polybar/README.md

# Polybar

[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/jaagr/polybar.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/jaagr/polybar)
[![MIT License](https://img.shields.io/github/license/mashape/apistatus.svg?maxAge=2592000?style=plastic)](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/blob/master/LICENSE)

A fast and easy-to-use tool for creating status bars.

**Polybar** aims to help users build beautiful and highly customizable status bars
for their desktop environment, without the need of having a black belt in shell scripting.
Heres a few screenshots showing you what it can look like:

[![sample screenshot](http://i.imgur.com/xvlw9iHt.png)](http://i.imgur.com/xvlw9iH.png)
[![sample screenshot](http://i.imgur.com/cYQOuRrt.png)](http://i.imgur.com/cYQOuRr.png)
[![sample screenshot](http://i.imgur.com/A6spiZZt.png)](http://i.imgur.com/A6spiZZ.png)
[![sample screenshot](http://i.imgur.com/TY5a5r9t.png)](http://i.imgur.com/TY5a5r9.png)

Please note that the project still is in early development, so please report any
problems by [creating an issue ticket](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/issues/new). There's also an irc channel available at freenode, cleverly named `#polybar`.


## Table of Contents

* [Introduction](#introduction)
* [Getting started](#getting-started)
  * [Dependencies](#dependencies)
  * [Building from source](#building-from-source)
  * [Configuration](#configuration)
  * [Running](#running)
* [License](#license)


## Introduction

The main purpose of **Polybar** is to help users create awesome status bars.
It has built-in functionality to display information about the most commoly used services.
Some of the batteries included so far:

- Systray icons
- Window title
- Playback controls and status display for [MPD](https://www.musicpd.org/) using [libmpdclient](https://www.musicpd.org/libs/libmpdclient/)
- [ALSA](http://www.alsa-project.org/main/index.php/Main_Page) volume controls
- Workspace and desktop panel for [bspwm](https://github.com/baskerville/bspwm) and [i3](https://github.com/i3/i3)
- Workspace module for [EWMH compliant](https://specifications.freedesktop.org/wm-spec/wm-spec-1.3.html#idm140130320786080) window managers
- Keyboard layout and indicator status
- CPU and memory load indicator
- Battery display
- Network connection details
- Backlight level
- Date and time label
- Time-based shell script execution
- Command output tailing
- User-defined menu tree
- Inter-process messaging
- And more...

[See the wiki for more details](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/wiki).


## Getting started

If you are using **Arch Linux**, you can install the AUR package [polybar-git](https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/polybar-git/) to get the latest version, or
[polybar](https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/polybar/) for the latest stable release. If you create a package for any other distribution, please consider contributing the template.

If you are using **Void Linux**, there's a [xbps template available](https://github.com/jaagr/void-packages/blob/polybar/srcpkgs/polybar/template) that you could use to build the project.
A [pull-request has been submitted](https://github.com/voidlinux/void-packages/pull/5192) but it is still not merged into the official repositories so I wouldn't hold my breath.


### Dependencies

A compiler with C++14 support ([clang-3.4+](http://llvm.org/releases/download.html), [gcc-5.1+](https://gcc.gnu.org/releases.html)).
- cmake
- libXft
- python2
- xcb-proto
- xcb-util-wm
- xcb-util-image

Optional dependencies for extended module support:
- alsa-lib (required by `internal/volume`)
- jsoncpp (required by `internal/i3`)
- libmpdclient (required by `internal/mpd`)
- libcurl (required by `internal/github`)
- wireless_tools (required by `internal/network`)

~~~ sh
# required
$ apt-get install cmake cmake-data libfontconfig1-dev libfreetype6-dev libghc-x11-xft-dev libx11-xcb-dev libxcb1-dev libxcb-ewmh-dev libxcb-icccm4-dev libxcb-image0-dev libxcb-randr0-dev libxcb-util0-dev libxcb-xkb-dev pkg-config python-xcbgen xcb-proto
# optional
$ apt-get install i3-wm libasound2-dev libmpdclient-dev libiw-dev
~~~


### Building from source

Please [report any problems](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/issues/new) you run into when building the project.

  ~~~ sh
  $ git clone --branch 2.4.8 --recursive https://github.com/jaagr/polybar
  $ mkdir polybar/build
  $ cd polybar/build
  $ cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ..
  $ sudo make install
  ~~~

There's also a helper script available in the root folder:

  ~~~ sh
  $ ./build.sh
  ~~~


### Configuration

Details on how to setup and configure the bar and each module have been moved to [the wiki](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/wiki/Configuration).

  ~~~ sh
  # Install the example configuration
  $ make userconfig
  # Launch the example bar
  $ polybar example
  ~~~

**NOTE:** If the bar output looks odd, it's probably because you're
missing the fonts defined in the config. Update the config or install the
missing fonts.


### Running

[See the wiki for details on how to run polybar](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/wiki).


## License

Polybar is licensed under the MIT license. [See LICENSE for more information](https://github.com/jaagr/polybar/blob/master/LICENSE).