dotfiles

Some details

• OS: Ubuntu 18.04
• WM: AwesomeWM
• Terminal: Kitty
• File Manager: Nemo for GUI, Ranger for terminal
• Launcher: Rofi
• Editor: Vim
• Org editor: Remacs
• Browser: Firefox

Latest preview

Dependencies

Here is a complete list of dependencies needed for making these themes work. If you install all of them you will have a (mostly) smooth out of the box experience. Of course, not all of them actually do something useful (see fortune-mod dependency). Also if you are willing to edit a few configuration files, which you will have to do at some point, most of these dependencies can be replaced. For example you can replace rofi with dmenu,maim with scrot.

If you notice that something is missing, please open an issue so I can add the dependency to this table.

Dependency	Description	Why/Where is it needed?
awesome (git master branch)	Window manager	(explains itself)
rofi	Window switcher, application launcher and dmenu replacement	(explains itself)
light	Gets/Sets screen brightness	Brightness keybinds
lm_sensors	CPU temperature sensor	CPU temperature widgets
upower	Abstraction for enumerating power devices, listening to device events and more	Battery widgets
acpid	Daemon for delivering ACPI events	Charger notifications
pulseaudio, libpulse	Sound system (Installed by default on most distros)	Volume widgets and keybinds
jq	Parses json output	Weather widgets
fortune-mod	Displays random quotations (fortune cookies)	Fortune widget
redshift	Controls screen temperature	Night mode command
mpd	Server-side application for playing music	Music widgets
mpc	Minimalist command line interface to MPD	Music widgets
maim	Takes screenshots (improved scrot)	Screenshot keybinds
feh	Image viewer and wallpaper setter	Screenshot previews, wallpapers
openweathermap key	Provides weather data	Weather widgets

Fonts

Icon fonts

• Typicons
• Material Icons
• Icomoon
• Nerd Fonts

Monospace

• Iosevka
• Anka/Coder

Fancy

• Scriptina

Sans

• Google Sans
• Roboto Condensed
• San Francisco Display

Things to do after you set up dependencies

• Backup your current ~/.config/awesome directory if you have one and copy this repo's config/awesome directory in its place.

• Configure user preferences

  In rc.lua there is a User variables and preferences section where user preferences and default applications are defined. There include the terminal, editor, file manager, screenshot directory, weather widget configuration and more. You should change those to your liking.

• Configure autostart applications in autostart.sh

  The commands in autostart.sh will run every time AwesomeWM restarts. If you would like to run something only once on login, I suggest you create the file ~/.xprofile, make it executable and put the commands you want there.

• (Optional) Load any Xresources colorscheme (xrdb -merge <colorscheme file>). In the .xfiles directory I provide you with a few of my own colorschemes, but you can also use your favorite one. All of my AwesomeWM themes take their colors from xrdb.

• Have a general idea of what my keybinds do

  My keybinds will most probably not suit you, but on your first login you might need to know how to navigate the desktop.

  See the Basic keybinds section for more details.

You are now ready to login with AwesomeWM!

Some recommended applications

• Terminals: Termite / Kitty / urxvt / st
• File managers: Nemo / Thunar
• Launchers: Rofi / dmenu
• Browsers: Firefox (with Vimium extension) / Qutebrowser
• Editors: Vim / Sublime Text (with NeoVintageous plugin) / Spacemacs
• Music players: mpd (with ncmpcpp)

Eye-candy suggestions

• bin/bunnyfetch script - Display some system info
• neofetch - Display a ton of system info
• even-better-ls - Icons for the ls command
• cava - Audio visualizer

AwesomeWM configuration: File structure

I have split my rc.lua into multiple files for organization purposes.

• The noodle directory contains widgets that usually take up more than 50 lines of code.

  I prefer not filling my files with a ton of widget configurations, but also not making a seperate file for every widget.

• The evil directory contains daemons (processes that run in the background) which emit system info.

  They provide an easy way of writing widgets that rely on external information. All you need to do is subscribe to the signal a daemon provides. No need to remember which shell command gives you the necessary info or bother about killing orphan processes. Evil takes care of everything.

• In themes you can find a directory for each available theme.

  Such a directory should include at least a theme.lua and optionally icons, wallpaper, and whatever asset you need that is theme-specific.

• In bars you can find a .lua file for each available bar or bar group.

  Multiple bars can be created in one file. Every bar theme provides the global functions toggle_wibars() and toggle_tray() which you can bind to any keys you want.

Basic keybinds

I use super AKA Windows key as my main modifier.

