Commands

EasyBar exposes shell command helpers for Lua widgets.

Use commands carefully. Long-running synchronous commands block the Lua runtime.

Synchronous commands

easybar.exec(...) runs a command synchronously.

easybar.exec("date +%H:%M", function(output)
    clock:set({
        label = {
            string = output,
        },
    })
end)

Use this only for fast commands.

Asynchronous commands

easybar.exec_async(...) runs a command in the background and calls back later with output and exit code.

This is preferred for:

• package managers
• network requests
• slow scripts
• commands used by popup buttons
• anything that should not block other widgets

easybar.exec_async("brew outdated --json=v2", function(output, code)
    if code ~= 0 then
        easybar.log(easybar.level.warn, "brew failed", code, output)
        return
    end

    brew_status:set({
        label = {
            string = output,
        },
    })
end)

Environment

Commands run with the environment configured under [app.env].

For GUI-launched EasyBar sessions, configure PATH explicitly:

[app.env]
PATH = "/usr/local/bin:/opt/homebrew/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin"

This avoids relying on .zshrc or other shell startup files.