IceWM

The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.

Documentation

Tips

Startup/shutdown actions

Install a script (executable!) called ~/.icewm/startup or ~/.icewm/shutdown

Personalisations

Just copy anything from /usr/share/icewm or /etc/X11/icewm to ~/.icewm and modify it locally.
You can use iceme to modify easily the menus (copy /etc/X11/icewm/keys to be able to edit the keybindings)
You can use icepref to modify your preferences
See the links above for tips & tricks

Background

it's easier to use xsetbg from xloadimage package
do that from ~/.icewm/startup script

xsetbg -fullscreen <full path to jpeg image>

Icons

one nice way is to use apwal (the author is French, comprendra qui pourra :-)
No way to bind apwal to right-click under icewm, bind it to a a key combination instead

Gkrell

apt-get install gkrellmwireless gkrellm-x86info

You can launch it from ~/.icewm/startup with e.g.:

pgrep gkrellm >/dev/null || (gkrellm &)

winoptions

You can copy it from /usr/share/icewm to ~/.icewm

Examples:

To get gkrellm on all desktops but invisible on the taskbar:

gkrellm.Gkrellm.allWorkspaces: 1                                                     
gkrellm.Gkrellm.ignoreTaskBar: 1                                                     
#gkrellm.Gkrellm.layer: Below                                                        
#gkrellm.Gkrellm.doNotCover: 1

To launch Firefox and Thunderbird on their own desktops:

Gecko.Firefox-bin.workspace: 4                                                       
Gecko.Iceweasel-bin.workspace: 4                                                       
Gecko.Thunderbird-bin.workspace: 5                                                   
Gecko.Icedove-bin.workspace: 5

Note that I have the following in my "preferences" file

WorkspaceNames=" 1 "," 2 "," 3 "," 4 ","Fx","Th"

and that workspaces are numbered from 0 so 4 for Fx and 5 for Th

To get jabber windows on all desktops: main.psi.allWorkspaces: 1 chat.psi.allWorkspaces: 1 psi.Psi.allWorkspaces: 1

But how to know how to refer to a specific window application?
Easy: run the following command and click on the applic to identify:

xprop | grep WM_CLASS | xmessage -file - -center

With Iceweasel which is at that time not yet migrated from Firefox, I get

WM_CLASS(STRING) = "Gecko", "Firefox-bin"

So I use

Gecko.Firefox-bin.property: value