Hover Widgets

Nine compact Noctalia bar widgets that expand on hover. Add only the entries you want; each instance has its own settings. The defaults use a slim volume track, a background media visualiser, hover playback controls and text-based CPU/RAM readings.

Plugin

Field	Value
ID	pulser/hover-widgets
Entries	Bar widgets: clock, volume, cpu, ram, temp, net-down, net-up, media, active-window

Requirements

Noctalia 5.2.0 or later, plugin API 32, on Linux. Install these commands on PATH:

• noctalia: native Control Center actions.
• wpctl: read, set and mute the default PipeWire output volume.
• playerctl and sh: choose an MPRIS player, read metadata and control playback.
• wlrctl: read the focused window. Requires wlr-foreign-toplevel-management-v1 support from the compositor.
• nvidia-smi: NVIDIA temperature when Show GPU temperature is enabled. Optional on systems without an NVIDIA GPU; disable that setting if unavailable.

Dependencies are declared for the whole plugin, so the host may report a missing command even if you do not use the associated widget. ImageMagick is not required. The media visualiser uses Noctalia's shared PipeWire spectrum service; seeking requires an MPRIS player that supports it.

Usage

Enable Hover Widgets in Settings → Plugins. In Settings → Bar → Widgets, add any of these entries. Installing the plugin does not automatically replace existing widgets or add all nine.

Entry	Widget type	Behaviour
clock	pulser/hover-widgets:clock	Time/date expand to the full weekday, ordinal day and month, with seconds on hover. Click opens Calendar.
volume	pulser/hover-widgets:volume	Speaker click toggles mute; percentage/padding opens Audio. Hover reveals the track; click or drag it to change volume. Wheel adjusts by 2 percentage points per step by default.
cpu	pulser/hover-widgets:cpu	CPU and GPU usage; hover adds CPU frequency and package power where available. Click opens System.
ram	pulser/hover-widgets:ram	Used memory with a theme-tinted RAM icon; hover adds total memory and percentage. Click opens System.
temp	pulser/hover-widgets:temp	CPU temperature; hover adds enabled GPU, DIMM, hottest-core and NVMe readings where available. Click opens System.
net-down	pulser/hover-widgets:net-down	Receive speed, hidden below the configured threshold. Hover expands the units. Click opens System.
net-up	pulser/hover-widgets:net-up	Transmit speed, hidden below the configured threshold. Hover expands the units. Click opens System.
media	pulser/hover-widgets:media	Cover art, title, playback progress and audio visualiser. Hover reveals previous/play-pause/next and expands the title up to its configured limit.
active-window	pulser/hover-widgets:active-window	Focused window title and app icon expand on hover; long titles cycle. Hidden when no window is available.

Volume

Dragging is enabled by default. The 100px-wide, 7px-thick track has a flat point and no handle; colour, width, thickness and handle visibility are adjustable. The widget keeps its width stable during a drag. With dragging enabled, it waits 1.2 seconds after leaving before folding, or 500ms after releasing outside. Queued slider layout changes do not count as new drags.

Media

The default background pill is 164px wide, expands up to 280px, and is 16px thick. It fits shorter titles rather than always using the maximum; longer titles cycle while hovered. Its 44-band visualiser uses the Progress mask, with configurable colour and darkening. Change Progress placement to Inline for a separate progress track.

Left-click the cover or the play/pause button to toggle playback. Previous/next operate the selected player. Click the title/background to seek. With Right-click controls to seek enabled, right-click over a playback control seeks at that horizontal position; left-click still operates the button. The upper/lower control slivers also seek on left-click without highlighting the button. Keep the media widget's native right-click action set to none (the default) so this routing works; right-click elsewhere opens Media. Wheel seeking moves 10 seconds per step by default, or select track skipping instead.

If migrating from the separate development plugins, replace each widget with the corresponding pulser/hover-widgets:<entry> type. Existing per-instance overrides are retained only if you carry them over; reset plugin settings to use these defaults. Native bar placement, capsule styling, font and widget scale remain Noctalia appearance settings. To match the development bar exactly, set volume's native Scale to 0.85 and media's Font family to Adwaita Sans.

