Wayfire

Resources

GitHub

Home

#wayfire (webchat)

Wayfire is a Wayland compositor inspired by Compiz and based on wlroots.

Wayfire aims to create a customizable, extendable and lightweight environment without sacrificing its appearance. It features a lot of graphical effects, such as the desktop cube, wobbly windows, fire animation, fish eye, workspace scale view and window rotations, among many other features.

Installation

USE flags

USE flags for gui-wm/wayfire compiz like 3D wayland compositor

X	Enable support for X11 applications (XWayland).
gles	use libglvnd to do animations more efficiently
gles3	Enable OpenGL ES 3.x Features.
system-wfconfig	Use the system-wide gui-libs/wf-config instead of building as a submodule. It will block system-wide gui-libs/wf-config from being installed.
system-wlroots	Use the system-wide gui-libs/wlroots instead of building as a submodule. It will block system-wide gui-libs/wlroots from being installed.
test	Enable dependencies and/or preparations necessary to run tests (usually controlled by FEATURES=test but can be toggled independently)

Data provided by the Gentoo Package Database · Last update: 2024-03-19 10:05 More information about USE flags

Emerge

root #emerge --ask gui-wm/wayfire

Configuration

The default configuration file is ~/.config/wayfire.ini but Wayfire also supports loading custom configuration files. A graphical interface for configuration is provided by the optional package gui-apps/wcm.

• 

  Wayfire demo

• 

  Wayfire demo

• 

  Wayfire demo

• 

  Wayfire demo

Manual configuration

Copy over the default configuration from /usr/share/wayfire like so:

user $cp /usr/share/wayfire/wayfire.ini ~/.config/

Plugins

Wayfire plugins can be enabled and disabled via adding and removing entries in the plugins = in the [core] section of ~/.config/wayfire.ini.

For example, to remove the wrot plugin which allows for window rotation, comment it out in ~/.config/wayfire.ini like so:

FILE ~/.config/wayfire.ini

[core]
plugins = \
  alpha \
  animate \
  autostart \
  command \
  cube \
  decoration \
  expo \
  fast-switcher \
  fisheye \
  foreign-toplevel \
  grid \
  gtk-shell \
  idle \
  invert \
  move \
  oswitch \
  place \
  resize \
  switcher \
  vswitch \
  window-rules \
  wm-actions \
  wobbly \
 # wrot \
  zoom

To install extra plugins, emerge the gui-libs/wayfire-plugins-extra package:

root #emerge --ask gui-libs/wayfire-plugins-extra

Shortcuts

Important
For binding variables, you must use evdev codes. For more information see the link in 'External resources'

External shortcuts in wayfire are managed by the command plugin. A custom keybind requires 2 things:

• A binding or repeatable_binding prefixed variable.
  • repeatable_binding assumes that the key in question is going to be held down.
  • Available meta keys include:
    • <super>
    • <alt>
    • <shift>
• A command prefixed variable.

Note
The order and name of the variables doesn't matter, as long as the binding and command prefixed variables have the same suffix, e.g. binding_x, command_x.

For example, assume that a custom bind needs to be created for launching firefox, and to launch it the super, shift, and 1 keys need to be pressed.

First, the key binds themselves can be added like so:

FILE ~/.config/wayfire.ini

binding_firefox = <super> <shift> KEY_1

Then, the command to be launched when the key combination is pressed can be added like this:

FILE ~/.config/wayfire.ini

command_firefox = firefox

Usage

Wayfire is only a Wayland compositor and does not provide the full capabilities expected from a desktop environment. It is best used alongside gui-apps/wf-shell, which adds among other features a GTK3-based status bar and wallpaper support.

Wayfire needs additional applications which implement other parts of the XDG specifications from Freedesktop, such as desktop notifications, application launchers, screenshotting, screen recording and screen locking among other important necessities; refer to the List of software for Wayland article for examples.

Removal

Unmerge

root #emerge --ask --depclean --verbose gui-wm/wayfire

See also

• Wayland — a replacement for the X11 window system protocol and architecture with the aim to be easier to develop, extend, and maintain
• List of software for Wayland — various desktop related packages for Wayland

External resources

https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/input/event-codes.txt - kernel documentation on all event input codes

https://github.com/WayfireWM/wayfire/wiki/Configuration - official wayfire documentation