NAME
feh - image viewer and cataloguer
SYNOPSIS
feh [options] file ...
DESCRIPTION
feh is an image viewer using the imlib2 library to open and manipulate
images. It has a large number of operational modes. The default mode is
an image slideshow, showing one image at a time from those specified on
the command line. Keys and mouse control may be used to move through
them. Other modes can be specified on the commandline, and are described
below.
feh can also recurse through a directory structure to form a filelist for
processing, and will convert directory names on the commandline into a
list of their contents automatically.
Filelists can be sorted in a number of ways. The default is the order in
which the files were specified on the commandline, or the order in which
they were read from the disk. You can specify sorting modes such as
randomize or you can sort by filename, image name, width, height, pixels,
etc. Filelists can also be saved to or loaded from files.
MODES
Montage mode forms a montage from the filelist. The resulting image can
be viewed or saved, and its size can be limited by height, width or both.
Collage mode is very similar to montage mode, except the images are
distributed randomly and may overlap each other.
Index mode forms an index print from the filelist. Image thumbnails are
shown along with the filename, filesize and pixel size, printed using a
truetype font of your choice. The resulting image can be viewed or
saved, and its size can be limited by height, width or both.
Thumbnail mode is like index mode, but the mini-images are clickable and
open the selected image in a new window.
Multiwindow mode shows images in multiple windows, instead of as a
slideshow in one window. Don’t use with a large filelist ;)
Fullscreen mode shows images in fullscreen view. Can be combined with a
slide-change delay to show an automated presentation.
List mode doesn’t display images. Outputs an ls - style listing of the
files in the filelist, including image info such as size, pixels, type,
etc. Customlist mode will display whatever image info you want, in the
format you choose.
feh can also list either all the loadable files in a filelist or all the
unloadable files. Useful for preening a directory.
feh also has the ability to load files via http or ftp, simply specify
the url on the commandline.
feh can read options from the commandline, or from a config file. The
syntax is the same in each case. See CONFIG FILE SYNTAX for details
about using themes defined in a config file. These methods may be used
in conjunction.
OPTIONS
-A, --action action
Specify a string as an action to perform on the image. In
slideshow or multiwindow modes, the action will be run when the
enter key is pressed, in list mode, the action will be run for
each file listed. In loadables/unloadables mode, the action will
be run for each loadable/unloadable file, respectively. The
action will be executed by /bin/sh. Use format specifiers to
refer to image info. See FORMAT SPECIFIERS for examples. E.g.
"feh -A mv ~/images/%n *". In slideshow mode, the next image
will be shown after running the action, in multiwindow mode, the
window will be closed.
--action1 .. --action9
Extra actions which can be set and triggered using the appropiate
number key.
-Z, --auto-zoom
Zoom pictures to screen size in fullscreen (affected by --stretch
and --ignore-aspect).
--bg-center file
Set file as centered desktop background
--bg-fill file
Like --bg-scale, but preserves aspect ratio by zooming the image
until it fits. Either a horizontal or a vertical part of the
image will be cut off.
--bg-scale file
Set file as scaled desktop background. This will fill the whole
background with file, but its aspect ratio will not be preserved.
--bg-seamless file
Like --bg-tile, but with blurry corners so that it is (in some
cases ;-)) less obvious that the image is too small for the
screen.
--bg-tile file
Set file as desktop background, tiled if necessary. feh can use
enlightenment IPC if you are running it, or it will fall back to
X methods. feh stores the commandline necessary to restore the
background in ~/.fehbg. So to have your background restored when
you restart X, add the line "‘cat ~/.fehbg‘" to your X startup
script (e.g. ~/.xinitrc). Note that you only need to do this for
non E window managers.
-x, --borderless
Create borderless windows.
-Q, --builtin
Use builtin HTTP client to grab remote files instead of wget(1).
--cache-thumbnails
Enable (experimental) thumbnail caching in ~/.thumbnails. Only
works with thumbnails <= 256x256 pixels.
--caption-path path
Path to directory containing image captions. This turns on
caption viewing, and if captions are found in path, which is
relative to the directory of each image, they are overlayed on
the displayed image. E.g. with caption path "captions/", and
viewing image "images/foo.jpg", the caption will be looked for in
"images/captions/foo.jpg.txt".
