Dmenu

dmenu is a keyboard-driven menu

Menu (computing)

In computing and telecommunications, a menu is a list of commands presented to an operator by a computer or communications system. They may be thought of as "shortcuts to frequently used commands that avoid the operator having to have a detailed knowledge or recall of syntax...

 utility developed as part of the dwm

Dwm

dwm is a dynamic tiling window manager for X11 exhibiting the principles of minimalism. It is externally similar to wmii, but internally much simpler. dwm is written purely in C and, for simplicity, lacks any configuration interface besides editing the source code...

 project. When invoked, usually by a user-configurable key combination, dmenu displays a horizontal menu of its stdin stream at the top edge of the screen. This is usually used to pipe in a list of executable names from the user's $PATH, but dmenu can be used for any purpose where a menu is required. The user can start typing a program name, and dmenu will narrow the list to show only substring

Substring

A subsequence, substring, prefix or suffix of a string is a subset of the symbols in a string, where the order of the elements is preserved. In this context, the terms string and sequence have the same meaning.- Subsequence :...

 matches for what the user typed.

dmenu is a keyboard-driven menu

Menu (computing)

In computing and telecommunications, a menu is a list of commands presented to an operator by a computer or communications system. They may be thought of as "shortcuts to frequently used commands that avoid the operator having to have a detailed knowledge or recall of syntax...

 utility developed as part of the dwm

Dwm

dwm is a dynamic tiling window manager for X11 exhibiting the principles of minimalism. It is externally similar to wmii, but internally much simpler. dwm is written purely in C and, for simplicity, lacks any configuration interface besides editing the source code...

 project. When invoked, usually by a user-configurable key combination, dmenu displays a horizontal menu of its stdin stream at the top edge of the screen. This is usually used to pipe in a list of executable names from the user's $PATH, but dmenu can be used for any purpose where a menu is required. The user can start typing a program name, and dmenu will narrow the list to show only substring

Substring

A subsequence, substring, prefix or suffix of a string is a subset of the symbols in a string, where the order of the elements is preserved. In this context, the terms string and sequence have the same meaning.- Subsequence :...

 matches for what the user typed. The user can also use the arrow keys to navigate the menu. When a choice is made, dmenu sends the selected text to stdout, which is usually piped into a shell to launch the program.

dmenu is similar in function to utilities such as Katapult

Katapult

Katapult is a free application launcher for Linux. It allows the user to quickly launch applications or open files by pressing Alt + space and typing the beginning of the file or application name. Katapult doubles as a quick calculator, spell checker, and document viewer. Katapult also evaluates...

 or GNOME Do

GNOME Do

GNOME Do is a popular, free application launcher for Linux originally created by David Siegel, and currently maintained by Alex Launi...

 for linux or LaunchBar

LaunchBar

LaunchBar is a launch application for Mac OS X. It provides access to user's applications and files, by entering short abbreviations of the searched item's name. It uses an adaptive algorithm that 'learns' a user's preferred abbreviations for a particular application...

 or Quicksilver

Quicksilver (software)

Quicksilver is a computer utility software program for Mac OS X, made by Blacktree Software and distributed freely. It is essentially a graphical shell for the OS X operating system aimed at increasing user efficiency...

 for Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a line of computer operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc., and since 2002 has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

in that it allows quick launching of programs from a graphical environment using the keyboard.

External links

• Vertical dmenu patch