Xmonad/Config archive

xmonad configuration examples

For more screenshots see the Xmonad/Screenshots archive.

For a quick introduction to haskell see Tour of the Haskell Syntax, this wikibook regarding indentation and whitespace, and the sidebar Learning links on haskell.org.

EwmhDesktops users upgrading to xmonad-0.9 , please note layoutHook, handleEventHook, startupHook change. For more information about how to update your Ewmh configuration, and other changes that may require edits to xmonad.hs, see the 0.9 release changelog.

Template xmonad config files

/Template xmonad.hs (0.9) -- (Or for darcs: /Template xmonad.hs (darcs))

The template xmonad.hs file shows all the default xmonad settings; it is merely a slightly modified reference copy of the XMonad source module which sets up the configuration. Note that while this file is usable, it contains lots of uneeded extra settings; normally you would only include and customize the parts you want to change. If you don't want to use the minimal style as shown in the following tutorial, you can instead copy-and-paste from the template instead.

For a plain text version of the template see the man/xmonad.hs file distributed with xmonad source, or you can download the latest darcs template xmonad.hs from code.haskell.org.

For customized examples in the template xmonad.hs style see oxymor00n's (darcs), [31d1]'s (0.9), and lars' (0.8) configs.

Minimal xmonad config files

See the John Goerzen tutorial for an example of customizing a minimal xmonad.hs like the following:

import XMonad

main = xmonad defaultConfig
        { modMask = mod4Mask -- Use Super instead of Alt
        , terminal = "urxvt"
        -- more changes
        }

Current release and darcs (development) version config files

/31d1's xmonad.hs (darcs/gnome)

/adamvo's xmonad.hs (darcs): XMobars for multiple screens (xmobar>0.9.2), mediaKeys, SubLayouts, TopicSpace, support for replacing and temporarily running other window managers, extensive gridselect usage.

/jelly(12gen)'s xmonad.hs (0.9)
/jelly(12gen)'s xmobarrc
Standard setup using ShellPrompt, Actions.Search, xmobar, urgencyhook, custsom keybindings.

/Andrea Rossato's xmonad.hs (0.8): Tabbed, Xmobar with DynamicLog, (Shell|Ssh|Man)Prompt.

/Andrea Spada xmonad.hs (0.8): Tall, Resizable Mosaic and Combo, EvmhDesktops, additional keybindings - Work In Progress...

/andrewsw's xmonad.hs (0.8)
/andrewsw's .Xdefault: These screenshots show some compositing and nice transparent urxvt's with a circle layout and a magnified grid layout.

/And1's xmonad.hs (darcs): mirrored layout, manageHook, dynamicLog with dzen, conky piped into dzen,; urgency hints, perWorkspace layouts, gimpLayout, PP for dzen and xmobar,; custom keys with application shortcuts and mpd controls, gridSelect;; more of my screenshots can be found in my screenshots/ directory

/brad's xmonad.hs (0.8): very basic, just some cosmetic and key-shortcut changes

/Brent Yorgey's darcs xmonad.hs (darcs): modMask = mod4Mask; DynamicLog, RotView, ViewPrev, WindowNavigation, ToggleLayouts (toggle full screen mode), UrgencyHook + dzen, FlexibleManipulate, a bunch of Prompts, Submap, Search, and a few others, with keybindings for all! (Warning: lots of non-standard keybindings. =)

/David Roundy's xmonad.hs (0.8): Combo config for small screen + xclock. This config also keeps mod=mod1, and therefore moves a number of key bindings to non-standard locations (my laptop has no spare modifier keys).

/doitan's xmonad.hs (0.8): libnotify UrgencyHook, many features from tips and tricks page integrated, many custom prompts including workspace and layout switching. dotfiles

/Don's xmonad.hs (0.9): colours, use custom terminal, dynamicLogDzen

/enko's xmonad.hs (0.8): I'm using xmobar and mostly tall layout (but in really it is just fullscreenlayout since there aren't any other windows). The config is accumulated stuff and could be cleaned of cruft, but since I don't know ATM what is cruft and what not, it is not an option, but it works for me™. I'm using urxvt as a terminal and the mailer you can see there is wanderlust for emacs. You can also see my screen setup at the bottom.

/gray_hem's xmonad.hs (0.9): dzen + conky config using dzen layout icons, resizable tall, xmonad shell prompt, urgency popup plus status bar formatting.

