HOWTO: Get an awesome screenshot info grabber for your system

[picpak]

Introduction

If you've ever frequented the Arch Linux forums, you'd know that many a screenshot features this script. However, they've only developed it for Arch and Debian. Here's a guide that can let you get it on Ubuntu.

Here's the original topic that this guide is based off of:

http://forum.beryl-project.org/viewt...hp?f=51&t=5448

Here's a screenshot of it in action (courtesy of Beryl Forums):



What's the point? Well, if nothing else, it saves you less typing for when you post in the Screenshots thread.

Getting the script

You can download this script from here: info.pl.tar.gz

Open up a terminal (Applications>Accessories>Terminal), extract the file, and place it in ~/bin:

tar -xvf info.pl.tar.gz
mkdir ~/bin
mv info.pl ~/bin

By default, the script takes a screenshot of your screen after 10 seconds. To do this, you need to install scrot:

sudo apt-get install scrot

If you don't want this feature, you can edit info.pl and change it like so:

gedit ~/bin/info.pl

change line 17 from

my $shot = 0;

to

my $shot = 1;

save the file and exit.

Testing it out

To try it out, open up a terminal and run the following:

perl ~/bin/info.pl

It should all work well.

Going one step further: loading it when the console/terminal loads

This is a nice trick to make the console look a little nicer. Edit .bash_profile:

gedit ~/.bash_profile

and place in the following at the bottom of the file:

clear;
perl ~/bin/info.pl

Save the file and exit.

Note that this only pertains to the system consoles (Ctrl+Alt+F1-F6)! If you'd like to load it when the terminal opens up (Applications>Accessories>Terminal) then do the following:

Edit .bashrc:

gedit .bashrc

and place in the following at the bottom of the file:

perl ~/bin/info.pl

Save the file and exit.

The end!

And there you have it! A fancy script that works in almost all desktop environments and window managers. Have fun!

[nikoPSK]

thank you.

[picpak]

Glad to help you out.

[nikoPSK]

I ahd another one but didn't like it.

[Gourgi]

nice one !
i didn't want screenshots and i wanted to load my gnome terminal quickly and not to wait 10 seconds, so i edited line 17 to :
changes are in red

## Takes a screen shot if set to 0 ##
my $shot = 0;
## Command to run to take screen shot ##
my $command = "scrot -d 0.2";

few notes :

• better look for ubuntu logo would be more "eyecandy"
• no compiz details
• neither emerald details

also when i try switching Alt+Ctrl+F1 and run the script i get this :

giblib error: Can't open X display. It *is* running yeah?

any ideas/fixes ?


also here's my screenshot

[picpak]

few notes :

• better look for ubuntu logo would be more "eyecandy"
• no compiz details
• neither emerald details

Hmm, that's weird, maybe under this section

my %WMlist = ("Beryl", "beryl",
              "Fluxbox", "fluxbox",
              "Openbox", "openbox",
              "Blackbox", "blackbox",
              "Xfwm4", "xfwm4",
              "Metacity", "metacity",
              "Kwin", "kwin",
              "FVWM", "fvwm",
              "Enlightenment", "enlightenment",
              "IceWM", "icewm",
              "Window Maker", "wmaker",
              "PekWM","pekwm" );

try adding

my %WMlist = ("Beryl", "beryl",
              "Compiz", "compiz",
              "Emerald", "emerald",
              "Fluxbox", "fluxbox",
              "Openbox", "openbox",
              "Blackbox", "blackbox",
              "Xfwm4", "xfwm4",
              "Metacity", "metacity",
              "Kwin", "kwin",
              "FVWM", "fvwm",
              "Enlightenment", "enlightenment",
              "IceWM", "icewm",
              "Window Maker", "wmaker",
              "PekWM","pekwm" );

?

also when i try switching Alt+Ctrl+F1 and run the script i get this :

giblib error: Can't open X display. It *is* running yeah?

any ideas/fixes ?


also here's my screenshot

That's weird, it loads fine here. Are you running it along with X (Ctrl-Alt-F7)?

[Gourgi]

Hmm, that's weird, maybe under this section
try adding

my %WMlist = ("Beryl", "beryl",
              "Compiz", "compiz",
              "Emerald", "emerald",
              "Fluxbox", "fluxbox",
              "Openbox", "openbox",
              "Blackbox", "blackbox",
              "Xfwm4", "xfwm4",
              "Metacity", "metacity",
              "Kwin", "kwin",
              "FVWM", "fvwm",
              "Enlightenment", "enlightenment",
              "IceWM", "icewm",
              "Window Maker", "wmaker",
              "PekWM","pekwm" );

that worked thanks

that's weird, it loads fine here. Are you running it along with X (Ctrl-Alt-F7)?

that message appears when i turn into terminal/console mode ( Alt+Ctrl+F1 ) , where obvisouly i don't run X display.
i wondered if there can be a "if ... fi" statement for console mode.
of course everything looks just fine in X display ( Alt+Ctrl+F7 ) !

[picpak]

that message appears when i turn into terminal/console mode ( Alt+Ctrl+F1 ) , where obvisouly i don't run X display.

I meant is X running in the background. It should grab your settings from X, like it does for me.

i wondered if there can be a "if ... fi" statement for console mode.
of course everything looks just fine in X display ( Alt+Ctrl+F7 ) !

a) I didn't write this script and b) I don't know perl, so I can't help you there. Sorry.

[Gourgi]

i found it
the script has no bugs at all !!
the message appears only when the script is set to take screenshot and only for console mode.
no problem
thanks again for sharing it

[kodak]

OS and Kernel are the only info that shows up