XLOCK(1)

✨ NAME ✨

okay so this is XLOCK(1), the manual for xlock — and its whole thing is: locks the local X display until a password is entered. That's the vibe. Bestie, it's giving "screen lock from the before-times" but make it Unix 💅.

🔒 SYNOPSIS 🔒

xlock [ -help ] [ -version ] [ -resources ] [ -display displayname ] [
       -visual visualname ] [ -name resourcename ] [ -mode modename ] [ -delay
       usecs ] [ -batchcount num ] [ -count num ] [ -cycles num ] [ -ncolors
       num ] [ -size num ] [ -saturation value ] [ -erasemode modename ] [
       -erasedelay usecs ] [ -/+allowaccess ] [ -vtlock modename ] [ -/+nolock
       ] [ -/+inwindow ] [ -/+inroot ] [ -/+remote ] [ -/+mono ] [ -/+allowroot
       ] [ -/+debug ] [ -/+description ] [ -/+echokeys ] [ -echokey echokey ] [
       -/+enablesaver ] [ -/+resetsaver ] [ -/+grabmouse ] [ -/+grabserver ] [
       -/+install ] [ -/+mousemotion ] [ -/+sound ] [ -/+showdate ] [
       -/+timeelapsed ] [ -/+usefirst ] [ -/+verbose ] [ -nice level ] [
       -lockdelay seconds ] [ -timeout seconds ] [ -xkblockgroup layout ] [
       -font fontname ] [ -planfont fontname ] [ -bg color ] [ -fg color ] [
       -background color ] [ -foreground color ] [ -username string ] [
       -password string ] [ -info string ] [ -validate string ] [ -invalid
       string ] [ -geometry geom ] [ -icongeometry geom ] [ -glgeometry geom ]
       [ -/+wireframe ] [ -/+showfps ] [ -fpsfont fontname ] [ -/+fpstop ] [
       -/+use3d ] [ -delta3d value ] [ -none3d color ] [ -right3d color ] [
       -left3d color ] [ -both3d color ] [ -program programname ] [
       -messagesfile formatted-filename ] [ -messagefile filename ] [ -message
       string ] [ -messagefont fontname ] [ -bitmap filename ] [ -cpasswd
       crypted-password ] [ -forceLogout minutes ] [ -logoutButton minutes ] [
       -logoutButtonLabel textstring ] [ -logoutButtonHelp textstring ] [
       -logoutFailedString textstring ] [ -/+dtsaver ] [ -/+xinerama ] [
       -modulepath path ] [ -locksound string ] [ -infosound string ] [
       -validsound string ] [ -invalidsound string ] [ -startCmd string ] [
       -endCmd string ] [ -pipepassCmd string ] [ -logoutCmd string ]

🫶 DESCRIPTION 🫶

so xlock locks the X server till the user enters their password at the keyboard. While xlock is running, all new server connections are refused. The screen saver is disabled. The mouse cursor is turned off. The screen is blanked and a changing pattern is put on the screen. If a key or a mouse button is pressed then the user is prompted for the password of the user who started xlock.

If the correct password is typed, then the screen is unlocked and the X server is restored. When typing the password Control-U and Control-H are active as kill and erase respectively. To return to the locked screen, click in the small icon version of the changing pattern. 🖱️✨

In the lower part of the password screen a text is displayed. This message is taken from the first file of the following that exists: $HOME/.xlocktext, $HOME/.plan, or $HOME/.signature.

On systems which support new BSD style authentication, the password may be prefixed by an authentication style followed by a colon (i.e. "style:password"). See the login.conf(5) for more information on authentication styles.

💅 NOTE ON ETIQUETTE 💅

Xlock should not be used on public terminals when there is a high demand for them. Like, read the room, bestie.

If you find a public terminal that has been locked by another user and there are no other terminals available, and the terminal appears to have been left idle for a while (normally more than 15 minutes), it is fair to try to reset the session in some manner.

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

okay, option time — one bullet each, no skipping, no invented features, periodt.

• -help — Print options and a brief description to standard output.
• -version — Print version number (if >= 4.00) to standard output.
• -resources — Print default resource file to standard output.
• -display displayname — The display option sets the X11 display to lock. xlock locks all available screens on a given server, and restricts you to locking only a local server such as unix:0, localhost:0, or :0 unless you set the -remote option.
• -visual visualname — visualname is one of "StaticGray", "GrayScale", "StaticColor", "PseudoColor", "TrueColor", "DirectColor", or "default". default used to set the screen's default visual (the visual of the root window).
• -name resourcename — resourcename is used instead of XLock when looking for resources to configure xlock.
• -mode modename — As of this writing there are over 90 display modes supported (plus one more for random selection of one of these).

