[SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

barney · 2024-03-28 11:18:41

I want to get the properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox. For that purpose I am using xdotool to get the window id and pass that to obxprop:

obxprop --id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)

The output of this command is nothing. What I am doing wrong?

Last edited by barney (2024-03-29 08:36:15)

seth · 2024-03-28 12:58:35

What is the window under the mouse pointer?
The command itself is fine, but not every window has window properties set.
And since you're not just using xprop I suspect this is some popup menu?

barney · 2024-03-28 14:00:02

seth wrote:

What is the window under the mouse pointer?

How to explain what is the window under the mouse pointer? If I have few open windows, if the mouse is within some window (that window needs not to be in focus) that window is under the mouse pointer.

The command itself is fine, but not every window has window properties set.

I know that all the widows on my desktop have some properties set, I can confirm that using the obxprop and xprop commands without the id option.

And since you're not just using xprop I suspect this is some popup menu?

No it is not the popup menu the obxprop command is similar to xprop command. It is interesting that the following command:

xprop -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)

also gives nothing. It is ok for me to use xprop command, it is not needed that the obxconf command must be used.

seth · 2024-03-28 14:04:33

How to explain what is the window under the mouse pointer?

xdotool getmouselocation
xwininfo -int -id <the_id_from_above>

I know that all the widows on my desktop have some properties set

I know that that is wrong.
The decorated windows you see will for pretty much sure, yes.
All windows? No. Pretty much guaranteed.

barney · 2024-03-28 14:34:19

seth wrote:

How to explain what is the window under the mouse pointer?
xdotool getmouselocation
xwininfo -int -id <the_id_from_above>

This gives some properties, but I am not interested in them.

I know that all the widows on my desktop have some properties set
I know that that is wrong.
The decorated windows you see will for pretty much sure, yes.
All windows? No. Pretty much guaranteed.

OK, I can agree with that.
Does the

xdotool getmouselocation

returns the id that can be uset with the -id options of the xprop.
I am interested in the "_OB_APP_CLASS(UTF8_STRING)" property and xprop is returning that property.

seth · 2024-03-28 14:35:21

This gives some properties, but I am not interested in them.

No, it does not - but it tells you what the window actuall is and the idea was that you post that here.

barney · 2024-03-28 15:11:44

seth wrote:

This gives some properties, but I am not interested in them.
No, it does not - but it tells you what the window actuall is and the idea was that you post that here.

I have impression that you are not giving me all the information about windows. You want I to infer the knowledge that I need. But I can't without your help.

V1del · 2024-03-28 15:20:20

And we can't really tell you what you're looking for if you do not post the properties you're given.

Generally what seth is likely thinking here. The window you're trying to grab information from is not handled by OB like e.g. a notification bubble or a context menu or some such sort -- as such obxprop will not show you anything because it's looking for a specific set of properties. Trying to give you all the possible answers of what could be the case when you have all the tools at your disposal to give us the information on what is actually the case is a much more fruitful endeavour. And it's more useful to give an explanation if we have all the context of the issue.

seth · 2024-03-28 15:29:35

According to the OP xprop is likewise empty, but generally yes - I suspect the OP is testing something they don't perceive as a "window" and that simply has no properties set at all.
@barney, the one sitting on critical information (xwininfo) and not sharing them is /you/.

barney · 2024-03-28 15:44:22

seth wrote:

According to the OP xprop is likewise empty, but generally yes - I suspect the OP is testing something they don't perceive as a "window" and that simply has no properties set at all.
@barney, the one sitting on critical information (xwininfo) and not sharing them is /you/.

