FEH(1) BSD General Commands Manual FEH(1)
NAME
feh — image viewer and cataloguer
SYNOPSIS
feh [options] [--] [files | directories | URLs ...]
VERSION
This manual documents feh 3.9.1
Compile-time switches in this build:
• libcurl remote file support enabled
• Xinerama multi-monitor support enabled
• libexif builtin EXIF reader available
• inotify-based auto-reload of changed files enabled
• libmagic disabled
DESCRIPTION
feh is a light-weight, configurable and versatile image viewer. It is
aimed at command line users, but can also be started from graphical file
managers. Apart from viewing images, it can compile text and thumbnail
listings, show (un)loadable files, set X11 backgrounds, and more.
Features include filelists, various image sorting modes, custom action
scripts, and image captions. feh can be controlled by configurable key-
board and mouse shortcuts, terminal input and signals. When no file ar-
guments or filelists are specified and --start-at is not used, feh dis-
plays all files in the current directory.
EXIF tags are supported either using exiv2 / exifgrep via --info (see the
USAGE EXAMPLES section), or as a builtin feature by compiling feh with
exif=1. In this build of feh, builtin EXIF support is available.
MODES
feh is based on various modes, which are selected at startup by command
line options.
Slideshow mode is the default. It opens a window and displays the first
image in it; the slideshow position can be advanced (or otherwise
changed) using keyboard and mouse shortcuts. In slideshow mode, images
can be deleted either from the filelist or from the disk, a changed
filelist can also be saved to the disk and reopened at a later time. An
image can also be read from stdin via "feh -".
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.
Index mode forms an index print from the filelist. Image thumbnails are
shown along with the filename, size and dimensions, printed using a true-
type 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 ;)
List mode doesn't display images. Instead, it outputs an ls-style list-
ing of the files in the filelist, including image info such as size, num-
ber of pixels, type, etc. There is also a Customlist mode which prints
image info in a custom format specified by a printf-like format string.
feh can also list either all the loadable files in a filelist or all the
unloadable files. This is useful for preening a directory.
SUPPORTED FORMATS
feh can open any format supported by imlib2, most notably jpeg, png, pnm,
tiff, and bmp. The gif format is also supported, but only for static im-
ages. In case of animations, only the first frame will be shown. If the
convert binary (supplied by ImageMagick) is available, it also has lim-
ited support for many other file types, such as svg, xcf and otf. If
dcraw is available, feh also supports RAW files provided by cameras and
will display the embedded thumbnails. Use --conversion-timeout timeout
with a non-negative value to enable support for these formats.
(optional feature, disabled in this build) feh can use libmagic to only
pass image files to Imlib2. This feature is disabled in this build.
When using feh with lots of non-image files (especially with Imlib2
version 1.6.x or 1.7.0), this can speed up the detection of non-image
files significantly. If you think that Imlib2 can load a file which feh
has determined to be likely not an image, set the environment variable
"FEH_SKIP_MAGIC" to pass all files directly to Imlib2, bypassing this
check. The environment variable's value does not matter, it just needs
to be set.
OPTIONS
-A, --action [flag][[title]]action
Specify a shell command as an action to perform on the image. In
slideshow or multiwindow mode, the action will be run when the
action_0 key is pressed, in list mode, it will be run for each
file. In loadable/unloadable mode, it will be run for each load-
able/unloadable file, respectively. In thumbnail mode, clicking
on an image will cause the action to run instead of opening the
image.
If flag is ";", feh will reload the current image instead of
switching to the next one (slideshow mode) or closing the window
(multiwindow mode) after executing the action. If [title] is
specified (note the literal "[" and "]"), --draw-actions will
display title instead of action in the action list. Note that
title must not start with a space. If it does, the action is
handled as if it did not have a title. This special case exists
for backwards compatibility reasons and makes sure that actions
like "[ -L %F ] && foo" still work.
The action will be executed by /bin/sh. Use format specifiers to
refer to image info, see FORMAT SPECIFIERS for details. Example
usage: "feh -A "mv %F ~/images/%N" *".
--action1 .. --action9 [flag][[title]]action
Extra actions which can be set and triggered using the appropri-
ate number key.
--auto-reload
(optional feature, enabled in this build) automatically reload
image when the underlying file changes. Note that auto-reload
(if enabled in the build) is on by default. This option is only
useful to re-enable auto-reload after it has been disabled by a
preceding --reload=0 option.
Automatic reload is not supported in montage, index, or thumbnail
mode.
--auto-rotate
(optional feature, available in this build) (deprecated in favor
of Imlib2's auto-orientation support) Automatically rotate images
based on EXIF data. Does not alter the image files.