Keyboard

• super + enter - Spawn terminal
• super + shift + enter - Spawn floating terminal
• super + d - Launch rofi
• super + shift + q - Close client
• super + control + space - Toggle floating client
• super + [1-0] - View tag AKA change workspace (for you i3 folks)
• super + shift + [1-0] - Move focused client to tag
• super + s - Tiling layout
• super + shift + s - Floating layout
• super + w - Maximized / Monocle layout
• super + [arrow keys] / hjkl - Change focus by direction
• super + shift + [arrow keys] / [hjkl] - Move client by direction. Move to edge if it is floating.
• super + control + [arrow keys] / [hjkl] - Resize
• super + f - Toggle fullscreen
• super + m - Toggle maximize
• super + n - Minimize
• super + shift + n - Restore minimized
• super + c - Center floating client
• super + u - Jump to urgent client (or back to last tag if there is no such client)
• super + shift + b - Toggle bar
• super + = - Toggle tray
• ... And many many more.

Mouse on desktop

• left click - Dismiss all notifications, close sidebar and main menu
• double left click - Jump to urgent client (or back to last tag if there is no such client)
• right click - Main menu
• middle click - Start screen
• scroll up/down - Cycle through tags
• move to left/right edge - Show sidebar
• ... And more.

Mouse on titlebars

• left click - Focus and raise
• left click (drag) - Move
• right click (drag) - Resize
• middle click - Close
• ... And more.

Custom titlebars per class / name / whatever

• For the custom titlebars to work your terminal or application needs to be able to set its own class or name

  Example: For the mpd titlebar it needs to have class "music" or name "Music Terminal". You can change this in titlebars.lua. You can find an example script that launches a terminal like this in bin/music_terminal

  # Termite
  termite --class music --exec ncmpcpp
  # st / xst
  st -c music -e ncmpcpp
  # urxvt
  urxvt -T "Music Terminal" -e ncmpcpp
  

• Of course you can set your own custom titlebars for any application as long as you know its class, name, instance, whatever and then creating a custom titlebar setup in the existing if-else block in titlebars.lua. For example if c.class == "Thunar" ...

• You can find details such as class, name, and others for any client with the xprop utility.

More details about the start screen

• Activate it with super+F1, or by middle clicking anywhere on the desktop.
• Dismiss with escape, q or F1 or middle click.
• You can scroll on the calendar to switch to the previous / next month. Left click to reset.
• The fortune box requires fortune-mod. Clicking it gives you a new fortune cookie :)
• The brightness bar requires xorg-xbacklight.
• The bell icon suspends / re-enables notifications on click.
• The camera icon takes a screenshot instantly on left click and with a 5 second delay on right click. Requires "screenshot.sh" from my repo. Alternatively you can set your own screenshot command.

More details about the sidebar

• Can be toggled with super+grave.
• Can be activated by moving the mouse to the edge of the screen and hidden by moving the mouse out of it (these settings can be easily enabled/disabled in your user preferences in rc.lua).
• By default it is always above windows, and does not grab your keyboard (so you can have it open while doing something else, or just toggle it for a second to check your battery while you are watching something in fullscreen).
• Most widgets (volume, search, exit, music...) are clickable.
• Volume and music update only when they need to, as they are subscribed to pulse and mpd events respectively.
• For the weather widget I modified this polybar custom script. It uses the openweathermap API. If you want this to work, you will need to create an account there, get your key, look for your city ID, and place them in noodle/weather.lua. (Same goes for text_weather.lua)

More details about the exit screen

• Activate it with super+escape, by clicking Exit on the sidebar, or in the right click menu (awesome -> quit)
• Mouse controls: Click on any icon to execute the command, right click or middle click anywhere to cancel.
• Keyboard controls:
  • escape or q or x to cancel
  • p to poweroff
  • r to reboot
  • s to suspend
  • e to exit (logout)
  • l to lock

Tips / Notes

• You can open an issue if you have any questions / problems.

  Do not forget to search through old issues first. They could already contain an answer to your question. Also make sure you have the latest version of the repo. Little fixes happen all the time.

• If you are new to AwesomeWM...

  I suggest you start from the default configuration and add pieces you like to it instead of trying to modify someone else's configuration. Even if you feel really comfortable with that specific config, you will realize that you have no idea how anything works and how you can modify things to your own liking. Trust me, I've been there.

• Don't forget to use the API Documentation for AwesomeWM.

  It is well written and has plenty of examples.

• You can also post your questions on /r/awesomewm

Older theme previews

Theme	Preview	Reddit post
Skyfall		Skyfall
Lovelace		Mechanical Love
Manta		Cake Day
Reasons		25 reasons why you need a tiling WM