Go to file
Richard Grenville 606e2d7061 Misc: Code clean-up
- Change some members of options_t. Clean up wrongly replaced option
  names in comments. Rename "options" to "opts", to avoid breaking line
  width too much, and to minimize typing as it's so frequently used.
  :-)

- Let general options in commandline arguments override wintype-specific
  options in a configuration file, which could be a more natural
  behavior.
2012-09-26 18:54:35 +08:00
bin rename settrans to compton-trans, add manpage. 2012-06-23 17:39:49 -05:00
man rename settrans to compton-trans, add manpage. 2012-06-23 17:39:49 -05:00
src Misc: Code clean-up 2012-09-26 18:54:35 +08:00
.gitignore Improvement: Change window type detection 2012-09-22 20:59:26 +08:00
LICENSE readme, etc 2011-11-06 22:03:18 -06:00
Makefile Feature: Configuration file parsing 2012-09-25 10:32:41 +08:00
README.md Feature: Configuration file parsing 2012-09-25 10:32:41 +08:00
compton.sample.conf Feature: Wintype-specific options in configuration files 2012-09-25 21:08:54 +08:00

README.md

Compton

Compton is a compositor for X, and a fork of xcompmgr-dana.

I was frustrated by the low amount of standalone lightweight compositors. Compton was forked from Dana Jansens' fork of xcompmgr and refactored. I fixed whatever bug I found, and added features I wanted. Things seem stable, but don't quote me on it. I will most likely be actively working on this until I get the features I want. This is also a learning experience for me. That is, I'm partially doing this out of a desire to learn Xlib.

Changes from xcompmgr:

  • inactive window transparency (specified with -i)
  • titlebar/frame transparency (specified with -e)
  • menu transparency (thanks to Dana)
  • shadows are now enabled for argb windows, e.g. terminals with transparency
  • removed serverside shadows (and simple compositing) to clean the code, the only option that remains is clientside shadows

The above features give compton a feature set similar to the xfce compositor.

Compton has only been tested with openbox so far, but frame transparency should work with any window manager that properly sets _NET_FRAME_EXTENTS.

Fixes from the original xcompmgr:

  • fixed a segfault when opening certain window types
  • fixed a memory leak caused by not freeing up shadows (from the freedesktop repo)

Building

The same dependencies as xcompmgr.

Dependencies:

B for build-time

R for runtime

  • libx11 (B,R)
  • libxcomposite (B,R)
  • libxdamage (B,R)
  • libxfixes (B,R)
  • libXext (B,R)
  • libxrender (B,R)
  • pkg-config (B)
  • make (B)
  • xproto / x11proto (B)
  • bash (R)
  • xprop,xwininfo / x11-utils (R)
  • libpcre (B,R) (Will probably be made optional soon)
  • libconfig (B,R) (Will probably be made optional soon)

To build, make sure you have the above dependencies:

$ make
$ make install

Usage

$ compton -cC -i 0.6 -e 0.6
$ compton -cC -i 0.6 -e 0.6 -fF
$ compton -cC -fF -I 0.065 -O 0.065 -D 6 -m 0.8 -i 0.6 -e 0.6

Options

compton [-d display] [-r radius] [-o opacity]
        [-l left-offset] [-t top-offset]
        [-i opacity] [-e opacity] [-cCfFSdG]
  • -d display Specifies the display to manage.
  • -r radius Specifies the blur radius for client-side shadows.
  • -o opacity Specifies the opacity for client-side shadows.
  • -l left-offset Specifies the left offset for client-side shadows.
  • -t top-offset Specifies the top offset for client-side shadows.
  • -I fade-in-step Specifies the opacity change between steps while fading in.
  • -O fade-out-step Specifies the opacity change between steps while fading out.
  • -D fade-delta Specifies the time (in milliseconds) between steps in a fade.
  • -c Enable client-side shadows on windows.
  • -f When -c is specified, enables a smooth fade effect for transient windows like menus, and for all windows on hide and restore events.
  • -C When -c is specified, attempts to avoid painting shadows on panels and docks.
  • -F When -f is specified, also enables the fade effect when windows change their opacity, as with transset(1).
  • -i opacity Specifies inactive window transparency. (0.1 - 1.0)
  • -e opacity Specifies window frame transparency. (0.1 - 1.0)
  • -G Avoid painting shadows on DND windows.
  • -b daemonize Attempt to daemonize process.
  • -S Enables synchronous operation. Useful for debugging.

License

xcompmgr has gotten around. As far as I can tell, the lineage for this particular tree is something like:

  • Keith Packard (original author)
  • Matthew Hawn
  • ...
  • Dana Jansens
  • Myself

Not counting the tens of people who forked it in between.

See LICENSE for more info.