-c, --collage
Enable collage mode. Collage mode is very similar to montage
mode, except the images are distributed randomly. When using
collage mode, you should also specify --limit-width and
--limit-height.
-L, --customlist format
Use format (printf-like string containing image info specifiers)
for list output. See FORMAT SPECIFIERS.
--cycle-once
Exit feh after one loop through the slideshow.
--draw-actions
Draw the defined actions and what they do at the top-left of the
image.
-d, --draw-filename
Draw the filename at the top-left of the image.
-f, --filelist file
This option is similar to the playlists used by music software.
If file exists, it will be read for a list of files to load, in
the order they appear. The format is a list of image filenames,
absolute or relative to the current directory, one filename per
line. If file doesn’t exist, it will be created from the
internal filelist at the end of a viewing session. This is best
used to store the results of complex sorts (-Spixels for example)
for later viewing. Any changes to the internal filelist (such as
deleting a file or it being pruned for being unloadable) will be
saved to file when feh exits. You can add files to filelists by
specifying them on the commandline when also specifying the list.
-C, --fontpath path
Specify path as extra directory in which to search for fonts; can
be used multiple times to add multiple paths.
-I, --fullindex
Same as Index mode, but you also get image size and dimensions
printed below each thumbnail.
-F, --full-screen
Make the window fullscreen.
-g, --geometry width x height
Limit (and don’t change) the window size. Takes an X-style
geometry string like 640x480. Note that larger images will be
zoomed out to fit but you can see them at 1:1 by clicking the
zoom button.
-h, --help
display help output and exit.
--hide-pointer
Hide the pointer (useful for slideshows etc).
-B, --image-bg style
Use style as background for transparent image parts and the like.
Accepted values: white, black, default.
-i, --index
Enable Index mode. Index mode is similar to montage mode, and
accepts the same options. It creates an index print of
thumbails, printing the image name beneath each thumbnail. Index
mode enables certain other options, see INDEX MODE OPTIONS.
--index-dim bool
Toggle showing image dimensions in thumbnail/index mode.
--index-name bool
Toggle showing the filename in thumbnail/index mode.
--index-size bool
Toggle showing the filesize in thumbnail/index mode.
-k, --keep-http
When viewing files using HTTP, feh normally deletes the local
copies after viewing, or, if caching, on exit. This option
prevents this so that you get to keep the local copies. They
will be in /tmp with "feh" in the name.
-l, --list
Don’t display images. Analyse them and display an ls(1) - style
listing. Useful in scripts to hunt out images of a certain
size/resolution/type etc.
-U, --loadable
Don’t display images. Just print out their names if imlib2 can
successfully load them.
-), --menu-bg file
Use file as background image in menus.
--menu-border int
Specify number of pixels that define the menu background’s
border. Borders are not stretched when images are scaled.
-M, --menu-font font
Use font (truetype, with size, like "yudit/12") as menu font.
--menu-style file
Read file to determine menu style.
-m, --montage
Enable montage mode. Montage mode creates a new image consisting
of a grid of thumbnails of the images in the filelist. When
montage mode is selected, certain other options become available.
See MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS.
-w, --multiwindow
Disable slideshow mode. With this setting, instead of opening
multiple files in slideshow mode, multiple windows will be
opened; one per file.
--no-jump-on-resort
Don’t jump to the first image after resorting the filelist.
-N, --no-menus
Don’t load or show any menus.
--no-xinerama
Disable Xinerama support. Only makes sense when you have
Xinerama support compiled in.
-j, --output-dir directory
Save files to directory (only useful with -k)
-p, --preload
Preload images. This doesn’t mean hold them in RAM, it means run
through them and eliminate unloadable images first. Otherwise
they will be removed as you flick through. This also analyses
the images to get data for use in sorting, such as pixel size,
type etc. A preload run will be automatically performed if you
specify one of these sort modes.
-q, --quiet
Don’t report non-fatal errors for failed loads. Verbose and
quiet modes are not mutually exclusive, the first controls
informational messages, the second only errors.