🦋 the -mode modes 🦋

• anemone — Shows wiggling tentacles. 🪸
• ant — Shows Langton's and Turk's generalized ants. 🐜
• ant3d — Shows 3D ants. 🐜
• apollonian — Shows Apollonian circles. ⭕
• atlantis — Shows moving sharks/whales/dolphin. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🦈
• atunnels — Advance GL tunnels screensaver. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🚇
• ball — Shows bouncing balls. ⚽
• bat — Shows bouncing flying bats. 🦇
• bevel — Shows an auto-solving Bevel or Helicopter Cube. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🧩
• blot — Shows Rorschach's ink blot test. 🖤
• bouboule — Shows Mimi's bouboule of moving stars. ⭐
• bounce — Shows bouncing footballs. 🏈
• boxed — Shows GL's boxed balls. 📦
• braid — Shows random braids and knots. 🎀
• bubble — Shows popping bubbles. 🫧
• bubble3d — Shows Richard Jones's GL bubbles. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🫧
• bug — Shows Palmiter's bug evolution and a garden of Eden. 🐛
• clock — Shows Packard's oclock. 🕰️
• coral — Shows a coral reef. 🪸
• crystal — Shows polygons in 2D plane groups. 💎
• daisy — Shows a meadow of daisies. 🌼
• dclock — Shows a floating digital clock or message. ⏰
• deco — Shows art as ugly as sin. 🎨
• demon — Shows Griffeath's cellular automata. 😈
• dilemma — Shows Lloyd's Prisoner's Dilemma simulation. 🤝
• dino — Shows an auto-solving Dinosaur Cube. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🦕
• discrete — Shows various discrete maps. 🗺️
• dragon — Shows Deventer's Hexagonal Dragons Maze. 🐉
• drift — Shows cosmic drifting flame fractals. 🔥
• cage — Shows the Impossible Cage, an Escher-like GL scene. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🪤
• epicycle — Shows points moving around a circles recursively. 🌀
• euler2d — Shows a simulation of 2D incompressible inviscid fluid. 🌊
• eyes — Shows eyes following a bouncing grelb. 👀
• fadeplot — Shows a fading plot of sine squared. 📉
• fiberlamp — Shows a Fiber Optic Lamp. 💡
• fire — Shows a 3D fire-like image. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔥
• flag — Shows a waving flag image. This may be text or a graphic image. Default text is the hostname and operating system. 🏳️
• flame — Shows cosmic flame fractals. 🔥
• flow — Shows dynamic strange attractors. 🌪️
• forest — Shows binary trees of a fractal forest. 🌲
• fzort — Shows a metallic-looking fzort. ✨
• galaxy — Shows crashing spiral galaxies. 🌌
• gears — Shows GL's gears. May not be available depending on how it was configured. ⚙️
• glplanet — Animates texture mapped sphere (planet) 🪐
• goop — Shows goop from a lava lamp. 🫠
• grav — Shows orbiting planets. 🪐
• helix — Shows string art. 🧵
• hop — Shows real plane iterated fractals. 🌀
• hyper — Shows spinning n-dimensional hypercubes. 🧊
• ico — Shows a bouncing polyhedron. 🔷
• ifs — Shows a modified iterated function system. 🧮
• image — Shows randomly appearing logos. 🖼️
• juggle — Shows a Juggler, juggling. 🤹
• juggle — Shows a 3D Juggler, juggling. 🤹
• julia — Shows the Julia set. 🌿
• kaleid — Shows Brewster's Kaleidoscope. 🔭
• kumppa — Shows kumppa. 🌀
• laser — Shows spinning lasers. 🔦
• life — Shows Conway's game of life. 🧬
• life1d — Shows Wolfram's game of 1D life. 🧬
• life3d — Shows Bays' game of 3D life. 🧬
• lightning — Shows Keith's fractal lightning bolts. ⚡
• lisa — Shows animated lissajous loops. 🎀
• lissie — Shows lissajous worms. 🐛
• loop — Shows Langton's self-producing loops. 🔁
• mandelbrot — Shows mandelbrot sets. 🌀
• marquee — Shows text. 📝
• matrix — Shows the matrix. 🟩
• maze — Shows a random maze and a depth first search solution. 🧩
• mball — Shows an auto-solving Masterball puzzle. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔮
• moebius — Shows the Moebius Strip II, an Escher-like GL scene with ants. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🐜
• molecule — Draws molecules, based on coordinates from PDB (Protein Data Base) files. 🧪
• morph3d — Shows GL morphing polyhedra. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔷
• mountain — Shows Papo's mountain range. 🏔️
• munch — Shows munching squares. 🟪
• noof — Shows SGI Diatoms. 🔬
• nose — Shows a man with a big nose runs around spewing out text. 👃
• oct — Shows an auto-solving octahedron puzzle. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔶
• pacman — Shows Pacman(tm). 🟡
• paterson — Shows Paterson's Worm Paths. 🪱
• penrose — Shows Penrose's quasiperiodic tilings. 🔷
• petal — Shows various GCD Flowers. 🌸
• petri — Shows a mold simultation in a petri dish 🧫
• pipes — Shows a self-building pipe system. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🧩
• polyominoes — Shows attempts to place polyominoes into a rectangle. 🟦
• puzzle — Shows a puzzle being scrambled and then solved. 🧩
• pyraminx — Shows an auto-solving Pyraminx puzzle. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔺
• pyro — Shows fireworks. 🎆
• pyro2 — Shows other fireworks. 🎇
• qix — Shows spinning lines a la Qix(tm). 🌀
• roll — Shows a rolling ball. 🔴
• rain — Shows rain. 🌧️
• rotor — Shows Tom's Roto-Rooter. 🌀
• rubik — Shows an auto-solving Rubik's Cube. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🧊
• sballs — Shows balls spinning like crazy in GL. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🔮
• scooter — Shows a journey through space tunnel and stars. 🚀
• shape — Shows stippled rectangles, ellipses, and triangles. 🔺
• sierpinski — Shows a Sierpinski's triangle. 🔺
• sierpinski3d — Shows a Sierpinski's gasket. 🔺
• skewb — Shows an auto-solving Skewb. May not be available depending on how it was configured. 🧩
• slip — Shows slipping blits. 🌀
• solitaire — Shows Klondike's game of solitaire. 🃏
• space — Shows a journey into deep space. 🚀
• sphere — Shows a bunch of shaded spheres. 🔵
• spiral — Shows a helical locus of points. 🌀
• spirolateral — Shows Odds' Spirolaterals. 🔲
• spline — Shows colorful moving splines. 🌈
• sproingies — shows Sproingies! 🫧 Nontoxic. Safe for pets and small children. May not be available depending on how it was configured.
• squiral — shows spiral-producing automata. 🌀
• stairs — shows Infinite Stairs, an Escher-like GL scene. 🪜 May not be available depending on how it was configured.
• star — shows a star field with a twist. ⭐
• starfish — shows starfish. 🌟
• strange — shows strange attractors. 🦋
• superquadrics — shows 3D mathematical shapes. 🔷 May not be available depending on how it was configured.
• swarm — shows a swarm of bees following a wasp. 🐝
• swirl — shows animated swirling patterns. 🍥
• t3d — shows a Flying Balls Clock Demo. 🕒
• tetris — shows an autoplaying tetris game. 🧱
• text3d | text3d2 — shows 3D moving texts. 🔤
• thornbird — shows an animated Bird in a Thorn Bush fractal map. 🐦
• tik_tak — shows rotating polygons. 🔺
• toneclock — shows Peter Schat's toneclock. 🎼
• triangle — shows a triangular mountain range. ⛰️
• tube — shows an animated tube. 🧪
• turtle — shows turtle fractals. 🐢
• vines — shows fractal-like vines. 🌿
• voters — shows Dewdney's Voters. 🗳️
• wator — shows Dewdney's Water-Torus planet of fish and sharks. 🐟🦈
• wire — shows a random circuit with 2 electrons. ⚡
• world — shows spinning Earths. 🌍
• worm — shows wiggly worms. 🪱
• xjack — shows Jack having one of those days. 😵‍💫
• xcl — shows a Control Line combat model race. ✈️
• blank — shows nothing but a black screen. Does not show up in random mode. ⬛