Note that Imlib2 version 1.7.5+ performs auto-rotation by itself,
so this option is obsolete on systems with Imlib2 version 1.7.5
or later. feh currently cannot detect this at runtime.
-Z, --auto-zoom
Zoom pictures to screen size in fullscreen / fixed geometry mode.
-x, --borderless
Create borderless windows.
--cache-size size
Set imlib2 in-memory cache to size MiB. A higher cache size can
significantly improve performance especially for small slide
shows, however at the cost of increased memory consumption. size
must be between 0 and 2048 MiB and defaults to 4.
-P, --cache-thumbnails
Enable thumbnail caching. Thumbnails are saved in
$XDG_CACHE_HOME/thumbnails, which defaults to
~/.cache/thumbnails. Note that thumbnails are only cached if the
configured thumbnail size does not exceed 256x256 pixels.
-K, --caption-path path
Path to directory containing image captions. This turns on cap-
tion viewing, and if captions are found in path, which is rela-
tive 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".
--conversion-timeout timeout
feh can use ImageMagick to try converting unloadable files into a
supported file format. As this can take a long time, it is dis-
abled by default. Set timeout to a non-negative value to enable
it. A positive value specifies after how many seconds conversion
attempts should be aborted, zero causes feh to try indefinitely.
Negative values restore the default by disabling conversion alto-
gether.
--class class
Set the X11 class hint to class. Default: feh
-L, --customlist format
Don't display images, print image info according to format in-
stead. See FORMAT SPECIFIERS.
-G, --draw-actions
Draw the defined actions and what they do at the top-left of the
image.
--draw-exif
(optional feature, available in this build) display some EXIF in-
formation in the bottom left corner, similar to using --info with
exiv2 / exifgrep.
-d, --draw-filename
Draw the file name at the top-left of the image.
--draw-tinted
Show overlay texts (as created by --draw-filename et al) on a
semi-transparent background to improve their readability.
--edit Enable basic editing of files. This makes rotation and mirroring
(bound to "<", ">", "|", and "_" by default) change the underly-
ing file and not just its displayed content.
-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 file names,
absolute or relative to the current directory, one file name 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 command line when also specifying the list.
If file is "-", feh will read the filelist from its standard in-
put.
-e, --font font
Set global font. Should be a truetype font, resident in the cur-
rent directory or the font directory, and should be defined in
the form fontname/size, like "yudit/12" (which is the default).
-C, --fontpath path
Specify path as extra directory in which to search for fonts; can
be used multiple times to add multiple paths.
--force-aliasing
Disable anti-aliasing for zooming, background setting etc.
-I, --fullindex
Same as index mode, but with additional information below the
thumbnails. Works just like "feh --index --index-info
"%n\n%S\n%wx%h"". Enables MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS.
Note: This option needs to load all images to calculate the di-
mensions of the feh window, so when using it with many files it
will take a while before a feh window is visible. Use --preload
to get a progress bar.
-F, --fullscreen
Make the window fullscreen. Note that in this mode, large images
will always be scaled down to fit the screen, and --zoom zoom
only affects smaller images and never scales larger than neces-
sary to fit the screen size. The only exception is a zoom of
100, in which case images will always be shown at 100% zoom.
When combined with --thumbnails, this option only affects images
opened from the thumbnail overview. The thumbnail list itself
will still be windowed.
-g, --geometry width x height | + x + y | width x height + x + y
Use a fixed window size as specified in the X-style geometry
string, e.g. 640x480. An optional +x+y window offset can be
specified. Combine with --scale-down to scale down larger images
like in fullscreen mode. Note that this option does not enforce
the window size; changing it by a tiling WM or manually is still
possible. However, auto-resize remains disabled.
-Y, --hide-pointer
Hide the pointer (useful for slideshows).
-B, --image-bg style
Use style as background for transparent image parts and the like.
Accepted values: default, checks, or an XColor (e.g. "black" or
"#428bdd"). Note that some shells treat the hash symbol as a
special character, so you may need to quote or escape it for the
XColor code to work. In windowed mode, the default is checks (a
checkered background so transparent image parts are easy to see).
In fullscreen and background setting mode, checks is not accepted
and the default is black.
-i, --index
Enable Index mode. Index mode is similar to montage mode, and
accepts the same options. It creates an index print of thumb-
nails, printing the image name beneath each thumbnail. Index
mode enables certain other options, see INDEX AND THUMBNAIL MODE
OPTIONS and MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS.
--info [flag]command_line
Execute command_line and display its output in the bottom left
corner of the image. Can be used to display e.g. image dimen-
sions or EXIF information. Supports FORMAT SPECIFIERS. If flag
is set to ";", the output will not be displayed by default, but
has to be enabled by the toggle_info key.
