[howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

barchi · 2011-02-13 16:32:14

Part one:

There are many howto´s to achieve this using urxvt, but i prefer lxterminal.
When i login to my system, i want to have lxterminal as transparent, undecorated, permanent and vertical maximized shell on the left side of my desktop1, without a panel-icon or entry.

This is quite simple to achieve (now that i found out how to do that...).

1. edit /home/Username/.config/openbox/autostart.sh and add: lxterminal &

2. open obconf, go to Appearance and disable "Windows retain a border when undecorated"

3. open /home/Username/.config/openbox/rc.xml

4. add this at the end of the file (between the "-->" and "</applications>")

<application name="lxterminal" class="Lxterminal">
   <decor>no</decor>
   <position force="yes">
     <x>10</x>
     <y>0</y>
   </position>
   <desktop>1</desktop>
   <layer>below</layer>
   <skip_pager>yes</skip_pager>
   <skip_taskbar>yes</skip_taskbar>
   <maximized>vertical</maximized>
</application>

5. logout and login, done

6. (optional) If the background is not transparent, change this in the options of lxterminal (rightclick-->options, background)

7. (optional) If the size is not your taste, just press ALT+rightmouse to change it.

8. (optional) to fit the color of archbey with your textcolor edit "/home/Username/.bashrc" and change the color.

Part two:

You may want to use by habit another shell, maybe from your openbox menu or your panel.
I would suggest to use the already installed xterm and make it look not so ugly as the standard configuration is.

1. create as root a textfile in "/usr/share/applications/" and name it "Xterm.desktop", copy these lines into it:

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Exec=/usr/bin/xterm -geometry 100x24 -bg black -fg green -fa "monospace" -fs 11
Icon=/usr/share/icons/smokikon/scalable/apps/terminal.svg
StartupNotify=false
Terminal=false
Categories=Utility;
Name=Xterm
Comment=Use the command line with the standard Terminal

or edit the already existing file "Terminal Emulator.desktop" and replace the existing line with this one, if you do not want the "Xterm" entry in your menu.

Exec=xterm -geometry 100x24 -bg black -fg green -fa "monospace" -fs 11

--> change this to your taste, geometry=windowsize, bg=background color, fg=text color, fa=font name, fs=font size

2. link to Xterm on your panel or obmenu, done

I wrote this because i often use multiple terminals during my work and have running processes on the desktop lxterminal
and want to run another process. Sure you can use the tabs of lxterminal for that but this looks ugly on the desktop.
Another, very cool program to have multiple terminals is "Terminator", it can be made permanent on desktop the same way as lxterminal.

Last edited by barchi (2011-02-14 10:28:28)

oliver · 2011-02-13 17:09:39

I really like this idea but unfortunately, I still see the border around the terminal window. I have everything set to hidden in the menus... did you experience this? If so, how did you get around it?

barchi · 2011-02-13 17:51:04

Oliver, i have updated the instructions look at Part one, point 2.

Last edited by barchi (2011-02-13 22:04:30)

gone · 2011-02-14 02:05:16

ty for this, much needed and much appreciated

pablokal · 2011-02-14 07:25:40

This is something for the wiki.

oliver · 2011-02-14 08:07:18

barchi wrote:

Oliver, i have updated the instructions look at Part one, point 2.

nice one! Thanks again

I took the liberty of adding this to the wiki... I'd upload the picture, but I think the option has been disabled

http://wiki.archbang.org/index.php?titl … on_desktop

Last edited by oliver (2011-02-14 10:37:15)

barchi · 2011-02-14 11:21:47

Oliver, nice wiki article

maybe you can link to the screenshot:
http://www.jaypac.de/upload/48318257_uh … 0x1080.png

I´ ve updated again something in Part One (just added the class="Lxterminal" after name="lxterminal") it doesnt change anything but is recommended by the openbox wiki.

Btw, the link to your wiki article works fine, but when i go to http://wiki.archbang.org/ i dont see any other pages than:
Installation & Key Bindings.

Where are the other articles???

One little last point:
I think it´s better to use consistently the american english vocabular, look for the word color vs. colour in your article

Last edited by barchi (2011-02-14 11:56:23)

pablokal · 2011-02-14 16:32:34

Great, Oliver, this is wonderful, if the wiki would become of some substance.

