LOG LEVELS

Some arguments support setting the log level. j4-dmenu-desktop uses the following log levels: ERROR, WARNING, INFO and DEBUG. The WARNING (and ERROR) loglevels are displayed by default. Lower loglevels automatically enable higher ones.

TERM MODE

There are several modes available for the --term-mode flag:

default

The default mode. A temporary shell script is created containing the chosen command. The script deletes itself upon execution, j4-dmenu-desktop never deletes it itself. It sets the title of terminal emulator using OSC escape sequences (see console_codes(4)). Terminal emulator is executed as follows:

[terminal emulator] -e [generated temporary script]

Other modes should be preferred. This approach is universal but fragile.

Default value of --term is i3-sensible-terminal.

xterm

Use xterm calling convention:

[terminal emulator] -title [desktop app Name] -e [command line]

Default value of --term is xterm. Other compatible terminal emulators include: rxvt-unicode.

alacritty

Use alacritty calling convention:

[terminal emulator] -T [desktop app Name] -e [command line]

Default value of --term is alacritty. Other compatible terminal emulators include: st, foot.

kitty

Use kitty calling convention:

[terminal emulator] -T [desktop app Name] [command line]

Default value of --term is kitty. Other compatible terminal emulators include: foot.

terminator

Use terminator calling convention:

[terminal emulator] -T [desktop app Name] -x [command line]

Default value of --term is terminator. Other compatible terminal emulators include: xfce4-terminal.

gnome-terminal

Use gnome-terminal calling convention:

[terminal emulator] --title [desktop app Name] -- [command line]

Default value of --term is gnome-terminal.

custom

Allow for completely custom handling of --term. When --term-mode custom is passed, an alternative system for handling --term is used. It is handled as a list of arguments separated by space ( ). No other whitespace characters act as an argument separator (this behavior differs from the shell).

Multiple consecutive space characters will be treated as a single space (except for escaped spaces). Leading and trailing spaces in --term will be ignored. This means that it is not possible to pass zero-length arguments to --term.

The contents of --term are not executed through a shell. This means that shell constructs like redirection, && and || chaining and more will not work. If you need this, you can either create a wrapper shell script and call it from --term or you can call /bin/sh -c or some other shell directly from --term (although using a wrapper script should be preferred, because it is clearer and simpler to use).

The following placeholders are recognised:

{name}

Name of desktop app. Useful for setting the title.

{cmdline@}

Command line to be executed expanded as separate arguments. This must be an independent argument; ‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "-e={cmdline@}"’ is invalid.

{cmdline*}

Command line to be executed expanded as a single argument. {cmdline@} should be preferred over {cmdline*}. Arguments will be escaped; Contents of {cmdline*} can be passed to /bin/sh -c safely.

{script}

Filename of a script generated by j4-dmenu-desktop. This is the same script used by --term-mode default. The script will be generated only if this placeholder is specified at least once in --term. The script sets terminal title itself, it shouldn't be necessary to set it manually.

{cmdline@} and {cmdline*} should be preferred over {script}.

The following escape sequences are recognised:

\\

Literal \ character.

\{

Literal { character.

\ 

(backslash with space) Do not handle the following space as an argument separator.

Undefined escape sequences and placeholders will result in an error message and program termination.

Default value of --term is same as of default term mode.

This is how other modes look when written using custom mode:

default

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "i3-sensible-terminal -e {script}"’

xterm

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "xterm -title {name} -e {cmdline@}"’

alacritty

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "alacritty -T {name} -e {cmdline@}"’

kitty

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "kitty -T {name} {cmdline@}"’

terminator

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "terminator -T {name} -x {cmdline@}"’

gnome-terminal

‘j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "gnome-terminal --title {name} -- {cmdline@}"’

This is how the deprecated -e flag of gnome-terminal could be used:

j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "gnome-terminal --title {name} -e {cmdline*}"

This is how placeholders can be escaped:

j4-dmenu-desktop --term-mode custom --term "echo \{name}\ \{cmdline*}"

--term receives two arguments: ‘echo’ and ‘{name} {cmdline*}’, no placeholders are replaced. j4-dmenu-desktop would see three arguments instead of two if the second \ had not been passed.