About

wmrc is a shell script framework for extending window manager capabilities using modules with dependency and error checking.

The goal of this utility is to help you maintain a set of concise and ergonomic scripts (modules) for configuring and customizing various aspects of a custom desktop environment. It comes with only a few batteries included, in order to provide maximum portability and modularity across different operating systems, window managers and init daemons.

Installation

Arch Linux (AUR)

paru -S aur/wmrc

Generic instructions

git clone 'https://github.com/filiparag/wmrc'
cd ./wmrc
sudo make install

Modules

Modules are groups of arbitrary POSIX-compliant shell scripts located in $HOME/.config/wmrc/modules/<group>/<module>. Each module should be responsible for one functionality of the desktop environment — for instance, module polybar in group screen is tasked with configuring and running all bars.

Modules can invoke special libwmrc functions and access global variables which are injected into them before execution. These functions implement common functionality for interfacing with wmrc, logging and daemon control. Their implementation can be overridden when necessary.

Each module can have WMRC_DEPENDENCIES global variable declaring needed system executables and wmrc modules it calls. If multiple modules share functionality, they can import custom wmrc libraries by declaring them in the WMRC_LIBRARIES variable. These libraries are sources from $HOME/.config/wmrc/modules/libs. Dependencies and libraries are checked before module execution, in order to prevent errors and undefined behavior.

Example module

Module screen/vnc for controlling VNC server:

#!/bin/sh

export WMRC_DEPENDENCIES='x0vncserver'

start() {
  if ! [ -f "$HOME/.vnc/passwd" ]; then
    error "Password for VNC server is not set!"
    return 1
  fi
  if daemon_get_pid; then
    error "VNC server is already running!"
    return 1
  fi
  x0vncserver --PasswordFile="$HOME/.vnc/passwd" >/dev/null &
  daemon_set_pid "$!"
}

This module uses injected libwmrc functions for logging and control of the spawned background process. Functionality for stopping and restarting module is inherited and doesn't need to be explicitly declared.

Service can be started implicitly as wmrc start screen/vnc or explicitly as a method call: wmrc call screen/vnc start.

Implicit method calls are available for functions start, stop, restart and status.

Configuration file

Configuration file is located at $HOME/.config/wmrc/rc.conf and contains global variables and execution units.

Variables

Variables declared here are visible in all modules with WMRC_ prefix. They can be assigned any constant value or shell expression.

Execution units

Execution unit is a sequence of method calls to wmrc modules. Their purpose is to group execution of various methods which should always be executed together.

Mehod calls in units are executed in parallel, but can be executed conditionally in sequence using wait and crit flags.

Example configuration

%LOCKSCREEN_COVER = '$HOME/Pictures/bliss.jpg'

[lock]
screen/lock::start crit
screen/brightness::set(100%)
audio/playerctl::pause

Now, hotkey daemon can call wmrc unit lock and the lock unit will be executed.