Libnotify

Summary
This article discusses how to install, configure and use libnotify for application development.
Related
GTK+
Libcanberra

Libnotify is an easy way to display desktop notifications and information in a small dialog. It implements the Desktop Notifications Specification and it is already used by many open source apps like Evolution, Pidgin, etc. It has support for GTK+ and Qt applications and is desktop independent.

Installation

Libnotify can be installed with the package libnotify, available in the official repositories.

In order to use libnotify, you have to install a notification server:

Builtin servers

The following desktop environments use their own implementations to display notifications, and you can't replace them. Their notification servers are started automatically on login to receive notifications from applications via DBus.

• Avant Window Navigator has a notification-daemon applet provided by awn-extras-applets.
• Cinnamon provides a notification server itself. Notifications are displayed at the top right corner of the screen.
• Enlightenment provides a notification server trough its Notification module. Notifications are displayed at the top right corner of the screen.
• GNOME provides a notification server itself. Notifications are displayed at the bottom of the screen.
• GNOME Flashback uses notification-daemon. Notifications are displayed at the top right corner of the screen.
• KDE uses knotify4 from package kdebase-runtime to display notifications. Notifications are displayed at the bottom right corner of the screen.

Other servers

In other desktop environments, the notification server is launched on the first call via DBus. You can choose one of the following implementations:

• dunst is a minimalistic notification daemon for Linux designed to fit nicely into minimalistic windowmanagers like dwm.
• notification-daemon is the notification server used by GNOME Flashback. It doesn't have a D-Bus service file by default. To use it outside from GNOME Flashback, create the following file:

/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.gnome.Notifications.service

[D-BUS Service]
Name=org.freedesktop.Notifications
Exec=/usr/lib/notification-daemon-1.0/notification-daemon

• notify-osd is a notification server for Unity, available in the official repositories.
• statnot is a small, lightweight notification daemon that can output notifications to the root window's title, stdout or FIFO pipes, making it integrate very well with tiling window managers. It's available in the Arch User Repository or as a git repo.
• twmn-git is a notification system for tiling window managers. It's available in the Arch User Repository or as a git repo.
• xfce4-notifyd is a notification server for Xfce, available in the official repositories.

Tip: To configure xfce4-notifyd, run the following command in the terminal: xfce4-notifyd-config.

Tips and tricks

Write your own notify app

You can write your own libnotify display messages easily in many programming languages through GObject-Introspection or bindings, or you can simply use bash.

The following examples display simple a "Hello world" notification.

Bash

• Dependency: libnotify

hello_world.sh

#!/bin/bash
notify-send 'Hello world!' 'This is an example notification.' --icon=dialog-information

Boo

• Dependency: notify-sharp (boo)
• Makedependency: boo
• Build with: booc hello_world.boo
• Run with: mono hello_world.exe (or booi hello_world.boo)

hello_world.boo

import Notifications from "notify-sharp"
Hello = Notification()
Hello.Summary  = "Hello world!"
Hello.Body     = "This is an example notification."
Hello.IconName = "dialog-information"
Hello.Show()

C

• Dependency: libnotify
• Build with: gcc -o hello_world `pkg-config --cflags --libs libnotify` hello_world.c

hello_world.c

#include <libnotify/notify.h>
void main () {
	notify_init ("Hello world!");
	NotifyNotification * Hello = notify_notification_new ("Hello world", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
	notify_notification_show (Hello, NULL);
}

C++

• Dependency: libnotifymm from AUR
• Build with: g++ -o hello_world `pkg-config --cflags --libs libnotifymm-1.0` hello_world.cc

hello_world.cc

#include <libnotifymm.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
	Notify::init("Hello world!");
	Notify::Notification Hello("Hello world", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
        Hello.show();
}

C#

• Dependency: notify-sharp
• Build with: mcs -pkg:notify-sharp hello_world.cs
• Run with: mono hello_world.exe

hello_world.cs

using Notifications;
public class HelloWorld {
	static void Main() {
		var Hello = new Notification();
		Hello.Summary  = "Hello world!";
		Hello.Body     = "This is an example notification.";
		Hello.IconName = "dialog-information";
		Hello.Show();
	}
}