I must admit that I don't have enough knowledge to properly explain what I want to achieve.
I will use simple words. Lets say I have two windows (applications) on my desktop, firefox and (Libre Office) writer. In any moment the mouse can be in one of two positions, within firefox (I don't know if this is application or window) or within writer. All I want is when the mouse is within the firefox (this does not mean that firefox is active window), to get the text "firefox", or when it is within writer I want to get the text "writer" all this from terminal emulator.
And I don't know what do you mean by "OP".

seth · 2024-03-28 15:50:22

You're the OP and we've a pretty good idea what you want to achive, just not what you're doing there, so please post the xwininfo output (and you can also try to manually get the xprop output, bn. that it'll require you to pass "-int" b/c you're getting the ID in decimal from xdotool)

Fyi, the window under the mouse is the window under the mouse - not the window under the window under the mouse.
If you want to test for general intersection, you'll have to traverse the window tree (or at least check all top level windows) and match their geometry against the cursor position.

barney · 2024-03-28 16:05:03

The output of

xprop -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)

is empty.
The output from

xwininfo -all -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)

is:

xwininfo: Window id: 4225094 (has no name)

  Root window id: 628 (the root window) (has no name)
  Parent window id: 628 (the root window) (has no name)
     24 children:
     75497515 "Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox / Newbie Corner / Arch Linux Forums — Mozilla Firefox": ("Navigator" "firefox")  1243x1023+1+22  +676+22
        2 children:
        75497528 (has no name): ()  1243x1023+0+0  +676+22
        75497516 (has no name): ()  1x1+-1+-1  +675+21
     4225138 (has no name): ()  26x1+1218+1049  +1893+1049
     4225137 (has no name): ()  26x1+1218+1045  +1893+1045
     4225136 (has no name): ()  1x25+1244+1025  +1919+1025
     4225135 (has no name): ()  26x1+1+1049  +676+1049
     4225134 (has no name): ()  26x1+1+1045  +676+1045
     4225133 (has no name): ()  1x25+0+1025  +675+1025
     4225132 (has no name): ()  1191x1+27+1049  +702+1049
     4225131 (has no name): ()  1191x1+27+1045  +702+1045
     4225126 (has no name): ()  1243x3+1+1046  +676+1046
        4 children:
        4225130 (has no name): ()  1x3+1217+0  +1893+1046
        4225129 (has no name): ()  1x3+25+0  +701+1046
        4225128 (has no name): ()  25x3+1218+0  +1894+1046
        4225127 (has no name): ()  25x3+0+0  +676+1046
     4225118 (has no name): ()  1x1000+1244+26  +1919+26
     4225117 (has no name): ()  1x1000+0+26  +675+26
     4225111 (has no name): ()  1243x1+1+21  +676+21
     4225110 (has no name): ()  1x25+1244+1  +1919+1
     4225109 (has no name): ()  26x1+1219+0  +1894+0
     4225108 (has no name): ()  26x1+0+0  +675+0
     4225107 (has no name): ()  1193x1+26+0  +701+0
     4225106 (has no name): ()  1x25+0+1  +675+1
     4225105 (has no name): ()  1243x20+1+1  +676+1
        12 children:
        4225125 (has no name): ()  14x14+1189+3  +1865+4
        4225124 (has no name): ()  16x16+4+2  +680+3
        4225123 (has no name): ()  14x14+0+0  +676+1
        4225122 (has no name): ()  14x14+0+0  +676+1
        4225121 (has no name): ()  14x14+1225+3  +1901+4
        4225120 (has no name): ()  14x14+1207+3  +1883+4
        4225119 (has no name): ()  1161x16+24+2  +700+3
        4225116 (has no name): ()  4x20+1239+0  +1915+1
        4225115 (has no name): ()  25x3+1218+0  +1894+1
        4225114 (has no name): ()  4x20+0+0  +676+1
        4225113 (has no name): ()  25x3+0+0  +676+1
        4225112 (has no name): ()  1193x3+25+0  +701+1
     4225100 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
        2 children:
        4225102 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
        4225101 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
     4225099 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
        1 child:
        4225104 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
     4225098 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
     4225097 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
        1 child:
        4225103 (has no name): ()  1x1+0+0  +675+0
     4225095 (has no name): ()  1243x1023+1+22  +676+22
        1 child:
        4225096 (has no name): ()  1243x1023+0+0  +676+22

  Absolute upper-left X:  675
  Absolute upper-left Y:  0
  Relative upper-left X:  675
  Relative upper-left Y:  0
  Width: 1245
  Height: 1050
  Depth: 24
  Visual: 0x21
  Visual Class: TrueColor
  Border width: 0
  Class: InputOutput
  Colormap: 0x20 (installed)
  Bit Gravity State: ForgetGravity
  Window Gravity State: NorthWestGravity
  Backing Store State: NotUseful
  Save Under State: no
  Map State: IsViewable
  Override Redirect State: no
  Corners:  +675+0  -1920+0  -1920-30  +675-30
  -geometry 1245x1050+675+0