Settings

Each table applies to its named entry. The clock has no plugin-specific settings. Dependent appearance settings are hidden when their parent selection is inactive.

volume

Setting	Type	Default	Description
icon_click	select	mute	Click the speaker to toggle mute, or open Audio. Click the expanded track to set volume. Percentage/padding and right-click open Audio. Options: mute, panel.
show_percent	bool	true	Show volume percentage or muted. Click this label to open Audio.
scroll_step	int	2	How much one scroll notch changes the volume.
invert_scroll	bool	false	By default scroll up raises the volume. Turn this on if it feels backwards.
drag_enabled	bool	true	Drag the classic volume track. It folds when idle and stays open during an active drag.
slider_width	int	100	Expanded track width in pixels, independent of thickness and speaker size.
slider_thickness	int	7	Track thickness, independent of its width. The circular knob is 1.5 times this size.
bar_color	select	primary	Theme colour role used for the classic filled track and circular knob. Options: primary, onsurface, secondary, tertiary, hover, error.
point_style	select	flat	Rounded or flat moving progress edge. Flat also uses a slim rectangular volume handle. Options: rounded, flat.
show_knob	bool	false	Show the circle or flat handle at the current volume. Turn off for a plain bar.
knob_color	select	primary	Independent knob colour. On-primary matches the knob used by native Settings sliders. Options: on_primary, on_surface, primary, secondary, tertiary, error.

cpu

Setting	Type	Default	Description
show_gpu	bool	true	Show GPU utilisation beside CPU usage using Noctalia system monitoring. A dash means the sensor is unavailable or still loading.
gauge	bool	false	Compact display: gauge bar (on) or plain percentage (off)

ram

Setting	Type	Default	Description
gauge	bool	false	Compact display: gauge bar (on) or plain percentage (off)
amount_first	bool	true	On: shows used GB by default, revealing the percentage and total on hover. Off: shows the percentage by default, revealing used/total GB on hover.

temp

Setting	Type	Default	Description
show_gpu	bool	true	Show GPU temp on hover
show_nvme	bool	false	Show hottest NVMe temp on hover
show_ram	bool	true	Show RAM (DIMM) temp on hover
show_hottest_core	bool	true	Show hottest CPU core on hover

net-down

Setting	Type	Default	Description
threshold_kbps	int	1024	Hide entirely below this; hovering always shows it. 1024 = 1 MB/s
compact_units	bool	true	34K/1.2M instead of 34KB/s/1.2MB/s while not hovering
hide_completely	bool	true	On: vanishes below the idle threshold. Off: icon stays, only the number hides

net-up

Setting	Type	Default	Description
threshold_kbps	int	1152	Hide entirely below this; hovering always shows it. 1024 = 1 MB/s
compact_units	bool	true	34K/1.2M instead of 34KB/s/1.2MB/s while not hovering
hide_completely	bool	true	On: vanishes below the idle threshold. Off: icon stays, only the number hides

