmTabs: addIcon image
205 Image to use on add toolbar button. Default is none.
206 *FvwmTabs: swallowIcon image
208 Image to use on add toolbar button when tabber will swallow next
209 window to popup. Default is none. By using a separate icon to addI‐
210 con, this option provides visual feedback on when a tabber will
211 unconditionally swallow the next window to popup.
212 *FvwmTabs: releaseIcon image
214 Image to use on release toolbar button. Default is none.
215 *FvwmTabs: menuIcon image
217 Image to use on menu toolbar button. Default is none.
218
220 A number of fvwm functions are available once the FvwmTabs module is
221 started.
222 NewTabber
224 Create a new tabber. Optional argument is tabber name. No white‐
225 space is allowed in the tabber name. Can also prefix --geometry
226 argument.
227 Example: NewTabber --geometry=+200+400 scottie
229 Tabize
231 Add a window (as a tab) to a tabber.
232 NextTab
234 Show/select the next tab.
235 PrevTab
237 Show/select the previous tab.
238 LastTab
240 Show/select the last selected tab (if there was one).
241 ReleaseTab
243 Release a tabbed window back to fvwm.
244 ReleaseIconifyTab
246 Release a tabbed window back to fvwm & iconify it.
247 ReleaseAllTabs
249 Release all windows in a tab-manager back to fvwm.
250 ReleaseIconifyAllTabs
252 Release all windows in a tab-manager back to fvwm & iconify them.
253 CloseTabber
255 Destroy a tab-manager. All windows in the tab-manager are released
256 back to fvwm.
257 AddTab
259 Pick a new window to add to a tab-manager. Selecting this option &
260 clicking on a window will add the selected window to the tab-man‐
261 ager.
262 MultiAddTab
264 Pick & add new windows to a tab-manager until ESC is pressed.
265 ShowTab tabNo
267 Show/select tab tabNo in the tab-manager. tabNo is zero-based. ie.
268 0 is the first tab, 1 is the second, etc.
269 AddToTabber
271 Add a window (as a tab) to a tab-manager.
272 SwapLeft
274 Swap the selected window with the window on its immediate left.
275 SwapRight
277 Swap the selected window with the window on its immediate right.
278 SelectTabber
280 Select a tab-manager for a new window to be added to.
281 EnableDND
283 Swallow windows that (are moved to) overlap a tabber.
284
286 By default, FvwmTabs reads a default user configuration file FvwmTabs-
287 DefaultSetup which defines several useful key-bindings for FvwmTabs.
288 You can tell FvwmTabs NOT to read this file with "SetEnv FvwmTabs_NoDe‐
289 faultSetup" - this environment variable must be set before starting the
290 module.
291 All of the key bindings can be changed using the standard fvwm Key com‐
293 mand & making use of the aforementioned fvwm functions. ie.
294 Key (FvwmTabs*) A A CM Function AddTab
296 Then, pressing Ctrl-Alt-a (when the focus is in a tab-manager) will
298 allow you to click on a window to add to the tab-manager.
299 The default key bindings (set in the FvwmTabs-DefaultSetup file) are:
301 Ctrl-Alt-a
303 AddTab
304 Ctrl-Alt-c
306 CloseTabber
307 Ctrl-Alt-i
309 ReleaseIconifyTab
310 Ctrl-Alt-Shift-I
312 ReleaseIconifyAllTabs
313 Ctrl-Alt-l
315 LastTab
316 Ctrl-Alt-m
318 MultiAddTab
319 Ctrl-Alt-n & Ctrl-Alt-Tab
321 NextTab
322 Ctrl-Alt-p
324 PrevTab
325 Ctrl-Alt-r
327 ReleaseTab
328 Ctrl-Alt-Shift-R
330 ReleaseAllTabs
331 Ctrl-Alt-t
333 NewTabber
334 Ctrl-Alt-num
336 ShowTab num.
337 Ctrl-Alt-Left
339 SwapLeft
340 Ctrl-Alt-Right
342 SwapRight
343
345 Mouse bindings on Tab Buttons
346 Mouse-1 on a tab-button displays the window associated with the tab.
348 Mouse-2 on a tab-button releases the window associated with the tab
350 back to the window manager as a standalone window.
