dwm - dynamic window manager

dwm is an extremely fast, small, and dynamic window manager for X.

This is a heavily modified version of dwm based on the original suckless.org dwm. It includes numerous patches and customizations for a productive, user-friendly desktop on Arch Linux with Xorg.

• Polybar integration (replaces dwm built-in bar)
• Window swallowing — terminals absorb child GUI windows
• EWMH compliance — proper desktop/tag reporting for external tools
• Pertag — independent layouts, master counts, and sizing per tag
• Cfact — per-window sizing in tiled layouts
• Movestack — reorder windows in the stack with keybinds
• Systray — built-in system tray (disabled by default when using Polybar)
• Fullscreen — actual and fake fullscreen toggle (3-state)
• Window icons — title bar icons via _NET_WM_ICON
• Cursor warp — cursor follows focus across windows/monitors
• Noborder — auto-remove borders when only one window is visible
• Multi-monitor — Xinerama support with per-monitor Polybar bars

Use Linutil for automated setup:

curl -fsSL https://christitus.com/linux | sh

Select dwm, rofi, bash prompt, and ghostty using the v key, then press Enter.

Build dependencies (required to compile):

sudo pacman -S --needed base-devel libx11 libxft libxinerama imlib2 libxcb xcb-util freetype2 fontconfig

Xorg:

sudo pacman -S --needed xorg-server xorg-xinit xorg-xrandr xorg-xsetroot xorg-xset

Runtime dependencies (desktop experience):

sudo pacman -S --needed rofi picom dunst feh flameshot dex mate-polkit alsa-utils noto-fonts-emoji ttf-meslo-nerd

Terminal emulator (at least one):

# Pick one — ghostty is the default in config.h
sudo pacman -S ghostty   # or: alacritty, kitty

Polybar (status bar):

sudo pacman -S polybar

git clone https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/dwm-titus.git
cd dwm-titus
cp config.def.h config.h    # Create your personal config
make
sudo make install

Polybar icon fonts (MaterialIcons, Feather) are bundled in polybar/fonts/:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/fonts
cp -r polybar/fonts/* ~/.local/share/fonts/
fc-cache -fv

An install script is provided that handles all of the above:

./install.sh

Option A — Display Manager (SDDM, GDM, LightDM): Log out, select dwm from the session menu, and log back in.

Option B — startx: The installer places .xinitrc in your home directory. Start with:

startx

The .xinitrc disables screen blanking/DPMS (prevents NVIDIA GPU issues on wake), launches Polybar, and starts dwm.

Press SUPER + / inside dwm for an interactive keybind viewer (via rofi).

See docs/src/keybinds.md for the full reference.

dwm is configured by editing config.h and recompiling:

$EDITOR config.h
make && sudo make install

Note: config.def.h is the clean default template. config.h is your personal customization. If config.h doesn't exist, make will create it from config.def.h automatically.

Key things to customize in config.h:

• refresh_rate — match your monitor (default: 60, set to 120 for high-refresh)
• fonts[] — font family and size
• colors[] — color scheme (Nord theme by default in config.h)
• autostart[] — programs launched on startup
• rules[] — per-application window rules (floating, tags, terminal detection)
• keys[] — all keybindings
• MODKEY — modifier key (Mod4Mask = Super, Mod1Mask = Alt)

Black screen / dwm doesn't start:

• Verify Xorg is installed: pacman -Q xorg-server xorg-xinit
• Check .xinitrc exists and ends with exec dwm
• Try startx from a TTY to see error output

No status bar / Polybar missing:

• Install polybar: sudo pacman -S polybar
• Check fonts are installed: fc-list | grep -i meslo
• Verify polybar config: ls ~/.config/polybar/

Missing icons in Polybar:

• Install icon fonts: cp -r polybar/fonts/* ~/.local/share/fonts/ && fc-cache -fv

Terminal doesn't open (SUPER+X):

• Install a terminal emulator (ghostty, alacritty, kitty, or st)
• Or edit config.h → termcmd[] to use your preferred terminal

Multi-monitor issues:

• Polybar auto-detects monitors via xrandr
• Primary monitor gets systray + EWMH tags; secondary monitors get a simpler bar
• If tags don't switch correctly across monitors, check debug_ewmh.sh

Dependency check:

bash scripts/check-deps.sh