dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

rent0n · 2010-04-12 20:51:48

Hi,

[What I need]
I'm trying to get a system info statusbar working on my wmii setup.

[What I've done so far]
1. Using wmii's statusbar directly is too difficult for me as I don't have enough knowledge about my system to get all the information I need and I a feel *a bit* unconfortable to work with sed and awk.
2. Then I tried to pipe conky into wmii statusbar but it is not straightforward at all, as the only working way I found, posted on the wmii thread, makes conky write a file and then wmii status bar to continuosly 'cat' that file. This way my hard disk is always active as wmii is always reading conky's output file.
3. I finally decided not to use wmii's stausbar and "replace" it with conky piped into dzen2. The major problem is that dzen initially displays conky's output correctly but the whole bar disappears as soon as I switch to another workspace.

Can someone point me to a solution?

Here's my dzen_conky.sh script:

#!/bin/bash
FG='#999999'
BG='#181818'
FONT='-xos4-terminus-medium-r-*--12-*-*-*-*-*-iso10646-1'

conky | dzen2 -ta r -h 12 -y 787 -fg $FG -bg $BG -fn $FONT

Many thanks!

sam87 · 2010-04-12 21:04:47

rent0n wrote:

Hi,
[What I need]
I'm trying to get a system info statusbar working on my wmii setup.
[What I've done so far]
1. Using wmii's statusbar directly is too difficult for me as I don't have enough knowledge about my system to get all the information I need and I a feel *a bit* unconfortable to work with sed and awk.
2. Then I tried to pipe conky into wmii statusbar but it is not straightforward at all, as the only working way I found, posted on the wmii thread, makes conky write a file and then wmii status bar to continuosly 'cat' that file. This way my hard disk is always active as wmii is always reading conky's output file.
3. I finally decided not to use wmii's stausbar and "replace" it with conky piped into dzen2. The major problem is that dzen initially displays conky's output correctly but the whole bar disappears as soon as I switch to another workspace.
Can someone point me to a solution?
Here's my dzen_conky.sh script:
#!/bin/bash
FG='#999999'
BG='#181818'
FONT='-xos4-terminus-medium-r-*--12-*-*-*-*-*-iso10646-1'

conky | dzen2 -ta r -h 12 -y 787 -fg $FG -bg $BG -fn $FONT
Many thanks!

hmmm...i think you'll need to add -p at the end of the dzen2 options line..it means persist or something like that.i hope that helps

rent0n · 2010-04-12 21:19:50

Thanks, I tried it but it doesn't fix the problem: as soon as I open a new terminal or switch workspace it completely disappears...

sam87 · 2010-04-12 21:29:23

strange...i tried and it woked fine on mine, am not using wmii though, but still dzen2 should work the same.try daemonizing it, conky | dzen2 $OPTS & see if that works, if that doesn't then am sorry, i have no idea
oh and how exactly do you start dzen_conky.sh?in your .xinitrc?

Last edited by sam87 (2010-04-12 21:35:26)

rent0n · 2010-04-13 11:25:54

I've tried different approaches:
1. start dzen_conky.sh from wmii config file (like xsetroot -solid and feh --bg-scale)
2. writing directly the conky | dzen2 $OPTS & command in .xinitrc
but I always end up with dzen bar disappearing as soon as I do something.

It seems to be a problem related to wmii that covers dzen, unfortuntely google doesn't help this time...
I would be also to have a simple and effective way to pipe conky into wmii's stauts bar, like it can be done in dwm: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dwm#Conky_statusbar

sam87 · 2010-04-13 21:25:33

Well I got the same problem once in dwm and i did it as follows, (solution from jasonwryan)
1.Have a script you call from your .xinitrc, dzen_conky.sh and in it, the dzen_conky script, have the following
(sleep 3s && conky | dzen2 $OPTS -p ) &
something like that.this ensures that the wimii bar is drawn first and then afterwards the dzen2 bar takes over.thats how i did it in dwm..you might need to change the sleep time so that the wmii bar gets drawn first and then the dzen2 bar

Last edited by sam87 (2010-04-13 21:26:09)

Arch Linux

#1 2010-04-12 20:51:48

dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

#2 2010-04-12 21:04:47

Re: dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

#3 2010-04-12 21:19:50

Re: dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

#4 2010-04-12 21:29:23

Re: dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

#5 2010-04-13 11:25:54

Re: dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

#6 2010-04-13 21:25:33

Re: dzen, conky and wmii statusbar...

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