Keyboard driven applications to make your life easier

[GrannyGeek]

while not as hardcore as posters above, I too try to avoid grabbing the dirty little mouse.
Kind of accustomed to xfce4 (overall not very keyboard friendly),

Have you seen the prebuilt keyboard shortcuts in Settings, Settings Manager, Keyboard, Shortcuts tab and Settings Manager, Windows Manager, Keyboard? You can add your own shortcuts if you wish.
--GrannyGeek

[toothandnail]

The console is by far the most executed program in my pc, so it's worth to spend some time testing alternatives.

Konsole and terminal (xfce) are not the kind of app I'm looking for, as they steal shortcuts (I'm sure it's configurable), so for some time I've been using aterm,much faster than xterm (I don't need xterm 'extra' features), but it has some refreshing issues.

I must admit I don't like either much. Konsole is too bulky for my tastes, though I do like the profiles and selection method. Xfce terminal is just a bit too much of a resource hog. As a result, in the past I've used Aterm for a lot of things.

Now I've discovered rxvt-unicode.  It's scriptable in perl, and it has some cool features, like scrollback search.

That's what I'm using atm, but  suggestions are welcome .

I've been using Mrxvt for a while now. It has lots of nice features - small, fast, can have right-click context menus, multiple profiles (so I can have a normal terminal, one that executes MC, a root terminal, etc). Also uses xft so can provide good quality fonts. Its only drawback is that it doesn't yet support unicode, but I can live with that..

Regarding shell matters, I switched from bash to zsh some time ago, and I'm really satisfied with the change.

Haven't tried zsh, though I've meant to. Must do that...

paul.

[rbistolfi]

I frequently use my laptop in CLI mode only, it gives me more battery life. My notebook is pretty simple, I can see the cpu temperature (it has a small fan) and battery status by cating the proper files in /proc. However I wondered if I can get those values in a glance as you do with those fancy applets in the X desktops. So I decided I wanted to have those values in my GNU Screen hardstatus line. I found you can use the backtick command in your ~/.screenrc as follows:

Code:

backtick 1 120 120 /usr/bin/lua /home/rbistolfi/.screen/temp.lua
backstick 2 1200 1200 /usr/bin/lua /home/rbistolfi/.screen/battery.lua

It takes four arguments, the first int is a simple id that you can use to refer it later in your hardstatus line as a string with the escaping char like %<id>`. I am using 1 as 2 as ID, so I will use %1` ans %2` later in my hardstatus line. The second arg is lifespan in seconds, is the  number  of  seconds the  output  is considered valid. The 3rd arg is the autorefresh value also in seconds, after that time the command will be ran again and the values in the screen will be updated. The 4th arg is the command to run and it's arguments. I used lua to grep the temp and the battery state because I like the syntax more than bash and it is fast and small, but you can use whatever you want, sed and cut will do it just fine, you can use the values from /proc or lmsensors if your mobo supports that. Finally you only need to build your hardstatus line, I use this in my screenrc:

hardstatus on
hardstatus alwayslastline "%{=b kW}[ %{= Y}$USER @ %H %{b W}][%= %{= kw}%?%-Lw%?%{r}(%{W}%n*%f%t%?(%u)%?%{r})%{w}%?%+Lw%?%?%= %{b W}][%{= Y} %m/%d/%y %{Y}%C %{b W}] T | %1` C Battery | %2`"

You can see the %1` and %2` at the end of the line

That produces something like this:

http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/3898/05122008vectorjp8.png

You can see temp and batt status at lower right, in cli mode or even your X terminal emulator

[wcs]

I frequently use my laptop in CLI mode only

Now that's hardcore... 

[kidd]

I frequently use my laptop in CLI mode only

Then you'll find it unvaluable:

open your keymap file ( its in /usr/share/kbdkeymaps/i386/qwerty/es.map.gz  for my qwerty spanish keyboard)

and change the line

keycode  58 = Caps_Lock

to

keycode  58 = Control

And you'll get rid of capsLOCK to have an accessible control key

[alec]

Have you seen the prebuilt keyboard shortcuts in Settings, Settings Manager, Keyboard, Shortcuts tab and Settings Manager, Windows Manager, Keyboard? You can add your own shortcuts if you wish.
--GrannyGeek

XFCE is great in that. Very simple to add new handy shortcuts.
Adding menu items or desktop icons is somewhy much more difficult. Or maybe I wasn't briefed how to do it...

