COMPTON-TRANS(1)

📦
version 1 · 5 versions
, in ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

✨ COMPTON-TRANS(1) ✨

okay bestie, gather round, we're talking about compton-trans 💖

🦋 NAME 🦋

compton-trans — an opacity setter tool. yes, it makes your windows see-through. no, it's not a filter, it's the real deal 💅

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

compton-trans [-w WINDOW_ID] [-n WINDOW_NAME] [-c] [-s] OPACITY

that's it. that's the whole mood. 🎀

💜 DESCRIPTION 💜

so compton-trans is a bash script — literally just a script, no cap — that sets the _NET_WM_WINDOW_OPACITY attribute of a window, and it does it using the standard X11 command-line utilities you already have, including xprop(1) and xwininfo(1). 🫶

it's basically the same energy as transset(1) or transset-df(1). iykyk. ✨

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

  • -w WINDOW_ID — tell it the window id of the target window, bestie. you know exactly which one you mean.
  • -n WINDOW_NAME — give it a window name and it'll try to match that name. (try! it's doing its best 🥺)
  • -c — target the currently active window instead. lowkey only works if the EWMH _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW property actually exists on the root window, so if it ghosts you, that's why 💀
  • -s — pick the target window with your mouse cursor 🖱️✨. this is the default if you didn't specify a window any other way.
  • -o OPACITY — the new opacity value for the window, babes. it can be anywhere from 1 to 100. and here's the iconic part: if you prefix it with a plus or minus (+/-), it'll increment or decrement from the target window's current opacity instead of setting it outright. math but make it fashion 🔥

🌈 EXAMPLES 🌈

  1. set the opacity of the window with a specific window ID to 75% — periodt:
compton-trans -w "$WINDOWID" 75
  1. set the opacity of the window named "urxvt" to 75%:
compton-trans -n "urxvt" 75
  1. set the current window to an opacity of 75%:
compton-trans -c 75
  1. select a target window and set its opacity to 75%:
compton-trans -s 75
  1. increment the opacity of the current active window by 5%:
compton-trans -c +5
  1. decrement the opacity of the current active window by 5%:
compton-trans -c -- -5
not me pointing out that -- in example 6 👀 it's there so the -5 doesn't get read as a flag, and it slays 🫶

💀 BUGS 💀

found a bug? please report any bugs you find to https://github.com/chjj/compton . do not suffer in silence, bestie, that's not the vibe 🙈

👑 AUTHORS 👑

Christopher Jeffrey (https://github.com/chjj). an icon, honestly. 💅

💖 SEE ALSO 💖

compton(1), xprop(1), xwininfo(1) — go read these too, they're giving main character energy ⭐

and that's a wrap, gorgeous 🌸 this one's from the compton source, version nightly-20121114, dated 01/14/2026. go forth and make your windows translucent, you absolute legend 🎀✨🦋

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