For a while now, I’ve wanted a quick way to do arithmetic on my Linux laptop (which runs Sway), similar to Spotlight on OS X.

If I’m already in a terminal, it’s easy. But sometimes I’m focused on some other app, and I want to make a quick calculation.

So, in .config/sway/config.d/60-bindings-interactive-python.conf, I have:

for_window [app_id="terminal-floating"] floating enable
bindsym $mod+Semicolon exec '$term --app-id=terminal-floating python3 -q'

• The first line ensures windows with the given app-id (terminal-floating) will be shown as floating windows.
• The second line adds a key binding that runs python3 -q in a new terminal window.
  • The --app-id flag will differ between terminal emulators. I’m using foot.
  • The -q flag suppresses the default version and copyright messages.
  • Control+d closes the window when you’re done.

Alternatives

• The choice of python3 is personal – I picked it because I’m familiar with it. You could do the exact same thing with bc -q, for example.
• rofi-calc also looks nice. (Though in this case, I don’t want to add another dependency to my desktop environment.)

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