TLATER / blm

Bash login manager

blm

A login manager written entirely in bash.

Setup

1. Disable any graphical login managers (many Linux distributions come with such preinstalled). Refer to the relevant documentation when in doubt.
2. Execute echo 'exec bash blm' >> ~/.bash_profile to enable launching the script on login. When using a non-bash login shell, refer to the relevant documentation.

Configuration

To configure which sessions can be launched from the manager, create the relevant directories as specified in your configuration file.

Options:

Option	Values	Default	Function
PS3	string	"Select session: "	Specifies the prompt.
MODE	("text"/"dialog")	"dialog"	Specifies the display mode. For mode "dialog" the dialog library must be installed.
XSESSIONS	path	"/etc/blm/xsessions"	The X sessions directory path (see Sessions).
OSESSIONS	path	"/etc/blm/osessions"	The directory path for non-X sessions.

Dialog-specific options:

Option	Values	Default	Function
HEIGHT	number	14	The height of the dialog.
WIDTH	number	55	The width of the dialog.
ITEMHEIGHT	number	6	The height of items in the dialog.

Sessions

There are 2 session types:

• Xsessions :: Sessions launched using xinit. The file is executed after X launches, much like the .xinit file when launching using startx.
• Osessions :: Sessions launched using exec. These are shell scripts that are executed. A simple example would be, for example, exec /bin/bash for a normal tty.

Menus are subdirectories of these directories. In these the items of sub-menus can be specified.

Example

For example, by default the following structure would work:

.config/blm
├── blm.conf
├── osessions
│   ├── bash
│   ├── emacs
│   ├── remote
│   │   └── my.fav.server.net
│   └── shutdown
│       ├── reboot
│       └── shutdown
└── xsessions
    ├── awesome
    └── Gnome