At some occasions a situation may arise where you desire something light weight, yet simple and good looking, alternative to Gnome panel or Kde panel which tend to be getting bigger and more resource demanding as time goes by. In this post a panel called Tint2 is presented with a config that makes it usable in everyday computer life.
Definition: Tint2
A light weight panel which provides all the common needed panel functions, such as a task bar, a launcher functionality and a window handling which can be modified according to user’s needs. Tint2 is configured via text editor but the config is pretty easy and straight forward. Tint2 can be colored to use different colors, however, at this given moment, it does not support background image files like do ,for example, gnome panel or kde4 panel.
Homepage: http://code.google.com/p/tint2/
Installing Tint2:
Tint2 can be usually found inside package repositories of most Linux distributions of today. At its most simple stage the install inside Debian/Ubuntu is something like:
sudo apt-get install tint2
OR
su root
apt-get install tint2
After these steps tin2 should be installed to your system.
Starting up the Tint2 panel
Once you start up tint2 with the tint2 command the following folder structure will be created inside your home folder:
.config/tint2/tint2rc
The hiden folder .config will now host a file called tint2rc inside the tint2 folder. The tint2rc is the default file which shall be run once tint2 command is executed inside the Linux system. You can change the default location of tint2 config file with the following command structure:
tint2 -c .config/tint2/current
Where: after the option -c you can specify any locations you desire, here we will be however using a file named as current. Do note that you can start multiple tint2 panels by -c variable when you point the end results to different config files.
Configuring Tint2
As I have found it useful to have a dark, almost transparent, panel with launchers that automatically hides itself after it is not under mouse focus a following configuration has proven to be useful in my daily activities:
#####The material inside tint2 config file called current activate with tint2 -c switch####
#———————————————
# TINT2 CONFIG FILE
#———————————————
# For more information about tint2, see:
# http://code.google.com/p/tint2/wiki/Welcome
#
# Background definitions
# ID 1
rounded = 0
border_width = 1
background_color = #303030
border_color = #444444 99
# ID 2 – task active
rounded = 1
border_width = 0
background_color = #000000 99
border_color = #000000 99
# ID 3 – task
rounded = 1
border_width = 0
background_color = #000000 0
border_color = #000000 0
# ID 4
rounded = 1
border_width = 1
background_color = #000000 99
border_color = #000000 99
# ID 5 – taskbar
rounded = 0
border_width = 1
background_color = #000000 0
border_color = #000000 0
# ID 6 – active taskbar
rounded = 0
border_width = 0
background_color = #222222 00
border_color = #000000 99
# ID 7 – tooltip
rounded = 3
border_width = 0
background_color = #222222 90
border_color = #222222 90
# ID 8
rounded = 1
border_width = 1
background_color = #888888 20
border_color = #888888 20
# Panel
panel_monitor = all
panel_position = bottom center horizontal
panel_items =CTSL
panel_size = 100% 36&
panel_margin = -6 -2
panel_padding = 0 0
panel_dock = 0
wm_menu = 1
panel_layer = bottom
panel_background_id = 1
# Launcher
launcher_padding = 8 4 4
launcher_background_id = 0
launcher_icon_size = 48
# Specify icon theme names with launcher_icon_theme.
# if you have an XSETTINGS manager running (like xfsettingsd), tint2 will follow your current theme.
#launcher_icon_theme = Mint-X
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/Thunar.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/firefox.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/gthumb.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/emesene.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/PlayOnLinux.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/libreoffice-startcenter.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/evince.desktop
launcher_item_app =/usr/share/applications/mintBackup_mime.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/abiword.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/gnumeric.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/lxmusic.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/gimp.desktop
launcher_item_app = usr/share/applications/skype.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/vlc.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/parole.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/rhythmbox.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/sakura.desktop
launcher_item_app = /usr/share/applications/blueman-manager.desktop
# Panel Autohide 0=off 1=on
autohide = 1
autohide_show_timeout = 0.3
autohide_hide_timeout = 7.5
autohide_height = 6
strut_policy = follow_size
# Taskbar
taskbar_mode = single_desktop
taskbar_padding = 6 0 6
taskbar_background_id = 5
taskbar_active_background_id = 6
taskbar_name = 0
taskbar_name_background_id = 0
taskbar_name_active_background_id = 0
taskbar_name_font = Liberation Sans 9
taskbar_name_font_color = #828282 100
taskbar_name_active_font_color = #828282 100
# Tasks
urgent_nb_of_blink = 20
task_icon = 1
task_text = 0
task_centered = 1
task_maximum_size = 100 100
task_padding = 4 2
task_background_id = 3
task_active_background_id = 1
task_urgent_background_id = 4
task_iconified_background_id = 3
# Task Icons
task_icon_asb = 80 0 0
task_active_icon_asb = 100 0 0
task_urgent_icon_asb = 100 0 0
task_iconified_icon_asb = 80 0 0
# Fonts
#task_font = Liberation Sans 06_55 6
task_font_color = #828282 60
task_active_font_color = #828282 100
task_urgent_font_color = #FFFFFF 100
task_iconified_font_color = #d8d8d8 60
font_shadow = 0
# System Tray
systray = 1
systray_padding = 4 2 3
systray_sort = ascending
systray_background_id = 0
systray_icon_size = 24
systray_icon_asb = 100 0 0
# Tooltips
tooltip = 1
tooltip_padding = 2 2
tooltip_show_timeout = 0.0
tooltip_hide_timeout = 0.0
tooltip_background_id = 7
tooltip_font_color = #d8d8d8 100
tooltip_font = Liberation Sans normal 9.0
# Mouse
mouse_middle = none”
mouse_right = close
mouse_scroll_up = toggle
mouse_scroll_down = iconify
# Battery
battery = 1
battery_low_status = 20
battery_low_cmd = notify-send “battery low”
battery_hide = 96
bat1_font = Liberation Sans 10
bat2_font = Liberation Sans 8
battery_font_color = #FFFFFF 100
battery_padding = 2 0
battery_background_id = 0
# End of config
As you can notice I have mapped quite many launcher_item_apps ready to use as a default. Once you install, for example, Mozilla Firefox it will pop up to your tint2 panel or vice verse if you remove Mozilla Firefox it will disappear from your Tint2 panel. The end result of the tint2 config should be something as seen below. If you fail to see the launcher_item_apps it means that your tint2 is too old and you will need to compile a newer version from a source code. The compilation follows a pretty simple structure of:
./configure && make && sudo make install
OR
su root
make install
Be sure to tweak tint2 to your preferences and have a great time with it. And finally here is the screenshot where you can see Tint2 at the bottom of the screen:
