Question about URXVT in Spectrwm

r4nd0m · n00b Joined: 21 May 2013 Posts: 2

Hello,
first of all i wasn't sure where to post this, if I am in the wrong subforum please tell me..
I'm also new to Gentoo and Linux in general.
Is it normal that the terminal stays open after I execute i.e. firefox? The terminal sorta blocks 1/2 of the screen, since I can't write in it and firefox is in the other half of the screen (working)

shazeal · Posted: Sat Jun 22, 2013 12:06 am Post subject:

You can just add an & symbol after the command and it will run in the background. And yes its normal for the terminal to stay open. You need to use some menu or launcher if you want to launch stuff without a terminal. Look up dmenu for a good launcher for tiled window managers.

eg. firefox &

The WM should have some commands to launch firefox in a separate workspace tho which means it doesnt have to fight with the terminal for screen space.

A good place to look for info on stuff is the Archlinux wiki, its pretty comprehensive. Just ignore the archlinux specific bits (like pacman commands which is the Archlinux package manager)

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Spectrwm

r4nd0m · n00b Joined: 21 May 2013 Posts: 2

Thank you, the '&' solves the issue so far, dmenu is already installed but I guess I have to configure it properly before I can use it, it lists me everything on the system..

edit: Should i mark it as solved or delete the thread?

smartass · Posted: Sat Jun 22, 2013 1:58 pm Post subject:

When you start dmenu, it lists everything, but the list is narrowed as you type the name of the program you want to run.
So start dmenu (through some keyboard shortcut I suppose) and start typing "firefox". As soon as you see it in the list, you can navigate to it using arrow keys or just finish writing the whole name and then press Enter.