Configuring Slate

Files

Traditional Configuration

Slate is configured using a .slate file in the current user's home directory. Configuration is loaded upon running Slate. You can also re-load the config using the Relaunch and Load Config menu option on the status menu. (Use this at your own risk. It is better to simply restart Slate.)

JavaScript Configuration

NEW: You may now use a .slate.js file to configure slate using JavaScript. This allows for much more complex and dynamic configurations than the normal slate configuration style below. You can check out the documentation for this here.

Default Config File

Note: If no .slate or .slate.js file exists in the current user's home directory, the default config file will be used.

Traditional Configuration Format

Directives

Configuration is split into the following directives:

• config for global configurations
• alias to create alias variables
• layout to configure layouts
• default to default certain screen configurations to layouts
• bind for key bindings
• source to load configs from another file

Note: # is the comment character. Anything after a # will be ignored.

Expressions

Some directives allow parameters that can be expressions. The following strings will be replaced with the appropriate values when using expressions:

Variable	Description
screenOriginX	target screen's top left x coordinate (should not be used in Window Hints configs)
screenOriginY	target screen's top left y coordinate (should not be used in Window Hints configs)
screenSizeX	target screen's width
screenSizeY	target screen's height
windowTopLeftX	window's current top left x coordinate (should not be used in Window Hints configs)
windowTopLeftY	window's current top left y coordinate (should not be used in Window Hints configs)
windowSizeX	window's width
windowSizeY	window's height
newWindowSizeX	window's new width (after resize, only usable in topLeftX and topLeftY, should not be used in configs)
newWindowSizeY	window's new height (after resize, only usable in topLeftX and topLeftY, should not be used in configs)
windowHintsWidth	the value of the windowHintsWidth config (only usable in windowHintsTopLeftX and windowHintsTopLeftY)
windowHintsHeight	the value of the windowHintsHeight config (only usable in windowHintsTopLeftX and dowHintsTopLeftY)

In addition to the variables above, expressions can be used with the following functions and operators:

Operator/Function	Example
+	1+1 ⇒ 2
-	1-1 ⇒ 0
*	2*2 ⇒ 4
/	4/2 ⇒ 2
**	3**2 ⇒ 9
sum	sum({1,2,3}) ⇒ 6
count	count({4,5,6}) ⇒ 3
min	min({1,3,5}) ⇒ 1
max	max({1,3,5}) ⇒ 5
average	average({1,2,3,4}) ⇒ 2.5
median	median({1,2,3,10,15}) ⇒ 3
stddev	stddev({1,2,3,4,5}) ⇒ 1.4142135623730951
sqrt	sqrt(9) ⇒ 3.0
log	log(100) ⇒ 2.0
ln	ln(8) ⇒ 2.0794415416798357
exp	exp(2) ⇒ 7.3890560989306504 (same as e**parameter)
floor	floor(1.9) ⇒ 1.0
ceiling	ceiling(1.1) ⇒ 2.0
abs	abs(-1) ⇒ 1
trunc	trunc(1.1123123123) ⇒ 1.0
random	random() ⇒ 0.20607629744336009 (random float between 0 and 1)
randomn	randomn(10) ⇒ 4 (random integer between 0 and parameter-1)

Note: When using expressions spaces are not allowed!

Example Config

You can check out an example config here.