autorandr

Automatically select a display configuration based on connected devices

Stefan Tomanek <stefan.tomanek@wertarbyte.de>

Branch information

The original wertarbyte/autorandr tree seems unmaintained, with lots of open pull requests and issues. I forked it and merged what I thought were the most important changes. I will maintain this branch until wertarbyte finds the time to maintain his branch again.

How to use

Save your current display configuration and setup with:

autorandr --save mobile

Connect an additional display, configure your setup and save it:

autorandr --save docked

Now autorandr can detect which hardware setup is active:

 $ autorandr
   mobile
   docked (detected)

To automatically reload your setup, just append --change to the command line

To manually load a profile, you can use the --load <profile> option.

autorandr tries to avoid reloading an identical configuration. To force the (re)configuration, apply --force.

To prevent a profile from being loaded, place a script call block in its directory. The script is evaluated before the screen setup is inspected, and in case of it returning a value of 0 the profile is skipped. This can be used to query the status of a docking station you are about to leave.

If no suitable profile can be identified, the current configuration is kept. To change this behaviour and switch to a fallback configuration, specify --default <profile>.

Another script called postswitch can be placed in the directory ~/.autorandr as well as in all profile directories: The scripts are executed after a mode switch has taken place and can notify window managers or other applications about it.

While the script uses xrandr by default, calling it by the name autodisper or auto-disper forces it to use the disper utility, which is useful for controlling nvidia chipsets. The formats for fingerprinting the current setup and saving/loading the current configuration are adjusted accordingly.

To install autorandr call make install, define your setup and then call make hotplug to install hotplug scripts.

For Debian using auto-disper: To make the screen auto-configure when your computer wakes up,

• Copy auto-disper into /usr/local/bin/
• Copy pm-utils/40auto-disper into /etc/pm/sleep.d/
• (Assuming gnome) Run gnome-keybinding-properties and ADD a shortcut, I called it "Run auto-disper", I set it to CTRL-F7, and the command is: auto-disper -c --default default
• Create a default disper setting... eg for laptop: unplug all monitors, set up the screen nicely on the laptop display. Then run auto-disper --save laptop