/Gwern's xmonad.hs (darcs): Ratpoison-y keybindings; example usage of XSelection.

/John Goerzen's Configuration and Tutorial (0.8): A step-by-step guide to customizing Xmonad, starting from where the tutorial leaves off, getting to a configuration with xmobar and simple but intentionally minimal customizations in xmonad.hs

/John Yates' polished Gnome bar (0.8): This is an attempt to provide an easy path into the world of tiling window managers for colleagues using recent Ubuntu and RedHat distributions. Emphasis is on visual integration with familar UI elements while conforming to widespread tiling WM idioms: (1) a single bar, (2) no window decoration, (3) current window's title display in the bar. Starting from a vanilla Ubuntu Gnome setup I eliminated the lower Gnome panel and its applets. On the remaining upper panel I included left to right: (1) a standard Gnome separator applet, (2) the Gnome Window Selector applet, (3) dzen2 built with Xft support displaying the current window's title, (4) the Gnome Workspace Switcher applet:

The Window Selector icon tracks the displayed window title. Clicking on that icon activates the selector, displaying window titles grouped by workspace:

Mod-p preserves Xmonad's default dmenu binding. Keeping with the emphasis on font consistency I created a version of dmenu that supports Xft fonts and a bar height option (currently available as a patch against dmenu 4.0):

At present my xmonad.hs is utterly sparse, attempting only to simplify the process of accommodating additional themes.

/Josh Rickmar's xmonad.hs (0.8)
/Josh Rickmar's dzenscript: This config uses keybindings optimized for the Colemak keyboard layout, alternate swapUp/Down methods which won't cycle windows if moving the last to first or vice-versa, a nice dzen2 status bar, and dwm-like tagging with CopyWindow. Workspaces which contain copies of windows are displayed with a different XPM in dzen (dwm-style). Xinerama keybindings are also removed, simply because I don't use them.

/lars' xmonad.hs (0.8): Move/Resize windows using keyboard easily:; 1. move window around using M-Arrows.; 2. resize windows using C-Arrows.; 3. Holding <Shift> to move/resize 2 pixels per step instead of 20 pixels.; Please find the lines below comment "-- moving floating window with key" to see details.

/lithis's xmonad.hs (darcs)
/lithis's xmobarrc (newer than xmobar-0.9): The screenshot shows xmobar, two screens, a spiral layout, a tabbed layout, XFT fonts, and ShellPrompt with tab completion. The config also has pointer follows focus.

/lorincs xmonad.hs (0.9): Config for using xcompmgr with kde4. See blog for more details.

/loupgaroublonds xmonad.hs (darcs): a somewhat modified config but with support for gnome and my cat

/Marcot's xmonad.hs (darcs)
With Gnome support and Multimedia Keyboard configuration

/Mntnoe's xmonad.hs (0.8 modified): Modular xmonad config. Labeled pager addon for DynamicLog. Fast navigation between workspaces. Application specific border colors. Modified Scratchpad using GNU Screen. Host specific settings.

/nattfodd's xmonad.hs (0.8/darcs): DynamicLog, smartBorders, French keyboard, defaultGap, urgencyHook in workspace toolbar and some prompts.

/Octoploid's xmonad.hs (0.9): Xmobar with customized DynamicLog, CycleWS with custom keys, colors, terminal, golden ratio

/oxymor00n's xmonad.hs (darcs): /oxymor00n's xmobarrc; Tabbed layout, Floating Layout, xmobar, EZConfig for Emacs-like keybinding-definition, added some bindings for the mouse wheel (cycle focus and cycle workspaces), cycleWS-stuff that might be interesting for Xinerama-users,...

/Robert Manea's xmonad.hs (0.8): Customized DynamicLog and ShellPrompt, ManageDock, some efforts to make the colors of all components go together well

0.5 screenshot:

/rtalreja's xmonad.hs (0.8.1)
/rtalreja's .conkyrcdzen: dynamicLogWithPP with dzen, conky piped into dzen, urgency hints, compositing, shortcuts for mpd controls.

/sereven-xmonad.hs (0.9): FadeInactive excluding some windows. Additional left hand key bindings for screens, workspaces, scratchpad, etc -- plus misc xmonad and haskell searches. Also spawnOnce via pidof and gimp layout for people that combine gimp toolboxes (use single dock for panels).

