FvwmIconMan(1)

NAME
FvwmIconMan - an Fvwm Icon Manager

SYNOPSIS
FvwmIconMan is spawned by fvwm, so no command line invocation will work.

DESCRIPTION
FvwmIconMan is an icon manager modeled after the TWM icon manager. The user may have multiple icon managers, each of which armed with a list of window types which it manages. For example, the user may have one manager which lists only emacs windows, and another which lists everything else. You may also specify what resolution each icon manager uses, for example, one icon manager may manage windows on all desks, and another may manage only those on the current desk, or page. If you have applied the MiniIcons patch to fvwm2, then FvwmIconMan can display the miniature icons for its managed windows. The managers may have a maximum number of columns (and so grows vertically), a maximum number of rows (and then grows horizontally), or stay at a fixed size, and adjust the size of the window buttons to fit (think win95's Taskbar). And when support is compiled in for the X Shape extension, then the manager windows may be shaped. You can specify actions to be run when mouse, or key events are received. For example, you could bind the first mouse button to iconify the selected window, and make bindings for the arrow keys to navigate the manager window without the mouse. FvwmIconMan can be set to display which window currently has the keyboard focus, and by binding the select event (see below) to the fvwm Focus function, you can emulate the TWM icon manager's behavior.

INITIALIZATION
During initialization, FvwmIconMan searches though the fvwm configuration file for the options which are described below. It is highly recommended that you make FvwmIconMan be a sticky window. And if you want to make use of the followfocus option, and/or binding an action to Focus, then you should make FvwmIconMan clicktofocus. Also, when using the Shape option, it's recommended that the FvwmIconMan window not be decorated at all by fvwm.

INVOCATION
FvwmIconMan can be invoked by inserting the line 'Module FvwmIconMan' in the .fvwmrc file. If FvwmIconMan is to be spawned during fvwm's initialization, then this line should be placed in the InitFunction and ResetFunction declarations, or it can be bound to a menu, mouse button, or keystroke to invoke it later. FvwmIconMan should be placed in the ModulePath (defined in the .fvwmrc file) in order for fvwm to find it. If you wish to run FvwmIconMan in a transient mode, such as with the built in window list, then pass Transient as an argument. The invocation "Module FvwmIconMan Transient" will do nicely. In this mode, FvwmIconMan will pop up one manager window directly under the cursor. When the mouse button is released, it will execute the appropriate action, and then exit. Things are somewhat complicated by the fact that you can specify that FvwmIconMan create multiple manager windows, behavior which is unsuitable when running transiently. So, when running transiently, FvwmIconMan will only create one manager window. Use the manager id 'transient' to specify options for this manager window.

CONFIGURATION OPTIONS REFERENCE CHART
FvwmIconMan has acquired quite a few options. I assume others share my dislike of paging though a long manpage, so here is a terse reference chart describing the available options. They are described in more detail in the next section.
Name            Description                Default
action          binds command to event     Mouse 0 N sendcommand Iconify
background      default background         gray
buttongeometry  size of button in pixels   100x17
dontshow        list of windows to ignore
drawicons       use miniicons              false
focusandselectbutton                       flat grey black
focusbutton     style for focused buttons  up grey black
followfocus     show which win has focus   false
font                                       8x13
foreground      default text color         white
format          describes button label     "%c: %i"
iconname        manger icon name           FvwmIconMan
managergeometry size of manager in buttons 0x1
nummanagers     number of managers         1
plainbutton     style for normal buttons   up black grey
resolution      global, desk, or page      global
selectbutton    style for selected buttons flat black grey
shape           use shape extension        false
show            list of windows to show
sort            keep managers sorted       name
title           manager title              FvwmIconMan
titlebutton     style for title button     raisededge black grey
usewinlist      honor WinListSkip?         true

CONFIGURATION OPTIONS
With the exception of the nummanagers option, all of the options may be defined on a per-manager basis. So, for example, the user may have his emacs manager with a red foreground, and his xterm manager with a blue one. A configuration line may therefore have one of two forms:

*FvwmIconMan*optionname optionvalue
    To specify that the optionname takes the value optionvalue for all managers.

*FvwmIconMan*managerid*optionname optionvalue
    To specify that the option optionname takes the value optionvalue for manager managerid. Mangerid may either be a positive integer, or the string "transient". An integral id refers to managers which FvwmIconMan creates when running normally, and an id of "transient" refers to the single manager which FvwmIconMan creates when running transiently.

The following options may be specified:

*FvwmIconMan*nummanagers num
    num is a positive integer specifying the total number of icon managers. Since FvwmIconMan would like to know how many managers there are before handling any manager specific options, this should come first. The default is 1.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]action type binding
    Binds an FvwmIconMan command to an event. Type may be one of the values: Key, Mouse, or Select. Actions are described in the following section ACTIONS.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]background background
    Specifies the default background color.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]buttongeometry geometry
    Specifies the initial geometry of an individual button in pixels. If the specified height is 0, then the button height is determined from the font size. X and Y coordinates are ignored.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]drawicons value
    If your version of fvwm2 is capable of using MiniIcons, then this option determines if FvwmIconMan displays the MiniIcons. Otherwise, it generates an error message. "true" means that MiniIcons are shown for iconified windows, "false" that MiniIcons are never shown, and "always" that MiniIcons are shown for all windows.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]focusbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
    Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of buttons whose windows have the keyboard focus.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]focusandselectbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
    Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of buttons which are both selected, and have the keyboard focus.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]font font
    Specifies the font to be used for labeling the buttons. The default is 8x13.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]foreground foreground
    Specifies the default foreground color.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]format formatstring
    A printf like format string which describes the string to be printed in the manager window for each managed window. Possible flags are: %t, %i, %c, and %r for the window's title, icon, class, or resource name, respectively. The default is "%c: %i". Warning: m4 reserves the word format, so if you use m4, take appropriate action.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]iconname iconstring
    Specifies the window icon name for that manager window. Iconstring may either be a single word, or a string enclosed in quotes. The default is "FvwmIconMan".

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]managergeometry geometry
    Specifies the initial geometry of the manager, in units of buttons. If height is 0, then the manager will use width columns, and will grow vertically once it has more than width windows. Likewise, if width is 0, it will use height rows, and grow horizontally. If both are nonzero, then the manager window will be exactly that size, and stay that way. As columns are created, the buttons will narrow to accommodate. If the geometry is specified with a negative y coordinate, then the window manager will grow upwards. Otherwise, it will grow downwards.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]plainbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
    Specifies how normal buttons look. style may be one of flat, up, down, raisededge, or sunkedge, and describes how the button is drawn. The color options are both optional, and if not set, then the default colors are used. If on a monochrome screen, then the style option is ignored, but must still be set.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]resolution resolution
    Specifies when the manager will display an entry for a certain window. resolution may take one of the following values: global, desk, or page. If global, then all windows of the appropriate type (see the show and dontshow options below) will be shown. If desk, then only those windows on the current desk will be down. And if page, then only those windows on the current page will be shown. The default is global.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]selectbutton style [forecolor backcolor]
    Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of buttons when the mouse is over them.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]shape boolean
    If True, then use make the window shaped. Probably only useful if you have multiple columns or rows. If FvwmIconMan wasn't compiled to support the Shape extension, this generates an error message. When using shaped windows, it's recommended that a fvwm style is made for FvwmIconMan that has no borders. Otherwise, fvwm will get confused.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]title titlestring
    Specifies the window title string for that manager window. Titlestring may either be a single word, or a string enclosed in quotes. The default is "FvwmIconMan". This will be drawn in the titlebar of the manager window, if any, and in the title button, which is the button drawn when the manager is empty.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]titlebutton style [forecolor backcolor]
    Same as the plainbutton option, but specifies the look of the title button (the button drawn when the manager is empty). The manager's title is drawn in the title button.