Maybe we should make a thread where people can suggest topics for the wiki.

You also can find a lot of useful info on my workblog http://www.stillstup.blogspot.com

lrcaballero · 2011-02-14 21:29:59

Thank You!! and Good Job!!! Archi and Oliver

Thanks for sharing..

oliver · 2011-02-15 09:05:30

barchi wrote:

maybe you can link to the screenshot:
http://www.jaypac.de/upload/48318257_uh … 0x1080.png

done... added to the intro section. And the 'class' thing has been added too

Btw, the link to your wiki article works fine, but when i go to http://wiki.archbang.org/ i dont see any other pages than:
Installation & Key Bindings.
Where are the other articles???

I realise the whole point of a wiki is open collaboration, but TBH, I don't see it as my place to modify the front page (although I did revert some spam that someone added there). I did add the article to a HowTo category though, so it should be searchable that way.

http://wiki.archbang.org/index.php?title=Category:HowTo

One little last point:
I think it´s better to use consistently the american english vocabular, look for the word color vs. colour in your article

yeah - good point. I forget myself sometimes.

barchi · 2011-02-15 09:08:12

Oliver, good job
I think the wiki needs someone how cares about it.

oliver · 2011-02-15 09:14:58

barchi wrote:

Oliver, good job
I think the wiki needs someone how cares about it.

absolutely right... it's overflowing with spam right now :-(

pablokal · 2011-02-15 09:40:58

On the Arch forum I saw a group called the Wiki spam fighters, maybe we should get some ideas from them.
I seems quite some trouble. Awful this spam garbage.

Paulo Truta · 2011-05-24 11:09:21

Hi.Nice ideia and i love it But, unfortunately, the terminal sticks only to one desktop. There is any way to make the terminal omnipresent across multiple Desktops?

Thanks I'm new to Archbang, and i'm loving it Cheers!

oliver · 2011-05-24 11:34:31

Paulo Truta wrote:

Hi.Nice ideia and i love it But, unfortunately, the terminal sticks only to one desktop. There is any way to make the terminal omnipresent across multiple Desktops?
Thanks I'm new to Archbang, and i'm loving it Cheers!

Try changing the desktop line from 1 to all

old
<desktop>1</desktop>

new
<desktop>all</desktop>

Paulo Truta · 2011-05-24 11:59:51

oliver wrote:

Paulo Truta wrote:
Hi.Nice ideia and i love it But, unfortunately, the terminal sticks only to one desktop. There is any way to make the terminal omnipresent across multiple Desktops?
Thanks I'm new to Archbang, and i'm loving it Cheers!
Try changing the desktop line from 1 to all
old
<desktop>1</desktop>
new
<desktop>all</desktop>

Exactly. Its written in the rc.xml comments and i was distracted. Thanks a lot and sorry to bother!

Last edited by Paulo Truta (2011-05-24 12:00:15)

oliver · 2011-05-24 13:29:59

Paulo Truta wrote:

Exactly. Its written in the rc.xml comments and i was distracted. Thanks a lot and sorry to bother!

no worries - and not a bother.

epzil0n · 2011-09-19 09:14:45

Nice, but the file Terminal Emulator.desktop does not exist and every time i log in the terminal is black and completely lost the transparency, even new terminals are black? Then i would like to have this permanent terminal a bit smaller, how can i do that?

n30phyt3 · 2012-02-25 06:04:08

I changed the background color to "0" but

--> everytime I restart
--> my lxterminal have a black backgorund

pls help

http://s14.directupload.net/images/120225/fp2qzb7b.png

Last edited by n30phyt3 (2012-02-25 06:10:46)

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 01:48:24

I don't manage to run it under archlinux. Is there something different under archlinux ?

scjet · 2012-07-26 04:54:40

Yes, thanks very much for this contribution.
good work.
EDIT: and, this will be a perfect fit for our next ArchBang releae,... hint. hint. nod, nod.