--insecure
When viewing files with HTTPS, this option disables all certifi-
cate checks. It allows images on sites with self-signed or ex-
pired certificates to be opened, but is no more secure than plain
HTTP.
-k, --keep-http
When viewing files using HTTP, feh normally deletes the local
copies after viewing, or, if caching, on exit. This option per-
manently stores them on disk, either in the directory specified
by --output-dir, or in the current working directory.
--keep-zoom-vp
When switching images, keep zoom and viewport settings (zoom
level and X, Y offsets)
-l, --list
Don't display images. Analyze 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. Returns false if at least one image
failed to load.
--max-dimension width x height
Only show images with width <= width and height <= height. If
you only care about one parameter, set the other to 0 (or a
negative value).
-M, --menu-font font
Use font (truetype, with size, like "yudit/12") as menu font.
--min-dimension width x height
Only show images with width >= width and height >= height. If
you only care about one parameter, set the other to 0.
-m, --montage
Enable montage mode. Montage mode creates a new image consisting
of a grid of thumbnails of the images in the filelist. When mon-
tage 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-conversion-cache
When loading images via HTTP, ImageMagick or dcraw, feh will only
load/convert them once and re-use the cached file on subsequent
slideshow passes. This option disables the cache. It is also
disabled when --reload is used. Use it if you rely on frequently
changing files loaded via one of these sources. Note that it
will impair performance.
--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-screen-clip
By default, window sizes are limited to the screen size. With
this option, windows will have the size of the image inside them.
Note that they may become very large this way, making them unman-
ageable in certain window managers.
--no-xinerama
(optional feature, enabled in this build) Disable Xinerama sup-
port.
--on-last-slide hold | quit | resume
Select behaviour when trying to select the next image on the last
slide (or the previous image on the first slide) in a slide show.
With hold, feh will stop advancing images in this case and con-
tinue displaying the first/last image, respectively. This is in-
tended for linear slide shows. Behaviour is unspecified when us-
ing other navigation commands than previous and next image.
quit will cause feh to quit when trying to advance past the last
image in the slide show.
resume is the default behaviour: On the last (first) image, feh
will wrap around to the first (last) image.
-j, --output-dir directory
Save files to directory when using --keep-http or the save_image
or save_filelist command. By default, files are saved in the
current working directory.
-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 infor-
mational messages, the second only errors.
-z, --randomize
When viewing multiple files in a slideshow, randomize the file
list before displaying. The list is re-randomized whenever the
slideshow cycles (that is, transitions from last to first image).
-r, --recursive
Recursively expand any directories in the command line arguments
to the content of those directories, all the way down to the bot-
tom level.
--no-recursive
Don't recursively expand any directories. This is the default,
but this option is useful to override themes containing
--recursive.
-R, --reload int
Reload filelist and current image after int seconds. Useful for
viewing HTTP webcams or frequently changing directories. (Note
that filelist reloading is still experimental.) Set to zero to
disable any kind of automatic reloading.
If an image is removed, feh will either show the next one or
quit. However, if an image still exists, but can no longer be
loaded, feh will continue to try loading it.
Setting this option causes inotify-based auto-reload to be dis-
abled. Reload is not supported in montage, index, or thumbnail
mode.
-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
Scale images to fit window geometry (defaults to screen size when
no geometry was specified). Note that the window geometry is not
updated when changing images at the moment. This option is rec-
ommended for tiling window managers. This option is ignored when
in fullscreen and thumbnail list mode.
In tiling environments, this also causes the image to be centered
in the window.
--scroll-step count
Scroll count pixels whenever scroll_up, scroll_down, scroll_left
or scroll_right is pressed. Note that this option accepts nega-
tive numbers in case you need to reverse the scroll direction.
See KEYS CONFIG SYNTAX for how to reverse it permanently. De-
fault: 20
-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
Sort file list according to image parameters. Allowed sort types
are: name, filename, dirname, mtime, width, height, pixels, size,
format. For sort modes other than name, filename, dirname, or
mtime, a preload run is necessary, causing a delay proportional
to the number of images in the list.
mtime starts with the most recently modified image. width,
height, pixels and size start with the smallest. Use --reverse
to sort by oldest or largest first.
For name, filename, and dirname you can use --version-sort to
sort numbers naturally, so that e.g. 10.jpg comes after 2.jpg.
-|, --start-at filename
Start the filelist at filename. If no other files or filelists
were specified on the command line, feh will first load all files
from the directory in which filename resides. This way, it's
possible to look at a specific image and use the next / prev keys
to browse through the directory. See USAGE EXAMPLES for exam-
ples. If filename is a remote URL and no files or filelists were
specified, feh will show filename and not attempt to load addi-
tional files or directories.
Note: If you use relative paths in your filelist, filename should
also be a relative path. If you use absolute paths, it should
also be an absolute path. If feh cannot find an exact match, it
will compare basenames (filenames without the directory suffix).