Genie

• Dependency: libnotify
• Makedependency: vala
• Build with: valac --pkg libnotify hello_world.gs

hello_world.gs

uses 
	Notify

init
	Notify.init ("Hello world")
	var Hello=new Notification ("Hello world!","This is an example notification.","dialog-information")
	Hello.show ()

Java

• Dependency: java-gnome from AUR
• Makedependency: java-environment
• Build with: mkdir HelloWorld && javac -classpath /usr/share/java/gtk.jar -d HelloWorld HelloWorld.java
• Run with: java -classpath /usr/share/java/gtk.jar:HelloWorld HelloWorld

HelloWorld.java

import org.gnome.gtk.Gtk;
import org.gnome.notify.Notify;
import org.gnome.notify.Notification;

public class HelloWorld
{
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Gtk.init(args);
        Notify.init("Hello world");
        Notification Hello = new Notification("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
        Hello.show();
    }
}

JavaScript

• Dependencies: libnotify, gjs (works also with seed)

hello_world.js

#!/usr/bin/gjs
Notify = imports.gi.Notify;
Notify.init ("Hello world");
Hello=new Notify.Notification ({summary: "Hello world!",
                                body: "This is an example notification.",
                                "icon-name": "dialog-information"});
Hello.show ();

Perl

• Dependencies: libnotify, perl-glib-object-introspection from AUR

hello_world.pl

#!/usr/bin/perl
use Glib::Object::Introspection;
Glib::Object::Introspection->setup (
	basename => 'Notify',
	version => '0.7',
	package => 'Notify');
Notify->init;
my $hello = Notify::Notification->new("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
$hello->show;

Or you can use the old, static perl-gtk2-notify bindings:

• Dependency: perl-gtk2-notify from AUR

hello_world.pl

#!/usr/bin/perl
use Gtk2::Notify -init, "Hello world";
my $hello = Gtk2::Notify->new("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
$hello->show;

Python

• Dependencies: libnotify, python-gobject (or python2-gobject for Python 2)

hello_world.py

#!/usr/bin/python
from gi.repository import Notify
Notify.init ("Hello world")
Hello=Notify.Notification.new ("Hello world","This is an example notification.","dialog-information")
Hello.show ()

Or you can use the old, static python-notify bindings:

• Dependency: python2-notify

hello_world.py

#!/usr/bin/python2
import pynotify
pynotify.init ("Hello world")
Hello=pynotify.Notification ("Hello world!","This is an example notification.","dialog-information")
Hello.show ()

Ruby

• Dependencies: libnotify, ruby-gir-ffi from AUR

hello_world.rb

#!/usr/bin/ruby
require 'gir_ffi'
GirFFI.setup :Notify
Notify.init("Hello world")
Hello = Notify::Notification.new("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information")
Hello.show

Or you can use the old, static ruby-libnotify bindings:

• Dependency: ruby-libnotify from AUR

hello_world.rb

#!/usr/bin/ruby
require 'RNotify'
Notify.init("Hello world")
Hello = Notify::Notification.new("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information")
Hello.show

Vala

• Dependency: libnotify
• Makedependency: vala
• Build with: valac --pkg libnotify hello_world.vala

hello_world.vala

using Notify;
public class HelloWorld {
	static void main () {
		Notify.init ("Hello world");
		var Hello = new Notification("Hello world!", "This is an example notification.", "dialog-information");
		Hello.show ();
	}
}

Visual Basic .NET

• Dependency: notify-sharp
• Makedependency: mono-basic
• Build with: vbnc -r:/usr/lib/mono/notify-sharp/notify-sharp.dll hello_world.vb
• Run with: mono hello_world.exe

hello_world.vb

Imports Notifications
Public Class Hello
	Public Shared Sub Main
		Dim Hello As New Notification
		Hello.Summary  = "Hello world!"
		Hello.Body     = "This is an example notification."
		Hello.IconName = "dialog-information"
		Hello.Show
	End Sub
End Class

See also

• Libnotify Reference Manual
• C example
• Python example (french article)