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29 <br style="clear: both">
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32 <h1>Layout saving in i3</h1>
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33 <span id="author">Michael Stapelberg</span><br />
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34 <span id="email"><tt><<a href="mailto:michael@i3wm.org">michael@i3wm.org</a>></tt></span><br />
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35 <span id="revdate">April 2014</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 <div class="sectionbody">
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43 <div class="paragraph"><p>Layout saving/restoring is a feature that was introduced in i3 v4.8.</p></div>
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44 <div class="paragraph"><p>Layout saving/restoring allows you to load a JSON layout file so that you can
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45 have a base layout to start working with after powering on your computer.
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46 Dynamic use-cases also come to mind: if you frequently (but not always!) need a
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47 grid layout of terminals with ping/traceroute commands to diagnose network
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48 issues, you can easily automate opening these windows in just the right layout.</p></div>
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52 <h2 id="_saving_the_layout">1. Saving the layout</h2>
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53 <div class="sectionbody">
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54 <div class="paragraph"><p>You can save the layout of either a single workspace or an entire output (e.g.
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55 LVDS1). Of course, you can repeat this step multiple times if you want to
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56 save/restore multiple workspaces/outputs.</p></div>
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57 <div class="paragraph"><p><tt>i3-save-tree(1)</tt> is a tool to save the layout. It will print a JSON
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58 representation of i3’s internal layout data structures to stdout. Typically,
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59 you may want to take a quick look at the output, then save it to a file and
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60 tweak it a little bit:</p></div>
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61 <div class="listingblock">
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62 <div class="content">
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63 <pre><tt>i3-save-tree --workspace 1 > ~/.i3/workspace-1.json</tt></pre>
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65 <div class="paragraph"><p>Please note that the output of <tt>i3-save-tree(1)</tt> is <strong>NOT useful</strong> until you
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66 manually modify it — you need to tell i3 how to match/distinguish windows (for
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67 example based on their WM_CLASS, title, etc.). By default, all the different
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68 window properties are included in the output, but commented out. This is partly
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69 to avoid relying on heuristics and partly to make you aware how i3 works so
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70 that you can easily solve layout restoring problems.</p></div>
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71 <div class="paragraph"><p>How to modify the file manually is described in <a href="#EditingLayoutFiles">[EditingLayoutFiles]</a>.</p></div>
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75 <h2 id="_restoring_the_layout">2. Restoring the layout</h2>
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76 <div class="sectionbody">
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77 <div class="paragraph"><p>After restoring the example layout from <a href="#EditingLayoutFiles">[EditingLayoutFiles]</a>, i3 will open
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78 placeholder windows for all the windows that were specified in the layout file.
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79 You can recognize the placeholder windows by the watch symbol
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80 <span class="footnote"><br />[Depending on the font you are using, a placeholder symbol may show up
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81 instead of the watch symbol.]<br /></span> in the center of the window, and by the swallow
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82 criteria specification at the top of the window:</p></div>
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83 <div class="paragraph"><p><span class="image">
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84 <a class="image" href="layout-saving-1.png">
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85 <img src="layout-saving-1.png" alt="Restored layout" width="400" />
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88 <div class="paragraph"><p>When an application opens a window that matches the specified swallow criteria,
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89 it will be placed in the corresponding placeholder window. We say it gets
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90 <strong>swallowed</strong> by the placeholder container, hence the term.</p></div>
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91 <div class="paragraph"><p>Note: Swallowing windows into unsatisfied placeholder windows takes precedence
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93 <a href="https://i3wm.org/docs/userguide.html#_automatically_putting_clients_on_specific_workspaces">assignment
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94 rules</a>. For example, if you assign all Emacs windows to workspace 1 in your i3
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95 configuration file, but there is a placeholder window on workspace 2 which
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96 matches Emacs as well, your newly started Emacs window will end up in the
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97 placeholder window on workspace 2.</p></div>
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98 <div class="paragraph"><p>The placeholder windows are just regular windows, so feel free to move them
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99 around or close them, for example.</p></div>
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100 <div class="sect2">
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101 <h3 id="_append_layout_command">2.1. append_layout command</h3>
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102 <div class="paragraph"><p>The <tt>append_layout</tt> command is used to load a layout file into i3. It accepts a
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103 path (relative to i3’s current working directory or absolute) to a JSON file.</p></div>
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104 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Syntax</strong>:</p></div>
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105 <div class="listingblock">
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106 <div class="content">
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107 <pre><tt>append_layout <path></tt></pre>
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109 <div class="paragraph"><p><strong>Examples</strong>:</p></div>
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110 <div class="listingblock">
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111 <div class="content">
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112 <pre><tt># From a terminal or script:
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113 i3-msg "workspace 1; append_layout /home/michael/.i3/workspace-1.json"
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115 # In your i3 configuration file, you can autostart i3-msg like this:
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116 # (Note that those lines will quickly become long, so typically you would store
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117 # them in a script with proper indentation.)