This may lead to mismatches if several files in your filelist
have the same basename.
-T, --theme theme
Load options from config file with name theme - see THEMES CONFIG
SYNTAX for more info. Note that command line options always
override theme options. The theme can also be set via the pro-
gram name (e.g. with symlinks), so by default feh will look for a
"feh" theme.
-t, --thumbnails
Same as Index mode, but the thumbnails are clickable image
launchers. Note that --fullscreen and --scale-down do not affect
the thumbnail window. They do, however, work for image windows
launched from thumbnail mode. Also supports INDEX AND THUMBNAIL
MODE OPTIONS as well as MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS.
-~, --thumb-title string
Set title for windows opened from thumbnail mode. See also
FORMAT SPECIFIERS.
-^, --title title
Set window title. Applies to all windows except those opened
from thumbnail mode. See FORMAT SPECIFIERS.
-u, --unloadable
Don't display images. Just print out their names if imlib2 can
NOT successfully load them. Returns false if at least one image
was loadable.
-V, --verbose
output useful information, progress bars, etc.
-v, --version
output version information and exit.
--version-sort
When combined with --sort name, --sort filename, or --sort
dirname: use natural sorting for file and directory names. In
this mode, filenames are sorted as an ordinary human would ex-
pect, e.g. "2.jpg" comes before "10.jpg". Note that this option
only has an effect when a sort mode is set using --sort.
--window-id windowid
Draw to an existing X11 window by its ID windowid. This option
is intended for use with software such as xcreensaver or xsecure-
lock, which provide a window for other applications to draw into.
Unexpected things will happen if you specify a window belonging
to software which does not expect feh to draw into it or attempt
to use options or keybindings which affect window attributes,
such as full-screen mode.
--xinerama-index monitor
(optional feature, enabled in this build) Override feh's idea of
the active Xinerama monitor. May be useful in certain circum-
stances where the window manager places the feh window on Xin-
erama monitor A while feh assumes that it will be placed on moni-
tor B.
In background setting mode: When used with any option other than
--bg-tile: Only set wallpaper on monitor. All other monitors
will be filled black/white. This is most useful in a Xinerama
configuration with overlapping monitors. For instance, assume
you have two overlapping displays (index 0 and 1), where index 0
is smaller. To center a background on the display with index 0
and fill the extra space on index 1 black/white, use
"--xinerama-index 0" when setting the wallpaper.
Use xrandr --listmonitor to determine how Xinerama monitor IDs
map to screens/monitors in your setup.
--zoom percent | max | fill
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. Specifying max is like set-
ting --auto-zoom, using fill makes feh zoom the image like the
--bg-fill mode.
--zoom-step percent
Zoom images in and out by percent (default: 25) when using the
zoom keys and buttons.
MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS
These additional options can be used for index, montage and (partially)
thumbnail mode.
-a, --alpha int
When drawing thumbnails onto the background, set their transpar-
ency level to int (0 - 255).
-b, --bg file | trans
Use file as background for your montage. With this option speci-
fied, 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 ra-
tios, 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.
-W, --limit-width pixels
Limit the width of the montage, defaults to 800 pixels.
If both --limit-width and --limit-height are specified, the mon-
tage will be exactly width x height pixels in dimensions.
-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 thumbnail size. Aspect ratio will
be maintained unless --ignore-aspect is specified.
-E, --thumb-height pixels
Set thumbnail height.
-y, --thumb-width pixels
Set thumbnail width.
INDEX AND THUMBNAIL MODE OPTIONS
In addition to MONTAGE MODE OPTIONS --alpha, --bg, --limit-height,
--limit-width, --output, --output-only, --thumb-height, --thumb-width,
the following options can be used.
--index-info format
Show image information based on format below thumbnails in index
/ thumbnail mode. See FORMAT SPECIFIERS. May contain newlines.
Use "--index-info ''" to display thumbnails without any info text
Note: If you specify image-related formats (such as %w or %s),
feh needs to load all images to calculate the dimensions of its
own window. So when using them with many files, it will take a
while before a feh window becomes visible. Use --preload to get
a progress bar.
-@, --title-font font
Set font to print a title on the index, if no font is specified,
no title will be printed.
-J, --thumb-redraw n
Redraw thumbnail window every n images while generating thumb-
nails. Redrawing takes quite long, so the default is 10. Set n
= 1 to update the thumbnail window immediately. With n = 0,
there will only be one redraw once all thumbnails are loaded.
BACKGROUND SETTING
In many desktop environments, feh can also be used as a background set-
ter. Unless you pass the --no-fehbg option, it will write a script to
set the current background to ~/.fehbg. So to have your background re-
stored every time you start X, you can add "~/.fehbg &" to your X startup
script (such as ~/.xinitrc). Note that the commandline written to
~/.fehbg always includes the --no-fehbg option to ensure that it is not
inadvertently changed by differences in X11 screen layout or similar.
Note that feh does not support setting the wallpaper of GNOME shell desk-
tops. In this environment, you can use "gsettings set
org.gnome.desktop.background picture-uri file:///path" instead.
For --bg-center, --bg-fill, and --bg-max, you can use --geometry to spec-
ify an offset from one side of the monitor instead of centering the im-
age. Positive values will offset from the left/top side, negative values
from the bottom/right. +0 and -0 are both valid and distinct values.
Note that all options except --bg-tile support Xinerama. For instance,
if you have multiple monitors connected and use e.g. --bg-center, feh
will center or appropriately offset the image on each monitor. You may
even specify more than one file, in that case, the first file is set on
monitor 0, the second on monitor 1, and so on. Use xrandr --listmonitor
to determine how Xinerama monitor IDs map to screens / monitors in your
setup.
Use --no-xinerama to treat the whole X display as one monitor when set-
ting wallpapers. You may also use --xinerama-index to use feh as a back-
ground setter for a specific monitor.
--bg-center
Center the file on the background. If it is too small, it will
be surrounded by a border as specified by --image-bg.
--bg-fill
Like --bg-scale, but preserves aspect ratio by zooming the image
until it fits. Either a horizontal or a vertical part of the im-
age will be cut off
--bg-max
Like --bg-fill, but scale the image to the maximum size that fits
the screen with borders on one side. The border color can be set
using --image-bg.
--bg-scale
Fit the file into the background without repeating it, cutting
off stuff or using borders. But the aspect ratio is not pre-
served either
--bg-tile
Tile (repeat) the image in case it is too small for the screen
--no-fehbg
Do not write a ~/.fehbg file
FORMAT SPECIFIERS
%a Information about slideshow state (playing/paused)
%f Image path/filename
%F Escaped image path/filename (for use in shell commands)
%g w,h window dimensions in pixels (mnemonic: geometry)
%h Image height
%l Total number of files in filelist
%L Temporary copy of filelist. Multiple uses of %L within the same
format string will return the same copy.
%m Current mode
%n Image name
%N Escaped image name
%o x,y offset of top-left image corner to window corner in pixels
%p Number of image pixels
%P Number of image pixels in human-readable format with k/M
(kilopixels / megapixels) suffix
%r Image rotation. A half right turn equals pi.
%s Image size in bytes
%S Human-readable image size (kB / MB)
%t Image format
%u Number of current file
%w Image width
%v feh version
%V Process ID
%z Current image zoom, rounded to two decimal places
%Z Current image zoom, higher precision
%% A literal %
CONFIGURATION
feh has three config files: themes for theme definitions, keys for key
bindings and buttons for mouse button bindings. It will try to read them
from $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/feh/, which (when XDG_CONFIG_HOME is unset) de-
faults to ~/.config/feh/. If the files are not found in that directory,
it will also try /etc/feh/.
All config files treat lines starting with a "#" character as comments.
Comments at the end of a line are not supported.
THEMES CONFIG SYNTAX
.config/feh/themes allows the naming of option groups, called themes.
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.
Note that the option parser does not behave like a normal shell: filename
expansion and backslash escape sequences are not supported and passed to
feh's option parser as-is. However, quoting of arguments is respected
and can be used for arguments with whitespace. So, the sequence "--info
"foo bar"" works as intended (that is, it display the string "foo bar"),
whereas the option string "--info foo\ bar" will only display "foo\" and
complain about the file bar not existing. Please keep this in mind when
writing theme files.
An example entry is "imagemap -rVq --thumb-width 40 --thumb-height 30
--index-info '%n\n%wx%h'".
You can 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. For the example above, this would be "ln -s `which feh `
~/bin/imagemap". Now just run "imagemap *.jpg" to use these options.
Note that you can split a theme over several lines by placing a backslash
at the end of an unfinished line. A single option-argument-pair must not
span multiple lines. A single line must not be longer than 1023 charac-
ters, but there's no upper limit for the length of a theme.
Command line options always override theme options.
KEYS CONFIG SYNTAX
.config/feh/keys defines key bindings. It has entries of the form
"action [key1 [key2 [key3]]]".
Each key is an X11 keysym name as shown by xev(1), like "Delete". It may
optionally start with modifiers for things like Control, in which case
key looks like mod-keysym (for example "C-Delete" for Ctrl+Delete or
"C-1-Delete" for Ctrl+Alt+Delete)
Available modifiers are C for Control, S for Shift and 1, 4 for Mod1 and
Mod4. To match an uppercase letter like "S" instead of "s", the Shift
modifier is not required.