• bomb — shows a bomb and will autologout after a time. 💣 Does not show up in random mode and may be available depending on how it was configured.
• random — shows a random mode from above except blank (and bomb). 🎲
• -delay usecs — the delay option sets the speed at which a mode will operate. It simply sets the number of microseconds to delay between batches of animations. In blank mode, it is important to set this to some small number of seconds, because the keyboard and mouse are only checked after each delay, so you cannot set the delay too high — but a delay of zero would needlessly consume cpu checking for mouse and keyboard input in a tight loop, since blank mode has no work to do. ⏱️
• -count num — the batchcount option sets number of things to do per batch to num. Here’s the mode-by-mode lore, bestie 👇
  • In anenome mode it means nothing.
  • In ant and ant3d modes this refers the number of ants.
  • In apollonian mode it is the number of possible ways to embed circles within a circle, all of integer curvature.
  • In atlantis mode it is the number of sharks.
  • In atunnels mode it is means nothing.
  • In ball mode it is the number of balls.
  • In bat mode it is the number of bats, could be less because of conflicts.
  • In bevel mode it is the number of moves.
  • In blot mode this refers to the number of pixels rendered in the same color.
  • In bouboule mode it is the number of stars.
  • In bounce mode it is the number of balls, could be less because of conflicts.
  • In braid mode it is the upper bound number of strands.
  • In bubble mode it is the number of bubbles.
  • In bubble3d mode it is the number of bubbles.
  • In bug mode it is the number of bugs, could be less because of conflicts.
  • In cage mode it is means nothing.
  • In clock mode it is the percentage of the screen, but less than 100%.
  • In coral mode it is the number of seeds.
  • In crystal mode it is the number of polygons.
  • In daisy mode it is the number flowers that make a meadow.
  • In dclock mode it means nothing.
  • In deco mode it is the depth.
  • In demon mode this refers the number of colors.
  • In dilemma mode this refers the number of initial defectors.
  • In dino mode it is the number of moves.
  • In discrete mode it is the number of points.
  • In drift mode it is the number of levels to recurse (larger = more complex).
  • In dragon mode it means nothing.
  • In epicycle mode it is the recursive depth.
  • In euler2d mode it is the number of segments.
  • In eyes mode it is the number of eyes.
  • In fadeplot mode it is the number of steps.
  • In fiberlamp it is the number of fibers.
  • In fire mode it is the number of fire particles (set it to 0 to have rain).
  • In flag mode it means nothing.
  • In flame mode it is the number of levels to recurse (larger = more complex).
  • In flow mode it is the number of bees.
  • In forest mode it is the number trees that make a forest.
  • In fzort mode it means nothing.
  • In galaxy mode it means the number of galaxies.
  • In gears mode it is the number of degrees to rotate the set of gears by.
  • In glplanet mode it is the number of hundredth degrees to roll the planet by.
  • In goop mode it is the number of blobs per plane.
  • In grav mode it is the number of planets.
  • In helix mode it means nothing.
  • In hop mode this refers to the number of pixels rendered in the same color.
  • In hyper mode it is the number of dimensions.
  • In ico mode it is the ith platonic solid.
  • In ifs mode it means nothing.
  • In image mode it means it is the number of logos on screen at once.
  • In juggle mode it is time in milliseconds between a throw and the next catch.
  • In juggler3d mode it is time in milliseconds between a throw and the next catch.
  • In julia mode it is the depth of recursion.
  • In kaleid mode it is the number of pens.
  • In kumppa mode it means nothing.
  • In lament mode it means nothing.
  • In laser mode it is the number lasers.
  • In life and life3d modes it is the number of generations before a glider is introduced.
  • In life1d mode it means nothing.
  • In lisa mode it is the number of loops.
  • In lissie mode it is the number of worms.
  • In loop mode it is the number of flaws.
  • In mandelbrot mode it is the order.
  • In marquee mode it means nothing.
  • In matrix mode it means nothing.
  • In maze mode it means nothing.
  • In mball mode it is the number of moves.
  • In moebius mode it is means nothing.
  • In molecule mode it means nothing.
  • In morph3d mode it is the ith platonic solid.
  • In mountain mode it is the number of mountains.
  • In munch mode it means nothing.
  • In noof mode it means nothing.
  • In nose mode it means nothing.
  • In qix mode it is the number of points.
  • In oct mode it is the number of moves.
  • In pacman mode it means the number of ghosts.
  • In paterson mode it means the number of worms.
  • In penrose mode it means nothing.
  • In petal mode it is the greatest random number of petals.
  • In petri mode it means nothing.
  • In pipes mode it shows different joints, 0 random, 1 spherical, 2 bolted elbow, 3 elbow, and 4 alternating.
  • In polyominoes mode it means nothing.
  • In puzzle mode it is the number of moves.
  • In pyraminx mode it is the number of moves.
  • In pyro mode it is the maximum number flying rockets at one time.
  • In pyro2 mode it is means nothing.
  • In rain mode it is means nothing.
  • In roll mode it is the number of points.
  • In rotor mode it is the number of rotor thingys which whirr...
  • In rubik mode it is the number of moves.
  • In sballs mode it is the number of spheres.
  • In scooter mode it is the number of doors.
  • In shape mode it means nothing.
  • In sierpinski mode it is the number of points.
  • In skewb mode it is the number of moves.
  • In slip mode it means nothing.
  • In solitaire mode it means nothing.
  • In space mode it is the number of stars.
  • In sphere mode it means nothing.
  • In spiral mode it is the number of spirals.
  • In spirolateral mode it is the number of angle divisions.
  • In spline mode it is the number of points "splined".
  • In sproingies mode it is the number of sproingies.
  • In siral mode it is the number of spirals.
  • In stairs mode it is means nothing.
  • In star mode it is the number of stars on the screen at once.
  • In starfish mode it means nothing.
  • In strange mode it means nothing.
  • In superquadrics mode its the number of horizontal and vertical lines in the superquadric.
  • In swirl mode it means the number of "knots".
  • In swarm mode it is the number of bees.
  • In t3d mode it means nothing.
  • In tetris mode it means nothing.
  • In text3d mode it means nothing.
  • In thornbird mode it is the number of points.
  • In triangular mode it is the number of mountains.
  • In tube mode it is a rectangle (= 1), an ellipse (= 2), or a polygon if greater.
  • In turtle mode it means nothing.
  • In vines mode it is draw a complete vine (= 0) or a portion (= 1).
  • In voters mode it means the number of parties, 2 or 3.
  • In wator mode it means the breed time for the fish.
  • In wire mode it means the length of the circuit.
  • In world mode it is the number of worlds.
  • In worm mode it is the number of worms.
  • In xcl mode it represents the number of planes.
  • In xjack mode it means nothing.
  • In blank mode it means nothing.
  • In bomb mode it means the number of minutes to autologout.