Last edited by scjet (2012-07-26 06:46:36)

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 06:31:43

I mean if I try to start the lxterminal over the autostart file nothing happens. I have the same config files. I tried every possible combination of the start command for example with "( sleep 3s && lxterminal) &" bacause it didn't work. I use LXDM as Login Manager and can choose a session at the start up the sessions scripts lay under "/usr/share/xsessions/openbox.desktop" maybe it doesn't start the "~/.config/openbox/autostart.sh" and for me it's just a "autostart" without ".sh"

oliver · 2012-07-26 06:40:28

does lxterminal run if you launch it from another terminal?

Do the other apps launch when run from autostart (and it is autostart now, not autostart.sh)

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 06:54:19

I can open a new lxterminal by tipping lxterminal in the shell and the other programms also did not start if I write them into the autostart file. What do I have to do to execute the autostart script by logging in into the openbox lxde session ?

oliver · 2012-07-26 07:41:21

can you run this and post the output?

$ ls -la ~/.config/openbox

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 08:01:22

drwxr-xr-x 2 doubleu users 4096 14. Jul 01:25 .
drwxr-xr-x 16 doubleu users 4096 26. Jul 14:53 ..
-rwxr-xr-x 1 doubleu users 515 26. Jul 14:56 autostart
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 23576 26. Jul 01:18 lxde-rc.xml
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 9617 13. Jul 12:01 menu.xml
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 23147 26. Jul 01:16 rc.xml

scjet · 2012-07-26 08:10:29

I have the transparency working as per "Part 1" of the above instructions.
I didn't bother with "Part 2".

but when I log out and back in,
lxterminal opens transparently, which I can change fine, on the left side of my desktop covering the entire left-hand of my desktop.
However, I cannot "move", or "shrink",... the lxterminal box around my screen, aka I have no mouse-control over it. ???. unless, of course, it's supposed to be like this ?

I assume my rc.xml is fine, since I didn't get any rc.xml errors, so I'm rather baffled, anyone else get this ?
EDIT: also -> "7. (optional) If the size is not your taste, just press ,left.ALT+rightmouse to change it." -doesn't do anything, ?
Thanks ahead.

Last edited by scjet (2012-07-26 08:39:19)

oliver · 2012-07-26 08:41:06

DoubleU wrote:

drwxr-xr-x 2 doubleu users 4096 14. Jul 01:25 .
drwxr-xr-x 16 doubleu users 4096 26. Jul 14:53 ..
-rwxr-xr-x 1 doubleu users 515 26. Jul 14:56 autostart
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 23576 26. Jul 01:18 lxde-rc.xml
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 9617 13. Jul 12:01 menu.xml
-rw-r--r-- 1 doubleu users 23147 26. Jul 01:16 rc.xml

Permissions are OK... maybe you have something in the file itself that is blocking executions of the contents. Can you also post the output from 'cat autostart'?

oliver · 2012-07-26 08:55:13

scjet wrote:

lxterminal opens transparently, which I can change fine, on the left side of my desktop covering the entire left-hand of my desktop.
However, I cannot "move", or "shrink",... the lxterminal box around my screen, aka I have no mouse-control over it. ???. unless, of course, it's supposed to be like this ?

warning: there may be a fair bit of conjecture and guesswork coming up :-)

I think the 'undecorate' option (part of the OB config) removes the little corners that would allow you to re-size with a left-mouse-select-drag...

also -> "7. (optional) If the size is not your taste, just press ,left.ALT+rightmouse to change it." -doesn't do anything, ?

...and so the ALT+rightmouse(drag) is the way to control it. I'm not sure of the exact recipe, but sometimes ALT+RMC moves the window without re-sizing and sometimes it resizes it. Not sure *exactly* how to control each aspect.

It's a *lot* easier if you remove the transparency temporarily for testing. For a while I thought it wasn't doing anything either but then I realised it wanted a drag rather than a click. And the blind squirrel had struck again :-)

scjet · 2012-07-26 09:10:44

Hey Thanks Oliver,
and, as usual, you came to the "rescue" again.
Gawd, I should slap myself for not knowing enough about the inner-workings of Openbox still. -ahh well.

Last edited by scjet (2012-07-26 09:11:19)

oliver · 2012-07-26 09:42:13

As an aside, I'm using the transparent terminal as a pseudo-replacement for conky. All it does is display a few shortcuts that my pea-brain has a hard time remembering (the app launchers and some stuff for terminator.)

I get the benefit of having a terminal too if I ever need it.