  Bit gravity: ForgetGravity
  Window gravity: NorthWestGravity
  Backing-store hint: NotUseful
  Backing-planes to be preserved: 0xffffffff
  Backing pixel: 0
  Save-unders: No

  Someone wants these events:
      ButtonPress
      ButtonRelease
      EnterWindow
      LeaveWindow
      SubstructureRedirect
      FocusChange
  Do not propagate these events:
  Override redirection?: No

  No window manager hints defined
  Window manager hints:
      Process id: (unknown)

  No normal window size hints defined
  No zoom window size hints defined

  No window shape defined
  No border shape defined

Window under mouse is firefox with this forum thread, and it's position is not changed between the two commands.
Please do not use terminology like "bn." "b/c" I cannot understand you.

Last edited by barney (2024-03-28 16:06:28)

seth · 2024-03-28 16:20:31

Window under mouse is firefox with this forum thread

No it's not:

wininfo: Window id: 4225094 (has no name)
-geometry 1245x1050+675+0
75497515 "Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox / Newbie Corner / Arch Linux Forums — Mozilla Firefox": ("Navigator" "firefox")  1243x1023+1+22  +676+22

Looks like the WM parent to encapsulate window and decoration - is the mouse over the window or its titlebar?

barney · 2024-03-28 16:24:27

is the mouse over the window or its titlebar?

Under the window.

seth · 2024-03-28 16:32:21

There's maybe another oddity - according to your xwininfo output the only named window is firefox, but there probably should be a terminal window where you've been running this??
What is the exact environment? Just openbox on bare metal? No wayland/VM/xephyr?

Is firefox the only affected client? Does this work with eg. xterm?
Is firefox a flatpak or appimage etc.?

barney · 2024-03-28 17:01:37

seth wrote:

There's maybe another oddity - according to your xwininfo output the only named window is firefox, but there probably should be a terminal window where you've been running this??

There are more applications: alacritty (three windows), obkey (one window) nyxt (one window) and thunar (one window). I have tested the two previous commands on all windows, and the situation is the same. If you want I can post the output of the xwininfo for the other windows? The output for the xprop is always empty.

What is the exact environment? Just openbox on bare metal? No wayland/VM/xephyr?

openbox on bare metal (one monitor and one TV, 4 desktops, all the windows are on desktop 1 and the monitor, not on the TV.

Is firefox the only affected client? Does this work with eg. xterm?

All applications that I have tested are affected. The situation is the same with xterm.

Is firefox a flatpak or appimage etc.?

All applications are installed from official arch repositories. (I have some applications from AUR, for example deadbeef. Tested on deadbeef, situation the same.

seth · 2024-03-28 18:02:38

Ok, just tried - xdotool misbehaves itr w/ openbox (other WMs incl. even fluxbox work as expected)
=> https://github.com/jordansissel/xdotool/issues

On a glimpse, the window stack looks reversed on openbox, so xdotool might want to introduce a flag to reverse the search strategy.

barney · 2024-03-28 21:10:40

V1del wrote:

And we can't really tell you what you're looking for if you do not post the properties you're given.

My English is not so good, my fault. Sorry. But sometimes Seth is using English "shortcuts" which I cannot understand. Again, My fault.

seth · 2024-03-28 21:38:54

It's maybe more that I originally only implied to post the xwininfo.

Try

obxprop --id $(xwininfo -children -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)  | sed '/^$/d;/^     /!d;/(has no name)/d;/ children:$/d;s/ *\([0-9]*\) \+.*/\1/g')

barney · 2024-03-28 22:54:17

The output of the

obxprop --id $(xwininfo -children -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)  | sed '/^$/d;/^     /!d;/(has no name)/d;/ children:$/d;s/ *\([0-9]*\) \+.*/\1/g')

is http://0x0.st/Xs5a.txt

seth · 2024-03-28 22:56:44

Did you look at it?

barney · 2024-03-28 23:08:54

seth wrote:

Did you look at it?