[GrannyGeek]

XFCE is great in that. Very simple to add new handy shortcuts.
Adding menu items or desktop icons is somewhy much more difficult. Or maybe I wasn't briefed how to do it...

I'm using XFce on VL 6 beta 2. I believe it works the same in earlier versions of VL and XFce. You can edit the desktop menu (what comes up when you click on the "Start" menu in the panel or when you right-click on a blank area of the desktop). Open the desktop menu, click on Settings and then on Menu Editor. Click on Add and you should be able to figure it out from there. This will add an entry to the menu but not under the Accessories, Development, Games, etc. section. What appears there is governed by .desktop files. If you install something that does not provide a .desktop file, you can create one yourself by simple editing. I've never bothered with this (I don't use the desktop menu often), so I've never paid attention to the location. Lots of people on this board know where to put the .desktop file, however, so I hope one of them will jump in. Instead of the desktop menu I customize the launchers in the panel. I add categories and arrange my main applications under an icon for the appropriate category. I use the desktop menu only for applications I don't use often.

For desktop icons, right-click on an existing icon, then click on Desktop, then on Create Launcher.
--GrannyGeek

[lm8]

Here's a keyboard shortcut I really like:
http://www.gentoo-wiki.info/TIP_Make_a_Screenshot_with_PrintScreen_Key
The article explains how to map the PrintScreen key to an image capture program.  I use shutterbug on my machine, but Imagemagick's import is probably just as good if not better.

Also, noticed the mention of vim and emacs in this thread.  Has anyone tried SciTE?  It's currently my favorite programming editor and it is highly customizable.  You can remap key commands however you like.  There are some lua scripts to add to the functionality of the program at:
http://lua-users.org/wiki/SciteScripts
Currently have my SciTE program doing things like spell checking and file comparison and converting abc notation to midi files with some helper applications.

[bigpaws]

I took a look at SciTE. Correct me if I am wrong but it does not appear to run without X. Vi and emacs
both run in consoles which iirc is part of the reason for using them. My preference is an editor
that I can use anywhere.

I did find the Lua scripts interesting.

Bigpaws

[kidd]

SciTE is a very interesting app.  I know many people using it because of its extensibility.

Using apps in console is a great feature. Not strictly necessary for me if the app is really worth but for now... nothing beats modal editing , nor emacs extensibility... I'm kind of divided because I'd like vim with emacs' extensibility powers....

I've been wanting to mess with lua for long time, but every time something else pops just before trying it.  It seems great to extend compiled apps.

btw, my script to make screenshots is simpler:

Code:

sleep $1;import -window root /tmp/screen.png;

I have not binded a key but a ratpoison command. This way I can type the parameter

[lm8]

Bigpaws, you're correct.  SciTE is strictly a GUI app and on Linux needs X.  Outside of X on Linux, I find myself using nano a lot, probably because I was already familiar with the keys from pine/alpine.  For DOS, in a DOSBox or with DOSEmu, there's a freeware application available at simtel and other archives called edwin that gives some nice key customization options and allows editing of multiple files at once.  Most of the time when I'm editing now, especially anything more than a single file at a time, I find I'm using SciTE, even if I have to go to X Windows to start it.  I'm usually running with multiple terminal programs open in X Windows anyway.  You can start SciTE or open files from command line in a terminal emulator which can be very convenient.  Even though it's just a text/programming editor, it's started to replace a lot of the functionality of my word processor as well.

[Windozer]

Couple of questions for ya'all ... this is kind of all over the map (... no pun intended  )

[^**References to the earlier, spawning thread "xinitrc and xmodmap"
http://forum.vectorlinux.com/index.php?topic=2996.msg18225#msg18225]

Does GNU Screen work seemlessly with Xmonad^**, WindowMaker, or Ratpoison?  Kidd, you mentioned them here too, I think. Any tricks or traps for putting them together? (I'm using VL6 RC3 now.)

