Hyprscratch

A simple tool for Qtile-like scratchpads in Hyprland or simplifying usage of the built-in functionality, that can be configured entirely inside of hyprland.conf.

Installation

Cargo:

cargo install hyprscratch

AUR:

paru -S hyprscratch

Usage

In hyprland.conf:

#start the hyprscratch daemon
exec-once = hyprscratch init [DAEMON_OPTIONS]

#configure scratchpads
bind = $MOD, $KEY, exec, hyprscratch $CLIENT_TITLE "$HYPRLAND_EXEC_COMMAND" [SCRATCHPAD_OPTIONS]

Example scratchpad:

bind = $mainMod, b, exec, hyprscratch btop "[size 70% 80%] alacritty --title btop -e btop" eager

Configuration

Daemon options:

• clean: automatically hides all scratchpads on workspace change.

• spotless: automatically hides all scratchpads on focus change.

• eager: spawns all scratchpads hidden on start.

• no-auto-reload: does not reload the configuration when hyprland.conf is updated.

• config </path/to/config>: specify a path to the configuration file.

Scratchpad options:

• persist: prevents the scratchpad from getting replaced when a new one is summoned.

• cover: prevents the scratchpad from replacing an already active one.

• sticky: prevents the scratchpad from being hidden by clean.

• shiny: prevents the scratchpad from being hidden by spotless.

• lazy: prevents the scratchpad from being spawned by eager.

• show: only creates or brings up the scratchpad.

• hide: only hides the scratchpad if active.

• poly: toggle all scratchpads with the same title simultaneously.

• pin: keeps the scratchpad active through workspace changes

• tiled: spawns the scratchpad tiled instead of floating.

• monitor <id>: restricts the scratchpad to a specific monitor.

• special: uses the special workspace. Does not work with all other options.

Extra subcommands:

• cycle [normal|special]: cycles between scratchpads (optionally only normal or special ones) in the order they are defined in the configuration file.

• toggle <name>: toggles the scratchpad with the given name.

• show <name>: shows the scratchpad with the given name.

• hide <name>: hides the scratchpad with the given name.

• previous: summons the last used scratchpad that is not currently active.

• hide-all: hides all scratchpads, useful mostly when stacking multiple of them.

• kill-all: closes all scratchpad clients that are open.

• reload: re-parses the configuration file without restarting the daemon.

• get-config: prints out the parsed configuration.

• kill: kills the hyprscratch daemon.

• logs: shows logs.

Optional Configuration File

If you consider it more convenient to use a separate configuration file, you can create a ~/.config/hypr/hyprscratch.conf or ~/.config/hyprscratch/config.conf and configure scratchpads in the following way:

name {
#Mandatory fields
title = title                        
command = command

#Optional fields
options = option1 option2 option3
rules = rule1;rule2;rule3
}

And in hyprland.conf:

exec-once = hyprscratch init

bind = $mainMod, t, hyprscratch toggle name
bind = $mainMod, s, hyprscratch show name
bind = $mainMod, h, hyprscratch hide name

Other Relevant Information

To find the title needed for a scratchpad, run hyprctl clients and check the initialTitle field. An incorrect title results in the scratchpad not being hidden and a new one being spawned every time.

To group multiple scratchpads together, bind them to the same key and use cover and persist on all of them.

Terminal applications often all use the title of the terminal emulator. Usually the title can be set with the --title flag to differentiate them.

If there are multiple scratchpads with the same title, the program just grabs the first one it finds.