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Layers

On Wayland, phonto draws on a layer-shell surface, and you pick which of its four layers, from under your windows to over everything.

The four layers

The layer-shell stack, exploded

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overlaystochos draws here

topbars, notifications

windowsapps, where kyma runs

bottomusually empty

backgroundphonto’s default

--layer

backgroundbottomtopoverlay

phonto aegean.mp4 --layer background

Wayland compositors give layer-shell surfaces four layers, two below the windows and two above. phonto’s video sits on background by default, and --layer moves it to any of the four.

background, the default, is where wallpapers go, under everything. bottom is still under your windows but over background, which helps when another wallpaper program is drawing there too. top and overlay put phonto over your windows, covering them. That’s no use on the desktop, but it’s how phonto plays behind hyprlock.

shell

$phonto ~/Videos/harbour.mp4 --layer bottom

On every layer, phonto covers the whole display, under your bars too, and never takes the keyboard.

On macOS

There’s no --layer. phonto’s window always sits at desktop level, under the icons.