-z, --randomize
When viewing multiple files in a slideshow, randomize the file
list before displaying.
-_, --rcfile file
Use file to parse themes and options from, instead of the default
~/.fehrc, /etc/fehrc files.
-r, --recursive
Recursively expand any directories in the commandline arguments
to the content of those directories, all the way down to the
bottom level.
-R, --reload int
Reload images after int seconds. Mainly useful when viewing
webcams via http.
-n, --reverse
Reverse the sort order. Use this to invert the order of the
filelist. E.g. to sort in reverse width order, use -nSwidth.
-., --scale-down
When not in fullscreen: Scale images to screen size if they are
too big.
--screen-clip bool
Disable/Enable screen clipping based on window size. With this
disabled, windows may become very large, making them unmanageable
in certain window managers.
-D, --slideshow-delay float
For slideshow mode, wait float seconds between automatically
changing slides. Useful for presentations. Specify a negative
number to set the delay (which will then be float * (-1)), but
start feh in paused mode.
-S, --sort sort_type
The file list may be sorted according to image parameters.
Allowed sort types are: name, filename, width, height, pixels,
size, format. For sort modes other than name or filename, a
preload run will be necessary, causing a delay proportional to
the number of images in the list.
-|, --start-at filename
Start the filelist at filename. See USAGE EXAMPLES.
-T, --theme theme
Load options from config file with name theme - see CONFIG FILE
SYNTAX for more info. Note that options from the theme file
always override commandline options.
-t, --thumbnails
Same as Index mode, but the thumbnails are clickable image
launchers.
-~, --thumb-title string
Set title for windows opened from thumbnail mode. See also
FORMAT SPECIFIERS.
-^, --title title
Set window title for slideshow mode.
-u, --unloadable
Don’t display images. Just print out their names if imlib2 can
NOT successfully load them.
-V, --verbose
output useful information, progress bars, etc.
-v, --version
output version information and exit.
-G, --wget-timestamp
Don’t add a timestamp ("?1234") to URLs when (re)loading them.
--zoom percent
Zoom images by percent when in full screen mode or when window
geometry is fixed. When combined with --auto-zoom, zooming will
be limited to the specified percent.
BUTTON OPTIONS
-0, --reload-button int
Set button to reload the image (default: 0).
-1, --pan-button int
Set button to pan the image (hold button down and move mouse to
move the image). When the mouse is not moved, advances to the
next image in slideshow mode. (default: 1, usually the left
button).
-2, --zoom-button int
Set button to enable zoom mode (default: 2, usually the middle
button).
-3, --menu-button int
Set button to activate the menu. (default: 3, usually the right
button).
--menu-ctrl-mask
Require CTRL+Button for menu activation.
-4, --prev-button int
Set button to switch to the previous image in slideshow mode
(default: 4, usually 〈mousewheel up〉).
-5, --next-button int
Set button to switch to the next image in slideshow mode
(default: 5, usually 〈mousewheel down〉).
-8, --rotate-button int
Use CTRL+Button to rotate the current image (default: 2).
--no-rotate-ctrl-mask
Don’t require CTRL+Button for rotation - just use the button.
-9, --blur-button int
Use CTRL+Button for blurring (default: 1).
--no-blur-ctrl-mask
Don’t require CTRL+Button for blurring - just use the button.
MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS
-a, --alpha int
When drawing thumbnails onto the background, set their
transparency level to int (0 - 255).
-b, --bg file | trans
Use file as background for your montage. With this option
specified, the montage size will default to the size of file if
no size restrictions were specified. Alternatively, if file is
"trans", the background will be made transparent.
-X, --ignore-aspect
By default, the montage thumbnails will retain their aspect
ratios, while fitting into thumb-width/-height. This options
forces them to be the size set by --thumb-width and
--thumb-height. This will prevent any empty space in the final
montage.
-H, --limit-height pixels
Limit the height of the montage. These options can be used
together to define the image size exactly, or separately. If
only one is specified, the other is calculated from the number of
files specified and the size of the thumbnails. The default is
to limit width to 800 pixels and calculate the height as
necessary.