I'm using urxvt, not lxterminal but the concept is the same. In my bashrc I have this:

if [ $TERM = rxvt-unicode-256color ] ; then
  clear; cat ~/.shortcuts
  export PS1=">>> "
fi

Output is:

<snip>
super+shift+1 	switch to Nth tab
super+shift+-> 	move tab left
super+shift+<- 	move tab right
super+shift+c 	close terminal
super+shift+d 	close all
>>>

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 09:51:57

#
# These things are run when an Openbox X Session is started.
# You may place a similar script in $HOME/.config/openbox/autostart
# to run user-specific things.
#
# If you want to use GNOME config tools...
#
#if test -x /usr/lib/openbox/gnome-settings-daemon >/dev/null; then
# /usr/lib/openbox/gnome-settings-daemon &
#elif which gnome-settings-daemon >/dev/null 2>&1; then
# gnome-settings-daemon &
#fi
# If you want to use XFCE config tools...
#
#xfce-mcs-manager &
(sleep 3s && lxterminal) &
audacious &

There are just my examples in it.

oliver · 2012-07-26 10:04:52

Do you know *how* LXDM is starting openbox? I *think* that if it's a plain old /usr/bin/openbox then autostart won't get run... but if it's /usr/bin/openbox-session then it should get run

Just out of interest, are you also not running any kind of taskbar (like tint2 for example)?

DoubleU · 2012-07-26 10:12:05

I run lxpanel and it's allready up when I am logging in. I don't know which file starts this application. I can autostart programms with ~/.config/autostart/*.desktop files but it's not exactly what I want, if I will run the shell above.

Mr Green · 2012-07-26 11:31:44

@Oliver

while read p; do
  echo $p
done < ~/shortcuts

scjet · 2012-07-26 11:35:37

oliver wrote:

I'm using urxvt, not lxterminal but the concept is the same. In my bashrc I have this:

nice code,..., and yes, urxvt (still) seems best to handle this kinda thing nicely, ..., but then again lxterminal definitely has an easy place too.?
It's hard to be diplomatic at times.

oliver · 2012-07-26 13:48:54

Mr Green wrote:

@Oliver

while read p; do
  echo $p
done < ~/shortcuts

Mr Green · 2012-07-26 14:01:45

I see colours

http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Bash-Prompt-HOWTO/x405.html

DoubleU · 2012-07-27 04:03:15

The problem for me is that I start the openbox-session with startlxde and so it didn't run the autostart file. I solved the problem with a combination of tilda and ~/.config/autostart/ files its a good alternative.

see also:https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Te … _Wallpaper

Mr Green · 2012-07-27 08:17:33

If you are running lxde then

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/LX … t_Programs

If not ignore....

Mr Green · 2012-08-02 10:53:13

Guide did not quite work, terminal is not fullscreen and will only open on desktop 2

Arch Wiki recommends tilda, guess it will not then clash with lxterminal...

Or maybe this will work with urxvt?

oliver · 2012-08-02 14:28:16

Mr Green wrote:

Guide did not quite work, terminal is not fullscreen and will only open on desktop 2

size of the terminal is outside the scope of the directions IMO. You can make it whatever size you want in the terminal settings. For me, I have it 33x32 to kind of mimic conky a little bit

Not sure about the desktop 2 thing... that should be in the rc.xml setting within the <desktop> tags

Mr Green · 2012-08-02 22:31:53

I got rc.xml set up with <desktop>2</desktop> as I want it fullscreen and in the background.

Not sure if lxterminal allows profiles so I can run other terminals.

Or could load up a different terminal [like aterm or urxvt]

Mr Green · 2012-08-03 12:07:01

This may help explain what I mean

http://crunchbanglinux.org/forums/topic … -profiles/

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#1 2011-02-13 16:32:14

[howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

#2 2011-02-13 17:09:39

Re: [howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

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Re: [howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

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Re: [howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

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#15 2011-05-24 11:34:31

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#16 2011-05-24 11:59:51

Re: [howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

#17 2011-05-24 13:29:59

Re: [howto] permanent, transparent lxterminal on desktop

#18 2011-09-19 09:14:45

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#19 2012-02-25 06:04:08

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#39 2012-07-27 04:03:15

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