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31 <h1>i3status(1)</h1>
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32 <span id="author">Michael Stapelberg</span><br />
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33 <span id="email"><tt><<a href="mailto:michael@i3wm.org">michael@i3wm.org</a>></tt></span><br />
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34 <span id="revnumber">version 2.6,</span>
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35 <span id="revdate">October 2012</span>
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37 <div id="toctitle">Table of Contents</div>
38 <noscript><p><b>JavaScript must be enabled in your browser to display the table of contents.</b></p></noscript>
42 <h2 id="_name">1. NAME</h2>
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43 <div class="sectionbody">
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44 <div class="paragraph"><p>i3status - Generates a status line for dzen2 or xmobar</p></div>
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48 <h2 id="_synopsis">2. SYNOPSIS</h2>
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49 <div class="sectionbody">
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50 <div class="paragraph"><p>i3status [-c configfile] [-h] [-v]</p></div>
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54 <h2 id="_options">3. OPTIONS</h2>
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55 <div class="sectionbody">
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56 <div class="dlist"><dl>
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57 <dt class="hdlist1">
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62 Specifies an alternate configuration file path. By default, i3status looks for
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63 configuration files in the following order:
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65 <div class="olist arabic"><ol class="arabic">
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73 ~/.config/i3status/config (or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/i3status/config if set)
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83 /etc/xdg/i3status/config (or $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS/i3status/config if set)
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92 <h2 id="_description">4. DESCRIPTION</h2>
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93 <div class="sectionbody">
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94 <div class="paragraph"><p>i3status is a small program (about 1500 SLOC) for generating a status bar for
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95 i3bar, dzen2, xmobar or similar programs. It is designed to be very
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96 efficient by issuing a very small number of system calls, as one generally
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97 wants to update such a status line every second. This ensures that even under
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98 high load, your status bar is updated correctly. Also, it saves a bit of energy
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99 by not hogging your CPU as much as spawning the corresponding amount of shell
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100 commands would.</p></div>
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103 <div class="sect1">
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104 <h2 id="_configuration">5. CONFIGURATION</h2>
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105 <div class="sectionbody">
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106 <div class="paragraph"><p>The basic idea of i3status is that you can specify which "modules" should
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107 be used (the order directive). You can then configure each module with its
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108 own section. For every module, you can specify the output format. See below
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109 for a complete reference.</p></div>
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110 <div class="listingblock">
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111 <div class="title">Sample configuration</div>
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112 <div class="content">
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114 output_format = "dzen2"
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121 order += "run_watch DHCP"
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122 order += "run_watch VPN"
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123 order += "wireless wlan0"
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124 order += "ethernet eth0"
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125 order += "battery 0"
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126 order += "cpu_temperature 0"
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128 order += "tztime local"
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129 order += "tztime berlin"
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132 format_up = "W: (%quality at %essid, %bitrate) %ip"
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133 format_down = "W: down"
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137 # if you use %speed, i3status requires the cap_net_admin capability
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138 format_up = "E: %ip (%speed)"
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139 format_down = "E: down"
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143 format = "%status %percentage %remaining %emptytime"
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144 path = "/sys/class/power_supply/BAT%d/uevent"
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149 pidfile = "/var/run/dhclient*.pid"
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153 pidfile = "/var/run/vpnc/pid"
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157 format = "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S"
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161 format = "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S %Z"
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162 timezone = "Europe/Berlin"
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169 cpu_temperature 0 {
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170 format = "T: %degrees °C"
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171 path = "/sys/devices/platform/coretemp.0/temp1_input"
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178 <div class="sect2">
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179 <h3 id="_general">5.1. General</h3>
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180 <div class="paragraph"><p>The <tt>colors</tt> directive will disable all colors if you set it to <tt>false</tt>. You can
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181 also specify the colors that will be used to display "good", "degraded" or "bad"
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182 values using the <tt>color_good</tt>, <tt>color_degraded</tt> or <tt>color_bad</tt> directives,
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183 respectively. Those directives are only used if color support is not disabled by
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184 the <tt>colors</tt> directive. The input format for color values is the canonical RGB
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185 hexadecimal triplet (with no separators between the colors), prefixed by a hash
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186 character ("#").</p></div>