A negative count allows for randomness. The range from the minimum allowed nonnegative count for a particular mode to the ABS(count) (or maximum allowed count, whichever is less). 🎲

• -batchcount num — the batchcount option is deprecated but should still work as count. 💅
• -cycles num — okay so this sets the number of cycles until timeout for ant, ant3d, apollonian, blot, braid, bug, clock, crystal, daisy, deco, demon, dilemma, discrete, dragon, epicycle, eyes, fiberlamp, flag, flow, forest, galaxy, helix, hop, hyper, ico, juggle, juggler3d, laser, life, life1d, life3d, lisa, lissie, loop, mandelbrot, mountain, paterson, petal, sierpinski, shape, spline +erase, t3d, thornbird, triangle, tube, voters, wator, and wire. For atlantis it is the shark speed, for bevel it is the number of steps to complete a 180 degree move, for dino it is the number of steps to complete a move of 120 or 180 degrees, for euler2d and worm it is the length of the lines, for fadeplot, julia, and spiral it is the length of the trail of dots, for munch it is the minimum size of the squares, for kaleid it is the % of black, for qix it is the number of lines, for spline -erase it means the number of splines * 64 (for compatibility with +erase), for gears it is the number of degrees to increment the spin of each gear by, for glplanet it is the number of hundredth degrees to rotate the planet by, for mball it is the number of steps to complete a turn, for molecule it is the time in seconds until timeout, for oct it is the number of steps to complete a move of 90 or 120 degrees, for pipes it is the number of systems to draw before clearing the screen, for pyraminx it is the number of steps to complete a move of 120 or 180 degrees, for rubik it is the number of steps to complete a 90 degree move, for sballs it is the sphere speed value, for scooter it is the speed, for skewb it is the number of steps to complete a 120 degree move, for spirolateral it is the incremental order, for superquadrics it is the number of frames it takes to morph from one shape to another. for text3d it is the number of times drawing a word before the next one, For others it means nothing. ✨
• -size num — sets the size maximum size of a star in bouboule, pyro, and star, size of ball in ball and bounce, size of bat in bat, maximum size of bubble in bubble, size of clock in clock, minimum size of rectangles in deco, size of the polygons in crystal, tik_tak, and toneclock, size of polyhedron in ico, size of lissie in lissie, size of dots of flag, for kaleid it is the symmetry, width of maze hallway, size of side of penrose tile, radius of loop in lisa, radius of ball in roll, number of corners in sierpinski, number of stars in scooter, size of tube in tube, width of worm in worm, line width in rotor, size of cells in ant, bug, dilemma, dragon, life, life1d, pacman, petri, tetris, voters, wator, and wire. In pipes it is the maximum length of a system. In flow and swarm it is the length of the lines. In atlantis it is the shark size. In mball it is the number of bands. In pyraminx, oct, and rubik it is size the puzzle. A negative number allows for randomness, similar to count. In atunnels, fire, gears, sballs, and sproingies it is the size of the screen (default 400), this is because on many slow systems it runs too slow when the picture covers the full screen. Set to 0 for full screen on fast machines. 💅
• -ncolors num — sets the maximum number of colors to be used. 🎨
• -saturation value — sets saturation of the color ramp used to value. 0 is grayscale and 1 is very rich color. 0.4 is a nice pastel. 🌸
• -erasemode modename — as of this writing there are over 12 erase modes supported (if its not chosen its assumed random). The erase modes are random_lines, random_squares, venetian, triple_wipe, quad_wipe, circle_wipe, three_circle_wipe, squaretate, fizzle, spiral, slide_lines, losira, no_fade. modename is now similar to the option modelist where you can it can be something like "all-losira" to get all erasemodes but losira. Use a + or a , to add modes like "spiral+venetian". 🌀
• -erasedelay usecs — sets the number of microseconds for steps of the erasemode (a setting of 0 and the erasemode is bypassed). ⏱️
• +/-nolock — the nolock option causes xlock to only draw the patterns and not lock the display. A key press or a mouse click will terminate the screen saver. 👀
• -/+inwindow — runs xlock in a window, so that you can iconify, move, or resize it and still use your screen for other stuff. When running in a window, xlock no longer locks your screen, it just looks good. 🪟
• -/+inroot — runs xlock in your root window. Like the inwindow option it no longer locks the screen, it just looks good. 🌈
• -/+remote — tells xlock to not stop you from locking remote X11 servers. This option should be used with care and is intended mainly to lock X11 terminals which cannot run xlock locally. If you lock someone else's workstation, they will have to know your password to unlock it. Using +remote overrides any resource derived values for remote and prevents xlock from being used to lock other X11 servers. (Use + instead of - to override resources for other options that can take the + modifier similarly.) 🫶
• -/+mono — causes xlock to display monochrome, (black and white) pixels rather than the default colored ones on color displays. 🖤🤍
• -/+allowaccess — this option is required for servers which do not allow clients to modify the host access control list. It is also useful if you need to run x clients on a server which is locked for some reason... When allowaccess is true, the X11 server is left open for clients to attach and thus lowers the inherent security of this lock screen. A side effect of using this option is that if xlock is killed -KILL, the access control list is not lost. 🔓
• -vtlock modename — this option is used on a XFree86 system to manage VT switching in [off|noswitch|switch|restore] mode.
  • off — means no VT switch locking.
  • switch — means VT switch locking + switching to xlock VT when activated.
  • restore — means VT switch locking + switching to xlock VT when activated + switching back to previous VT when deactivated.
  • noswitch — means VT switch locking only when xlock VT is active.
• -/+allowroot — allows the root password to unlock the server as well as the user who started xlock. May not be able to turn this on and off depending on your system and how xlock was configured. 👑
• -/+debug — allows xlock to be debugged by doing all but locking the screen. 🐛
• -/+description — causes xlock to show a mode description above the password window. The default is to show this description. 📝
• -/+echokeys — the echokeys option causes xlock to echo '?' characters (default) for each key typed into the password prompt. Some consider this a security risk, so the default is to not echo anything. 😭 yes bestie, the page says both — we keep both.
• -echokey echokey — the text character to use for echo key in echokeys. ⌨️
• -/+enablesaver — by default xlock will disable the normal X server's screen saver since it is in effect a replacement for it. Since it is possible to set delay parameters long enough to cause phosphor burn on some displays, this option will turn back on the default screen saver which is very careful to keep most of the screen black. 🔥
• -/+resetsaver — by default xlock will call XResetScreenSaver. This may be undesirable with DPMS monitors. 🖥️
• -/+grabmouse — causes xlock to grab the mouse and keyboard, this is the default. xlock can not lock the screen without this. 🖱️
• -/+grabserver — causes xlock to grab the server. This is not usually needed but some insecure X servers can be defeated without this. 🛡️
• -/+install — allows xlock to install its own colormap if xlock runs out of colors. May not work on with some window managers (fvwm) and does not work with the -inroot option. 🎨
• -/+mousemotion — allows you to turn on and off the sensitivity to the mouse to bring up the password window. 🐭
• -/+sound — allows you to turn on and off sound if installed with the capability. 🔊
• -/+showdate — allows you to turn on and off the date on password window. On by default. 📅
• -/+timeelapsed — allows you to find out how long a machine is locked so you can complain to an administrator that someone is hogging a machine. ⏳
• -/+usefirst — causes xlock to use the keystroke which got you to the password screen as the first character in the password. The default is to ignore the first key pressed. ✨
• -/+verbose — verbose mode, tells what options it is going to use. 🗣️
• -nice nicelevel — sets system nicelevel of the xlock process to nicelevel. 🌼
• -lockdelay seconds — sets the number of seconds before the screen needs a password to be unlocked. Good for use with an autolocking mechanism like xautolock(1). 🔒
• -timeout seconds — sets the number of seconds before the password screen will time out. ⏰
• -font fontname — sets the font to be used on the prompt screen. 🔤
• -planfont fontname — sets the font to be used for the text that is displayed in the lower part of the password screen. ✍️
• -fg color — sets the color of the text on the password screen to color. 🎀
• -bg color — sets the color of the background on the password screen to color. 🖌️
• -foreground color — sets the color of the text on the password screen to color. 💖
• -background color — sets the color of the background on the password screen to color. 🌷
• -username string — text string is shown in front of user name, defaults to "Name: ". 🪪
• -password string — text string is the password prompt string, defaults to "Password: ". 🔑
• -info string — text string is an informational message to tell the user what to do, defaults to "Enter password to unlock; select icon to lock.". 💬
• -validate string — text string is a message shown while validating the password, defaults to "Validating login...". 🧚
• -invalid string — okay so this is the text string shown when the password is invalid, and it defaults to "Invalid login." 💅
• -geometry geom — sets geom as the size and offset of the lock window (normally the entire screen). The entire screen format is still used for entering the password. The whole point is to see the screen even though it’s locked. Use this with caution, because many modes will fail if the windows are far from square or are too small (size must be greater than 0x0). This should also be used with -enablesaver to protect the screen from phosphor burn. 🫶
• -icongeometry geom — sets geom as the size of the iconic screen (normally 64x64) seen when entering the password. Use with caution too, because many modes will fail if the windows are far from square or too small (size must be greater than 0x0). The greatest size is 256x256. There should be some limit so users could see who has locked the screen. Position information of the icon is ignored. ✨
• -glgeometry geom — sets geom as the size of the screen for gl modes. Not normally available or needed. 🦋
• -/+wireframe — turns wireframe on/off. Available on ant3d, atlantis, atunnels, daisy, fire, gears, lament, life3d, mountain, sballs, sproingies, superquadrics, and triangle. 💀
• -/+showfps — turns the frame per sec display on/off. Available on atlantis, atunnels, bevel, dino, bubble3d, cage, fire, gears, invert, lament, moebius, morph3d, mball, oct, pyraminx, rubik, sballs, skewb, stairs, and superquadrics. 🔥
• -/+fpstop — turns the frame per sec display on top of the screen on/off, used if showfps is on. ⭐
• -fpsfont fontname — sets the font used in the frame per sec display, used if showfps is on. 🎀
• -/+use3d — turns 3d view on/off. Available on bouboule, pyro, star, and worm. 🌈
• -delta3d value — space between the center of your 2 eyes for 3d mode. 👀
• -none3d color — color used for empty size in 3d mode. 💜
• -right3d color — color used for the right eye in 3d mode. 💙
• -left3d color — color used for the left eye in 3d mode. 💚
• -both3d color — color used for overlapping images for the left and right eye in 3d mode. 🩷
• -program programname — sets the program to be used as the fortune generator. Currently used only for marquee and nose modes. 🍓
• -messagesfile formatted-filename — sets the file to be used as the fortune generator. The first entry is the number of fortunes, and the next line contains the first fortune. Fortunes begin with a "%%" on a line by itself. Currently used only for marquee and nose modes. If one exists, it takes precedence over the fortune program. 🧚
• -messagefile filename — sets the file whose contents are displayed. Currently used only for marquee and nose modes. If one exists, it takes precedence over the fortune program and messagesfile. 🌸
• -message textstring — sets the text to be displayed in a mode. Currently used only for flag, marquee, and nose modes. If one exists, it takes precedence over the fortune program, messagesfile, and message. 💖
• -messagefont fontname — sets the font to be used in the mode. Currently used only for flag, marquee, and nose modes. ✨
• -bitmap filename — sets the xbm, xpm, or ras file to be displayed with flag, image, life, life1d, maze, or puzzle mode. For eyes and pacman, only an xbm file is accepted. Certain modes reject the bitmap if it’s too big. / 🦋