/skorpan's xmonad.hs (0.8)
/skorpan's xmobarrc (0.9): Red/gray borders + NoBorders, EZConfig, xmobar 0.9 with workspaces, layout, title, battery, CPU usage, memory usage, date and time.

/sykopomp's xmonad.hs (darcs)
/sykopomp's xmonad.dv-vi.hs
This screenshot shows xfce-panel with pager + xmonad in a ResizableTall layout. Also using compositing and transparent urxvt's (thanks andrewsw) with bindings for changing transparency on focused window. Keybindings have been completely redone to be more similar to emacs-bindings (M-p and M-n for previous and next windows). The other config is an older config that uses the standard vi-like bindings, but translated by location to a dvorak layout.

/TeXitoi's xmonad.hs (0.7 and 0.8): French keyboard, ManageDock, EwmhDesktops. Minimal configuration file with Defaults not overwritten. Mist GTK theme is used.

/Thomas ten Cate's xmonad.hs (0.8): Designed for Ubuntu (Gnome), the Windows key, and a dvorak keyboard. Workspaces accessible through Alt+F1..F10 so they don't interfere with Alt+1..9 used by irssi/Firefox/etc.; Instant messaging (Skype and Pidgin) buddy lists are automatically placed on the side of the IM workspace, with chat windows being placed in the rest of this area. This uses some code modified from XMonad.Layout.IM.; Extensive comments at the top of the file explain the keybindings and usage.

/thoughtpolice's xmonad.hs (darcs)
/thoughtpolice's xmobarrc (0.9)
Emacs-esque keyboard bindings via EZConfig, dynamicLog with dzen, Submap google/hoogle/amazon/imdb/youtube/wikipedia searching, Shell & Ssh modules, slightly custom XPConfig and avoidStruts (ManageDocks.)

/twifkak's xmonad.hs (0.8): modMask = mod4Mask; noBorders tabbed layout; keybindings for dzen, rotview, swapworkspaces, windowbringer, and windownavigation; urgencyhook.

/void's xmonad.hs (0.8): dzen2 DynamicLog (in robert's style) and UrgencyHook, LayoutCombinators, IM workspace for Pidgin (on the right) with 2 layouts a dwmStyle decorated ResizableTall and a tabbed one, use of PerWorkspace and Named layouts, Scratchpad, custom theme, EZConfig for keybindings, NoBorders (and smarts too)

/vvv's xmonad.hs (0.8): EZConfig, CycleWS, {Man,Shell,Ssh}Prompt, Submap, DynamicWorkspaces, NoBorders, and ion-like status bar (written in nonkosher Perl).

/webframp's xmonad.hs (darcs): Basic Mirror tiled and ResizableTall layout, EZConfig keybindings,; dynamicLogWithPP + dzen, CycleWS, Prompt, promptSearch, Scratchpad, updatePointer, perWorkspace, compositing.

/Wraithan's xmonad.hs (darcs): Pretty standard setup using ShellPrompt, ResizableTile (with hinting), and xmobar for a little bit of the info I want.

/lazor's xmonad.hs (0.8): working xmonad.hs for KDE 4.2

Old configurations

This section is for configurations which do not work with the development XMonad and XMonadContrib, or at least the latest release.

Note that the configuration file is 'Config.hs' for xmonad < 0.5, but 'xmonad.hs' for xmonad >= 0.5.

Many config files marked as 0.5 probably work in 0.6 as well; give it a try and ask on the #xmonad IRC channel on freenode.org if you have problems.

/Template xmonad.hs (0.8)
/Template xmonad.hs (0.7)
/Template xmonad.hs (0.6): Previous versions of the default configuration.

/andrewsw's xmonad.hs (0.6)

/arossato's Config.hs (0.4)

/Brent Yorgey's xmonad.hs (0.6)

/cce xmonad.hs (0.5): alt+enter full screen, alt+hjkl to navigate, many remapped keys

/deifl's xmonad.hs (0.5): DynamicLog, WindowBringer, CopyWindow, ResizableTile, Tabbed layout. not default terminal, changed colors and some instances of dzen.

Clean
Populated

/Don's Config.hs (0.4)

/entropies xmonad.hs (0.5): windows as meta key, fullscreen & noborders on keypress for client. custom keybindings. magnifier.

/Eric Mertens' xmonad.hs (0.5): /Eric Mertens's Config.hs (0.4); Customized DynamicLog, ShellPrompt, TilePrime, Dual-head and an effort to make the statusbar similar to DWM.