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187 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example configuration</strong>:</p></div>
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188 <div class="listingblock">
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189 <div class="content">
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190 <pre><tt>color_good = "#00FF00"</tt></pre>
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192 <div class="paragraph"><p>Likewise, you can use the <tt>color_separator</tt> directive to specify the color that
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193 will be used to paint the separator bar. The separator is always output in
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194 color, even when colors are disabled by the <tt>colors</tt> directive.</p></div>
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195 <div class="paragraph"><p>The <tt>interval</tt> directive specifies the time in seconds for which i3status will
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196 sleep before printing the next status line.</p></div>
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197 <div class="paragraph"><p>Using <tt>output_format</tt> you can chose which format strings i3status should
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198 use in its output. Currently available are:</p></div>
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199 <div class="dlist"><dl>
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200 <dt class="hdlist1">
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205 i3bar comes with i3 and provides a workspace bar which does the right thing in
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206 multi-monitor situations. It also comes with tray support and can display the
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207 i3status output. This output type uses JSON to pass as much meta-information to
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208 i3bar as possible (like colors, which blocks can be shortened in which way,
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212 <dt class="hdlist1">
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217 Dzen is a general purpose messaging, notification and menuing program for X11.
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218 It was designed to be scriptable in any language and integrate well with window
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219 managers like dwm, wmii and xmonad though it will work with any windowmanger
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222 <dt class="hdlist1">
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227 xmobar is a minimalistic, text based, status bar. It was designed to work
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228 with the xmonad Window Manager.
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231 <dt class="hdlist1">
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236 Does not use any color codes. Separates values by the pipe symbol. This should
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237 be used with i3bar and can be used for custom scripts.
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241 <div class="paragraph"><p>It’s also possible to use the color_good, color_degraded, color_bad directives
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242 to define specific colors per module. If one of these directives is defined
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243 in a module section its value will override the value defined in the general
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244 section just for this module.</p></div>
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246 <div class="sect2">
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247 <h3 id="_ipv6">5.2. IPv6</h3>
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248 <div class="paragraph"><p>This module gets the IPv6 address used for outgoing connections (that is, the
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249 best available public IPv6 address on your computer).</p></div>
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250 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format_up</strong>: <tt>%ip</tt></p></div>
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251 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format_down</strong> <tt>no IPv6</tt></p></div>
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253 <div class="sect2">
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254 <h3 id="_disk">5.3. Disk</h3>
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255 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets used, free, available and total amount of bytes on the given mounted filesystem.</p></div>
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256 <div class="paragraph"><p>These values can also be expressed in percentages with the percentage_used,
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257 percentage_free, percentage_avail and percentage_used_of_avail formats.</p></div>
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258 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>disk /mnt/usbstick</tt></p></div>
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259 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%free (%avail)/ %total</tt></p></div>
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260 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%percentage_used used, %percentage_free free, %percentage_avail avail</tt></p></div>
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262 <div class="sect2">
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263 <h3 id="_run_watch">5.4. Run-watch</h3>
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264 <div class="paragraph"><p>Expands the given path to a pidfile and checks if the process ID found inside
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265 is valid (that is, if the process is running). You can use this to check if
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266 a specific application, such as a VPN client or your DHCP client is running.</p></div>
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267 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>run_watch DHCP</tt></p></div>
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268 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%title: %status</tt></p></div>
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270 <div class="sect2">
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271 <h3 id="_wireless">5.5. Wireless</h3>
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272 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the link quality and ESSID of the given wireless network interface. You
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273 can specify different format strings for the network being connected or not
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274 connected.</p></div>
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275 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>wireless wlan0</tt></p></div>
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276 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>W: (%quality at %essid, %bitrate) %ip</tt></p></div>
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278 <div class="sect2">
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279 <h3 id="_ethernet">5.6. Ethernet</h3>
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280 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the IP address and (if possible) the link speed of the given ethernet
