how do I remove windows decorations in metacity?

Simon Bridge · 12-24-2006, 04:57 AM

Some WM's allow me to launch an application, whatever, without the window decorations. I've been looking for a way to do this in metacity. I'm using Ubuntu Edgy right now and would rather not actually install a different WM just for the few things I want this for. (Rather do without.)

I've looked around and found a LQ thread with lump of code which does this... which is nice for writing my own app. But what about launching an existing one?

I've also found an "anti-theme" which has no borders, or anything else for that matter. Zero-width borders are not a problem at the theme level - but I like having borders! Just that sometimes they get in the way.

i.e. xdaliclock would be a nice bit of eye-candy for the desktop, especially with a transparent background, except for the windows border...

Thats just for the sake of a concrete example. By now there's probably a g-desklet that does the same thing. (In fact - I'm beginning to suspect that making it into a desklet is the only option.)

macemoneta · 12-25-2006, 08:57 PM

The devilspie utility can do this. There's a tutorial here. The action you are looking for is 'undecorate'.

Simon Bridge · 12-28-2006, 02:40 AM

Looks good - if a wee bit beta - latest version is 0.19: source install:

Code:

devilspie$ ./configure
...
checking for WNCK... configure: error: Package requirements (glib-2.0 >= 2.9.1
        gdk-2.0
        libwnck-1.0 >= 0.17) were not met:

No package 'gdk-2.0' found
No package 'libwnck-1.0' found

gdk is 1.9 ... program wants 2.0, libwnck is 2.16.1 ... program wants 1.17? 2.17 - I guess.
I am using Edgy, fully updated. I guess I'm going to have to go outside the official repos for this huh.

However, devilspie 0.17 is available via apt. This'll do

I'm half kicking myself, since I've read of devilspie in a Linux Magazine article (magazine in the rack next to my desk even...) but didn't make the connection.

Useful link - not only supplied the solution I needed but clarified the problem itself. Namely: metacity developers are deliberately creating a lean-ish WM and so concentrate on it's core jobs. Suppressing decorations for specific windows would not be part of a core WM job.

Thanx

Simon Bridge · 12-28-2006, 05:29 PM

For the sake of completness... I have used the following configuration file with devilspie:

Code:

~/.devilspie$ cat xdaliclock.ds
(if
        (is (application_name) "xdaliclock")
        (begin
                (undecorate)
                (below)
                (pin)
                (geometry "+760+100")
        )
)

... this, with the command:

xdaliclock -transparent -builtin1 -fg grey

... gives pretty much what I'm after.

All I need to do is stick "devilspie" as a startup program, with xdaliclock, and I'm set.