Settings#

Vimiv provides configurable settings.

There are two ways to change a setting:

Update the configuration file to change it permanently
Run the :set command to change it temporarily

The configuration file is $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/vimiv/vimiv.conf where $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is usually ~/.config/ if you have not updated it.

Referring to external resources#

In the configuration file, it is possible to refer to external resources using the option = ${RESOURCE:variable} syntax. Here RESOURCE defines the type of external resource, and variable is the corresponding variable name. The following options are available:

${env:VARIABLE} to retrieve the value of the environment variable $VARIABLE

Overview of all settings#

The following table explains all available settings. All setting names are of the form group.name where group maps to the corresponding section in the configuration file and name is the name within this section. In case there is no group, the setting belongs into the general section.

Note that all settings related to the statusbar content are described in detail in their own corresponding document.

Overview of settings#
Setting	Description	Default	Type
command.history_limit	Maximum number of commands to store in history	100	int
completion.fuzzy	Use fuzzy matching in completion	False	bool
image.autoplay	Start playing animations on open	True	bool
image.autowrite	Save images on changes	ask	Options
image.overzoom	Maximum scale to apply trying to fit image to window	1.0	float
image.zoom_wheel_ctrl	Require holding the control modifier for zooming with the mouse wheel	True	bool
keyhint.delay	Delay (in ms) until the keyhint widget is displayed	500	int
keyhint.timeout	Time (in ms) after which partially typed keybindings are cleared	5000	int
library.show_hidden	Show hidden files in the library	False	bool
library.width	Width of the library as fraction of main window size	0.3	float
metadata.current_keyset	Currently displayed metadata keyset	Exif.Image.Make,E…	str
monitor_filesystem	Monitor current directory for changes and reload widgets automatically	True	bool
read_only	Disable any commands that are able to edit files on disk	False	bool
scroll_to_center	Ensure the cursor is always at the center of the screen when scrolling	True	bool
search.ignore_case	Ignore case when searching, i.e. ‘A’ and ‘a’ are equal	True	bool
search.incremental	Automatically filter search results when typing	True	bool
slideshow.delay	Delay to next image in slideshow	2.0	float
slideshow.indicator	Text to display in statusbar when slideshow is running	slideshow:	str
sort.directory_order	Ordering of directories, e.g. in the library	alphabetical	str
sort.ignore_case	Ignore case when sorting, i.e. ‘A’ and ‘a’ are equal	False	bool
sort.image_order	Ordering of images, e.g. in the library	alphabetical	str
sort.reverse	Reverse the order of sorting, i.e. z before a, largest first, etc.	False	bool
sort.shuffle	Randomly shuffle images and ignoring all other sort settings	False	bool
startup_library	Enter library at startup if there are no images to show	True	bool
statusbar.collapse_home	Collapse /home/user to ~ in statusbar	True	bool
statusbar.mark_indicator	Text to display if the current image is marked	<b>*</b>	str
statusbar.message_timeout	Time in ms until statusbar messages are removed	60000	int
statusbar.show	Always display the statusbar	True	bool
thumbnail.save	Save new thumbnails to disk in the shared icon cache for later use	True	bool
thumbnail.size	Size of thumbnails	128	int
title.fallback	Default window title if no mode specific options exist	vimiv	str
title.image	Window title in image mode	vimiv - {basename}	str

Sorting#

The settings in the sort group allow changing the ordering of images and directories. The ordering principle is defined by the sort.image_order and sort.directory_order settings which both have the following options:

Overview of ordering types#
Ordering	Description
alphabetical	Regular ordering by string basename
natural	Natural ordering by basename, i.e. image2.jpg comes before image11.jpg
recently-modified	Ordering by modification time (`mtime`)
size	Ordering by filesize, in bytes for images, in number of files for directories
none	Do not sort or reverse. Use the existing order of the images (including that of a previous sort type). This is mostly for keeping the order from the command line or stdin.

In addition, the ordering can be reversed using sort.reverse and the string-like orderings (alphabetical and natural) can be made case-insensitive using sort.ignore_case except for when the none ordering type is used. When sort.shuffle is set, the image filelist is shuffled regardless of the other orderings, but the library remains ordered.