# The &kpager; Handbook

Dirk
Doerflinger

    ddoerflinger@web.de

Antonio
Larrosa
Jimenez

    larrosa@kde.org

Developer
Matthias
Elter

    elter@kde.org

Developer
Matthias
Ettrich

    ettrich@kde.org

Developer
Lauri
Watts

    vampyr@atconnex.net

Reviewer
2000
Dirk Doerflinger
&FDLNotice;
28/01/2001
0.02.00

&kpager; gives you a thumbnail view of all virtual desktops.

KDE
pager
kpager
desktop
overview

## Introduction

&kpager; gives you a thumbnail sketch of all your desktops. It is a handy tool to let you see, resize or close windows on any desktop and move windows around within or between desktops.

## Using &kpager;

Here's a screenshot of &kpager;
Screenshot

### More &kpager; features

&kpager; can show all virtual desktops and the applications within them. It can be used to chose an application or even to move applications within virtual desktops or to others.

## Command Reference

### The main &kpager; window

#### Using the mouse

In &kpager; you can activate applications by clicking them with the left button.

The middle button of the mouse can be used for draging applications within &kpager;. Applications can either be moved within a virtual desktop or to another one.

Clicking the right mouse button anywhere in &kpager; will open a contextmenu.

#### The Context Menu

The context menu depends on where the right mouse button is clicked: If it is clicked on the empty background of &kpager;, it only has two items: Configure KPager and Quit. Otherwise, if clicked on a window, there are also the name and the icon of the application, and Minimize, Maximize, To Desktop and Close are displayed. See below for a detailed description of the menu items.

Maximize

  Maximizes the application window to the whole desktop. This item only appears if right clicked on an application window.

Minimize

  Iconifies the application. This item only appears if right clicked on an application window.

To Desktop

  Sends the application window to the chosen virtual desktop. This item only appears if right clicked on an application window.

Close

  Closes the clicked application. This item only appears if right clicked on an application window.

Configure Pager

  Opens the settings dialog.

Quit

  Quits &kpager;.

### The Settings Dialog

Here's a screenshot of the settings dialog
Screenshot

In the settings dialog you will find five check boxes and two groups of radio buttons.

Enable Window Dragging

  If this box is checked, you can drag windows inside of &kpager; with the &MMB;. Windows can be dragged over the desktop or even to another desktop.

Show Name

  If this box is checked, the names of the desktops are shown in the main view of &kpager;.

Show Number

  If this box is checked, the numbers of the desktops are shown in the main view of &kpager;. If it is checked together with the Show Name box, the name is displayed with ordinals, e.g. 1. Desktop.

Show Background

  If this box is checked, the wallpaper of each desktop - if set - will be shown as backgrounds in &kpager;, too.

Show Windows

  If this box is checked, the applications on the desktops are shown in &kpager; as small views. Otherwise, &kpager; will remain empty, just for choosing the virtual desktops.

Type of Window

  This group of radio buttons sets the kind of view for the application window views. Plain will show just emty rectangles with the proportions of the application window, Icon will show them with their standard icon and Pixmap with a small view of the contents of the application window. Note that using the pixmap mode is only recommended for very fast machines.

Layout

  In this group the layout of the &kpager; main view can be set. Classical will show &kpager; in a 2xn grid like pager applications in some other window managers, Horizontal will show the virtual desktops in a horizontal view and Vertical in a vertical row, which may perfectly fit on the side of the desktop.

## Questions and Answers

Why could I need &kpager;?

&kpager; can be used as an alternative to the pager applet in the panel. It has the advantage of being resizeable and within this able to show icon or pixmap views of the running applications, move the windows across desktops and run outside of the panel.

How can I change the behaviour of &kpager;?

Clicking the right mouse button anywhere within &kpager; lets you chose Configure from the context menu for displaying the settings dialog

Windows are transparent by default, how do I turn the this off?

Currently, you cannot turn that option off within the config dialog, but you can do it manually like this:

Open the file `$KDEHOME/share/config/kpagerrc` with any text editor like &kedit; or vi. If you have no rights to write that file, you may need to do it as root or contact your system administrator. In this file you will have to add a new key with the name `windowTransparentMode` with a number as value. Values are:

- 0 - No transparent windows at all.
- 1 - Only maxized windows are transparent.
- 2 - all windows are transparent (default).

## Credits and License

&kpager;

Program copyright 2000 Antonio Larrosa larrosa@kde.org

Documentation copyright 2000 by Dirk Doerflinger ddoerflinger@web.de

&underFDL; &underGPL;

## Installation

### How to obtain &kpager;

&kpager; is part of the &kde; project http://www.kde.org. &kpager; can be found in the kbase package on ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/, the main ftp site of the KDE project and has a homepage at http://www.arrakis.es/~rlarrosa/kpager.html.

### Requirements

As &kpager; is part of the kdebase package, you will just need an installation of the main kde packages.

### Compilation and installation

In order to compile and install &kpager; on your system, type the following in the base directory of the kdebase distribution:

    % ./configure
    % make
    % make install

For further information please refer to the `INSTALL` file in the base directory of kdebase.

Since &kpager; is part of the kdebase package you probably won't have problems compiling ist. Should you run into problems please report them to the &kde; mailing lists.

If you obtained a RPM package please have a look at the rpm man page or the documentation of your distribution.