Configuration

Make changes to the way Regolith looks and behaves.

Wallpaper

The wallpaper can be changed via Settings, or super c by going to the Background tab and selecting the preferred image or color.

Wallpaper can also be set via dotfiles for those that prefer file-based configuration management over GSettings.

Regardless of which style you prefer, see this page that describes the configuration in detail.

Status Bar Indicators

Status indicators such as CPU load, date and time, notifications, weather, and other system info can be added or removed by installing packages. For example, to show a status indicator for your laptop battery simply run sudo apt install i3xrocks-battery and then refresh the session. To find what indicators are available, run apt search ^i3xrocks- or search for “i3xrocks-” in your favorite package manager GUI, such as Synaptic. Learn more about configuring status indicators in this HowTo.

Looks

Colors, wallpaper, window and bar layouts, and other visual factors are bundled together in Regolith and called “looks”. Looks provide a simple way of changing the entire look of the desktop with a few commands. At this time, looks can only be configured on the command line, but there is a script that manages the details for you. Like status bar indicators, looks are packaged and are installed and removed like any other software package. By convention, Look packages use the following naming format regolith-look-<name>. apt or a GUI package manager can be used to search for available looks. The tool regolith-look can be used to change looks and refresh the active session with the selected look. Here's an example that switches to the cahuella look that shipped by default in Regolith 1.3:

$ apt search ^regolith-look-
...
regolith-look-cahuella/bionic,now 2.4.9 amd64
...
$ sudo apt install regolith-look-cahuella
$ regolith-look set cahuella
$ regolith-look refresh

Installed Looks may also be set via the Look Dialog, activated via super alt l.

Keybindings

The most common keybinding change is the super key. Regolith uses Xresources as the canonical source of truth for settings, which are read by various UI components. The table of Xresource keys open to user configuration can be found here. To change the default super binding from the windows key to alt, add the following line to the file ~/.config/regolith/Xresources:

i3-wm.mod: Mod1
i3-wm.alt: Mod4

To change other keybindings, creating a user copy of the i3 config file is necessary. See the staging configs HowTo to learn more.

Note: GNOME also has it's own set of keybindings. When the Regolith session is first initialized, the conflicting GNOME keybindings are removed from the user settings. GNOME keybindings can be managed in Settings.

Window Behavior

Regolith uses an i3 window manager variant called i3-gaps. It controls how windows are drawn, how keybindings are configured, some start up applications, and other details. By default the Regolith version of the i3 config file is at /etc/regolith/i3/config.

Almost Everything Else

Settings or gnome-control-panel as it's also known, is the tool to configure locale, date, display, networking, and various other settings. Launch it via the app launcher with super space, type ‘settings’, and hit enter to launch the app. Or, the direct keybinding is super c.

Further Reading

To dig deeper checkout the section on Customization, find what HowTos are available, or read the Xresource reference. Become an i3 power user by reading the user guide.


Last modified November 24, 2020: Update Configuration help to mention Xres approach and link to corresponding howto. (3c75bd92)