To be honest, no. Because I was thinking that that information is only important for diagnostic purposes.
Now I can see that I can extract the

_OB_APP_GROUP_NAME(UTF8_STRING) = "firefox"

property.
Thanks.

seth · 2024-03-28 23:21:09

Please always remember to mark resolved threads by editing your initial posts subject - so others will know that there's no task left, but maybe a solution to find.
Thanks.

You still might want to file a bug against xdotool rather than relying on the somewhat sketchy approach to filter the children of the found window for a named one.

barney · 2024-03-29 09:05:26

seth wrote:

Please always remember to mark resolved threads by editing your initial posts subject - so others will know that there's no task left, but maybe a solution to find.
Thanks.

Done.

You still might want to file a bug against xdotool rather than relying on the somewhat sketchy approach to filter the children of the found window for a named one.

I don't know how to describe the problem to fill a bug. Is it enough to say that "xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5" is not returning what is expected to return?

Now I have a bizarre problem with escaping the quotation mark in xml file. I want to take the screenshots of the window under the mouse pointer. To do that I use the following command:

sh -c "import ~/pictures/screenshots/$(date '+%Y%m%d-%H%M%S')-$(obxprop --id $(xwininfo -children -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)  | sed '/^$/d;/^     /!d;/(has no name)/d;/ children:$/d;s/ *\([0-9]*\) \+.*/\1/g') | grep _OB_APP_NAME | cut -d '"' -f 2).png"

This works as expected from terminal emulator, but when I put this command in obkey and associate a key I get this message:

Text ended before matching quote was found for '.(The text was "sh -c "import ~/pictures/screenshots/$(date '+%Y%m%d-%H%M%S')-$(obxprop --id $(xwininfo -children -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)  | sed '/^$/d;/^     /!d;/(has no name)/d;/ children:$/d;s/ *\([0-9]*\) \+.*/\1/g') | grep _OB_APP_NAME | cut -d '"' -f 2).png"")

The problem is that escaping characters in xml file is not the same like escaping characters in the shell. I don't know how to solve this problem.

seth · 2024-03-29 09:21:20

I don't know how to describe the problem to fill a bug.

xdotool getmouselocation on some WMs (openbox) searches the stack in the wrong direction and finds the (unnamed) WM container instead of the actual client

Now I have a bizarre problem with escaping the quotation mark in xml file.

is veering off-topic…

#!/bin/sh
window_under_mouse="$(xwininfo -children -int -id $(xdotool getmouselocation | cut -d: -f 5)  | sed '/^$/d;/^     /!d;/(has no name)/d;/ children:$/d;s/ *\([0-9]*\) \+.*/\1/g')"
OB_APP_NAME="$(obxprop --id $window_under_mouse _OB_APP_NAME | cut -d '"' -f 2)"
import ~"/pictures/screenshots/$(date '+%Y%m%d-%H%M%S')-$OB_APP_NAME.png"

Arch Linux

#1 2024-03-28 11:18:41

[SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#2 2024-03-28 12:58:35

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#3 2024-03-28 14:00:02

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#4 2024-03-28 14:04:33

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#5 2024-03-28 14:34:19

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#6 2024-03-28 14:35:21

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#7 2024-03-28 15:11:44

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#8 2024-03-28 15:20:20

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#9 2024-03-28 15:29:35

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#10 2024-03-28 15:44:22

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#11 2024-03-28 15:50:22

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#12 2024-03-28 16:05:03

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#13 2024-03-28 16:20:31

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#14 2024-03-28 16:24:27

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#15 2024-03-28 16:32:21

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#16 2024-03-28 17:01:37

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#17 2024-03-28 18:02:38

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#18 2024-03-28 21:10:40

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#19 2024-03-28 21:38:54

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#20 2024-03-28 22:54:17

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#21 2024-03-28 22:56:44

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#22 2024-03-28 23:08:54

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#23 2024-03-28 23:21:09

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#24 2024-03-29 09:05:26

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

#25 2024-03-29 09:21:20

Re: [SOLVED]Properties of the window under the mouse pointer in OpenBox

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