Specifying an action without any keys unbinds it (i.e. the default bind-
ings are removed).
Note: Do not use the same keybinding for multiple actions. When binding
an action to a new key (or mouse button), make sure to unbind it from its
previous action, if present. feh does not check for conflicting bind-
ings, so their behaviour is undefined.
For a list of the action names, see KEYS. Note that not all of the key
names used there correspond to X11 keysyms. Most notably, page up (Prior
/ Page_Up), page down (Next / Page_Down) and the keypad keys (KP_*) do
not.
KEYS
The following actions and default key bindings can be used in an image
window. (The strings in [square brackets] are the config action names).
If feh is running inside a terminal and its standard input is not used
for images or filelists, key input from the terminal is also accepted.
However, terminal input support is currently limited to most alphanumeric
characters (0-9 a-z A-Z and some more), arrow keys, return and backspace.
The Alt (Mod1) modifier is also supported.
a [toggle_actions]
Toggle actions display (see --draw-actions)
A [toggle_aliasing]
Enable/Disable anti-aliasing
c [toggle_caption]
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_filenames]
Toggle filename display (see --draw-filename)
e [toggle_exif]
(optional feature, available in this build) Toggle EXIF tag dis-
play
f [toggle_fullscreen]
Toggle fullscreen
g [toggle_fixed_geometry]
Enable/Disable automatic window resize when changing images.
h [toggle_pause]
Pause/Continue the slideshow. When it is paused, it will not au-
tomatically change slides based on --slideshow-delay.
i [toggle_info]
Toggle info display (see --info)
k [toggle_keep_vp]
Toggle zoom and viewport keeping. When enabled, feh will keep
zoom and X, Y offset when switching images.
L [save_filelist]
Save the current filelist as "feh_PID_ID_filelist". It is saved
in the directory specified by --output-dir, if set, and in the
current working directory otherwise.
m [toggle_menu]
Show menu. Use the arrow keys and return to select items, and
⟨escape⟩ to close the menu.
n, ⟨space⟩, ⟨Right⟩ [next_img]
Show next image. Selects the next image in thumbnail mode.
o [toggle_pointer]
Toggle pointer visibility
p, ⟨BackSpace⟩, ⟨Left⟩ [prev_img]
Show previous image. Selects the previous image in thumbnail
mode.
q, ⟨Escape⟩ [quit]
Quit feh
r [reload_image]
Reload current image. Useful for webcams
s [save_image]
Save the current image as "feh_PID_ID_FILENAME". It is saved in
the directory specified by --output-dir, if set, and in the cur-
rent working directory otherwise.
w [size_to_image]
Change window size to fit current image size (plus/minus zoom, if
set). In scale-down and fixed-geometry mode, this also updates
the window size limits.
x [close]
Close current window
z [jump_random]
Jump to a random position in the current filelist
Z [toggle_auto_zoom]
Toggle auto-zoom.
[, ] [prev_dir, next_dir]
Jump to the first image of the previous or next sequence of im-
ages sharing a directory name in the current filelist. Use
--sort dirname if you would like to ensure that all images in a
directory are grouped together.
<, > [orient_3, orient_1]
rotate the image 90 degrees (counter)clockwise.
When --edit is used, this also rotates the image in the underly-
ing file. Rotation is lossless, but may create artifacts in some
image corners when used with JPEG images. Rotating in the re-
verse direction will make them go away. See jpegtran(1) for more
about lossless JPEG rotation. Note: feh assumes that this fea-
ture is used to normalize image orientation. For JPEG images, it
will unconditionally set the EXIF orientation tag to 1 ("0,0 is
top left") after every rotation. See jpegexiforient(1) for de-
tails on how to change this flag.
_ [flip]
Vertically flip image. When --edit is used, this also flips the
image in the underlying file (see above).
| [mirror]
Horizontally flip image. When --edit is used, this also flips
the image in the underlying file (see above).
0 .. 9 [action_0 .. action_9]
Execute the corresponding action (0 = --action, 1 = --action1
etc.)
⟨Return⟩ [action_0]
Run the command defined by --action
⟨Home⟩ [jump_first]
Show first image
⟨End⟩ [jump_last]
Show last image
⟨page up⟩ [jump_fwd]
Go forward ~5% of the filelist
⟨page down⟩ [jump_back]
Go backward ~5% of the filelist
+ [reload_plus]
Increase reload delay by 1 second
- [reload_minus]
Decrease reload delay by 1 second
⟨Delete⟩ [remove]
Remove current file from filelist
⟨Ctrl+Delete⟩ [delete]
Remove current file from filelist and delete it
⟨keypad Left⟩, ⟨Ctrl+Left⟩ [scroll_left]
Scroll to the left
⟨keypad Right⟩, ⟨Ctrl+Right⟩ [scroll_right]
Scroll to the right
⟨keypad up⟩, ⟨Ctrl+Up⟩ [scroll_up]
Scroll up
⟨keypad Down⟩, ⟨Ctrl+Down⟩ [scroll_down]
Scroll down. Note that the scroll keys work without anti-alias-
ing for performance reasons; hit the render key after scrolling
to anti-alias the image.
