Running rofi

To launch rofi directly in a certain mode, specify a mode with rofi -show <mode>. To show the run dialog:

rofi -show run

Emulating dmenu

rofi can emulate dmenu(1) (a dynamic menu for X) when launched with the -dmenu flag.

The website for dmenu can be found here http://tools.suckless.org/dmenu/.

rofi does not aim to be 100% compatible with dmenu. There are simply too many different flavors of dmenu. The idea is that the basic usage command-line flags are obeyed, theme-related flags are not. Besides, rofi offers some extended features (like multi-select, highlighting, message bar, extra key bindings).

Display Error message

rofi error dialog can also be called from the command line.

rofi -e "my message"

Markup support can be enabled, see CONFIGURATION options.

General

-help

The help option shows the full list of commandline options and the current set value. These include dynamic (run-time generated) options.

-dump-xresources

Dump the current active configuration in Xresources format to the command-line. This does not validate all passed values (for example, colors).

-threads num

Specify the number of threads rofi should use:

• 0: Autodetect the number of supported hardware threads.
• 1: Disable threading
• 2..N: Specify the maximum number of threads to use in the thread pool.

-dmenu

Run rofi in dmenu mode. This allows for interactive scripts. In dmenu mode, rofi reads from STDIN, and output to STDOUT. A simple example, displaying three pre-defined options:

echo -e "Option #1\nOption #2\nOption #3" | rofi -dmenu

Or get the options from a script:

~/my_script.sh | rofi -dmenu

-show mode

Open rofi in a certain mode. Available modes are window, run, drun, ssh, combi. The special argument keys can be used to open a searchable list of supported key bindings (see KEY BINDINGS)

To show the run-dialog:

rofi -show run

-modi mode1,mode1

Specify an ordered, comma-separated list of modes to enable. Enabled modes can be changed at runtime. Default key is Ctrl+Tab. If no modes are specified, all modes will be enabled. To only show the run and ssh launcher:

rofi -modi "run,ssh" -show run

Custom modes can be added using the internal ´script´ mode. Each mode has two parameters:

<name>:<script>

Example: Have a mode ´Workspaces´ using the i3_switch_workspaces.sh script:

rofi -modi "window,run,ssh,Workspaces:i3_switch_workspaces.sh" -show Workspaces

Notes: The I3 Window manager does not like commas in the command when specifying an exec command. For that case ´#´ can be used as an separator.

-case-sensitive

Start in case sensitive mode. This option can be changed at run-time using the -kb-toggle-case-sensitivity key binding.

-cycle

Cycle through the result list. Default is ´true´.

-filter filter

Filter the list by setting text in input bar to filter

-config filename

Load an alternative configuration file.

-scroll-method method

Select the scrolling method. 0: Per page, 1: continuous.

-no-show-match

Hide the indicator that shows what part of the string is matched.

-no-lazy-grab

Disables lazy grab, this forces the keyboard being grabbed before gui is shown.

-no-plugins

Disable plugin loading.

-plugin-path directory

Specify the directory where rofi should look for plugins.

-show-icons

Show application icons in drun and window modes.

-drun-icon-theme

Specify icon theme to be used in drun mode if show-icons setting is enabled. If not specified default theme from DE is used, Adwaita and gnome themes act as fallback themes.

Matching

-matching method

Specify the matching algorithm used. Current the following methods are supported.

• normal: match the int string
• regex: match a regex input
• glob: match a glob pattern
• fuzzy: do a fuzzy match

Default: normal

Note: glob matching might be slow for larger lists

-tokenize

Tokenize the input.

-drun-match-fields field1,field2,...

When using drun, match only with the specified Desktop entry fields. The different fields are:

• name: the application´s name
• generic: the application´s generic name
• exec: the application´s executable
• categories: the application´s categories
• comment: the application comment
• all: all of the above

Default: name,generic,exec,categories

-window-match-fields field1,field2,...

When using window mode, match only with the specified fields. The different fields are:

• title: window´s title
• class: window´s class
• role: window´s role
• name: window´s name
• desktop: window´s current desktop
• all: all of the above

Default: all

Layout

Most of the following options are deprecated and should not be used. Please use the new theme format to customize rofi. More information about the new format can be found in the rofi-theme(5) manpage.

-lines

Maximum number of lines to show before scrolling.

rofi -lines 25

Default: 15

-columns

Number of columns to show before scrolling.

rofi -columns 2

Default: 1

-width [value]

Set width of menu. [value] is specified in percentage.

rofi -width 60

If [value] is larger then 100, size is set in pixels. Example to span a full-HD monitor:

rofi -width 1920

If [value] is negative, it tries to estimates a character width. To show 30 characters in a row:

rofi -width -30

Character width is a rough estimate, and might not be correct, but should work for most monospaced fonts.