351 Mouse-3 on a tab-button releases the window associated with the tab
353 back to the window manager & iconifies it.
354 The tab-buttons can be reordered with a drag-&-drop operation initiated
356 with Ctrl-Mouse-2. A dragged tab is inserted before the tab-button onto
357 which it is dropped.
358 Mouse bindings on Toolbar Icons
360 Mouse-1 on the "menu" button will bring up a menu of options. See MENU
362 BINDINGS.
363 Mouse-1 on the "release" button will release the selected window from
365 the tabber.
366 Mouse-2 on the "release" button will release all windows from the tab‐
368 ber, and iconify them.
369 Mouse-3 on the "release" button will release all windows from the tab‐
371 ber.
372 Mouse-1 on the "add" button will add the next window you click on to
374 the tabber.
375 Mouse-2 on the "add" button will add the next window to popup to the
377 tabber.
378 Mouse-3 on the "add" button will add every window you click on (until
380 you press Esc) to the tabber.
381 Mouse-1 on the "kill" button will Close the selected window.
383 Mouse-2 on the "kill" button causes FvwmTabs to try to kill the
385 selected window itself.
386 Mouse-3 on the "kill" button will Kill the selected window.
388
390 Mouse-1 on the "menu" button will bring up a menu of options:
391 Release All will release all tabbed programs back to the window manager
393 as standalone windows.
394 Release All (Iconify) will release all tabbed programs back to the win‐
396 dow manager as iconised standalone windows.
397 Add will add the next mouse-clicked window to the tab-manager.
399 Add Next will add the next window that is created to the tab-manager.
401 Multi Add keeps adding mouse-clicked windows to a tab-manager until the
403 escape key is pressed. Useful for adding multiple windows to a tab-man‐
404 ager at once.
405 Font shows a sub-menu enabling you to dynamically configure the but‐
407 ton/title/menu fonts, using the external program identified by the
408 fontSelector option.
409 Show Titlebar toggles the display of the titlebar below the tab-but‐
411 tons.
412 Window Tabizer Dialog will popup a dialog box for specifying windows to
414 swallow. Windows can be specified explicitly (by name) or by using a
415 (Perl) regular expression matcher. (Note: / character is automatically
416 escaped.)
417 The menu options between the separators will display the window/tab
419 associated with the text. (The menu text is actually the title associ‐
420 ated with the window. The text on each tab-button is the icon name.)
421 About pops up a dialog with version/developer information.
423 Close will close the FvwmTabs window, invoking Release All in the
425 process.
426
428 * Tab-managers don't take focus when iconified.
429 * FvwmTabs doesn't obey "ClickToFocus" mode.
430 * FvwmTabs has a problem swallowing shaded windows.
431 * Using "Maximise" to resize tab-manager windows prevents dynamic
432 resizing from working.
433 Please send bug reports, feature requests & queries about FvwmTabs to
435 the fvwm Mailing list: fvwm@fvwm.org. Be sure to include the word
436 "FvwmTabs" somewhere in the subject line.
437
439 Features to be added to FvwmTabs in the future (in no particular
440 order):
441 * Colorset support. (use Colorset tracker from fvwm-perllib)
443 * Use Ctrl-Mouse-1 instead of Ctrl-Mouse-2 to reorder (drag-&-drop)
444 windows.
445 * option: menu item to sort tabs by name, file extension, etc.
446 * For autoSwallow options that specify a tab-manager, create the tab-
447 manager if it doesn't already exist. (default behaviour is not to swal‐
448 low it)
449
451 There is some useful information about FvwmTabs, including a short
452 tutorial, on the authors website:
453 <http://members.optusnet.com.au/~scottsmedley/fvwmtabs/>.
455
457 FvwmTabs is GPL software.
458 See <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
460
462 Scott Smedley <ss@aao.gov.au>
463FvwmTabs 2006-10-23 FvwmTabs(1)