⟨Alt+Left [scroll_left_page]⟩
Scroll to the left by one page
⟨Alt+Right [scroll_right_page]⟩
Scroll to the right by one page
⟨Alt+Up [scroll_up_page]⟩
Scroll up by one page
⟨Alt+Down [scroll_down_page]⟩
Scroll down by one page
R, ⟨keypad begin⟩ [render]
Anti-alias the image. Opens the currently selected image in
thumbnail mode.
⟨keypad +⟩, ⟨Up⟩ [zoom_in]
Zoom in
⟨keypad -⟩, ⟨Down⟩ [zoom_out]
Zoom out
*, ⟨keypad *⟩ [zoom_default]
Zoom to 100%
/, ⟨keypad /⟩ [zoom_fit]
Zoom to fit the window size
! [zoom_fill]
Zoom to fill the window size like --bg-fill
MENU KEYS
The following keys bindings are used for the feh menu:
⟨Escape⟩ [menu_close]
Close the menu
⟨Up⟩ [menu_up]
Highlight previous menu item
⟨Down⟩ [menu_down]
Highlight next menu item
⟨Left⟩ [menu_parent]
Highlight parent menu item
⟨Right⟩ [menu_child]
Highlight child menu item
⟨Return⟩, ⟨space⟩ [menu_select]
Select highlighted menu item
BUTTONS CONFIG SYNTAX
.config/feh/buttons. This works like the keys config file: the entries
are of the form "action [binding]".
Each binding is a button number. It may optionally start with modifiers
for things like Control, in which case binding looks like mod-button (for
example C-1 for Ctrl + Left button).
Note: Do not use the same button for multiple actions. feh does not
check for conflicting bindings, so their behaviour is undefined. Either
unbind the unwanted action, or bind it to another unused button. The or-
der in which you bind / unbind does not matter, though.
For the available modifiers, see KEYS CONFIGURATION SYNTAX.
BUTTONS
In an image window, the following buttons may be used (The strings in
[square brackets] are the config action names). Additionally, all ac-
tions specified in the KEYS section can also be bound to a button.
unbound [reload]
Reload current image
0 ⟨cursor movement while not panning, zooming, or similar⟩
Does not have a default binding. By binding it to quit, you can
turn feh into a simple screensaver.
1 ⟨left mouse button⟩ [pan]
pan the current image
2 ⟨middle mouse button⟩ [zoom]
Zoom the current image
3 ⟨right mouse button⟩ [toggle_menu]
Toggle menu
4 ⟨mousewheel down⟩ [prev_img]
Show previous image
5 ⟨mousewheel up⟩ [next_img]
Show next image
Ctrl+1 [blur]
Blur current image
Ctrl+2 [rotate]
Rotate current image
unbound [zoom_in]
Zoom in
unbound [zoom_out]
Zoom out
MOUSE ACTIONS
Default Bindings: When viewing an image, mouse button 1 pans the image
(moves it around) or, when only clicked, moves to the next image
(slideshow mode only). Quick drags with less than 2px of movement per
axis will be treated as clicks to aid graphics tablet users. Mouse but-
ton 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 bor-
der 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. The zoom will always happen so that the pixel on which you en-
tered the zoom mode remains stationary. So, to enlarge a specific part
of an image, click the zoom button on that part.
SIGNALS
In slideshow and multiwindow mode, feh handles the following signals:
SIGUSR1
Slideshow mode: switch to next image; reload current image if the
slideshow consists of a single file. Multiwindow mode: reload
all images.
SIGUSR2
Slideshow mode: switch to previous image; reload current image if
the slideshow consists of a single file. Multiwindow mode:
reload all images.