Default: 50

-location

Specify where the window should be located. The numbers map to the following locations on screen:

  1 2 3


  8 0 4


  7 6 5

Default: 0

-fixed-num-lines

Keep a fixed number of visible lines (See the -lines option.)

-padding

Define the inner margin of the window.

Default: 5

-fullscreen

Use the full-screen height and width.

-sidebar-mode

Open in sidebar-mode. In this mode a list of all enabled modes is shown at the bottom. (See -modi option) To show sidebar, use:

rofi -show run -sidebar-mode -lines 0

-auto-select

When one entry is left, automatically select it.

-m num

-m name

-monitor num

-monitor name

Select monitor to display rofi on. It accepts as input: primary (if primary output is set), the xrandr output name, or integer number (in order of detection). Negative numbers are handled differently:

• -1: the currently focused monitor.
• -2: the currently focused window (that is, rofi will be displayed on top of the focused window).
• -3: Position at mouse (overrides the location setting to get normal context menu behavior.)
• -4: the monitor with the focused window.
• -5: the monitor that shows the mouse pointer.

Default: -5

See rofi -h output for the detected monitors, their position, and size.

-theme filename

Path to the new theme file format. This overrides the old theme settings.

-theme-str string

Allow theme parts to be specified on the command line as an override.

For example:

rofi -theme-str ´#window { fullscreen: true; }´

This option can be specified multiple times.

-dpi number

Override the default DPI setting. If set to 0, it tries to auto-detect based on X11 screen size (similar to i3 and GTK). If set to 1, it tries to auto-detect based on the size of the monitor that rofi is displayed on (similar to latest Qt 5).

PATTERN setting

-terminal

Specify which terminal to start.

rofi -terminal xterm

Pattern: {terminal} Default: x-terminal-emulator

-ssh-client client

Override the used ssh client.

Pattern: {ssh-client} Default: ssh

SSH settings

-ssh-command cmd

Set the command to execute when starting a ssh session. The pattern {host} is replaced by the selected ssh entry.

Pattern: {ssh-client} Default: {terminal} -e {ssh-client} {host}

-parse-hosts

Parse the /etc/hosts file for entries.

Default: disabled

-parse-known-hosts -no-parse-known-hosts

Parse the ~/.ssh/known_hosts file for entries.

Default: enabled

Run settings

-run-command cmd

Set command ({cmd}) to execute when running an application. See PATTERN.

Default: {cmd}

-run-shell-command cmd

Set command to execute when running an application in a shell. See PATTERN.

Default: {terminal} -e {cmd}

-run-list-command cmd

If set, use an external tool to generate list of executable commands. Uses run-command.

Default: {cmd}

Window switcher settings

-window-format format

Format what is being displayed for windows.

format: {field[:len]}

field:

• w: desktop name
• t: title of window
• n: name
• r: role
• c: class

len: maximum field length (0 for auto-size). If length and window width are negative, field length is width - len. if length is positive, the entry will be truncated or padded to fill that length.

default: {w} {c} {t}

-window-command cmd

Set command to execute on selected window for a custom action. See PATTERN.

Default: "xkill -id {window}"

Combi settings

-combi-modi mode1,mode2

The modi to combine in combi mode. For syntax to see -modi. To get one merge view, of window,run, and ssh:

rofi -show combi -combi-modi "window,run,ssh" -modi combi

Notes: The I3 Window manager does not like commas in the command when specifying an exec command. For that case ´#´ can be used as a separator.

History and Sorting

-disable-history -no-disable-history (re-enable history)

Disable history

-sort to enable -no-sort to disable

Enable, disable sorting. This setting can be changed at runtime (see -kb-toggle-sort).

-levenshtein-sort to enable -no-levenshtein-sort to disable

When searching, always sort the result based on levenshtein distance. If disabled, fzf sorting is used when fuzzy matching is used. If enabled, levenshtein sorting is used event fuzzy matching is used.

For other matching modes sorting is always done via levenshtein-sort.

Dmenu specific

-sep separator

Separator for dmenu. Example: To show a list of ´a´ to ´e´ with ´|´ as a separator:

echo "a|b|c|d|e" | rofi -sep ´|´ -dmenu

-p prompt

Specify the prompt to show in dmenu mode. For example, select ´monkey´, a,b,c,d, or e.

echo "a|b|c|d|e" | rofi -sep ´|´ -dmenu -p "monkey:"

Default: dmenu

-selected-row selected row

Select a certain row.