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118 exec --no-startup-id "i3-msg 'workspace 1; append_layout /home/michael/.i3/workspace-1.json'"</tt></pre>
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123 <div class="sect1">
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124 <h2 id="_editing_layout_files">3. Editing layout files</h2>
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125 <div class="sectionbody">
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126 <div class="sect2">
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127 <h3 id="EditingLayoutFiles">3.1. Anatomy of a layout file</h3>
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128 <div class="paragraph"><p>Here is an example layout file that we’ll discuss:</p></div>
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129 <div class="listingblock">
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130 <div class="content">
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132 // splitv split container with 2 children
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133 "layout": "splitv",
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144 "class": "^URxvt$",
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145 "instance": "^irssi$"
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150 // stacked split container with 2 children
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151 "layout": "stacked",
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161 "class": "^Emacs$",
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162 "instance": "^notmuch$"
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167 "name": "midna: ~",
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177 // stacked split container with 1 children
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178 "layout": "stacked",
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187 "class": "^Google-chrome$"
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194 <div class="paragraph"><p>In this layout, the screen is divided into two columns. In the left column,
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195 which covers 40% of the screen, there is a terminal emulator running irssi on
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196 the top, and a stacked split container with an Emacs window and a terminal
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197 emulator on the bottom. In the right column, there is a stacked container with
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198 a Chrome window:</p></div>
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199 <div class="paragraph"><p><span class="image">
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200 <a class="image" href="layout-saving-1.png">
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201 <img src="layout-saving-1.png" alt="Restored layout" width="400" />
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204 <div class="paragraph"><p>The structure of this JSON file looks a lot like the <tt>TREE</tt> reply, see
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205 <a href="https://build.i3wm.org/docs/ipc.html#_tree_reply">https://build.i3wm.org/docs/ipc.html#_tree_reply</a> for documentation on that. Some
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206 properties are excluded because they are not relevant when restoring a layout.</p></div>
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207 <div class="paragraph"><p>Most importantly, look at the "swallows" section of each window. This is where
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208 you need to be more or less specific. As an example, remember the section about
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209 the Emacs window:</p></div>
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210 <div class="listingblock">
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211 <div class="content">
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212 <pre><tt>"swallows": [
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214 "class": "^Emacs$",
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215 "instance": "^notmuch$"
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219 <div class="paragraph"><p>Here you can see that i3 will require both the class and the instance to match.
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220 Therefore, if you just start Emacs via dmenu, it will not get swallowed by that
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221 container. Only if you start Emacs with the proper instance name (<tt>emacs24
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222 --name notmuch</tt>), it will get swallowed.</p></div>
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223 <div class="paragraph"><p>You can match on "class", "instance", "window_role" and "title". All values are
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224 case-sensitive regular expressions (PCRE). Use <tt>xprop(1)</tt> and click into a
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225 window to see its properties:</p></div>
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226 <div class="listingblock">
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227 <div class="content">
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229 WM_WINDOW_ROLE(STRING) = "gimp-toolbox-color-dialog"
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230 WM_CLASS(STRING) = "gimp-2.8", "Gimp-2.8"
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231 _NET_WM_NAME(UTF8_STRING) = "Change Foreground Color"</tt></pre>
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233 <div class="paragraph"><p>The first part of <tt>WM_CLASS</tt> is the "instance" (gimp-2.8 in this case), the
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234 second part is the "class" (Gimp-2.8 in this case). "title" matches against
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235 <tt>_NET_WM_NAME</tt> and "window_role" matches against <tt>WM_WINDOW_ROLE</tt>.</p></div>
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236 <div class="paragraph"><p>In general, you should try to be as specific as possible in your swallow
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237 criteria. Try to use criteria that match one window and only one window, to
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238 have a reliable startup procedure.</p></div>
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239 <div class="paragraph"><p>If you specify multiple swallow criteria, the placeholder will be replaced by
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240 the window which matches any of the criteria. As an example:</p></div>
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241 <div class="listingblock">
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242 <div class="content">
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243 <pre><tt>// Matches either Emacs or Gvim, whichever one is started first.