MORE OPTIONS (these may not be available) 💅

• -cpasswd crypted-password — sets the key to be this text string to unlock xlock instead of the password file. 🔐
• -forceLogout minutes — sets minutes to auto-logout. ⏳
• -logoutButton minutes — sets minutes to logoutButton is available on the password screen. 🚪
• -logoutButtonLabel string — text string is a message shown inside the logout button when the logout button is displayed. Defaults to "Logout". 🎀
• -logoutButtonHelp string — text string is a message shown outside the logout button when the logout button is displayed. Defaults to "Click the \"Logout\" button to log out current\n user and make workstation available." 🫶
• -logoutFailedString string — text string is a message shown when a logout is attempted and fails. Defaults to "Logout attempt FAILED.\n Current user could not be automatically logged out." 😭
• -/+dtsaver — turns CDE Saver Mode on/off. This option is only available if CDE support was compiled in. 🖥️
• -/+xinerama — turns Xinerama on/off. This option is only available if Xinerama support was compiled in. 🌈
• -modulepath path — sets the directories that xlock searches for mode modules to load. It is a colon separated list of directories to search. If %S is included in the path, it is replaced by the default modulepath. To add a private module directory to the default path, use something like '%S:~/mymoduledir' as the path. This option is only available if module support was compiled in. 🧩
• -locksound string — text string references the sound to use at lock time. Default sound, male voice: "Thank you, for your cooperation." 🔊
• -infosound string — text string references the sound to use for information. Default sound, male voice: "Identify please." 🗣️
• -validsound string — text string references the sound to use when a password is valid. Default sound, female voice: "Complete." ✅
• -invalidsound string — text string references the sound to use when a password is invalid. Default sound, female voice: "I am not programmed to give you that information." ❌
• -startCmd string — text string command to execute when the screen is locked. Commonly used instructions include: "zaway". This command, if still running when the screensaver exits, will be killed. 🚀
• -endCmd string — text string command to execute when the screen is unlocked. 🏁
• -pipepassCmd string — text string command into which to pipe the password when the screen is unlocked. 🫧
• -logoutCmd string — text string command to execute when the program logs the user out (either via the autologout or by pressing the logout button). 🚪
• -mailCmd string — text string command to execute when the program checks mail. 📬
• -mailIcon string — text string of the file for the "mail arrived" bitmap. 💌
• -nomailIcon string — text string of the file for the "no mail" bitmap. 📭
• -dpmsstandby seconds — allows one to set DPMS Standby for the monitor (0 is defined as infinite). (Horizontal sync on, Vertical sync off, RGB guns off, power supply on, tube filaments energized, (screen saver mode). Typical 17 inch screen... 110 out of 120 watts with a 3 sec recovery time.) This option is only available if DPMS support was compiled in. Minimum timeout is 5 seconds. 🔌
• -dpmssuspend seconds — allows one to set DPMS Suspend for the monitor (0 is defined as infinite). (Horizontal sync off, Vertical sync on, RGB guns off, power supply off, tube filaments energized. Typical 17 inch screen ... 15 out of 120 watts with a 3 sec recovery time.) This option is only available if DPMS support was compiled in. Minimum timeout is 5 seconds. 🔌
• -dpmsoff seconds — allows one to set DPMS Power Off for the monitor (0 is defined as infinite). (Horizontal sync off, Vertical sync off, Small auxiliary circuit stays on to monitor the HS/VS signals to enable power on when data needs to be displayed on the screen. Typical 17 inch screen ... 5 out of 120 watts with a 10 sec recovery time.) This option is only available if DPMS support was compiled in. Minimum timeout is 5 seconds. 🔌

