i3 -- a tiling window manager

I had used wmii for several months, and almost forgot it till today when my Ubuntu 12.04 stuck. I launched top and found the compiz consumed most of the resource of my PC. Of course I didn't find out the cause (due to my time and my skill level) and finally restart the system in command line mode.

So I recalled wmii the wonderful and lightweight window manager.

But I also recalled some reasons which prevented me using wmii as my main window manager:

1. I didn't know how to make wmii show the system panel (that was the gnome panel) which keeps something like volume controls and daemon icons of ibus and Dropbox, etc.
2. I have had two monitors and didn't know how to make wmii work with dual-monitor setting

I did some quick search and found an interesting article written by Tanguy: Tiling window managers.

The article listed three tilting window managers among which I've only used wmii. I heard of awesome but haven’t try it yet. After reading Tanguy's introduction, I decided to try i3.

I also did some more search about the system panel and finally got what I want. I listed some setting in my i3 configuration file (~/.i3/config):

# start-ups
exec unity-2d-panel
exec nm-applet
exec ibus-daemon
exec dropbox start -i
exec ~/Downloads/copy/x86/CopyAgent

# for dual-monitor
exec xrandr --output DVI-I-1 --auto --left-of DVI-I-2

where the DVI-I-1 and DVI-I-2 are my monitors detected by using the command xrandr.

Here is my working monitors with i3 as the window manager:

Using i3 window manager with dual monitors.

Close-up of the Unity panel.

I am not sure whether I got the dual-monitor setting right. In my case, the monitors show two different workspace but not a single workspace with extension monitor.

[QnA] Use xmodmap to set modifier keys

In the previous article, I described how to change the modifier key for wmii from Mod1(Alt) to Mod4(Windows key). That's no problem for my PCs, but not okay for my laptop, an IBM X31. The laptop has NO Windows key, so I cannot just modify the wmiirc file to make things run.

Fortunately, Google helped me to find the solution again. There is a command called xmodmap to modify keymaps.

The steps are:

• Create a file, for example, ~/.Xmodmap
• Paste the following lines in the created file

! No Caps Lock
clear lock
! Caps Lock as Win key
add mod4 = Caps_Lock


• Run xmodmap to enable the settings

$ xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap

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Reference:

• How to get special keys to work

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Edit (2010/06/01):

After changing Caps Lock key to Windows key, wmii cannot move windows to desktop#2.

[SW] Change modifier key for wmii

I have adopted wmii as my main WM for months and it has given pretty good experience in my daily usage. There has been one thing, however, bothering me a bit. The default modifier key of wmii is Alt, which is presented as Mod1 in wmiirc. Because Alt is a frequently used key for tools such as BASH, this default setting could cause some inconveniences. For example, when you want to move forward in BASH commands, Alt+F won't give you the expected moving but will make the working window run in full screen. Fortunately, wmii has been featured as its configurability.

In my system, which is Ubuntu 8.04, the confiuration files are located in
/etc/X11/wmii-3.5/

There are two files look like something to be the configureation file: rc.wmii and wmiirc. To make sure which one is used, use the following commands
ps aux | grep wmii | grep rc

In my case, it is the wmiirc file.

In the beginning of wmiirc, there are several lines which set the keys.
MODKEY=Mod1
UP=k
DOWN=j
LEFT=h
RIGHT=l

I set MODKEY from Mod1 to Mod4 which is the Windows key. Re-login and you can use wmii without the ``Alt conflict'' with many other programs.

[QnA] Sound volume control in command line

I've used wmii for several weeks, and it meets most of my need well. Sometimes, however, I want to control the volume but there is no the control panel as in the Gnome desktop environment.

Here is the solution: amixer (or alsamixer, which has the ncurses interface).

To use alsamixer is easier due to the straightforward interface. If you get the following error message when you type ``alsamixer'' in the command

alsamixer: function snd_ctl_open failed for default: Connection refused

then do the following steps:

$ rm ~/.asoundrc and then do
$ asoundconf list
$ asoundconf set-default-card foo

where the foo is one of the sound cards listed by `asoundconf list.'

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Ref:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=597765
http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=3631606&postcount=4