-W, --limit-width pixels
Limit the width of the montage.
-o, --output file
Save the created montage to file.
-O, --output-only file
Just save the created montage to file without displaying it.
-s, --stretch
Normally, if an image is smaller than the specified thumbnail
size, it will not be enlarged. If this option is set, the image
will be scaled up to fit the thumnail size. Aspect ratio will be
maintained unles --ignore-aspect is specified.
-E, --thumb-height pixels
Set thumbnail height.
-y, --thumb-width pixels
Set thumbnail width.
--thumb-redraw n
Only relevant for --thumbnails: Redraw thumbnail window every n
images. In feh <= 1.5, the thumbnail image used to be redrawn
after every computed thumbnail (so, it updated immediately).
However, since the redrawing takes quite long (especially for
thumbnail mode on a large filelist), this turned out to be a
major performance penalty. As a workaround, the thumbnail image
is redrawn every 10th image now by default. Set n = 1 to get the
old behaviour, n = 0 will only redraw once all thumbnails are
loaded.
INDEX MODE OPTIONS
-e, --font font
Set font for printing the information under each thumbnail.
Should be a truetype font, resident in the current directory or
the font directory, and should be defined in the form
fontname/points, like "myfont/12".
-@, --title-font font
Set font to print a title on the index, if no font is specified,
no title will be printed.
FORMAT SPECIFIERS
%f Image path/filename
%h Image height
%l Total number of files in filelist
%m Current mode
%n Image name
%p Number of image pixels
%P feh
%s Image size in bytes
%t Image format
%u Number of current file
%w Image width
%v feh version
CONFIG FILE SYNTAX
The config file allows the naming of option groups, called themes. If
~/.fehrc or /etc/fehrc exist, feh will look in them for name/options
pairs. If neither of them exist, feh will create a default one in
~/.fehrc.
It takes entries of the form "theme options ...", where theme is the name
of the entry and options are the options which will be applied when the
theme is used.
An example entry would be "imagemap -rVq --thumb-width 40 --thumb-height
30".
You cane use this theme in two ways. Either call "feh -Timagemap *.jpg"
or create a symbolic link to feh with the name of the theme you want it
to use. So from the example above: "ln -s ‘which feh ‘ ~/bin/imagemap".
Now just run "imagemap *.jpg" to use these options.
You can combine these themes with commandline options. An example .fehrc
is provided with a couple of cool example themes.
KEYS
In an image window, the following keys may be used:
a Toggle actions display (see --draw-actions)
c Caption entry mode. If --caption-path has been specified, then
this enables caption editing. The caption at the bottom of the
screen will turn yellow and can be edited. Hit return to confirm
and save the caption, or escape to cancel editing. Note that you
can insert an actual newline into the caption using
〈CTRL+return〉.
d Toggle filename display (see --draw-filename)
f Save the current filelist to a unique filename
h Pause/Continue the slideshow. When it is paused, it will not
automatically change slides based on --slideshow-delay.
m Show menu. Use the arrow keys and return to select items,
〈escape〉 to close the menu.
n, 〈space〉, 〈right arrow〉
Show next image
o Toggle pointer visibility
p, 〈backspace〉, 〈left arrow〉
Show previous image
q Quit feh
r Reload current image. Useful for webcams
s Save the current image to a unique filename
v Toggle fullscreen
w Change window size to fit current image size
x Close current window
z Jump to a random position in the current filelist
<, > In place editing - rotate the images 90 degrees
(counter)clockwise. The rotation is lossless, but may create
artifacts in some image corners when used with JPEG images.
Rotating in the reverse direction will make them go away. See
jpegtran(1) for more about lossless JPEG rotation.
0 .. 9 Execute the corresponding action (0 = --action, 1 = --action1
etc.)
