#cow #fvwm #wayland

I'm on holiday so I've been able to do more on CoW this week.

In no particular order, here's what's changed:

* Switched to libevent. The hand-rolled poll loops, socket handling code is gone, in favour of using libevent.

* Refactorings: across the code base, I've split out larger functions into helpers and reused them. This has reduced some of the duplication by about 60%.

* New hook: "on-start" which runs once CoW has started. Useful to be able to set outputs to different desks/pages.

* DSL: CoW now has a small DSL (which might evolve over time) to reduce boilerplate. This is achieved via the `script` command. For example:

```
rule -g -T on-start -n startup-pages script {
let output = "HDMI-A-1"
for d in (desks where d.output == output) {
desk -t '#{output}' -d #{d.nr}
scroll -t '#{output}' -a 1,1
}
}
````

This sets all desks on output `HDMI-A-1` to start on page `1,1` when CoW starts.

As usual the relevant man pages have been updated.

No doubt there's a tonne of bugs introduced with these changes. If you do happen to spot any, please open an issue on Codeberg:

https://codeberg.org/thomasadam/cow/issues

As always, see the pinned issues if you're interested in trying to help:

https://codeberg.org/thomasadam/cow/issues

And do join me and a small number of others on IRC if you wanted to learn more:

Server: irc.libera.chat
Channel: #cow-wayland

Thanks everyone!

#tmux

Version 3.7 will be released soon.

This release features a big change to how panes can be managed.

Panes can be told to be floating, and thus not part of the layout of that window (bound to '*' by default). See the `new-pane` command.

By default status line 2 shows the pane layouts (including floating panes).

Panes can also have scrollbars (see the attached screenshot; cowsay has scrollback and is shown via the grey scrollbar, and the red square).

The screenshot attached shows the above.

I personally do not think it's something I'm ever likely to use, but I'm sure some of you will want to try it. :)

#crossword #crypticcrossword

Brendan, via Guardian 30025:

https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/30025

This crossword is excellent, and has a theme of writers (authors). Some clued directly, others indirectly.

The clue I like is:

13dn: Like part of ancient Greece that’s accessible by flights? (5)

ATTIC

ATTICA was a part of Athens once, but also, one's ATTIC (if one has one) is accessible by "flights" which in this case refers to "stairs" -- as in "a flight of stairs".

This crossword also features many other references to "writers" (which we should take to mean as "authors") some of whom are clued directly or indirectly -- as in:

26ac: Robust half of comic duo (5)

HARDY

Robust == "Hardy" as in "a plant that can survive winter; not evergreen", HARDY is also one half of Laurel and HARDY. HARDY is also THOMAS HARDY, the author -- again, indirect...

All-in-all, another excellent crossword from Brendan. :)

#cow #fvwm #wayland

Hello all. Here's a few minor updates since I last posted:

* Output management improvements. Now, when, monitors are turned off, or one switches to a VT and back again, window positions are restored correctly. This is controlled by `set preserve_desk_on_output_loss` which defaults to true. Setting this to `false` will use the first available output and desk and mash all windows onto that.

* A new `desk-name` command to rename and limit the number of desks per output. There's also a `desks.count` setting to control the minimum number of desks.

Plus a few bug-fixes.

Since my last post, I've not had an offer to help overhaul the default config. That's OK -- but I admit, a pity as well.

I would also say it's worth looking at the outstanding PRs as well:

https://codeberg.org/thomasadam/cow/pulls

They're all from me, each in a state of "I'm working on them". The most recent is the DSL PR, which I hope will help with low-level scripting.

If there is anyone interested in helping this project, please join the #cow-wayland channel on irc.libera.chat and I'd be more than happy to find something worthwhile!

Enjoy!

#fvwm #cow #wayland

For a while now, I've been thinking about what a DSL might look like for CoW.

I've come up with this:

https://codeberg.org/thomasadam/cow/wiki/Scripting

It's not based on anything in fvwm, deliberately. It did take me a while to get the design correct, which I think I have now,

Hopefully what I've come up with will work and is extensible.

The code lives on the `ta/dsl` branch if anyone wishes to try it out.

Any questions, come ask me on #cow-wayland IRC channel on libera.chat