xscreensaver-getimage(6x)

📦
version 6.17 · 7 versions
, in fedora 44

💖 xscreensaver-getimage 💖

okay bestie, so this is xscreensaver-getimage, part of the XScreenSaver manual family — it's the little helper that loads a randomly-selected image onto an X11 Drawable so your screen savers have something pretty to play with. 🦋✨

✨ NAME ✨

xscreensaver-getimage — loads a randomly-selected image onto an X11 Drawable for use by screen savers 💅

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

xscreensaver-getimage [--display host:display.screen] [--verbose]
window-id [pixmap-id]

🎀 DESCRIPTION 🎀

So xscreensaver-getimage is a helper program for the xscreensaver hacks that manipulate images. Like, it's the backstage crew, not the main character. 🫶

It picks a random image and puts it on the window or pixmap you told it about. And what kind of image, you ask? Could be:

  • a snapshot of the desktop 📸
  • a frame captured from the system's video input 🎥
  • a randomly-selected image from disk 🖼️

If you only give it a window ID, the image gets painted right there. 🎨

If you give it both a window ID and a pixmap ID, then the image gets painted on the pixmap, and heads up — the window may get modified as a side-effect. not me casually altering your window as a lil treat 💀

✨ OPTIONS ✨

xscreensaver-getimage reads the ~/.xscreensaver file for its configuration info. Here's the settings it cares about:

  • grabDesktopImages — Whether it's acceptable to grab snapshots of the desktop. The security-paranoid girlies might wanna turn this off, so people can't see your desktop while the screen is locked. (They still can't touch it, bestie, just peek. 👀)
  • grabVideoFrames — Whether it's acceptable to grab frames of video from the system's video input. This grabbing is done by invoking the xscreensaver-getimage-video(6x) program. 🎬
  • chooseRandomImages — Whether it's acceptable to display random images found on disk. The selecting and loading of those images is handled by invoking the xscreensaver-getimage-file(6x) program. 🔍
  • imageDirectory — When loading images from disk, this is the directory to find them in. And yes, it searches that directory recursively for images, she's thorough. 🌲

It can also be the URL of an RSS or Atom feed, in which case a random image from that feed gets selected instead. The contents of the feed get cached locally and refreshed periodically as needed. 📡

okay so if none of those three options — grabDesktopImages, grabVideoFrames, chooseRandomImages — are set to True, then video colorbars get displayed instead. not the vibe you wanted probably but here we are. 🌈

💀 BUGS 💀

When grabbing desktop images, the window argument will be unmapped and have its contents modified, which causes flicker. 😭

Lowkey important: this does not happen when loading image files or video frames. So it's just a desktop-grab thing. 🙈

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

X(1), xscreensaver(1) xscreensaver-settings(1) xscreensaver-getimage-file(6x) xscreensaver-getimage-video(6x)

Copyright © 2001-2021 by Jamie Zawinski. Permission to use, copy, modify, distribute, and sell this software and its documentation for any purpose is hereby granted without fee, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation. No representations are made about the suitability of this software for any purpose. It is provided "as is" without express or implied warranty.

🌟 AUTHOR 🌟

Jamie Zawinski <jwz@jwz.org>, 14-Apr-2001

X Version 11 · 6.17-1.fc44 · (13-Oct-2026) — mwah, that's the version and date bestie, go forth and grab those images 💅💖✨

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