Provided by: herbstluftwm_0.9.3-2_amd64 
NAME
herbstluftwm-tutorial - A tutorial introduction to herbstluftwm
DESCRIPTION
This tutorial explains how to create a basic herbstluftwm setup and introduces the major herbstluftwm
features. This tutorial neither covers all features nor specifies the mentioned features entirely; see
herbstluftwm(1) for a compact and more complete description.
This tutorial covers these topics:
• Basic installation
• Usage of the client
• The tiling method
• Tags (or workspaces...)
• Multi-Monitor handling
BASIC INSTALLATION
This describes two alternate installation methods. In any case, you also have to install the
dependencies. Beside the standard libraries (XLib) which are found on nearly any system, you should
install dzen2 (as current as possible) which is needed by the default panel.sh.
Via the package manager
You always should prefer installing herbstluftwm via your package manager on your system. It should be
called herbstluftwm.
After installing it, the default configuration file has to be copied to your home directory:
mkdir -p ~/.config/herbstluftwm
cp /etc/xdg/herbstluftwm/autostart ~/.config/herbstluftwm/
You also should activate the tab completion for herbstclient. In case of bash, you can either activate
the tab completion in general or source the herbstclient-completion from the bash_completion.d directory
in your bashrc. In case of zsh the tab-completion normally is activated already (if not, consider
activating it).
Directly from git
If there is no package for your platform or if you want to use the current git version, then you can pull
directly from the main repository:
git clone https://github.com/herbstluftwm/herbstluftwm
cd herbstluftwm
make # build the binaries
# install files
mkdir -p ~/bin
# you also have to put $HOME/bin to your path, e.g. by:
echo 'export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin' >> ~/.bashrc # or to your zshrc, etc...
ln -s `pwd`/herbstluftwm ~/bin/
ln -s `pwd`/herbstclient ~/bin/
# copy the configuration
mkdir -p ~/.config/herbstluftwm/
cp share/autostart ~/.config/herbstluftwm/
cp share/panel.sh ~/.config/herbstluftwm/
• If you are using bash, then source the bash completion file in your ~/.bashrc
source path-to/herbstluftwm/share/herbstclient-completion
• If you are using zsh, then copy the share/_herbstclient file to the appropriate zsh-completion
directory.
Each time there is an update, you have to do the following steps in your herbstluftwm directory:
git pull
make
CONFIGURE HERBSTLUFTWM AS YOUR WINDOW MANAGER
As usual you can define herbstluftwm as your window manager by either selecting herbstluftwm in your
login manager or by starting it in your ~/.xinitrc, mostly by writing to your xinitrc (or .xsession on
some systems):
# start herbstluftwm in locked mode (it will be unlocked at the end of your
# autostart)
exec herbstluftwm --locked
After logging in the next time, you will get a default herbstluftwm session.
FIRST START
After starting herbstluftwm, the screen is surrounded by a green frame initially, which indicates that
there is only one large frame. A frame is a container where actual windows can be placed or which can be
split into two frames.
Start an xterm by pressing Alt-Return, which will fill your entire screen.
USING THE CLIENT
The only way to communicate to herbstluftwm is by using the client application called herbstclient. Its
usual syntax is: herbstclient COMMAND [ARGUMENTS]. This calls a certain COMMAND within your running
herbstluftwm instance. This causes some effect (which depends on the given COMMAND and ARGUMENTS),
produces some output which is printed by herbstclient and lets herbstclient exit with a exit-code (e.g. 0
for success) like many other UNIX tools:
shell COMMANDS,
╲ COMMAND, ARGUMENTS
╲ ARGUMENTS ╭────────────╮
╲ │ │
V │ V
herbstclient herbstluftwm
╱ ^ │
╱ output, │ │
╱ exit-code ╰────────────╯
V output,
shell/terminal exit-code
The most simple command only prints the herbstluftwm version:
$ # lines prefixed with $ describes what to type, other lines describe the
$ # typical output
$ # Type: her<tab>c<tab> ve<tab>
$ herbstclient version
herbstluftwm 0.4.1 (built on Aug 30 2012)
$ herbstclient set window_border_active_color red
$ # now the window border turned red
The configuration of herbstluftwm only is done by calling commands via herbstclient. So the only
configuration file is the autostart which is placed at ~/.config/herbstluftwm/ and which is a sequence of
those herbstclient calls.