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281 interface. Getting the link speed requires the cap_net_admin capability. Set
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282 it using <tt>setcap cap_net_admin=ep $(which i3status)</tt>.</p></div>
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283 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>ethernet eth0</tt></p></div>
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284 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>E: %ip (%speed)</tt></p></div>
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286 <div class="sect2">
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287 <h3 id="_battery">5.7. Battery</h3>
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288 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the status (charging, discharging, running), percentage, remaining
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289 time and power consumption (in Watts) of the given battery and when it’s
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290 estimated to be empty. If you want to use the last full capacity instead of the
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291 design capacity (when using the design capacity, it may happen that your
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292 battery is at 23% when fully charged because it’s old. In general, I want to
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293 see it this way, because it tells me how worn off my battery is.), just specify
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294 <tt>last_full_capacity = true</tt>.</p></div>
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295 <div class="paragraph"><p>If you want the battery percentage to be shown without decimals, add
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296 <tt>integer_battery_capacity = true</tt>.</p></div>
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297 <div class="paragraph"><p>If your battery is represented in a non-standard path in /sys, be sure to
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298 modify the "path" property accordingly. The first occurence of %d gets replaced
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299 with the battery number, but you can just hard-code a path as well.</p></div>
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300 <div class="paragraph"><p>It is possible to define a low_threshold that causes the battery text to be
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301 colored red. The low_threshold type can be of threshold_type "time" or
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302 "percentage". So, if you configure low_threshold to 10 and threshold_type to
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303 "time", and your battery lasts another 9 minutes, it will be colored red.</p></div>
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304 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>battery 0</tt></p></div>
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305 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%status %remaining (%emptytime %consumption)</tt></p></div>
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306 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example low_threshold</strong>: <tt>30</tt></p></div>
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307 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example threshold_type</strong>: <tt>time</tt></p></div>
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309 <div class="sect2">
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310 <h3 id="_cpu_temperature">5.8. CPU-Temperature</h3>
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311 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the temperature of the given thermal zone. It is possible to
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312 define a max_threshold that will color the temperature red in case the
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313 specified thermal zone is getting too hot. Defaults to 75 degrees C.</p></div>
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314 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>cpu_temperature 0</tt></p></div>
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315 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>T: %degrees °C</tt></p></div>
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316 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example max_threshold</strong>: <tt>42</tt></p></div>
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318 <div class="sect2">
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319 <h3 id="_cpu_usage">5.9. CPU Usage</h3>
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320 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the percentual CPU usage from <tt>/proc/stat</tt> (Linux) or <tt>sysctl(3)</tt> (FreeBSD/OpenBSD).</p></div>
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321 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>cpu_usage</tt></p></div>
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322 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%usage</tt></p></div>
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324 <div class="sect2">
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325 <h3 id="_load">5.10. Load</h3>
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326 <div class="paragraph"><p>Gets the system load (number of processes waiting for CPU time in the last
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327 1, 5 and 15 minutes). It is possible to define a max_threshold that will
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328 color the load value red in case the load average of the last minute is
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329 getting higher than the configured threshold. Defaults to 5.</p></div>
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330 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>load</tt></p></div>
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331 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%1min %5min %15min</tt></p></div>
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332 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example max_threshold</strong>: 5</p></div>
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334 <div class="sect2">
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335 <h3 id="_time">5.11. Time</h3>
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336 <div class="paragraph"><p>Outputs the current time in the local timezone.
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337 To use a different timezone, you can set the TZ environment variable,
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338 or use the <tt>tztime</tt> module.
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339 See <tt>strftime(3)</tt> for details on the format string.</p></div>
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340 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>time</tt></p></div>
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341 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S</tt></p></div>
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343 <div class="sect2">
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344 <h3 id="_tztime">5.12. TzTime</h3>
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345 <div class="paragraph"><p>Outputs the current time in the given timezone.
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346 If no timezone is given, local time will be used.
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347 See <tt>strftime(3)</tt> for details on the format string.
