DESKTOP tint2: Make a "Wingpanel" by Modifying tint2

Over on the Ubuntu side of things, there is a project that's aiming to make computing enjoyable to the non-computing masses. It's called elementary and among other things they've written a little panel that sits in the top-right corner of the screen and holds appindicators (Ubuntu's new panel indication system). If you're still confused it looks like this:

When I migrated back to #! after being on Ubuntu for a while, I missed the functionality and looks of the wingpanel, but it requires appindicators (which require GNOME, etc.) to run. So I searched for other options and eventually found that tint2 could be modified to look and act like a wingpanel but with regular “old-style” indication icons. The result looks like this:

and can be acheived with this tint2 code:

# ID 1 - Panel
rounded = 2
border_width = 1
background_color = #0A0A0A 70
border_color = #ffffff 90
...
# Panel
panel_monitor = all
panel_position = top right horizontal #you can change this to any corner you want
panel_items = TSCL #the task bar is just there for it to right-justify
panel_size = 15% 28 #make it bigger if everything won't fit
panel_margin = -1 -2 #this is to make the border look right
panel_padding = 0 0
panel_dock = 0
wm_menu = 1
panel_layer = top
panel_background_id = 1
...
taskbar_background_id = 0
taskbar_active_background_id = 0
taskbar_name = 0
taskbar_name_background_id = 0
taskbar_name_active_background_id = 0
...
task_icon = 0
task_padding = 0 0
task_background_id = 0
task_active_background_id = 0
task_urgent_background_id = 0
task_iconified_background_id = 0

Basically, just take out the non-syspanel stuff, except the taskbar (and clock if you want it), and set every background except the panel's to 0.

If you don't mind if the icons float to the left you can leave out the taskbar too.

And if you want the power button like in the screenshot just add a launcher to a .desktop file that runs oblogout or something similar.

Happy Hacking!

[I got help with this information from forum member Jadrian.]