Presets

A preset is a saved group of appearance and layout settings. Select one from Properties → General → Preset and MeowMenu updates immediately.

A fresh installation starts with Modern.

Built-in presets

Classic

A compact, traditional launcher. It uses a list, a right sidebar, square corners, and a solid background. Profile and Session controls are visible.

Modern

A rounded Docked layout with a left sidebar and Places enabled. Profile and Session controls are visible, and the Applications/Places switch uses icons.

Full Screen

A screen-filling launcher with a slightly transparent background. It is well suited to touch and keyboard use. Places, Profile, and Session controls are visible.

Minimal

A small Centered window with a search bar and application list. The sidebar, Profile, and Session controls are hidden. Places remains available through an icon switch.

Preset	Calculator	Applications/Places switch
Classic	Off	Text
Modern	bc	Icons
Full Screen	bc	Text
Minimal	bc	Icons

If bc is not installed, normal search still works. See the Calculator installation notes.

Resetting a preset

Selecting a built-in preset restores all of its settings. Selecting it again, or choosing Reset preset, discards changes and restores the original values.

Built-in presets cannot be renamed, deleted, or exported.

Unsaved changes

Changing a setting covered by the current preset shows Unsaved custom in the preset selector. You can save the new arrangement or select another preset to discard it.

The selector uses these styles:

• bold for built-in presets;
• regular text for saved custom presets;
• italic text for Unsaved custom.

Managing custom presets

Use Properties → General:

• Save as new… creates a custom preset from the current settings.
• Rename… renames the selected custom preset.
• Delete removes it. Deleting the active preset restores Modern.
• Export… writes the selected custom preset to a file.
• Import… loads a preset file and handles duplicate names.

Invalid files are rejected without changing your saved presets. Unknown settings are ignored, and missing settings use their defaults.

Advanced: hand-written preset files

A .meowpreset file contains [Preset] and [Settings] sections:

[Preset]
Name=My Custom Preset
SchemaVersion=1
Id=my-custom
Description=My preset

[Settings]
layout-mode=docked
corner-radius=8
search-bar-position=top
show-profile=true
show-session=true
sidebar-enabled=true
sidebar-position=horizontal

Save it as <id>.meowpreset. The filename must match the Id value. Place it in:

~/.local/share/meowmenu/presets/

Restart the panel with xfce4-panel -r. The preset will then appear under Properties → General → Preset.

For descriptions of individual settings, see Configuration.