SPECIAL MODE DEPENDENT OPTIONS 🎀

• -neighbors num — sets the number of neighbors of a cell to 3, 4, 6, 9 (may not have real mathematical meaning), or 12 for several automata modes (ant, bug, demon, dilemma, life, loop, voters, wator, and wire) (bug and loop do not span this full range). Setting it to 0 typically randomizes this, except where bitmaps are used (dilemma, life, voters, and wator). 🧬
• -/+eyes — turns eyes on/off for ant, ant3d, and bug. 👀
• -/+cycle — turns colour cycling on/off in crystal, lyapunov, mandelbrot, starfish, swirl, tetris, tik_tak, toneclock, and tube. 🌈
• -/+label — turns alternate space and number labeling on/off in apollonian. For ant and ant3d, this turns the labeling of the rule on/off. For life and life3d, this turns the labeling of the pattern name and rule on/off. 🏷️
• -/+serial — turns sequential allocation of colors on/off in kaleid. For life and life3d, this turns the picking of sequential patterns on/off (to be used with the middle button of the mouse). 🖱️
• -/+trackmouse — turns mouse interaction on/off in eyes, fire, julia, solitaire, sballs, swarm, and tetris. For maze, pacman, solitaire, and tetris, this may not be available depending on how xlock was configured. 🐭
• -/+texture — turns texturing on/off in fire, lament, and sballs. This may not be available depending on how xlock was configured. 🧵
• -rule <rule> — the rule string is defined as B<neighborhood>/S<neighborhood> for life and life3d. Special parameters: P picks a random rule from all rules that have known patterns; G picks a random rule from all rules that have known gliders. For life, a good example is Conway’s rule, which is B3/S23. Others are B36/S23 and B3678/S34678. For life3d, good examples are Bay’s rules, which are B5/S45, B6/S567, B5/S56, and B67/S67. The rule string is defined as a binary string (requires at least one 1 and one 0) for ant, and a base 4 (or quadranary) string (requires 3 of 4 digits to be represented) for ant3d. Here, a special parameter, T and then a number, will pick a specific table. 🧠
• -lifefile filename — sets the life and life3d lifeform. Only one format is currently supported, similar to the #P xlife format. For life3d, 2 linefeeds in a row are assumed to advance the depth. 🧬
• -arms num — allows one to set the number of arms in anemone. 🐙

okay bestie we're still deep in the option mines ⛏️💖 no brakes, keep scrolling — every single one of these is real and every single one matters.

