Blob bar

This is the Quickshell implementation of the Blob status bar. It is shipped as a first-party plugin of blob-shell, the long-running shell host. The bar is mounted at startup and lives inside the shell for its whole session.

manifest.json declares the plugin (id: blob.bar, kind: bar) and points at Bar.qml as the entry point.
Bar.qml is Blob-owned bar engine code, loaded by the blob-shell host. Users should not edit it directly.
widgets/ holds simple first-party bar widgets with sibling manifests.
Feature plugins such as ../panels/audio/, ../panels/network/, and ../panels/power/ provide richer popup bar plugins.
The bar receives its config from the host shell as a barConfig property; the host loads it from ~/.config/blob/shell.json (or config/blob/shell.json when the user has no file).
blob bar position updates only the user shell.json file.

Customizing

The bar config lives under the bar: key of ~/.config/blob/shell.json. Out of the box the shell uses config/blob/shell.json. Once you customize anything via the bar gestures, blob bar ..., or by editing shell.json directly, your file is canonical — there is no deep-merge.

The bar is configured directly on the bar itself: drag empty bar space (or click-and-hold) to move the bar to another screen edge, double-left-click empty center-bar space to toggle transparency, and drag widgets to reorder them. The blob bar position, blob bar transparent, blob bar move, and blob bar set commands do the same from scripts. Enable or disable widgets with blob plugin enable and blob plugin disable (widget ids come from blob plugin list).

Example shell.json (bar subtree only shown):

{
  "version": 1,
  "bar": {
    "position": "top",
    "transparent": false,
    "centerAnchor": "blob.clock",
    "layout": {
      "left": [
        { "id": "blob.menu" },
        { "id": "blob.spacer", "size": 12 },
        { "id": "blob.workspaces" }
      ],
      "center": [
        { "id": "blob.media" },
        { "id": "blob.clock", "format": "HH:mm" }
      ],
      "right": [
        { "id": "blob.audio" },
        { "id": "blob.power" }
      ]
    }
  }
}

centerAnchor pins one center module to the exact horizontal/vertical center and flanks others around it. Set to an empty string to disable anchoring (the center list is centered as a group).

Module catalogue

First-party interactive widgets

Name	What it does	Interactions
`blob.menu`	Blob menu launcher	left = menu · right = terminal
`blob.workspaces`	Hyprland workspace switcher	left = focus workspace
`blob.clock`	Date/time label + popup with a month grid, ISO week numbers, and month stepping	left = popup · right = cycle label format · middle = timezone selector
`blob.media`	MPRIS now-playing — scrolling track + artist, cover-art popup	left = play/pause · middle = next · scroll = prev/next · right = popup
`blob.indicators`	Manual state indicators	left = indicator action
`blob.system-update`	Available update indicator	left = update
`blob.tray`	System tray	hover = reveal drawer · right on chevron = manage
`blob.weather`	Weather icon + popup with forecast	left = popup · right = full notification
`blob.microphone`	Mic icon + scroll volume	left = mute toggle · middle = audio panel · scroll = source volume

The blob.indicators widget loads individual bar indicators from indicators/. Omit items (or set it to an empty array) to show all indicators in the default order, or set items to a subset such as ["Dnd", "Reminder", "NightLight"]. Set alwaysShow to true to keep inactive indicators visible instead of revealing them only on hover. Multiple blob.indicators instances are allowed, so different sections can show different subsets.

Orientation

All widgets work in top, bottom, left, and right positions. Popups anchor on the side opposite the bar edge, sliding into the workspace. Vertical bars use 28px width; widgets that show text fall back to compact icon-only forms (e.g. media hides its scrolling label).

Custom user modules

The schema accepts arbitrary module ids that you provide. Set type to command for shell-driven output or qml for a custom QML widget. Both still go under bar.layout.<section> in shell.json.

Command module:

{
  "version": 1,
  "bar": {
    "layout": {
      "right": [
        { "id": "blob.tray" },
        { "id": "vpn", "type": "command", "exec": "~/.config/blob/bar/scripts/vpn-status", "interval": 5, "tooltip": "VPN", "onClick": "nm-connection-editor" },
        { "id": "blob.audio" }
      ]
    }
  }
}

The command may print plain text or Waybar-style JSON, for example:

{"text":"󰌆","tooltip":"Work VPN","class":"active"}

QML module:

{
  "version": 1,
  "bar": {
    "layout": {
      "right": [
        { "id": "gpu", "type": "qml" },
        { "id": "blob.audio" }
      ]
    }
  }
}

Then create ~/.config/blob/bar/modules/gpu.qml. If you want to store it elsewhere, add a source path.

Custom QML modules should be an Item with implicitWidth and implicitHeight. They may optionally define these properties, which the bar fills after loading:

import QtQuick

Item {
  property var bar
  property string moduleName
  property var settings

  implicitWidth: 28
  implicitHeight: bar ? bar.barSize : 26

  Text {
    anchors.centerIn: parent
    text: "GPU"
    color: bar ? bar.foreground : "white"
    font.family: bar ? bar.fontFamily : "monospace"
    font.pixelSize: 12
  }

  MouseArea {
    anchors.fill: parent
    onClicked: if (bar) bar.run("blob-launch-or-focus-tui btop")
  }
}

Bar properties available to widgets

Widgets receive bar (the shell root), moduleName (string), and settings (object) injected at load time. The bar exposes:

bar.foreground, bar.background, bar.urgent — theme colors (live-updated)
bar.fontFamily — current monospace family
bar.position — "top" | "bottom" | "left" | "right"
bar.vertical — boolean shortcut
bar.barSize — 26 horizontal / 28 vertical
bar.run(command) — fire-and-forget bash exec
bar.shellQuote(value) — safe shell-quote a string
bar.showTooltip(target, text) / bar.hideTooltip(target) — shared tooltip popup
bar.requestPopout(owner) / bar.releasePopout(owner) — one-popup-at-a-time coordinator

First-party bar widgets are manifest-backed just like third-party widgets. Simple widgets carry sibling manifests such as widgets/Workspaces.manifest.json; richer popup plugins live in feature directories such as ../panels/audio/, and ../panels/network/; and feature plugins such as blob.menu and blob.media declare their bar-widget entry points in their own manifest.json. Bar layout ids are namespaced, e.g. blob.audio, blob.network, and blob.clock. Older UpperCamelCase ids such as AudioPanel and Clock are migrated forward; new configs should use the namespaced ids.

Third-party widgets ship as separate plugins under ~/.config/blob/plugins/<plugin-id>/ with their own manifest.json declaring kinds: ["bar-widget"] and a barWidget entry point. See ../../README.md for the manifest schema. Rescan, enable, and place third-party plugins with blob-shell shell rescanPlugins, blob plugin enable, and blob bar move.

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