@EFG: in May '07, you mentioned^** that you switched from Xmonad back to WM because you keyboard more than mouse. Have you worked with Xmonad since? (To me, any FP is just way too cool to pass up --- the way to debug!)

IPython is by far the best interactive programming language shell I've ever used on any platform ever

Yes, Indeed!
 

... start SciTE ... in a terminal emulator ... it's just a text/programming editor, it's started to replace a lot of the functionality of my word processor as well.

Wonder how difficult it would be to combine IPython with SciTE? Should SciTE call IPython or vice versa?   A bit of hacking is in order 

know many people using [SciTE] because of its extensibility.

Right! Nothing beats programmability when you've got a mind-numbing task at hand. 

It would be KILLER to have IPython + SciTE under Screens on Xmonad.  Is this a crazy idea?

Looking forward to your replies!

- H in FL
~~~~~
______________________________________________________
IPython: http://ipython.scipy.org/moin/
What is Ratpoison - pros and cons: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Using_Ratpoison/Introduction
XMonad: http://www.xmonad.org/
WindowMaker: http://windowmaker.info/imageview.php?cat=big&id=50

[kidd]

GNU screen only needs a terminal emulator to work. I've used it with lots of different ones, and pure console as well. I'm using it now with urxvt and ratpoison.

if scite is extensible enough, scite should call ipython and show the prompt in a buffer (or however you call that in scite slang).

Actually that kind of things are what vim cannot do (and its author won't implement because vim is *JUST* an editor), because it requires asynchronous socket handling to comunicate with ipython.

Emacs can do it, and in fact, a quick google search showed that an ipython mode already exists

It would be KILLER to have IPython + SciTE under Screens on Xmonad.  Is this a crazy idea?

well, there are some incongruences there:

scite under screen:  screen is for terminal apps and Scite is a X app. you can't embeed scite into a terminal.
ipython+scite : probably. if not, try emacs. or vim+screen.

Look the different approaches: emacs tries to get all the functionallity inside itself, so the user is always 'living' in the emacs world, getting lots of synergy benefits.  vim's approach is 'do one thing and do it well'. a typical vim user would use screen with vim and ipython inside.  No idea for the scite+ipython combination but google didn't show any relevant results at first glance. You probably can't extend scite to theese levels...

no problem using them under xmonad nor any other tiling wm.

[Windozer]

Hey thanks for the quick reply, kidd

scite under screen:  screen is for terminal apps and Scite is a X app. you can't embeed scite into a terminal.
...  emacs tries to get all the functionallity inside itself

Yes, I was thinking along that approach, putting SciTE as the 'master' with the screens under/in it, then IPy. in one of the screens - the others would be debug window, data, configs, monitor, etc.  (I know the power of emacs since it's early days ... but, like many, I've never been able to remember the keys --- or am too lazy to try )

... You probably can't extend scite to these levels...

that's the part I've not figured out - Clearly, IPy can access pretty much whatever python can. Maybe SciTE can have modules do the same (but they'd probably end up non-portable, which would be ok for my case.)  There's some stuff on windows specific DLL's ... maybe SciTE can do sockets... hmmm ... whichever way, the trick seems to be in some sort of call-back / handshaking.

no problem using them under xmonad nor any other tiling wm.

Oh good! Thanks for letting me know.

cheers
-H

[Windozer]

A follow up...

ipython+scite : probably.

May be probably not. This is starting to look a tad ugly    [RANT] And it seems to have more support and work better under 'doze... oxymoronic, if you ask me. Wasn't Python invented on a *nix platform? As Monty says: "Bring out yer dead! Bring out yer dead!" [/RANT]

[EDIT: deleted errant info]

Well, as is typical, the install problems were due to 'user error' --- me being the user 

However, IPython talking to the SciTE output window would be "very difficult" to do ... that feedback from an exchange I had with one of the SciTE folks on a forum. Oh well... sorry not to have something positive to contibute here. I will still use the two anyway...

- H