14 .TH XScreenSaver 1 "17-Jun-99" "X Version 11"
16 webcollage - decorate the screen with random images from the web
19 [\-display \fIhost:display.screen\fP]
22 [\-timeout \fIsecs\fP]
24 [\-background \fIbg\fP]
28 [\-filter \fIcommand\fP]
29 [\-filter2 \fIcommand\fP]
30 [\-http\-proxy host[:port]]
31 [\-dictionary \fIdictionary-file\fP]
32 [\-driftnet [\fIcmd\fP]]
34 The \fIwebcollage\fP program pulls random image off of the World Wide Web
35 and scatters them on the root window. One satisfied customer described it
36 as "a nonstop pop culture brainbath." This program finds its images by
37 doing random web searches, and extracting images from the returned pages.
38 It places the images on the root window by using the
48 \fIwebcollage\fP is written in
52 It will be an order of magnitude faster if you also have
53 the \fIwebcollage-helper\fP program installed (a GDK/JPEG image
54 compositor), but \fIwebcollage\fP works without it as well.
57 accepts the following options:
60 Draw on the root window. This option is manditory, if output is being
61 produced: drawing to a window other than the root window is not yet
64 .B \-verbose \fRor\fP \-v
65 Print diagnostics to stderr. Multiple \fI-v\fP switches increase the
66 amount of output. \fI-v\fP will print out the URLs of the images,
67 and where they were placed; \fI-vv\fP will print out any warnings,
68 and all URLs being loaded; \fI-vvv\fP will print information on
69 what URLs were rejected; and so on.
71 .B \-timeout \fIseconds\fP
72 How long to wait for a URL to complete before giving up on it and
73 moving on to the next one.
76 .B \-delay \fIseconds\fP
77 How long to sleep between images. Default 2 seconds. (Remember that
78 this program probably spends a lot of time waiting for the network.)
80 .B \-background \fIcolor-or-ppm\fP
81 What to use for the background onto which images are pasted. This may be
82 a color name, a hexadecimal RGB specification in the form '#rrggbb', or
83 the name of a PPM file.
86 Normally, the output image will be made to be the size of the screen.
87 This lets you specify the desired size.
90 If this option is specified, then no composite output image will be
91 generated. This is only useful when used in conjunction
95 If this option is specified, then no composite output image will be
96 generated: instead, a list of image URLs will be printed on stdout.
98 .B \-filter \fIcommand\fP
99 Filter all source images through this command. The command must take
100 a PPM file on stdin, and write a new PPM file to stdout. One good
101 choice for a filter would be:
103 webcollage -root -filter 'vidwhacker -stdin -stdout'
106 .B \-filter2 \fIcommand\fP
107 Filter the \fIcomposite\fP image through this command. The \fI-filter\fP
108 option applies to the sub-images; the \fI-filter2\fP applies to the
109 final, full-screen image.
111 .B \-http\-proxy \fIhost:port\fP
112 If you must go through a proxy to connect to the web, you can specify it
113 with this option, or with the \fB$http_proxy\fP or \fB$HTTP_PROXY\fP
114 environment variables.
116 .B \-dictionary \fIfile\fP
117 Webcollage normally looks at the system's default spell-check dictionary
118 to generate words to feed into the search engines. You can specify an
119 alternate dictionary with this option.
121 .B \-driftnet \fI[ args ]\fP
123 is a program that snoops your local ethernet for packets that look
124 like they might be image files. It can be used in conjunction
125 with \fIwebcollage\fP to generate a collage of what other people on
126 your network are looking at, instead of a search-engine collage.
127 If you have \fIdriftnet\fP installed on your $PATH, just use
128 the \fI\-driftnet\fP option. You can also specify the location
129 of the program like this:
131 -driftnet /path/to/driftnet
133 or, you can provide extra arguments like this:
135 -driftnet '/path/to/driftnet -extra -args'
137 Driftnet version 0.1.5 or later is required. Note that
138 the \fIdriftnet\fP program requires root access, so you'll have
139 to make \fIdriftnet\fP be setuid-root for this to work.
140 Please exercise caution.
145 to get the default host and display number.
148 to get the name of a resource file that overrides the global resources
149 stored in the RESOURCE_MANAGER property.
151 .B http_proxy\fR or \fPHTTP_PROXY
152 to get the default HTTP proxy host and port.
155 .I /usr/dict/words \fRor\fP /usr/share/lib/dict/words \fRor\fP /usr/share/dict/words
156 To find the random words to feed to search engines.
158 .I http://random.yahoo.com/bin/ryl, http://image.altavista.com/
159 To find random web pages.
161 When drawing on the root window, it always uses the default colormap.
162 This is actually a limitation of xv. But regardless, when using this
163 program with xscreensaver, it must be given the \fBdefault-n\fP
164 visual specification (see the
166 manual for more details.)
168 Animating GIFs are not supported.
170 Too many of the images that it finds are text, not pictures. This is
171 because most of the web is pictures of text. Which is pretty sad.
174 .BR xscreensaver (1),
190 Copyright \(co 1998-2002 by Jamie Zawinski. Permission to use, copy, modify,
191 distribute, and sell this software and its documentation for any purpose is
192 hereby granted without fee, provided that the above copyright notice appear
193 in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice
194 appear in supporting documentation. No representations are made about the
195 suitability of this software for any purpose. It is provided "as is" without
196 express or implied warranty.
198 Jamie Zawinski <jwz@jwz.org>, 24-May-98.
projects / xscreensaver / blob