Chameleon 🦎

A lightweight, blazing-fast C daemon that automatically switches Neovim and Alacritty colorschemes based on the time of day.

Built for Linux. Relies on systemd timers for zero-overhead scheduling.

Future release features will include: tmux status bar, waybar color palette, and wallpaper switch.

Prerequisites

• gcc (for compiling)
• systemd (for scheduling)
• Neovim & Alacritty (target applications)

1. Compile

Compile the source code with basic optimizations and warnings enabled:

gcc -O2 chameleon.c -o chameleon -Wall -Wextra

2. Install the Binary

Move the compiled executable to your local bin directory:

mkdir -p ~/.local/bin

mv chameleon ~/.local/bin/

(Make sure ~/.local/bin is in your $PATH if you want to run it manually from anywhere).

3. Setup Systemd Scheduling

Move the provided .service and .timer files to your user's systemd directory:

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user/

cp chameleon.service ~/.config/systemd/user/

cp chameleon.timer ~/.config/systemd/user/

4. Enable and Start

Reload the systemd daemon to recognize the new files, then enable and start the timer:

systemctl --user daemon-reload

systemctl --user enable --now chameleon.timer

Useful Commands

• Check the timer status: systemctl --user list-timers --all
• Trigger a theme switch manually right now: systemctl --user start chameleon.service
• Check the logs: journalctl --user -u chameleon.service