asclock(1x)

💖 NAME 💖

okay so real quick, bestie: asclock is the AfterStep clock. that's the whole name section, she's lowkey modest, but keep reading because the rest is so much.

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

asclock [ -help] [-12 | -24] [-shape]
        [-position [+|-]x[+|-]y]
        [-exe program]
        [-theme dir]
        [-led color]
        [-noblink]
        [-dock]
        [-version]

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

so asclock is a clock, right, but not just any clock — it was written to emulate the date/time application on the NEXTSTEP(tm) operating system. it's giving retro desktop main character energy and honestly? iconic.

and she's multilingual too 🦋 — asclock supports multiple languages, both military time and AM/PM time formats, program execution (yes she can launch stuff for you), and the shape extension to X-Windows. she does it all, no cap.

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💅 CONFIGURATION OPTIONS 💅

here's the full menu of things you can tell her to do. every single one, we're not skipping anybody 🫶

• -help — prints the usage message, which looks exactly like this:

usage:  asclock [-options ...]
where options include:
    -12                     12 hour format
    -24                     24 hour format
    -exe <program>          program to start on click
    -led <color>            color of the led
    -position [+|-]x[+|-]y  position of asclock
    -shape                  without groundplate
    -theme <dir>            theme directory
    -noblink                don't blink
    -dock                   without window decorations
    -version                show version information

• -12 or -24 — sets the desired time format to either twelve hour with AM/PM (-12) or military time (-24). and listen, if you don't pick either one? military time is the default. she just goes ahead and picks for you, queen behavior.
• -shape — turns on shaped window support for asclock. when this is on, the asclock windows will only appear to be the led and date pad. by default shaped windows are turned off and the clock will appear on a 64 pixel by 64 pixel base. so you're either a cute little silhouette or a square, no in-between.
• -led <color> — specifies the color of the led. to find out what colors are available, try showrgb(1) (part of X11). go pick something cute ✨
• -position [+|-]x[+|-]y — specifies the starting position of asclock. the [+|-] works like the standard X-Windows x/y geometry option. classic, we love a familiar syntax.
• -exe <program> — specifies the application to start when the pointer is activated over asclock. to invoke applications with parameters, you have to set quotes around the command. see the example below... 👀 (there really is an example below, we're getting there)
• -noblink — specifies if asclock should blink. yes bestie, that's literally the description. make of it what you will 💀
• -theme <dir> — specifies the theme to used. a theme consists of a directory containing 8 xpms and a position file called 'config'. read the Themes section. yes, go read it, it's right there ⬇️
• -dock — tells the window manager not to put window decorations around asclock, useful for docking with Window Maker. ⚠️ note that in several window managers this causes asclock to ignore the position specified with -position (if present). so like, she might just do her own thing, and that's on the window manager.
• -version — show version information. she'll tell you who she is 🌈

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🎀 INVOCATION 🎀

asclock can be called from one of many ways. the most common invocation is the command line:

[user@host] ~% asclock -12 -exe 'xlock -mode hop' &

another way to call asclock is from the window manager:

*Wharf - - MaxSwallow "asclock"    asclock -theme shape -12&

this line, when placed in the .steprc file in the users home directory, will cause asclock to use the shape extensions so that it will be a button on the Wharf (1) button bar under the afterstep (1) window manager. ✨ look at her, she's a button now, she's networking.

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🦋 THEMES 🦋

a theme consists of a directory containing 8 xpms and a position file called 'config'. all tiles within the same xpm must have the same width or height, except the colon which has half the width of the other digits. (colon out here being a whole different size, we respect the range 🙈)

the pixmaps are called:

• clock.xpm
• date.xpm
• led.xpm
• month.xpm
• weekday.xpm
• hour.xpm
• minute.xpm
• second.xpm

for a full description of the format, take a look at README.THEMES. 📖

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💀 BUGS 💀

we don't have bugs :)

(that's a direct quote, bestie. she said what she said. no cap.)

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👑 COPYRIGHTS 👑

Copyright 1996, Beat Christen <bchriste@iiic.ethz.ch>. No guarantees or warranties or anything are provided or implied in any way whatsoever. Use this program at your own risk. Permission to use this program for any purpose is given, as long as the copyright is kept intact.

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🫶 AUTHORS 🫶

• Beat Christen <bchriste@iiic.ethz.ch> — application
• Dan Weeks <dan@mango.sfasu.edu> — man page

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okay that's the whole thing, you're officially an asclock expert now, no notes 💖

this was brought to you by the 3rd Berkeley Distribution, dated 23 July 1996, filed under asclock(1x). mwah 💋 periodt.