• -finpoints num — sets how wide the arms are in anemone 🌀
• -width num — sets the final number of points in each array of anemone
• -withdraws num — sets the withdraw frequency in anemone
• -turnspeed num — sets the turning speed in anemone (she spins, you decide how fast 💫)
• -/+truchet — turns Truchet lines (trail) on/off in ant 🐜
• -/+altgeom — turns alternate geometries on/off in apollonian mode — off is euclidean space, on includes spherical and hyperbolic 🌐
• -whalespeed num — sets the speed of the whales and dolphin in atlantis 🐋
• -/+boil — turns on/off having the bubbles bubble up in bubble 🫧
• -nx num — sets the number of unit cells in the x-direction in crystal
• -ny num — same but for the y-direction in crystal
• -/+centre — turns centering on screen on/off in crystal 🎯
• -/+maxsize — turns centering on screen on/off in crystal (yes, the original really does say "centering on screen" for both — not me, I'm just the messenger 🙈)
• -/+cell — turns drawing of the unit cell on/off in crystal
• -/+grid — turns drawing of the grid of unit cells on/off (only if -cell is on) in crystal 🔲
• -/+garden — turns the garden look off and on in daisy 🌼 (the flipped order is theirs, not mine, iykyk)
• -/+binary — turns the binary clock on/off in dclock ⏰
• -/+led — turns the led clock on/off in dclock
• -/+popex — turns the population explosion counter on/off in dclock 💥
• -/+forest — turns the tropical deforest (hectares/acres) counter on/off in dclock 🌴
• -/+hiv — turns the HIV infection counter on/off in dclock
• -/+lab — turns the Animal Research counter on/off in dclock 🐁
• -/+veg — turns the Animal Consummation counter on/off in dclock
• -/+y2k — turns the Year 2000 countdown on/off in dclock
• -/+millennium — turns the Second Millennium (January 1, 2001) countdown on/off in dclock 🎉
• -bonus value — sets the bonus for cheating... between 1.0 and 4.0 in dilemma 😈 (the ellipsis is canon, bestie)
• -/+conscious — turns self-awareness off and on in dilemma (again: off/on, that's the order they wrote it) 🧠
• -/+grow — turns growing fractals on/off for drift — when it's off they're animated instead 🌱
• -/+liss — turns using lissajous figures to get points on/off for drift ✨
• -/+fog — turns fog on/off for fire 🔥
• -/+shadows — turns shadows on/off for fire
• -trees num — validates the displaying of trees for fire if it's greater than zero 🌲
• -/+invert — turns inverting of the flag on/off 🏳️
• -/+rotate — turns rotating around the attractor on/off in flow 🌀
• -/+ride — turns rideing on/off in the flow (their spelling, and honestly? iconic) 🎢
• -/+box — turns the bounding box on/off in flow 📦
• -/+periodic — turns periodic attractors on/off in flow
• -/+search — turns the search for new attractors on/off in flow 🔍
• -/+dbuf — turns double buffering on/off in flow
• -/+tracks — turns star tracks on/off in galaxy ⭐
• -/+light — turns lighting of the planet on/off for glplanet 💡
• -/+bounce — turns bouncing movement of the planet on/off for glplanet 🏀
• -pimage filename — uses the named xbm or xpm file for texturing the planet in glplanet; use BUILTIN as the filename for the builtin image taken from Xearth 🌍
• -/+roll — turns rolling of the planet on/off for glplanet
• -/+rotate — turns rotation of the planet on/off for glplanet (yes, a second -/+rotate, different mode, keep both 💅)
• -/+texture — turns texturing of the planet on/off for glplanet 🎨
• -/+stars — turns showing stars in the background on/off for glplanet ✨
• -/+decay — turns decaying orbits on/off for grav 🪐
• -/+trail — turns the decaying trail of dots on/off for grav
• -/+ellipse — turns ellipse format on/off in helix
• -/+martin — turns Barry Martin's square root hop on/off
• -/+popcorn — turns Clifford A. Pickover's popcorn hop on/off 🍿
• -/+ejk1...ejk6 — turns Ed J. Kubaitis' hops on/off (all six of them, slay)
• -/+rr — turns Renaldo Recuerdo's hop on/off
• -/+jong — turns Jong's hop on/off
• -/+sine — turns Barry Martin's sine hop on/off 〰️
• -pattern <pattern> — sets the pattern for juggle 🤹
• -tail num — Minimum Trail Length for juggle
• -/+real — turns real-time juggling on/off for juggle. Deprecated. There should be no need to turn off real-time juggling, even on slow systems — adjust speed using -count instead ⚠️
• -/+describe — turns pattern descriptions on/off in juggle
• -/+balls — turns Balls on/off in juggle 🔴
• -/+clubs — turns Clubs on/off in juggle 🏏
• -/+torches — turns Flaming Torches on/off in juggle 🔥
• -/+knives — turns Knives on/off in juggle 🔪
• -/+rings — turns Rings on/off in juggle 💍
• -/+bballs — turns Bowling Balls on/off in juggle 🎳
• -/+planetary — turns planetary gears on/off in gears ⚙️
• -planetsize num — sets the size of the screen for the planetary option in gears; this is for machines with slower CPU (set to 0 for full screen)
• -/+disconnected — turns disconnected pen movement on/off in kaleid 🖊️
• -/+alternate — turns alternate rotated display mode on/off in kaleid
• -/+quad — turns quad mirrored/rotated mode on/off, similar to size 4 in kaleid
• -/+oct — turns oct mirrored/rotated mode on/off, similar to size 8 in kaleid
• -/+linear — turns Cartesian/Polar coordinate mode on/off in kaleid 📐
• -/+conway — turns John Conway's original Life rule B3/S23 on/off in life 🧬
• -/+highlife — turns David Bell's HighLife rule B36/S23 on/off in life
• -/+daynight — turns Nathan Thompson's Day and Night rule B3678/S34678 on/off in life 🌗
• -/+callahan — turns Paul Callahan's B2o/S2m34 hexagonal life on/off
• -/+andreen — turns Bob Andreen's B2o3o4m/S2om4o hexagonal life on/off
• -/+trilife — turns Carter Bays' B45/S34 triangular life on/off 🔺
• -/+trilife1 — turns Carter Bays' B456/S45 triangular life on/off
• -/+trilife2 — turns Carter Bays' B45/S23 triangular life on/off
• -/+totalistic — turns totalistic rules on/off for life1d; if this is off it follows the rules of the LCAU collection, and those rules may not be symmetric and are more general 🧮
• -/+additive — turns additive functions mode on/off in lisa
• -/+dissolve — turns disolving state on/off in loop (yep, "disolving" — copying it exactly, bestie 🫠)
• -/+evolve — turns Evolving Loops on/off in loop 🦋
• -/+langton — turns Langton Loops on/off for loop
• -/+sheath — turns sheath extension on/off for loop
• -/+wrap — turns wrapping of borders on/off for loop 🎁
• -increment num — sets the option for increasing orders in mandelbrot
• -/+alpha — turns interior displaying level of closest return on/off in mandelbrot
• -/+binary — turns binary decomposition color modulation on/off in mandelbrot
• -/+dem — turns Distance Estimator Method on/off (instead of escape time) in mandelbrot 📏
• -/+index — turns interior displaying iteration of closest return on/off in mandelbrot
• -/+lyap — turns interior displaying according to an estimate of the Lyapunov exponent on/off in mandelbrot
• -/+pow — turns adding z^z on/off in mandelbrot ⚡
• -/+sin — turns adding sin(z) on/off in mandelbrot
• -/+noants — turns ants off and on in moebius 🐜
• -/+solidmoebius — turns the solid Mobius strip on/off in moebius 🎀
• -/+atoms — turns the drawing of spheres for the atoms on/off in molecule ⚛️
• -/+bbox — turns showing the molecules in a blue box on/off in molecule 🟦
• -/+bonds — turns the drawing of the atomic bonds on/off in molecule
• -molecule filename — reads a molecule structure from a pdb file in molecule 🧪
• -/+labels — turns the labeling of the atoms on/off in molecule 🏷️
• -spin{x|y|z} — sets the axis for molecule rotation in molecule; the default is "XYZ"
• +spin — turns off the molecule rotation in molecule (note: no minus, just +spin — that's the whole point 🛑)
• -/+titles — turns the molecule description on/off in molecule
• -/+wander — turns the moving of the molecule on a sinusoid curve on/off in molecule — and (as written on the same line) turn on and off movements in fire 🌀
• -/+ammann — turns lines on/off for penrose 📏
• -increment value — allows fine adjustments to order in mandelbrot
• -/+erase — turns erasing on/off for spline; if this option is on, cycles is divided by 64 to compute the number of lines, so as to be compatible when using -fullrandom 🧽
• -factory num — Number of extra factory parts in pipes 🏭
• -/+fisheye — turn on if you want a zoomed-in view of pipes 🐟
• -/+tightturns — turn on if you want the pipes to bend more often in pipes 🪢
• -/+rotatepipes — turn on if you want the pipe system rotated in pipes 🔄
• -/+complete — turn complete graph morphing on or off in qix
• -msg textstring — lets you pass different explosion elements to pyro2; the explosion type is one of &0, &1, ... &9, &a, ... &f, each of which presents a different type of explosion. Normal text can be sent, and the string may contain blanks if quoted. An operation system logo will be shown if the # sign is sent 💥
• -fnt font — lets you pass different elements to pyro2 🔤
• -size[xyz] num — the number represents the number of cubies on the x, y, or z axis; negative numbers offer randomness from 2 to the absolute value of the number. star. 🎲
• -/+hideshuffling — turns hidden shuffle phase on or off for bevel, dino, mball, oct, pyraminx, rubik and skewb 🎩
• -/+border — turns borders on or off in shape
• -/+shadowing — turns shadowing on or off in shape
• -/+stippling — turns stippling on or off in shape ✏️
• -intensity value — sets the brightness (default 2185) of the sierpinski structure for sierpinski3d 💡
• -maxdepth value — sets the maximum depth (up to 10) of the sierpinski structure for sierpinski3d 🕳️
• -speed value — determines after how much steps the depth changes for sierpinski3d ⏩
• -sharpness num — random by default, will give sharper turns if possible for spirolateral 📐
• -trek num — if it's a high number you will see the space ship all the time in star 🚀

still with me? iconic. more coming 💅

okay so we are still in the special-mode-dependent-options zone, bestie — carry on, no heading repeat needed, just vibes and flags ✨

