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fltk-dialog

fltk-dialog is meant to start dialog windows from a shell script. This can be used to make user interaction easier.

Here I will explain the different dialog types and give some usage examples.

--message

A simple message box with a "close" button. Return code (echo $?) is always 0.

Usage example:

fltk-dialog \
  --message \
  --title="Example" \
  --text="Hello World"

Hint: line breaks make your code easier to read if you add a lot of command line parameters.

--warning

A message box with an "OK" button and a "Cancel" button. Return code is 1 if "Cancel" is clicked or if the window was closed (Alt+F4), clicking "OK" returns 0.

Example:

fltk-dialog --warning \
  --title="Warning!" \
  --text="Something went wrong!"

You can use the command directly in an if-else statement to make use of the return code:

if fltk-dialog --warning \
  --title="$title" \
  --text="$text"
then
  do_something_ok
else
  do_something_cancel
fi

Or you can use the special shell variable $? to get the exit code of the last executed command:

fltk-dialog --warning \
  --title="$title" \
  --text="$text"

if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
  do_something_ok
else
  do_something_cancel
fi

--question

A yes/no question dialog. "Yes" returns 0, "No" and closing the window returns 1.

Example:

if ! fltk-dialog --question \
  --title="Continue" \
  --text="Do you really want to continue?"
then
  exit
fi

You can also alter the text of the buttons with --yes-label=TEXT and --no-label=TEXT:

if ! fltk-dialog --question \
  --title="Continue" \
  --text="Do you want to continue?" \
  --yes-label="Continue" \
  --no-label="Stop"
then
  exit
fi

If required a third button, which will return 2 if clicked, can be added with --alt-label=TEXT:

fltk-dialog --question \
  --title="Continue" \
  --text="Do you want to continue?" \
  --yes-label="Continue" \
  --no-label="Stop" \
  --alt-label="Go back"

case $? in
  0) action_continue ;;
  1) exit ;;
  2) action_back ;;
esac

--dnd

A drag & drop window. You can drag files/directories/symbolic links, hypertext links and selected text into it. The filenames, links or text will be printed on the shell. File paths are printed as URIs. Return code is always 0. Here's an example that will convert URIs (file:///path/to/the%20file.txt) into regular filenames (/path/to/the file.txt):

for f in $(fltk-dialog --dnd) ; do
  # replace percent-escaped characters and
  # remove preceeding "file://"
  printf "%b\n" "${f//%/\\x}" | sed 's|^file://||'
done

--file / --directory

A file/directory selection dialog. Returns 1 if cancelled, otherwise 0. The full path of the selected file/directoy will be printed on the shell. With --file --native or --directory --native you can also choose the system's native selection dialog, which may look and integrate better into your desktop environment. If fltk-dialog can't start the native dialog, it will fall back to FLTK's version. You can also try to explicitly run the Qt5, Qt4 or GTK dialog by using --native-qt5, --native-qt4 or --native-gtk instead of --native.

Example:

file=$(fltk-dialog --file \
  --native \
  --title="Select a file you want to copy")

if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
  cp "$file" "$HOME/$(basename $file)"
fi

--entry

A text entry dialog. Returns 1 if cancelled, otherwise 0.

Example:

name=$(fltk-dialog \
  --entry \
  --title="Username" \
  --text="Select a username:")

if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
  echo "Username: $name"
fi

--password

Same as --entry, but instead of the entered characters only dots will be visible. Use this wisely. It's better to use gksudo or kdesudo if you need a graphical sudo password entering form.

--progress

To do.

--calendar

Displays a calendar form and returns the selected date. The default format for the returned date is Y-M-D.

--date

A simple dialog to select a date. Default format for the returned date is Y-M-D.

--color

Color selection dialog. Returns the selected color in 4 different formats, separated by a pipe (|) symbol: RGB (range 0.000-1.000)|RGB (range 0-255)|HTML hex|HSV

As an example, here is the output when selecting blue: 0.000 0.000 1.000|0 0 255|#000ff|4.000 1.000 1.000

--scale

This will display a horizontal slider with a default range of 0-100. On "OK" the selected value will be returned.

--checklist

Create a multiple choice selection list. Items for the list are separated with a pipe (|) symbol. Pressing "OK" it will return a pipe separated list with the labels TRUE for selected items and FALSE for items that weren't selected.

For example: creating a list of fruits with --checklist="Apple|Banana|Cherry|Orange" and picking Apple and Cherry will return TRUE|FALSE|TRUE|FALSE.

--radiolist

Create a radio button list. This is similar to --checklist, but you can only select one item at a time. The selected item's label will be returned.

For example: creating a list of fruits with --radiolist="Apple|Banana|Cherry|Orange" and picking Cherry will return Cherry.

--dropdown

Create a drop-down menu. It's the same as --radiolist but with a drop-down menu button.

--html

Use --html=FILE to view an HTML file. The HTML support is very limited. You can use it as a document viewer, i.e. for manuals or license texts.

--text-info

To do.

--notification

Show up a notification message. This requires libnotify.

Example: fltk-dialog --notification --title="Error" --text="Something weird happened!"

--font

A font selection dialog. The selected font and font size, separated by a pipe (|), will be returned. An example output would be: sans bold italic|14