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245 {"class": "^Emacs$"},
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246 {"class": "^Gvim$"}
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250 <div class="sect2">
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251 <h3 id="_json_standard_non_compliance">3.2. JSON standard non-compliance</h3>
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252 <div class="paragraph"><p>A layout file as generated by <tt>i3-save-tree(1)</tt> is not strictly valid JSON:</p></div>
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253 <div class="olist arabic"><ol class="arabic">
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256 Layout files contain multiple “JSON texts” at the top level. The JSON
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257 standard doesn’t prohibit this, but in practice most JSON parsers only
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258 allow precisely one “text” per document/file, and will mark multiple texts
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264 Layout files contain comments which are not allowed by the JSON standard,
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265 but are understood by many parsers.
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269 <div class="paragraph"><p>Both of these deviations from the norm are to make manual editing by humans
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270 easier. In case you are writing a more elaborate tool for manipulating these
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271 layouts, you can either use a JSON parser that supports these deviations (for
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272 example libyajl), transform the layout file to a JSON-conforming file, or
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273 <a href="https://github.com/i3/i3/blob/next/.github/CONTRIBUTING.md">submit a patch</a>
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274 to make <tt>i3-save-tree(1)</tt> optionally output standard-conforming JSON.</p></div>
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278 <div class="sect1">
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279 <h2 id="_troubleshooting">4. Troubleshooting</h2>
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280 <div class="sectionbody">
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281 <div class="sect2">
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282 <h3 id="_restoring_a_vertically_split_workspace">4.1. Restoring a vertically split workspace</h3>
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283 <div class="paragraph"><p>When using <tt>i3-save-tree</tt> with the <tt>--workspace</tt> switch, only the <strong>contents</strong> of
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284 the workspace will be dumped. This means that properties of the workspace
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285 itself will be lost.</p></div>
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286 <div class="paragraph"><p>This is relevant for, e.g., a vertically split container as the base container of
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287 a workspace. Since the split mode is a property of the workspace, it will not be
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288 stored. In this case, you will have to manually wrap your layout in such a
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289 container:</p></div>
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290 <div class="listingblock">
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291 <div class="content">
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292 <pre><tt>// vim:ts=4:sw=4:et
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294 // this is a manually added container to restore the vertical split
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295 "layout": "splitv",
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300 // the dumped workspace layout goes here
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306 <div class="sect2">
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307 <h3 id="_placeholders_using_window_title_matches_don_8217_t_swallow_the_window">4.2. Placeholders using window title matches don’t swallow the window</h3>
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308 <div class="paragraph"><p>If you use the <tt>title</tt> attribute to match a window and find that it doesn’t
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309 work or only works sometimes, the reason might be that the application sets the
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310 title only after making the window visible. This will be especially true for
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311 programs running inside terminal emulators, e.g., <tt>urxvt -e irssi</tt> when
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312 matching on <tt>title: "irssi"</tt>.</p></div>
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313 <div class="paragraph"><p>One way to deal with this is to not rely on the title, but instead use, e.g.,
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314 the <tt>instance</tt> attribute and running the program to set this window instance to
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315 that value:</p></div>
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316 <div class="listingblock">
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317 <div class="content">
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318 <pre><tt># Run irssi via
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319 # urxvt -name "irssi-container" -e irssi
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324 "instance": "irssi-container"
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332 <div id="footnotes"><hr /></div>
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333 <div id="footer" lang="de">
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334 © 2009-2011 Michael Stapelberg, <a href="/impress.html">Impressum</a>
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projects / i3 / i3.github.io / blob