The two following options control which windows get handled by which managers. A manager can get two lists, one of windows to show, and one of windows to ignore. If only the show list is given, then that manager will show only the windows in the list. If only the dontshow list is given, then the manager will show all windows except those in the list. If both lists are given, then a window will be shown if it is not in the dontshow list, and in the show list. And finally, if neither list is given, then the manager will handle all windows. Each list is made up of patterns of the form type=pattern, where type is one of class, resource, title, or icon, and pattern is an expression of the same format used in the fvwm style command (minimalistic shell pattern matching). Quotes around the pattern will be taken as part of the expression. If a window could be handled by more than one manager, then the manager with the lowest id gets it.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]show pattern list
    If a window matches one of the patterns in the list, then it may be handled by this manager.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]dontshow pattern list
    If a window matches one of the patterns in the list, then it may not be handled by this manager.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]usewinlist boolean
    If true, then honor the WinListSkip style flag. Otherwise, all windows are subject to possible management according to the show and dontshow lists.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]followfocus boolean
    If true, then the button appearance reflects which window currently has focus. Default is false.

*FvwmIconMan*[id*]sort value
    If name, then the manager list is sorted by name. If namewithcase, then it is sorted by name sensitive to case. If id, then the manager list is sorted by the window id, which never changes after the window is created. Or it can be set to none, which results in no sorting. Default is name.

ACTIONS
Actions are commands which may be bound to an event of the type: a keypress, a mouse click, or the mouse entering a window manager button - denoted by the action types Key, Mouse, and Select. Normally, actions bound to a mouse click are executed when the button is pressed. In transient mode, the action is executed when the button is released, since it is assumed that FvwmIconMan was bound to some mouse event. A tip/warning: FvwmIconMan still keeps track of the mouse button and any modifier keys in this case, so if you bind FvwmIconMan to say, meta-button3, then it would be wise to ensure that the action you want to execute will be executed when the meta-button3 event occurs (which would be the button release, assuming you kept your finger on the meta key). The syntax for actions are:

Key actions: Key Keysym Modifiers FunctionList
    Keysym and Modifiers are exactly the same as for the fvwm Key command.

Mouse actions: Mouse Button Modifiers FunctionList
    Button and Modifiers are exactly the same as for the fvwm Mouse command.

Select actions: Select FunctionList

A FunctionList is a sequence of commands separated by commas. They are executed in left to right order, in one shared context - which currently only contains a pointer to the "current" button. If a button is selected (typically by the mouse pointer sitting on it) when the action is executed, then the current button is initialized to that button. Otherwise, it points to nothing. Most of the available commands then modify this "current" button, either by moving it around, making it become the selected button, or sending commands to fvwm acting on the window represented by that button. Note that while this current button is initialized to be the selected button, the selected button does not implicitly follow it around. This way, the user can send commands to various windows, without changing which button is selected. Commands take five types of arguments: Integer, Manager, Window, Button, and String. A String is a string specified exactly as for fvwm - either in quotes or as a single word not in quotes. Again, you may bind a sequence of commands to an event, by listing them separated by commas. Window and Button types look exactly the same in the .fvwmrc file, but are interpreted as either specifying a managed window, or a FvwmIconMan button representing a window. They can either be an integer (which is interpreted module N where N is the number of buttons - so 0 is the first and -1 is the last), or one of the strings: Select, Focus, Up, Down, Right, Left, Next, Prev. Select and Focus refer to the currently selected or focused button or window. Up, Down, Right, and Left refer to the button or window above, below, to the right of, or to the left of the current button in the manager window, allowing navigation around the manager window. Next and Prev designates the window, button, or manager after or before the current button, allowing navigation of the one dimensional list of windows which is drawn in the manager window. If the manager is sorted, Next and Prev move through the windows in the sorted order. The Manager type can either be an integer, Next, or Prev. The meaning is analogous to that of the Button type, but in terms of the integral index of the managers, restricted to managers which are nonempty. The following functions are currently defined:

bif Button Integer/String
    A relative branch instruction. If Button is Select or Focus, then take the branch if there is a selected button or a focused button. If Button is an integer, then branch if nonzero. If it is one of Up, Down, Right, Left, Next, Prev, then the branch is taken when the current button can move in that direction. If the branch is taken, then Integer commands are skipped. No backwards branches are allowed.