/Erthad's xmonad.hs (darcs 25 Aug 2008/0.7): mixed hotkeys config (standard+EZConfig), wmii-like keyboard behavior,; EWMH desktops, dzen integration (dzen configs see at http://fly.osdn.org.ua/~erthad/)

/Gwern's Config.hs (0.4) (old)

/Lee Aylward's xmonad.hs (0.5): Resizable Tall, NoBorders, dzen DynamicLog, rhythmbox control shortcuts, windows key

/Mr.Elendig's xmonad.hs (0.7)
Somewhat simple, but verbose config, with ResizableTall, xmobar and mpd controlls.

/nomeatas Config.hs (0.4): modMaks = mod4Mask; gnome-stuff

/nomeata’s xmonad.hs (xmonad 0.7): CycleWS to avoid changing visible workspaces on other screens, EWMH, UpdatePointer, avoidStruts, IM for piding (on the right side), fullscreen via toggleLayouts, no boarders,

/OldSchoolWSNav xmonad.hs (0.8): FWIW example config to experiment with gnome-like workspace navigation, where all physical screens shift at once and use one workspace. Beware: uses two modules without maintainers, LayoutScreens and LayoutCombinators. LayoutCombinators puts windows into combined layouts one after the other, so with one layout tabbed, the other will always be full. Using Grid or other layouts might be better than using LayoutCombinators. Uses dzen2 to display workspaces and layout names.

/Ray's xmonad.hs (0.5): DynamicLog, custom manageHook, changed from default terminal, border colors, prompts, and layouts. Pseudo-Haskell dzen statusbar with Greek letters for workspace names.

/Remi's xmonad.hs (0.7)
/Remi's .xmobarrc (0.8)
/Remi's .xinitrc: Lots of key bindings for destkop-navigation/moving, xmonad.hs-editing, music, next-N-windows-float-hack. xmobar integration and PerWorkspace Layouts. And a yet-to-be-published libmpd xmobar plugin.

/Robert Manea's Config.hs and support scripts (0.4)

0.4 screenshot:

/sereven's xmonad.hs (0.7) cross-host
/sereven's xmonad.hs one-host (0.8): Colors, homedir, mod key modified per host, dzen scaled to different screen sizes, so can use one xmonad.hs. 'h,j,k,l' directional navigation with resizableTall and toggle noBorders Full for borderless xinerama screen, perWorkspace IM layout for tiled gimp, dzen format stripper for independent ppUrgent and ppHidden formatting. File:--Xmonad16.xpm-- icon from dzen config.

/sphynx's xmonad.hs (0.7): Emacs-style keybindings, xmobar integration, XFT-fonts, ManageDocks, Tabbed layout, IM layout for Pidgin and Skype configured through PerWorkspace, Search extension for Wikipedia, translation and Google, usage of CopyWindow to 'make window always visible', Urgency hook, PerWorkspace usage, Scratchpad terminal, custom styles for prompt and borders.

/twifkak's Config.hs (0.4)

/Wfarr's xmonad.hs (0.6): ResizableTall Layout using EZConfig, cycleWS, CopyWindows, and DZen to get some cool stuff happening.

/Xilon's xmonad.hs (0.5): Simple and clean setup with dzen and a tray. Dzen with workspaces uses UrgencyHook for Urgent windows.

/iderrick xmonad.hs (0.8)

Maximize, Dynamiclog with xmobar, Custom layout (with Combo) for latex writing (xpdf + editor + little terminal), French keyboard, Windows key for shortcuts

Note on uploading

Request a haskell wiki account if needed.

To upload your config file, create some text on this page of the form:

; [[/you xmonad.hs]](0.9)
: description of your setup

and save the page. Note that the configs are in alphabetical order and specify what xmonad version is required. (It's helpful to also include the version info somewhere in your comments.) This will create a new page under /you into which you can paste your xmonad.hs text.

Wrap the haskell in <haskell> and </haskell> tags (the tags should go on their own lines), to enable nice markup; add a nice category like [[Category:XMonad configuration]], and upload.

Images can be uploaded by clicking on the 'Upload file' link, and then referring to the uploaded image as, e.g.

[[Image:you-config.png|center|200px]]

which will scale the image correctly for a thumbnail.