USAGE EXAMPLES
Here are some examples of useful option combinations. See also:
⟨https://feh.finalrewind.org/examples/⟩
feh ~/Pictures
Show all images in ~/Pictures
feh -r ~/Pictures
Recursively show all images found in ~/Pictures and subdirecto-
ries
feh -rSfilename --version-sort ~/Pictures
Same as above, but sort naturally. By default, feh will show
files in the string order of their names, meaning e.g. "foo
10.jpg" will come before "foo 2.jpg". In this case, they are in-
stead ordered as a human would expect.
feh -t -Sfilename -E 128 -y 128 -W 1024 ~/Pictures
Show 128x128 pixel thumbnails, limit window width to 1024 pixels.
feh -t -Sfilename -E 128 -y 128 -W 1024 -P -C
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/ttf-dejavu/ -e DejaVuSans/8 ~/Pictures
Same as above, but enable thumbnail caching and use a smaller
font.
feh -irFarial/14 -O index.jpg ~/Pictures
Make an index print of ~/Pictures and all directories below it,
using 14 point Arial to write the image info under each thumb-
nail. Save the image as index.jpg and don't display it, just
exit. Note that this even works without a running X server
feh --unloadable -r ~/Pictures
Print all unloadable images in ~/Pictures, recursively
feh -f by_width -S width --reverse --list .
Write a list of all images in the directory to by_width, sorted
by width (widest images first)
feh -w ~/Pictures/holidays
Open each image in ~/Pictures/holidays in its own window
feh -FD5 -Sname ~/Pictures/presentation
Show the images in .../presentation, sorted by name, in
fullscreen, automatically change to the next image after 5 sec-
onds
feh -rSwidth -A "mv %F ~/images/%N" ~/Pictures
View all images in ~/Pictures and below, sorted by width, move an
image to ~/image/image_name when enter is pressed
feh --start-at ~/Pictures/foo.jpg
View all images in ~/Pictures, starting with foo.jpg. All other
images are still in the slideshow and can be viewed normally
feh --start-at ~/Pictures/foo.jpg ~/Pictures
Same as above.
feh --info "exifgrep '(Model|DateTimeOriginal|FNumber|ISO|Flash)' %F |
cut -d . -f 4-" .
Show some EXIF information, extracted by exifprobe/exifgrep
feh --action 'rm %F' -rl --max-dimension 1000x800
Recursively remove all images with dimensions below or equal to
1000x800 pixels from the current directory.
feh -L '%w %h %f' | awk '{ if ($1 > $2) { print $0 } }' | cut -d ' ' -f
3- | feh -f -
Show landscape pictures (image width greater than height) in the
current directory.
DEPENDENCIES
When --edit is used, feh needs the jpegtran and jpegexiforient binaries
(usually distributed in "libjpeg-progs" or similar) for lossless JPEG ro-
tation.
To view images from URLs such as "http://", feh must be compiled with
libcurl support. It is enabled in this build
KNOWN BUGS
Imlib2 releases prior to 1.7.4 are unable to load gif, tiff, and webp im-
ages if the filename does not end with gif, tiff, or webp, respectively.
Notably, this means that feh is unable to show gif, tiff, and webp images
from stdin or network URLs on systems using an Imlib2 version older than
1.7.4.
Imlib2 releases 1.7.5+ automatically rotate images based on their EXIF
tags. When combined with the --auto-rotate option, this causes images to
be rotated twice and end up in an incorrect orientation. As a work-
around, do not use --auto-rotate on systems with Imlib2 version 1.7.5 or
later.
On systems with giflib 5.1.2, feh may be unable to load gif images. For
affected mips, mipsel and arm devices, gif support is completely broken,
while on x86 / x86_64 gifs can usually only be loaded if they are the
first image in the filelist. This appears to be a bug in giflib, see
⟨https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=813729⟩ for details.
Workaround: Use --conversion-timeout 5 (or some other positive value) to
load gifs with imagemagick instead, or downgrade to giflib 5.1.1, or up-
grade to giflib 5.1.4.
While loading images using libcurl, feh will not react to key or mouse
actions.
Thumbnail mode is somewhat inefficient, and because of that not nearly as
fast as it could be.
--scale-down does not take window decorations into account and may there-
fore make the window slightly too large.
REPORTING BUGS
If you find a bug, please report it to ⟨derf+feh@finalrewind.org⟩ or via
⟨https://github.com/derf/feh/issues⟩.
Please include the feh version ⟨the output of "feh --version"⟩, steps to
reproduce the bug and, if necessary, images to reproduce it. Note that
feh is a hobby project, so bug reports may be addressed with significant
delays.
LICENSE
Copyright (C) 1999, 2000 by Paul Duncan. Copyright (C) 1999, 2000 by Tom
Gilbert and contributors. Copyright (C) 2010-2020 by Daniel Friesel and
contributors.
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a
copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Soft-
ware"), 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 condi-
tions:
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 Soft-
ware was used.
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS
OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABIL-
ITY, 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.
Current developer: Daniel Friesel ⟨derf@finalrewind.org⟩
Original author (no longer developing): Tom Gilbert
⟨feh_sucks@linuxbrit.co.uk⟩
Website: https://feh.finalrewind.org
BSD August 22, 2022 BSD
Generated by dwww version 1.15 on Thu Jun 20 12:28:02 CEST 2024.