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348 The system’s timezone database is usually installed in <tt>/usr/share/zoneinfo</tt>.
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349 Files below that path make for valid timezone strings, e.g. for
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350 <tt>/usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Berlin</tt> you can set timezone to <tt>Europe/Berlin</tt>
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351 in the <tt>tztime</tt> module.</p></div>
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352 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>tztime berlin</tt></p></div>
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353 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S %Z</tt></p></div>
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354 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example timezone</strong>: <tt>Europe/Berlin</tt></p></div>
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356 <div class="sect2">
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357 <h3 id="_ddate">5.13. DDate</h3>
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358 <div class="paragraph"><p>Outputs the current discordian date in user-specified format. See <tt>ddate(1)</tt> for
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359 details on the format string.
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360 <strong>Note</strong>: Neither <strong>%.</strong> nor <strong>%X</strong> are implemented yet.</p></div>
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361 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>ddate</tt></p></div>
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362 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>%{%a, %b %d%}, %Y%N - %H</tt></p></div>
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364 <div class="sect2">
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365 <h3 id="_volume">5.14. Volume</h3>
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366 <div class="paragraph"><p>Outputs the volume of the specified mixer on the specified device. Works only
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367 on Linux because it uses ALSA.
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368 A simplified configuration can be used on FreeBSD and OpenBSD due to
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369 the lack of ALSA, the <tt>device</tt>, <tt>mixer</tt> and <tt>mixder_idx</tt> options can be
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370 ignored on these systems. On these systems the OSS API is used instead to
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371 query <tt>/dev/mixer</tt> directly.</p></div>
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372 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example order</strong>: <tt>volume master</tt></p></div>
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373 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example format</strong>: <tt>♪: %volume</tt></p></div>
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374 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example configuration</strong>:</p></div>
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375 <div class="listingblock">
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376 <div class="content">
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377 <pre><tt>volume master {
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378 format = "♪: %volume"
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387 <div class="sect1">
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388 <h2 id="_using_i3status_with_dzen2">6. Using i3status with dzen2</h2>
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389 <div class="sectionbody">
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390 <div class="paragraph"><p>After installing dzen2, you can directly use it with i3status. Just ensure that
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391 <tt>output_format</tt> is set to <tt>dzen2</tt>.</p></div>
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392 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example for usage of i3status with dzen2</strong>:</p></div>
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393 <div class="listingblock">
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394 <div class="content">
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395 <pre><tt>i3status | dzen2 -fg white -ta r -w 1280 \
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396 -fn "-misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--13-120-75-75-C-70-iso8859-1"</tt></pre>
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400 <div class="sect1">
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401 <h2 id="_using_i3status_with_xmobar">7. Using i3status with xmobar</h2>
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402 <div class="sectionbody">
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403 <div class="paragraph"><p>To get xmobar to start, you might need to copy the default configuration
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404 file to <tt>~/.xmobarrc</tt>. Also, ensure that the <tt>output_format</tt> option for i3status
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405 is set to <tt>xmobar</tt>.</p></div>
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406 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example for usage of i3status with xmobar</strong>:</p></div>
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407 <div class="listingblock">
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408 <div class="content">
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409 <pre><tt>i3status | xmobar -o -t "%StdinReader%" -c "[Run StdinReader]"</tt></pre>
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413 <div class="sect1">
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414 <h2 id="_what_about_memory_usage_or_cpu_frequency">8. What about memory usage or CPU frequency?</h2>
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415 <div class="sectionbody">
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416 <div class="paragraph"><p>While talking about two specific things, please understand this section as a
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417 general explanation why your favorite information is not included in i3status.</p></div>
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418 <div class="paragraph"><p>Let’s talk about memory usage specifically. It is hard to measure memory in a
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419 way which is accurate or meaningful. An in-depth understanding of how paging
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420 and virtual memory work in your operating system is required. Furthermore, even
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421 if we had a well-defined way of displaying memory usage and you would