Open it in your favourite text editor and replace the Mod-line by this to use the Super-key (or also
called Windows-key) as the main modifier:
# Mod=Mod1 # use alt as the main modifier
Mod=Mod4 # use Super as the main modifier
After saving the autostart file, you have to reload the configuration:
# the following line is identical to directly calling:
# ~/.config/herbstluftwm/autostart
herbstclient reload
Now you may notice that the red border color of your terminal turned green again, because the color is
set in the default autostart. That’s the typical configuration workflow:
1. Try some new settings in the command line
2. Add them to the autostart file
3. Press Mod-Shift-r which calls the reload command or directly execute the autostart file from your
shell to get the error messages if something went wrong.
To learn more about herbstluftwm, just go through the man page line by line and check using the
herbstluftwm(1) man page what it does. For a quick introduction to the central paradigms, continue
reading this.
TILING
Initially there is one frame. Each frame has one of the two following possible types:
1. It serves as a container for windows, i.e. it can hold zero up to arbitrarily many windows. Launch
several more terminals to see what happens: If there are multiple windows in one frame, they are
aligned below each other. To change this layout algorithm, press Mod-space to cycle all the available
layouting algorithms for the focused frame.
2. A frame also can be split into two subframes, which can be aligned next to or below each other. Press
Mod-o to split to an horizontal alignment. To navigate to the fresh frame right of the old one press
Mod-l. Press Mod-u to split vertically. The intuitive navigation is:
⎧ h (or ←) ⎫ ⎧ left
⎪ j (or ↓) ⎪ means ⎪ down
Mod + ⎨ k (or ↑) ⎬ ═══════> focus ⎨ up
⎩ l (or →) ⎭ ⎩ right
To undo splitting, you can remove a frame via Mod-r. To shift some window from one frame to one of
its neighbours, use the same keyboard shortcut while holding the Shift key pressed. It is not
possible to resize single windows, only to resize frames. The according keyboard shortcut is the same
while holding Control pressed. All in all it is:
⎧ h (or ←) ⎫ ⎧ left
⎧ ⎫ ⎪ j (or ↓) ⎪ means ⎧ focus frame ⎫ ⎪ down
Mod + ⎨ Shift ⎬ + ⎨ k (or ↑) ⎬ ═════> ⎨ move window ⎬ ⎨ up
⎩ Control ⎭ ⎩ l (or →) ⎭ ⎩ resize frame ⎭ ⎩ right
With this, you can define a custom layout. It can be printed via the layout command:
$ herbstclient layout
╾─┐ horizontal 50% selection=1
├─┐ vertical 70% selection=0
│ ├─╼ vertical: 0x1400009
│ └─╼ vertical:
└─╼ max: 0x1a00009 [FOCUS]
Just play with it a bit to understand how it works. You also can permanently save the layout using the
dump command:
$ herbstclient dump
(split horizontal:0.500000:1
(split vertical:0.700000:0
(clients vertical:0 0x1400009)
(clients vertical:0))
(clients max:0 0x1a00009))
$ layout=$(herbstclient dump)
And after some changes you can rewind to the original layout with the load command:
$ herbstclient load "$layout" # mind the quotes!
TAGS (OR WORKSPACES OR VIRTUAL DESKTOPS OR ....)
A tag consists of a name and a frame layout with clients on it. With the default autostart, there are
nine tags named 1 to 9. You can switch to the ith tag using Mod-i, e.g. Mod-4 to switch to tag 4 or with
the command use 4. A window can be move to tag i via Mod-Shift-i, i.e. with the move command.
MONITORS
The notion of a monitor in herbstluftwm is treated much more abstract and general than in other window
managers: A monitor just is a rectangular part of your screen which shows exactly one tag on it.
Initially there is only one large monitor ranging over your entire screen:
$ herbstclient list_monitors
0: 1440x900+0+0 with tag "1" [FOCUS]
The output shows that there is only one monitor with index 0 at position +0+0 of size 1440x900 showing
tag 1. In most cases, the herbstluftwm monitors will match the list of physical monitors. So to add
another physical monitor, you have to perform several steps:
1. Enable it, such that it shows a part of your screen. You can use xrandr, xinerama or any other tool
you like.
2. Register it in herbstluftwm: Lets assume your new monitor has the resolution 1024x768 and is right of
your main screen, then you can activate it via:
$ herbstclient set_monitors 1440x900+0+0 1024x768+1440+0
Alternatively, if xinerama or xrandr works for your setup, simply run:
$ herbstclient detect_monitors
For even more automation, you can enable the setting auto_detect_monitors. For more advanced examples,
look at the q3terminal.sh example script, which implements a drop-down-terminal like monitor where you
can put any application you like.
herbstluftwm 0.9.3 2021-10-12 HERBSTLUFTWM-TUTORI(7)