• -/+rock — Turn on and off rocks for star. If this is off, stars will be seen instead. ⭐
• -/+straight — Turn on if star gets you motion sick. 🌀
• -cyclepeed num — Set speed of cycling in starfish. (yes, it's spelled cyclepeed, keep it exactly like that 💅)
• -rotation num — Set rotation velocity in starfish.
• -thickness num — Set thickness in starfish.
• -/+rock — yes, again — this one turns on and off blob for starfish. 🫧
• -curve num — Set the curve factor of the attractors for strange.
• -points num — Change the number of points/iterations each frame for strange.
• -point-size num — Change the size of individual points for strange.
• -zoom float — Zoom in or out for strange. 🔍
• -brightness float — Adjust the brightness for accumulator mode for strange.
• -motion-blur float — Adds motion blur for strange.
• -spinspeed num — Set speed of rotation, in degrees per frame for superquadrics.
• -/+bonus — Turn on in tetris to see 5 square bonus pieces. 🎁
• -/+well — Turn on in tetris to see welltris.
• -ttfont filename — Sets the True Type font file (or font directory) used for text3d.
• -extrusion num — Sets length of the text extrusion for text3d.
• -rot_amplitude float — Sets rotation amplitude value of each letter for text3d.
• -rot_frequency float — Sets rotation frequency for text3d.
• -/+no_split — Turn on and off word splitting for text3d.
• -ttanimate function_name — Sets the animation function used for text3d. Currently one of : Random FullRandom Default Default2 None Crazy UpDown Extrude RotateXY RotateYZ Frequency Amplitude
• -speed km/h — The speed for all planes in km/h for xcl. ✈️
• -frametime microseconds — The time for one frame on the screen. This time is used to calculate the delay time and depends on the speed of the X server for xcl.
• -line_length mm — The distance between the pilot and the plane for xcl.
• -spectator mm — The distance between spectator and pilot. It should be grater than the line_length and the half wing width of the plane to be not dangerous for the spectator for xcl. (yes, grater — leave it, bestie 🧀)
• -viewmodel — Shows an animated view of one model for xcl.
• -/+oldcolor — Sets the colors for the first two planes fixed to red and yellow in xcl. 🔴🟡
• -xcldebug — Shows some additional timing information to make sure that the calibrate procedure goes right in xcl.
• -automatic — The auto scale for automatic fit into the window is Deactivated with this option for xcl.
• -randomstart — Use a random start point for models at startup for xcl.
• -duration seconds — Allows one to set a duration for a mode in random. Duration of 0 is defined as infinite. ♾️
• -/+fullrandom — Turn on/off randomness options within modes in random. Not implemented for all mode options.
• -modelist textstring — Allows one to pass a list of files to randomly display to random. "all" will get all files but blank (and bomb if compiled in). "all,blank" will get all modes. "all,-image bounce,+blank" will get all modes excluding image and bounce modes. "bug wator" will get only bug and wator. "allgl" will get only the GL modes if compiled in, all-allgl will get all excluding the GL modes, "allnice" will weed out high cpu usage modes (as well as hackers and gl modes). "allxpm" will get all modes that use xpm. "allwrite" will get all modes that take advantage of writable colormaps (not including xpm). "all3d" will get all the modes that support this option. "allmouse" will get all the modes that support mouse interaction. Similarly, "allautomata" for automata modes, "allfractal" for fractal modes, "allgeometry" for geometry modes, "allspace" for space modes. The random mode itself can not be referenced. 🧠
• -/+sequential — Turn on non-random random option.

---

⚠️ WARNING ⚠️

real talk, bestie — xlock can appear to hang if it is competing with a high-priority process for the CPU. For example, if xlock is started after a process with 'nice -20' (high priority), xlock will take considerable amount of time to respond. 💀

🕵️ SHADOW PASSWORDS 🕵️

If the machine is using a shadow password system, then xlock may not be set up to get the real password and so must be given one of its own. This can be either on the command line, via the -cpasswd option, or in the file $HOME/.xlockrc, with the first taking precedence. In both cases an encrypted password is expected (see makekey(8)). If neither is given, then xlock will prompt for a password and will use that, also storing an encrypted version of it in $HOME/.xlockrc for future use. 🔐

🔑 XLOCK AND SSH-AGENT 🔑

If you use ssh-agent(1) to avoid entering a passphrase every time you use one of your ssh(1) private keys, it's good security practice to have ssh-agent forget the keys before you leave your terminal unattended. That way, an attacker who takes over your terminal won't be able to use your private ssh keys to log in to other systems. Once you return to your terminal, you can enter the passphrase and re-add the keys to ssh-agent. There are a couple of ways in which xlock can help to automate this process. Firstly, the startCmd option allows xlock to be configured to run ssh-add -D every time you lock the screen, so that your keys are automatically deleted from ssh-agent. If the passphrase on your ssh keys is the same as your password, then xlock can also be made to re-add the keys to ssh-agent when you unlock the screen, via the pipepassCmd option. This requires a bit of scripting, as the command must read your password from standard input and then automate the interaction with ssh-add to re-add the keys. There is an example of such a script in the xlock distribution - see etc/xlockssh* 🫶

💀 BUGS 💀

"kill -KILL xlock " causes the server that was locked to be unusable, since all hosts (including localhost) were removed from the access control list to lock out new X clients, and since xlock could not catch SIGKILL, it terminated before restoring the access control list. This will leave the X server in a state where:

"you can no longer connect to that server, and this operation cannot be reversed unless you reset the server." -From the X11R4 Xlib Documentation, Chapter 7.

NCD terminals do not allow xlock to remove all the hosts from the access control list. Therefore you will need to use the -remote and -allowaccess switches. If you happen to run without -allowaccess on an NCD terminal, xlock will not work and you will need to reboot the terminal, or simply go into the SETUP menus, under 'Network Parameters', and turn off TCP/IP access control. 😭

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

X(1), Xlib Documentation. that's it, that's the list ✨

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Maintained by: David A. Bagley, <bagleyd AT verizon.net>

The latest version is currently at:

https://www.sillycycle.com/xlock/

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/X11/screensavers/

Original Author:

Patrick J. Naughton, <naughton AT eng.sun.com>

Mailstop 21-14

Sun Microsystems Laboratories, Inc.

Mountain View, CA 94043

415/336-1080

with many additional contributors. 💖

📜 COPYRIGHT 📜

Copyright (c) 1988-1991 by Patrick J. Naughton

Copyright (c) 1993-2024 by David A. Bagley

Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation.

This file is provided AS IS with no warranties of any kind. The author shall have no liability with respect to the infringement of copyrights, trade secrets or any patents by this file or any part thereof. In no event will the author be liable for any lost revenue or profits or other special, indirect and consequential damages.

The original BSD daemon is Copyright (c) 1988 Marshall Kirk McKusick. All Rights Reserved.

DEC, HP, IBM, Linux, SCO, SGI, and Sun icons have their respective copyrights.

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this whole iconic page is from X11R6 Contrib, dated 20 Oct 2025, and it's officially XLOCK(1) — periodt, bestie 💅✨