CopyQ

CopyQ is clipboard manager with searchable and editable history.

To build and install CopyQ on your system read INSTALL file.

To start CopyQ run copyq command without parameters. The application main window is accessible by clicking on system tray icon or running copyq toggle.

To exit the application middle-click on the tray icon or press Ctrl-Q keys in the application window.

Keyboard navigation

• PgDown/PgUp, Home/End, Up/Down

  item list navigation

• Ctrl+Up, Ctrl+Down

  move selected items

• Ctrl+Left, Ctrl+Right

  cycle through item formats

• Escape

  hide window

• Ctrl+Q

  exit

• F2

  edit selected items (in place)

• Ctrl+E

  edit items in external editor

• F5

  open action dialog for selected items

• Delete

  delete selected items

• Enter

  put current item into clipboard

• F1

  show help

Type any number to select item with given id.

Type a regular expressions (case-insensitive) to search/filter items.

Command Line Interface

usage: copyq [COMMAND]
Starts server if no command is specified.
  COMMANDs:
    show    Show main window.
    hide    Hide main window.
    toggle  Show or hide main window.
    menu    Open context menu.
    exit    Exit server.

    clipboard [MIME_TYPE="text/plain"]
      Print clipboard content.
      Use ? for mime_type to print mime types.
    selection [MIME_TYPE="text/plain"]
      Print X11 selection content.
      Use ? for mime_type to print mime types.

    tab
      List available tab names.
    tab <TAB_NAME> [COMMAND]
      Run command on tab with given name.
      Tab is created if it doesn't exist.
    removetab! <TAB_NAME>
      Remove tab with given name.
    renametab  <TAB_NAME> <NEW_TAB_NAME>
      Rename tab.

    length, count, size
      Print number of items in history.
    select [ROW=0]
      Move item in the row to clipboard.
    add <TEXT> ...
      Add text into clipboard.
    remove [ROW=0] ...
      Remove item in given rows.
    edit [ROW=0] ...
      Edit clipboard item.

    read [MIME_TYPE="text/plain"|ROW] ...
      Print raw data of clipboard or item in row.
      Use ? for mime_type to print mime types.
    write <MIME_TYPE> <DATA> ...
      Write raw data to clipboard.
    - [MIME_TYPE="text/plain"]
      Copy text from standard input into clipboard.

    action [ROW=0] ...
      Show action dialog.
    action [ROW=0] ... "command" [separator=\n]
      Apply command on item text in the row.

    config
      List all options.
    config <OPTION>
      Get option value.
    config <OPTION> <VALUE>
      Set option value.

    help, -h, --help
      Print this help.

Usage Examples

CopyQ must be running to be able to issue commands using command line. Most of the examples should work on GNU/Linux with the correct applications installed.

To start CopyQ run following command:

copyq

Insert text to the clipboard:

copyq add "print([x**2 for x in range(10)])"

and process it in Python interpreter:

copyq action python

The result will be copied to the clipboard.

For each file in given directory create new item:

copyq action "ls /"

Load file content into clipboard:

copyq action "cat file.txt" ""

Note: Last argument is separator - empty string means "create single item".

Process an item with the Python interpreter and redirect the standard output to the standard error output using sh command (shell):

copyq add 'print("Hello world!")'
copyq action 'sh -c "python 1>&2"'

Note: Standard error output will be show as tray icon tooltip.

To concatenate items select them items in CopyQ window and press F5 key, type cat into command input field, check Output into item(s) check box, clear Separator field and press Ok button to submit.

Monitor file (or pipe) $HOME/clipboard and load every new line into clipboard:

copyq action "tail -f $HOME/clipboard"

This process can be killed by right clicking on tray icon and selecting the process from context menu.

Find files in current directory:

copyq action "find \"$PWD\" -iname '*.cpp'"

Open CopyQ window and select one of the found files from history. Open action dialog (press F5 key) and in the command field type your favorite text editor (e.g. gedit %1; %1 will be replaced with temporary filename containing selected text).

To copy an image to clipboard use for example:

copyq - image/gif < image.gif
copyq - image/svg < image.svg