〈return〉
Run the command defined by --action
〈home〉 Show first image
〈end〉 Show last image
〈page up〉
Go forward ~5% of the filelist
〈page down〉
Go backward ~5% of the filelist
〈escape〉
Quit the slideshow
+ Increase reload delay
- Decrease reload delay
〈delete〉
Remove current file from filelist
〈CTRL+delete〉
Remove current file from filelist and delete it
〈keypad left〉
Move the image to the lift
〈keypad right〉
Move the image to the right
〈keypad up〉
Move the image up
〈keypad down〉
Move the image down
〈keypad begin〉
Antialias the image
〈keypad +〉
Zoom in
〈keypad -〉
Zoom out
〈keypad *〉
Zoom to 100%
〈keypad /〉
Zoom to fit the window size
MOUSE ACTIONS
When viewing an image, by default mouse button 1 pans (moves the image
around) or, when only clicked, moves to the next image (slideshow mode
only); button 2 zooms (click and drag left->right to zoom in, right->left
to zoom out, click once to restore zoom to 100%); and mouse button 3
opens the menu.
CTRL+Button 1 blurs or sharpens the image (drag left to blur, right to
sharpen); CTRL+Button 2 rotates the image around the center point.
A note about pan and zoom modes: In pan mode, if you reach a window
border but haven’t yet panned to the end of the image, feh will warp your
cursor to the opposite border so you can continue panning.
When clicking the zoom button and immediately releasing it, the image
will be back at 100% zoom. When clicking it and moving the mouse while
holding the button down, the zoom will be continued at the previous zoom
level. Do not let the short snapback to 100% confuse you, it’ll be
removed as soon as you move the mouse. The zoom will always happen so
that the pixel on which you entered the zoom mode remains stationary.
So, to enlarge a specific part of an image, click the zoom button on that
part.
SIGNALS
In slideshow mode, feh handles the following signals:
SIGUSR1
Switch to next image
SIGUSR2
Switch to previous image
USAGE EXAMPLES
Here are some examples of useful option combinations
feh -r /opt/images
Recursively scan /opt/images and show all the images in a
slideshow
feh -rSname /opt/images
Same, but sort by filename
feh -m /opt/images/landscapes
Create a montage from the images in /opt/images/landscapes
feh -Xrm -W 400 --thumb-width 30 --thumb-height 20 landscapes
Create a montage from the images in ./landscapes and all
directories below it. Limit the width of the image to 400 and
make the thumbnails 30x20, ignoring aspect ratio
feh -irFarial/14 -O index.jpg /opt/images
Make an index print of /opt/images and all directories below it,
using 14 point Arial to write the image info under each
thumbnail. Save the image as index.jpg and don’t display it,
just exit. Note that this even works without a running X server
feh -LrSpixels /opt/images
List the images in /opt/images and all directories below, sorted
by pixel size, giving as much info as possible
feh -kR30 http://example.org/webcam.jpg
View a webcam, reloading every 30 seconds, saving the images in
/tmp
feh --unloadable -r /opt/images
Print all unloadable images in /opt/images, recursively
feh -w /opt/images/holidays
Open each image in /opt/images/holidays in its own window
feh -FD5 -Sname /opt/images/presentation
Show the images in .../presentation, sorted by name, in
fullscreen, automatically change to the next image after 5
seconds
feh -rSwidth -A "mv ’%f’ ~/images/’%n’" /opt/images
View all images in /opt/images and below, sorted by width, move
an image to ~/image/image_name when enter is pressed
feh --start-at ./foo.jpg .
View all images in the current directory, starting with foo.jpg.
All other images are still in the slideshow and can be viewed
normally
feh --start-at foo.jpg *
Same as above
DEPENDENCIES
feh requires the jpegtran binary (usually distributed in "libjpeg-progs"
or similar) for lossless rotation.
To view images from URLs such as http://, you need to have wget available
or use the builtin HTTP client (see --builtin).
BUGS
Xenarama support has a few problems, especially when not on Xinerama
screen 0.
There are probably other bugs, too. If you find one, let me know :)
LICENSE
Copyright Tom Gilbert (and various contributors), 1999, 2000
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a
copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
"Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including
without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish,
distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit
persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the
following conditions:
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included
in all copies of the Software and its documentation and acknowledgment
shall be given in the documentation and software packages that this
Software was used.
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS
OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING
FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER
DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
Email bugs and feature requests to 〈derf@chaosdorf.de〉
Original author (no longer developing): 〈feh_sucks@linuxbrit.co.uk〉