bifn Button Integer/String
    The complement of bif. The branch is taken if Button evaluates to false, by the criteria listed for bif.

gotobutton Button
    Sets current button to Button. If Button is an integer, then the current button is set to Button modulo the number of buttons, in the whichever manager contains the selected button, if any.

gotomanager Manager
    Sets button to button 0 of Manager. This will only go to a visible, nonempty manager. So an integral argument is taken modulo the number of such managers.

jmp Integer/String
    Executes a relative jump of Integer instructions. Backwards jumps are not allowed. The jump is computed relative to the instruction following the jmp.

label String
    Provides a label that previous instructions can jump to. It will not be visible to subsequent jump instructions, and the same label can be used multiple times in the same instruction list (though it would be perverse to do so.)

print String
    Prints String to the console. Useful for debugging actions.

quit
    Quits FvwmIconMan.

ret Stop executing the entire action.

select
    Selects the current button, if any. If a select action has been specified, it will then be run. Therefore, it is considered unwise to set the select button in the select action.

sendcommand Command
    Sends the fvwm command Command to the window represented by the current button, if any.

warp
    Warps cursor to current button, if any.

Examples:
    gotobutton select, gotobutton Down, select
Selects the button below the currently selected button. Since the current button is already initialized to the selected button, this may be shortened to "gotobutton Down , select".
    gotobutton Up, select
Selects the button above the currently selected button.
    gotobutton 0, select
Selects the first button of the current manager. If there is no current manager, which is the case when no button is selected, then this does nothing.
    gotobutton -1, select
Selects the last button of the current manager.
    gotobutton focus, select
Selects the button corresponding to the focused window.
    gotobutton focus, Iconify
Sends the fvwm command Iconify to the focused window. Note that this does not change the selected button.
    bif Next 3, gotobutton 0, select, ret, gotobutton Next, select
If a button is selected, and it's the last button, go to button 0. If it's not the last button, go to the next button. Otherwise, do nothing. Basically, this action cycles through all buttons in the current manager.
    bif select 7, bif focus 3, gotomanager 0, select, ret, gotobutton focus, select, ret, gotobutton down, select
This is good for sending to FvwmIconMan with a SendToModule command. If there is a selected button, it moves down. Otherwise, if there is a focused button, it is selected. Otherwise, button 0 of manager 0 gets selected.
    bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, ret, label Select, gotobutton down, select
Same as previous, but using the label instruction.

In addition to being bound to keys and mice, actions can be sent from fvwm to FvwmIconMan via the SendToModule command. Don't quote the command when using SendToModule. Also, due to a bug in the current version of fvwm2, don't quote FvwmIconMan either.

SAMPLE CONFIGURATIONS
This first example is of a the simplest invocation of FvwmIconMan, which only has one manager, and handles all windows:

XCOMM##############################################################
XCOMM Load any modules which should be started during
XCOMM fvwm initialization
ModulePath /usr/lib/X11/fvwm:/usr/bin/X11
Module FvwmIconMan
XCOMM Make FvwmIconMan title-bar-less, sticky, and give it an icon
Style "Fvwm*"      Icon toolbox.xpm,NoTitle,NoHandles,Sticky
Style "FvwmIconMan" HandleWidth 5, Handles, BorderWidth 5
XCOMM#############################################################
XCOMM#############################################################
XCOMM Definitions used by the modules
*FvwmIconMan*nummanagers        1
*FvwmIconMan*resolution         global
*FvwmIconMan*background         slategrey
*FvwmIconMan*foreground         white
*FvwmIconMan*font               7x13
*FvwmIconMan*buttongeometry     100x0
*FvwmIconMan*managergeometry    1x0-0+0

