Simple Auto-Ricing i3wm Dotfiles

[!WARNING] MAINTENANCE MODE — LIMITED UPDATES

This project currently uses Eww as its bar/widget framework. Eww has been effectively abandoned — no meaningful updates in years, and accumulated bugs with no fixes upstream.

Because of this, active development on this repo is paused until a replacement is ready.

What this means for you:

• The dotfiles still work as-is for most setups
• Bug reports related to Eww may not be fixable on this end
• No new features will be added in the meantime

What's coming: A complete rewrite is in progress using a custom bar/widget framework (currently in development). When ready, this repo will be updated or a new repo will be linked here.

Watch/star this repo to get notified. Thank you for 100+ stars ⭐

DEMO VIDEO

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/f52d2bca-540a-45a8-8b81-4ce3fa77b193

Screenshots

Clean Desktop

Busy Desktop

Minimalist Desktop

Daily Desktop

Colorful Desktop

Wonderful Desktop

Features

• Auto Material 3 Theming - Colors extracted from wallpapers via m3wal
• Lightweight - Minimal resources, fast performance
• Complete Setup - i3wm, Eww, Alacritty, Fish, Rofi, all themed
• One-Click Install - Automated with backup
• Robust System Info - CPU, RAM, disk read directly from /proc and free -k, no dependency on top output format
• Universal Hardware Detection - WiFi, battery, AC adapter auto-detected via glob patterns, works with any naming convention
• Persistent Workspaces - Visual-only in Eww bar, does not modify i3 behavior
• Config GUI - Eww widget to configure MAX_WORKSPACES, ICON_THEME, DOCK_ENABLED, etc. without editing files manually
• Integrated Dock & Start Menu - Bottom dock linked to start menu, manage dock apps without touching config files

Stack

Installation

git clone https://github.com/MDiaznf23/simple-autoricing-i3wm-dotfiles.git
cd simple-autoricing-i3wm-dotfiles
chmod +x install.sh
./install.sh

Script will:

• Install all packages (repos + AUR)
• Backup existing configs to ~/dotfiles_backup_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS
• Install yay if needed
• Install m3wal via aur (you can use pipx if you want)
• Copy all dotfiles
• Set Fish as default shell
• Apply initial theme

Then: Logout → Select i3 → Login

Usage

Keybindings

Theming

Change wallpaper:

m3wal /path/to/wallpaper.jpg --full

With options:

m3wal wallpaper.jpg --full --mode dark --variant VIBRANT
m3wal wallpaper.jpg --full --mode light --variant EXPRESSIVE
m3wal wallpaper.jpg --full  # auto-detect (recommended)

Variants: CONTENT (default), VIBRANT, EXPRESSIVE, NEUTRAL, TONALSPOT, FIDELITY, MONOCHROME

Modes: auto (default), light, dark

Configuration

m3wal Config

~/.config/m3-colors/m3-colors.conf

[General]
mode = auto              # auto, light, dark
variant = CONTENT        # Color variant
operation_mode = full    # generator or full

[Features]
set_wallpaper = true
apply_xresources = true
generate_palette_preview = true

Custom Templates

Create in ~/.config/m3-colors/templates/:

# myapp.conf.template
background={{m3surface}}
foreground={{m3onSurface}}
primary={{m3primary}}

Deploy via ~/.config/m3-colors/deploy.json:

{
  "deployments": [
    { "source": "myapp.conf", "destination": "~/.config/myapp/colors.conf" }
  ]
}

Hook Scripts

Create in ~/.config/m3-colors/hooks/:

# Colors are available as environment variables
echo "Primary color: $M3_M3PRIMARY"
echo "Mode: $M3_MODE"
echo "Wallpaper: $M3_WALLPAPER"

# Reload applications
killall -USR1 kitty
i3-msg reload
notify-send "Theme Updated" "Applied $M3_MODE mode"

Enable:

[Hook.Scripts]
enabled = true
scripts = reload-apps.sh

File Structure

~/.config/
├── i3/           # Window manager
├── eww/          # Bar & widgets
├── alacritty/    # Terminal
├── rofi/         # Launcher
├── m3-colors/    # Theming
│   ├── templates/     # Color templates
│   ├── hooks/         # Scripts
│   └── deploy.json    # Deployment
└── fish/         # Shell

~/.local/bin/     # Scripts
~/Pictures/Wallpapers/  # Your wallpapers

What's New

Robust System Info

• CPU Usage — reads /proc/stat twice and calculates the diff, instead of parsing top output
• CPU Temp — priority order: hwmon with label → thermal_zone filtered by type (x86_pkg_temp/acpitz), not blindly using zone0
• RAM — uses free -k (pure kilobytes), human-readable format calculated manually without sed 's/i//g'

Universal Hardware Detection

• WiFi — loops through /sys/class/net/*/wireless/, auto-detects wlan0, wlp2s0, wlpXsY, and any other name
• Battery — globs BAT*, BATT*, battery*, picks the first one with a capacity file
• AC Adapter — globs ADP*, AC*, ACAD*, works across different laptop models

Eww Extras

• Persistent Workspaces — workspace indicator always visible in the bar, visual-only, no i3 config changes
• Config GUI — widget to edit config-dotfiles (MAX_WORKSPACES, ICON_THEME, DOCK_ENABLED, MAX_DOCK_APPS) directly from the desktop
• Bottom Dock — app launcher dock at the bottom of the screen, built with Eww
• Start Menu — application menu integrated with the dock; add or remove dock apps directly from the menu without editing any config file

Troubleshooting

Fonts missing:

fc-cache -fv

Transparency broken:

picom --config ~/.config/picom/picom.conf &

Manual wallpaper:

feh --bg-scale /path/to/wallpaper.jpg

Advanced

Python API

from m3wal import M3WAL

m3 = M3WAL("wallpaper.jpg")
m3.analyze_wallpaper()
m3.generate_scheme(mode="dark", variant="VIBRANT")
m3.apply_all_templates()
m3.deploy_configs()

Random Wallpaper

m3wal $(find ~/Pictures/Wallpapers -type f | shuf -n1) --full

Links

• GitHub Issues
• m3wal
• Arch Wiki - i3