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422 understand it, I think that it’s not helpful to repeatedly monitor your memory
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423 usage. One reason for that is that I have not run out of memory in the last few
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424 years. Memory has become so cheap that even in my 4 year old notebook, I have
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425 8 GiB of RAM. Another reason is that your operating system will do the right
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426 thing anyway: Either you have not enough RAM for your workload, but you need to
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427 do it anyway, then your operating system will swap. Or you don’t have enough
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428 RAM and you want to restrict your workload so that it fits, then the operating
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429 system will kill the process using too much RAM and you can act accordingly.</p></div>
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430 <div class="paragraph"><p>For CPU frequency, the situation is similar. Many people don’t understand how
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431 frequency scaling works precisely. The generally recommended CPU frequency
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432 governor ("ondemand") changes the CPU frequency far more often than i3status
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433 could display it. The display number is therefore often incorrect and doesn’t
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434 tell you anything useful either.</p></div>
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435 <div class="paragraph"><p>In general, i3status wants to display things which you would look at
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436 occasionally anyways, like the current date/time, whether you are connected to
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437 a WiFi network or not, and if you have enough disk space to fit that 4.3 GiB
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438 download.</p></div>
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439 <div class="paragraph"><p>However, if you need to look at some kind of information more than once in a
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440 while (like checking repeatedly how full your RAM is), you are probably better
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441 off with a script doing that, which pops up an alert when your RAM usage reaches
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442 a certain threshold. After all, the point of computers is not to burden you
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443 with additional boring tasks like repeatedly checking a number.</p></div>
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446 <div class="sect1">
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447 <h2 id="_external_scripts_programs_with_i3status">9. External scripts/programs with i3status</h2>
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448 <div class="sectionbody">
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449 <div class="paragraph"><p>In i3status, we don’t want to implement process management again. Therefore,
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450 there is no module to run arbitrary scripts or commands. Instead, you should
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451 use your shell, for example like this:</p></div>
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452 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Example for prepending the i3status output</strong>:</p></div>
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453 <div class="listingblock">
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454 <div class="content">
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456 # shell script to prepend i3status with more stuff
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461 echo "mystuff | $line" || exit 1
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464 <div class="paragraph"><p>Put that in some script, say <tt>.bin/my_i3status.sh</tt> and execute that instead of i3status.</p></div>
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465 <div class="paragraph"><p>Note that if you want to use the JSON output format (with colors in i3bar), you
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466 need to use a slightly more complex wrapper script. There are examples in the
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467 contrib/ folder, see <a href="http://code.i3wm.org/i3status/tree/contrib">http://code.i3wm.org/i3status/tree/contrib</a></p></div>
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470 <div class="sect1">
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471 <h2 id="_signals">10. SIGNALS</h2>
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472 <div class="sectionbody">
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473 <div class="paragraph"><p>When receiving <tt>SIGUSR1</tt>, i3status’s nanosleep() will be interrupted and thus
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474 you will force an update. You can use killall -USR1 i3status to force an update
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475 after changing the system volume, for example.</p></div>
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478 <div class="sect1">
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479 <h2 id="_see_also">11. SEE ALSO</h2>
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480 <div class="sectionbody">
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481 <div class="paragraph"><p><tt>strftime(3)</tt>, <tt>date(1)</tt>, <tt>glob(3)</tt>, <tt>dzen2(1)</tt>, <tt>xmobar(1)</tt></p></div>
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484 <div class="sect1">
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485 <h2 id="_authors">12. AUTHORS</h2>
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486 <div class="sectionbody">
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487 <div class="paragraph"><p>Michael Stapelberg and contributors</p></div>
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488 <div class="paragraph"><p>Thorsten Toepper</p></div>
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489 <div class="paragraph"><p>Baptiste Daroussin</p></div>
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490 <div class="paragraph"><p>Axel Wagner</p></div>
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491 <div class="paragraph"><p>Fernando Tarlá Cardoso Lemos</p></div>
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495 <div id="footnotes"><hr /></div>
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496 <div id="footer" lang="de">
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497 © 2009-2011 Michael Stapelberg, <a href="/impress.html">Impressum</a>
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projects / i3 / i3.github.io / blob