This example is the Reader's Digest version of my personal configuration. It has two managers, one for emacs and one for everything else, minus things with no icon title. Only windows on the current page are displayed. The use of the drawicons and shape options requires that fvwm and FvwmIconMan we compiled with the correct options. Note how the geometry and show options are specified per manager, and the others are common to all:

Style "FvwmIconMan"  NoTitle, Sticky, WindowListSkip, BorderWidth 0
Style "FvwmIconMan"  HandleWidth 0
Key F8 A N SendToModule FvwmIconMan bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Select, gotobutton prev, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow
Key F9 A N SendToModule FvwmIconMan bif select Select, bif focus Focus, gotomanager 0, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Focus, gotobutton focus, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow, ret, label Select, gotobutton next, select, sendcommand WarpToWindow
*FvwmIconMan*numManagers 2
*FvwmIconMan*Resolution  page
*FvwmIconMan*background  steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*foreground  white
*FvwmIconMan*font        7x13
*FvwmIconMan*usewinlist  true
*FvwmIconMan*drawicons   true
*FvwmIconMan*shape	 true
*FvwmIconMan*followfocus true
*FvwmIconMan*sort	 name
*FvwmIconMan*plainbutton          up white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*selectbutton         down white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*focusbutton          up white brown
*FvwmIconMan*focusandselectButton down white brown
*FvwmIconMan*titleButton          raisededge white steelblue
*FvwmIconMan*1*title           "Emacs windows"
*FvwmIconMan*1*iconname        "FvwmIconMan: Emacs"
*FvwmIconMan*1*format          "%i"
*FvwmIconMan*1*show            resource=emacs resource=gemacs
*FvwmIconMan*1*managergeometry 1x0-400+0
*FvwmIconMan*1*buttongeometry  200x0
*FvwmIconMan*2*title           "All windows"
*FvwmIconMan*2*iconname        "FvwmIconMan: all"
*FvwmIconMan*2*format          "%c: %i"
*FvwmIconMan*2*dontshow        icon=Untitled
*FvwmIconMan*2*managergeometry 2x4-0+0
*FvwmIconMan*2*buttongeometry  200x0
*FvwmIconMan*transient*geometry 194x100
*FvwmIconMan*transient*dontshow icon=Untitled
*FvwmIconMan*transient*action   Mouse 0 A sendcommand select select Iconify
*FvwmIconMan*action	Mouse	1 N sendcommand Iconify
*FvwmIconMan*action	Mouse	2 N sendcommand WarpToWindow
*FvwmIconMan*action	Mouse	3 N sendcommand "Module FvwmIdent FvwmIdent"
*FvwmIconMan*action	Key	Left  N gotobutton Left, select
*FvwmIconMan*action	Key	Right N gotobutton Right, select
*FvwmIconMan*action	Key	Up    N gotobutton Up, select
*FvwmIconMan*action	Key	Down  N gotobutton Down, select
*FvwmIconMan*action	Key	q     N quit

UNFINISHED BUSINESS
There is one bug that I know of. A honest to goodness solution to this would be appreciated. When an icon manager is set to grow upwards or leftwards, on some machines it may wander occasionally. It doesn't handle windows without resource names as gracefully as it should.

AUTHOR
Brady Montz (bradym@cs.arizona.edu).

THANKS
Thanks to:
	David Berson <berson@cs.pitt.edu>,
	Gren Klanderman <greg@alphatech.com>,
	David Goldberg <dsg@mitre.org>,
	Pete Forman <gsez020@compo.bedford.waii.com>,
	Neil Moore <amethyst@maxwell.ml.org>,
	Josh M. Osborne <stripes@va.pubnix.com,
	Adam Rice <wysiwyg@glympton.airtime.co.uk>,
	Chris Siebenmann <cks@hawkwind.utcs.toronto.edu>,
	Bjorn Victor <victor@delial.docs.uu.se>.
for contributing either code or truly keen ideas.