Default: 0

-l number of lines to show

Maximum number of lines the menu may show before scrolling.

rofi -lines 25

Default: 15

-i

Makes dmenu searches case-insensitive

-a X

Active row, mark row X as active (starting at 0). You can specify single element: -a 3 A range: -a 3-8 or a set of rows: -a 0,2 or any combination: -a 0,2-3,9

-u X

Urgent row, mark row X as urgent (starting at 0). You can specify single element: -u 3 A range: -u 3-8 or a set of rows: -u 0,2 or any combination: -u 0,2-3,9

-only-match

Only return a selected item, do not allow custom entry. This mode always returns an entry, or returns directly when no entries given.

-no-custom

Only return a selected item, do not allow custom entry. This mode returns directly when no entries given.

-format format

Allows the output of dmenu to be customized (N is the total number of input entries):

• ´s´ selected string
• ´i´ index (0 - (N-1))
• ´d´ index (1 - N)
• ´q´ quote string
• ´f´ filter string (user input)
• ´F´ quoted filter string (user input)

Default: ´s´

-select string

Select first line that matches the given string

-mesg string

Add a message line below the filter entry box. Supports pango markup. For more information on supported markup see here https://developer.gnome.org/pango/stable/PangoMarkupFormat.html

-normal-window

Make rofi react like a normal application window. Useful for scripts like Clerk that are basically an application.

-dump

Dump the filtered list to stdout and quit. This can be used to get the list as rofi would filter it. Use together with -filter command.

-input file

Reads from file instead of stdin.

-password

Hide the input text. This should not be considered secure!

-markup-rows

Tell rofi that DMenu input is pango markup encoded, and should be rendered. See here https://developer.gnome.org/pango/stable/PangoMarkupFormat.html for details about pango markup.

-multi-select

Allow multiple lines to be selected. Adds a small selection indicator to the left of each entry.

-sync

Force rofi mode to first read all data from stdin before showing the selection window. This is original dmenu behavior.

Note: the default asynchronous mode will also be automatically disabled if used with conflicting options, such as -dump, -only-match or -auto-select.

-async-pre-read number

Reads the first 25 entries blocking, then switches to async mode. This makes it feel more ´snappy´.

default: 25

Message dialog

-e message

Pops up a message dialog (used internally for showing errors) with message. Message can be multi-line.

Other

-pid path

Make rofi create a pid file and check this on startup. The pid file prevents multiple rofi instances from running simultaneously. This is useful when running rofi from a key-binding daemon.

-fake-transparency

Enable fake transparency. This only works with transparent background color in the theme.

-fake-background

Select what to use as background for fake transparency. This can be ´background´, ´screenshot´ or a path to an image file (currently only supports png).

-display-{mode} string

Set the name to use for mode. This is used as prompt and in combi-browser.

-click-to-exit -no-click-to-exit

Click the mouse outside of the rofi window to exit.

Default: enabled

Debug

-no-config

Disable parsing of configuration. This runs rofi in stock mode.

-no-plugins

Disables the loading of plugins.

To get a trace with (lots of) debug information, set the following environment variable when executing rofi:

G_MESSAGES_DEBUG=all

The trace can be filtered by only outputting the relevant domains, for example:

G_MESSAGES_DEBUG=Dialogs.DRun

For more information on debugging, see the wiki https://github.com/DaveDavenport/rofi/wiki/Debugging%20Rofi

Window

Show a list of all the windows and allow switching between them. Pressing the delete-entry binding (shift-delete) will close the window. Pressing the accept-custom binding (control-enter or shift-enter) will run a command on the window. (See option window-command );

WindowCD

Shows a list of the windows on the current desktop and allows switching between them. Pressing the delete-entry binding (shift-delete) will kill the window. Pressing the accept-custom binding (control-enter or shift-enter) will run a command on the window. (See option window-command );

Run

Shows a list of executables in $PATH and can launch them (optional in a terminal). Pressing the delete-entry binding (shift-delete) will remove this entry from the run history. Pressing the accept-custom binding (control-enter or shift-enter) will run the command in a terminal.

DRun

Same as the run launches, but the list is created from the installed desktop files. It automatically launches them in a terminal if specified in the Desktop File. Pressing the delete-entry binding (shift-delete) will remove this entry from the run history. Pressing the accept-custom binding (control-enter or shift-enter) with custom input (no entry matching) will run the command in a terminal.

SSH

Shows a list of SSH targets based on your ssh config file, and allows to quickly ssh into them.

Keys

Shows a searchable list of key bindings.

Script

Allows custom scripted Modi to be added.

The text in the window switcher is not nicely lined out.

Try using a mono-space font.

The window is completely black.

Check quotes used on the commandline: you might have used “ ("smart quotes") instead of " ("machine quotes").

What does the icon in the top right show?

The indicator shows:

` ` Case insensitive and no sorting.
`-` Case sensitivity enabled, no sorting.
`+` Case insensitive and Sorting enabled
`±` Sorting and Case sensitivity enabled"