media

Setting	Type	Default	Description
show_cover_art	bool	true	Replace the play/pause icon with the track's (rounded) cover art when available.
corner_rounding	int	75	0 = square corners, 100 = fully circular.
cover_size	int	18	Size of the cover art icon in place of the play/pause glyph.
show_controls	bool	true	Show previous, play/pause and next buttons.
controls_on_hover	bool	true	When Playback controls is enabled, animate those buttons in and out on hover.
scroll_action	select	seek	Skip tracks or seek through the current song with the mouse wheel. Options: tracks, seek.
scroll_seek_step	int	10	Seconds per wheel step. Scroll up goes forward; down goes back.
audio_spectrum	bool	true	Show live audio bars behind background progress, or beside the controls for inline progress. Uses the shell’s shared audio spectrum; rests when paused or silent.
audio_spectrum_bands	int	44	Number of live frequency bands, from 8 to 128. Bars and gaps adapt to fit the widget.
visualiser_mode	select	progress	Background layout: overlay, show only on played progress, dark on progress/light on background, or use the audio bars as the progress fill. Inline visualisers keep the overlay style. Options: overlay, played_only, inverted, progress.
visualiser_color	color	on_tertiary	Theme/custom audio-bar colour. In inverted mode this is the lighter background colour; progress mode uses Progress colour.
visualiser_opacity	int	83	Opacity of the audio visualiser, independent of progress colour and darkening.
visualiser_height	int	18	Maximum height of the centred audio bars.
visualiser_width	int	50	Width when progress is inline; background mode uses the media widget’s full width.
show_progress_bar	bool	true	Show a playback-position bar next to the icon. It's a rendered image (not text), so it never affects the widget's Font setting -- when cover art is on, the bar sits beside the art; when off, it replaces the play/pause glyph.
point_style	select	flat	Rounded or flat moving progress edge. Applies to classic and background progress; the native slider keeps its own style. Options: rounded, flat.
progress_layout	select	background	Inline seekable bar or progress behind the media content. Click the background title/progress area to seek; artwork and buttons retain playback actions. Options: inline, background.
progress_darkening	int	20	Darken the played progress fill itself, from 0% (original colour) to 80%. Applies to background and classic progress.
background_progress_color	color	primary	Pick a theme colour or a custom colour for the background progress fill.
background_darkening	int	10	Darken the unplayed background around the progress. Zero matches the widget background; the progress colour stays at full strength.
background_width	int	164	Compact background pill width, in pixels; it grows to Expanded background width on hover.
background_expand_width	int	280	Maximum hovered background width. Expansion stops earlier when the whole title fits; longer titles cycle within this limit.
background_height	int	16	Thickness of the background progress pill, in pixels.
background_seek_strip	bool	true	Right-click a playback button to seek at its position on the background progress. Left-click operates the button; right-click elsewhere opens Media controls.
progress_style	select	classic_drag	Classic supports clicks. Classic with dragging keeps the same pill, uses expanded width, previews while dragging and seeks on release. Interactive uses the native slider appearance. Options: classic, classic_drag, interactive.
progress_width	int	86	Width of the seek slider in this state. Expanded width is at least the compact width. Set both equal for a fixed length.
progress_expand_width	int	35	Width of the seek slider in this state. Expanded width is at least the compact width. Set both equal for a fixed length.
progress_thickness	int	8	Progress bar thickness, independent of cover size and width. Rounded ends stay circular.
bar_color	color	on_surface	Pick a theme colour or a custom colour for classic progress.
compact_width	int	20	Text width when not hovering. The text only actually shrinks to this if it's longer -- a short title just stays put.
expand_width	int	40	Maximum title characters on hover. Shorter titles use only the space they need; longer titles cycle within the limit.

active-window

Setting	Type	Default	Description
compact_width	int	26	Text width when not hovering. The title only actually shrinks to this if it's longer -- a short title just stays put.
expand_width	int	45	Text width while hovering. If the title is still longer than this, it scrolls as a marquee instead of growing further.
icon_size	int	20	Per-app icon size when compact (not hovering). Only affects the real app icon -- the generic fallback glyph (shown when no icon can be resolved) is a fixed size, since the plugin API doesn't expose glyph sizing.
icon_size_hover	int	24	Per-app icon size while hovering; animates between this and the compact size along with the text width.

Notes

• Processes: volume runs wpctl; media runs the shipped pick-player.sh through sh and calls playerctl; active-window runs wlrctl; GPU temperature optionally runs nvidia-smi. Native panel callbacks can invoke noctalia msg panel-toggle control-center with the relevant page. No remote code is downloaded or executed.
• Artwork/network: media downloads HTTP(S) artwork from the URL supplied by the selected player using Noctalia's downloader. YouTube metadata without artwork may use i.ytimg.com. The artwork host receives the request and your IP address. Local file:// artwork is read directly. Downloads are cached under cache/media-mini in the plugin data directory, with a user-cache fallback.
• RAM icon: assets/memory.svg is a custom vector RAM outline. Theme-tinted copies are written to cache/ram-icons in the plugin data directory, with a user-cache fallback. The icon ships under this plugin's MIT license.
• System reads: CPU, memory and network widgets read /proc; temperature and CPU frequency/power read /sys. GPU usage comes from Noctalia's system monitor and may be unavailable. CPU frequency is CPU0, not an all-core average. Package power requires readable Intel RAPL counters. CPU temperature targets Intel coretemp; NVMe sensors use the composite reading and DIMM sensors use spd5118. Missing readings are omitted, or shown as a dash.
• Units: memory GB values are binary GiB; network KB/s and MB/s are binary KiB/s and MiB/s. Network thresholds are KiB/s. Non-loopback interface totals can double-count traffic across bridges, VPNs and physical interfaces.
• Text: expansion uses UTF-8-safe character slicing and cached approximate glyph widths. Smooth partial-glyph animation depends on future native API support.
• Privacy/compositors: focused-window titles and media metadata may contain private information. Tested on Noctalia 5.2.1 with DriftWM; other compositors and hardware have not been verified.

License

MIT, copyright 2026 pulser. See LICENSE.