Awesome: Wibar seems to ignore setup layout (height)

[BigfootN]

Hello,

I am trying to add some widgets to wibar (fixed vertically) but without any luck. The only way I managed to do so is by changing the wibar's height.

Output of awesome --version:

awesome v4.3-814-g158cc37a0 (Too long)
• Compiled against Lua 5.3.5 (running with Lua 5.3)
• API level: 4
• D-Bus support: yes
• xcb-errors support: no
• execinfo support: yes
• xcb-randr version: 1.6
• LGI version: 0.9.2
• Transparency enabled: yes
• Custom search paths: no

How to reproduce the issue:

Create this code:

bar:setup {
    {
        {
            {
                align = "center",
                valign = "center",
                text = "first text,
                widget = wibox.widget.textbox
            },
            layout = wibox.layout.fixed.horizontal
        },
        bg = "#ff0000",
        fg = "#00ff00",
        shape = gears.shape.rectangle,
        widget = wibox.container.background
    },
    {
        {
            {
                align = "center",
                valign = "center",
                text = "second text",
                widget = wibox.widget.textbox
            },
            layout = wibox.layout.fixed.horizontal
        },
        bg = "#ff0000",
        fg = "#0000ff",
        shape = gears.shape.rectangle,
        widget = wibox.container.background
    },
    spacing = 10,
    layout = wibox.layout.fixed.vertical,
}

Actual result:

The bar's height hasn't changed, I can only see the first text. With the
layout = wibox.layout.fixed.vertical isn't suppose to :

Each widget will get as much space as it asks for and each widget will be drawn next to its neighboring widget

(from the documentation)

Expected result:

To see all the widgets.

Thank you very much in advance.

[psychon]

Could you provide more information on what you see and what you want to see?

With the following patch to the default config (basically: Just move the wibar to the left and paste your code (+ a small fix to it)):

diff --git a/awesomerc.lua b/awesomerc.lua
index 6e2a3a6a6..38b13aed3 100644
--- a/awesomerc.lua
+++ b/awesomerc.lua
@@ -179,7 +179,7 @@ screen.connect_signal("request::desktop_decoration", function(s)

     -- @DOC_WIBAR@
     -- Create the wibox
-    s.mywibox = awful.wibar({ position = "top", screen = s })
+    s.mywibox = awful.wibar({ position = "left", screen = s })

     -- @DOC_SETUP_WIDGETS@
     -- Add widgets to the wibox
@@ -200,6 +200,40 @@ screen.connect_signal("request::desktop_decoration", function(s)
             s.mylayoutbox,
         },
     }
+    s.mywibox.widget = {
+    {
+        {
+            {
+                align = "center",
+                valign = "center",
+                text = "first text", -- There was a missing " here which I added
+                widget = wibox.widget.textbox
+            },
+            layout = wibox.layout.fixed.horizontal
+        },
+        bg = "#ff0000",
+        fg = "#00ff00",
+        shape = gears.shape.rectangle,
+        widget = wibox.container.background
+    },
+    {
+        {
+            {
+                align = "center",
+                valign = "center",
+                text = "second text",
+                widget = wibox.widget.textbox
+            },
+            layout = wibox.layout.fixed.horizontal
+        },
+        bg = "#ff0000",
+        fg = "#0000ff",
+        shape = gears.shape.rectangle,
+        widget = wibox.container.background
+    },
+    spacing = 10,
+    layout = wibox.layout.fixed.vertical,
+}
 end)
 -- }}}

...I get the following result (this is a part of a screenshot; the black is the wallpaper and the not-fully-black is the default wibox background color):

I can only see the first text.

Clearly, I can see more than just "first text", so there is already s difference here.

[BigfootN]

Thank your for your answer.

With the code in my first post, I can only see this:

while I would like to have both text (first text and second text). It's like the bar doesn't take into account it's children.

Here is my wibar:

local bar = awful.wibar ({
    position = 'top',
    type = "dock",
    screen = screen[1],
    bg = <some bg>,
    border_width = 3,
    border_color = <some color>,
    shape = gears.shape.rectangle
})

Also, what I wish to achieve, since it doesn't seem to be case in your screenshot, is to have a horizontal bar. I know that in my setup it ends with layout = wibox.layout.fixed.vertical, but it is in order to have both texts vertically aligned.

Hoping I managed to be clear enough and provided enough information, thank you very much for your answer.

[psychon]

Sorry, I am still confused.

If you change your code from position = 'top' to position = 'left' (= the wibar should be on the left edge of the screen and not on the top), does it then do what you want it to do?

what I wish to achieve, since it doesn't seem to be case in your screenshot, is to have a horizontal bar.

Hm... apparently I am wrong in what you want to achieve.

So... I did again what I did in my last comment. Only difference is that I did not set position = "left" and now I have this result:

From your screenshot I would guess that this is exactly what you want to get. Only that I get this result, but you do not. Even though we both use the same code...?

[BigfootN]

Hello, thank you for your response.

I'll try to explain what I am trying to achieve by a more general approach.

I am trying to have the wibar look like this:

|  widget 1  |                                         |
+------------+                                         |
|  widget 2  |                                         |
+------------+            Whole wibar                  |                
.                                                      |
.                                                      |
+------------+                                         |
|  widget N  |                                         |
+------------+-----------------------------------------+

And I would like to add widget 1, widget 2..widget N vertically in the wibar setup without setting the wibar height. I would like the wibar to adapt it's height accordingly to it's inner widgets.

Hoping I made myself clear enough, thank you very much for your precious help.

[manilarome]

I would like the wibar to adapt it's height accordingly to it's inner widgets.

You should use awful.popup instead. It will automatically adjust its height/width accordingly to its inner widgets. @BigfootN

[BigfootN]

You should use awful.popup instead. It will automatically adjust its height/width accordingly to its inner widgets.

Thank you for the advice. So if I understand well, wibar doesn't automatically adapt it's height ? If this is the case, why not ?

Thank you for all your help.

[Elv13]

If this is the case, why not ?

It would be super annoying if some "normally 1 line, but someone multiline" scripts caused the size to flicker all the time.

[BigfootN]

It would be super annoying if some "normally 1 line, but someone multiline" scripts caused the size to flicker all the time.

Thank you for your great answer. I understand now. But, just one last question if I may, wouldn't the result be same with awful.popup ?

Thank you very much for your great help.

[Elv13]

Popups and bars are 2 different use cases. Popups are when you explicitly want this behavior. The normal wibox is when you don't want it. Then awful.wibar is explicitly for a bar on the side of the screen with a specific size.

In the end, there is ~10 different classes of box with different attributes for different use cases. They all share the same code under the hood and and just specialized version with some pre-defined settings.

[BigfootN]

Thank you very much for your great answer. I have all the answers I need now.

Thank you very much.

[psychon]

One more small piece of information: awful.wibar defaults to "font size * 1.5" for its size. For example, with position="top", this is the relevant piece of code:
https://github.com/awesomeWM/awesome/blob/245f38ccd57f9fc4a6b090aca2c8ec800356fb5d/lib/awful/wibar.lua#L384-L385

What I want to emphasize/say is that the default height of a wibar is also pretty dumb and nothing magic.

[BigfootN]

Thank you very much for this valuable piece of information.