BACKSTEP(1)

📦 version 0.3, in ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble

💖 BACKSTEP(1) 💖

okay bestie, gather round, because today we're talking about backstep — the little program that draws icons for minimized windows on your desktop. yes. on the desktop. like it's 2006 and we're thriving. 🦋

✨ NAME ✨

backstep — Backstep is a program that draws icons for minimized windows on your desktop.

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

backstep [options]...

💅 DESCRIPTION 💅

okay so Backstep is a program that draws icons for minimized windows on your desktop. and the way it does it?? it does not depend on your window manager, and it does not depend on a desktop-drawing program either (for example, the author uses it with Nautilus). it's meant to work with window managers that are EWHM compliant.

but fr fr, here's the tea: the author only knows for sure that it works with Metacity and Xfwm4. and they also know it doesn't work with Fluxbox, and that it only partially works with Kwin (hopefully this will be corrected soon 👀). it hasn't been tested with other window managers yet. so like, vibe check your WM first, bestie.

ngl, drawing icons for minimized windows on the desktop might be considered a step backwards by many people (hence the name 😭 iconic honestly), but the author finds it useful to identify minimized windows by position rather than by name. and honestly? that's valid.

🎀 FEATURES 🎀

  1. Simple to use. You do not have to configure anything — just run 'backstep'. that's it. that's the whole setup. periodt. ✨
  2. Session management support — at least to the extent that backstep adds itself to the session so that it will be started automatically the next time you log in to your desktop environment. it just. shows up. main character energy. 👑
  3. Grouping. Windows can be grouped together (by right clicking on their icons and selecting a group) so that when one window from the group is shown or hidden, all windows in the group are shown or hidden. it's giving ✨squad goals✨ — they move as a unit.
  4. Configurable. You can make some adjustments to the way the icons look. this is done through a simple configuration dialog launched by right-clicking on an icon. cute, right? 🎀

🔥 OPTIONS 🔥

  • -?, --help — Show these help options
  • -c, --client=ID — Client id for session management
  • -n, --no-daemon — Do not run as a daemon
  • -v, --version — output version information and exit
  • --display=DISPLAY — X display to use

💜 AUTHOR 💜

Backstep was written by Christopher Carroll <christopher@salbot.com>.

This manual page was written by Mario Limonciello <superm1@gmail.com>, for the Ubuntu project (but may be used by others). 🫶

and that's the whole page, bestie!! 🌈 this manual page is dated September 27, 2006, and it lives in the BACKSTEP(1) section of the manual, so if you ever forget where you found it, it's right there waiting for you like a lil bookmark. 💖 mwah, go draw some icons. 🧚

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