Modular configs

Now that xmonad supports importing local module definitions into xmonad.hs from ~/.xmonad/lib/Path/To/Foo.hs with import Path.To.Foo, the download script below limits the usability of your uploaded config. Till it's made smarter, if you want your modular config to be easily downloadable, convert it into a single chunk of valid haskell between the first pair of <haskell> and </haskell> tags (each tag on its own line) i.e. comment the "module Foo where"s and their imports, merging them into a single import list, (qualifying as necessary).

If this is too painful, please consider other solutions, such as including commented links to downloadable lib module files or a browseable vcs, or help revise the downloader script to be smart enough to deal with a sensible method of posting such configs here.

A converter script might be useful as well.

Downloading all configs

Sometimes one wants to download all the xmonad.hs files linked from this page. Perhaps one simply wants to look at many versions, or perhaps one is interested in commonalities. Regardless, here's a small script (written by gwern and modified by sereven) which uses Tagsoup to download the files into the current directory:

import Text.HTML.Download (openURL)
import Text.HTML.TagSoup (parseTags, Tag(TagOpen))
import Data.List (isInfixOf, isPrefixOf)
import Control.Monad (liftM,liftM2, zipWithM_)

main :: IO ()
main = do urls <- liftM extractURLs $ openURL "http://haskell.org/haskellwiki/Xmonad/Config_archive"
          -- urls are prefixed "/haskellwiki/", so in raws, drop 13:
          let raws = map (\x -> "http://haskell.org/haskellwiki/?title=" ++ drop 13 x ++ "&action=raw") $ filter (isInfixOf "xmonad.hs") urls
          let hs = map (liftM2 fmap filterHaskell openURL) raws
          zipWithM_ (\x y -> writeFile x =<< y) (map ((++ ".hs") . show) [(1::Int)..]) hs

filterHaskell :: String -> String -> String
filterHaskell url = addLink . unlines . takeWhile (not . isPrefixOf "<nowiki>

</nowiki>") . drop 1 . dropWhile (not . isPrefixOf "<haskell>") . lines

   where addLink = (("-- " ++ (reverse . drop 11 . reverse) url ++ "\n") ++) -- add commented url less "&action=raw"

extractURLs :: String -> [String] extractURLs arg = [x | TagOpen "a" atts <- (parseTags arg), (_,x) <- atts, "/haskellwiki/Xmonad/Config_archive/" `isPrefixOf` x]

</haskell>

Make sure you have the tagsoup package installed from hackage or your package manager, then paste the script into a file, e.g. get-xmconfigs.hs, then, to download the configs into the current directory:

   % runhaskell get-xmconfigs

Note that this script will only work on those configs which strictly followed the above uploading guidelines, since the script makes a number of simplifying assumptions. (Specifically: title includes the string "xmonad.hs", it was uploaded to a subpage of this page, the <haskell> tags are on their own lines, and the first pair encloses the xmonad.hs. See gwern's original email for more details.)

Module Import Popularity

Here is a script to summarize the imports in a given directory of .hs files, such as the ones downloaded by the script in the previous section.

#!/usr/bin/runghc

import System.Directory(getDirectoryContents)
import System.FilePath(splitExtension)
import Control.Applicative((<$>))
import Control.Monad(mapM)
import Data.Char(isNumber, isSpace)
import Data.List(foldl', sortBy, stripPrefix)
import Data.Maybe(mapMaybe)
import Data.Monoid(mconcat)
import Data.Ord(comparing)

import qualified Data.Map as M

main = do
    fs <- filter ((\(fn,ext) -> ext == ".hs" && all isNumber fn) . splitExtension)
            <$> getDirectoryContents "."
    let getModName :: String -> [String]
        getModName = map (takeWhile (\x -> not $ isSpace x || x == '('))
                    . mapMaybe (mconcat $ map stripPrefix ["import qualified ","import "])
                    . lines
    xs <- mapM (fmap getModName . readFile) fs
    putStr . unlines . map show . sortBy (comparing snd) . M.toList
        . foldl' (\m k -> M.insertWith (+) k 1 m) M.empty
        . concat $ xs

Part of the output showing the most popular modules in the config archive is:

("XMonad.Layout.NoBorders",40)
("XMonad.Hooks.DynamicLog",43)
("XMonad.Util.Run",44)
("XMonad.Hooks.ManageDocks",45)
("Data.Map",53)
("XMonad.StackSet",53)
("XMonad",63)