Clipboard history (ins clip)

ins clip is the instantOS clipboard-history picker. It replaces the old instantclipmenu wrapper and automatically selects a small, session-native capture backend:

• Wayland uses cliphist
• X11 uses clipmenu

Only one backend is enabled at a time.

Open clipboard history

# Open in the current terminal
ins clip

# Open in a dedicated terminal window (useful for a desktop shortcut)
ins clip --gui

Type to filter the history. The preview understands more than plain text: images are rendered directly in Kitty-compatible terminals, PDFs and videos get a visual thumbnail when the relevant system tools are available, and audio, archives, and unknown binary data get useful metadata instead of raw bytes. chafa is used as an optional image fallback in other terminals.

Recognizable code and structured text are syntax-highlighted when the optional bat command is installed. Detection intentionally stays conservative because clipboard snippets have no filename; ambiguous content remains readable plain text instead of being highlighted as the wrong language.

Preview detection is lazy: opening the picker does not decode every item in your history. Press Enter to restore the selected entry to the clipboard, or Escape to close without changing it.

The picker remains useful when history is empty or capture is stopped. Its header shows the current entry count and capture state, and dedicated rows let you enable capture, open settings, or close without changing the clipboard.

instantWM opens the graphical picker with super+v. The previous quick-menu binding is available at super+shift+v.

Settings

Select Settings in the history picker or open it directly:

ins clip settings

The settings menu shows the active backend, installation and login-start state, and lets you start or stop background capture. Stopping capture preserves existing entries.

Clearing history uses two safeguards: first a review screen showing the number of entries and representative examples, then an explicit confirmation dialog. The clear action remains visible but disabled when history is already empty.

Capture service

Clipboard capture runs as a user service. ins clip enable installs and starts cliphist.service on Wayland or clipmenud.service on X11:

# Install the backend if needed, then start it now and on future logins
ins clip enable

# Inspect backend, service, and history state
ins clip status

# Stop capture and prevent it from starting on login
ins clip disable

Disabling capture does not erase existing history.

Scripting and maintenance

Every history entry has an ID shown by ins clip list. Commands that accept an ID also accept an unambiguous prefix. IDs are backend-owned and may change when an entry is restored, so scripts should read a fresh list before acting.

# Print IDs and one-line summaries, newest first
ins clip list

# Restore or delete one entry
ins clip copy 6ddd8602
ins clip delete 6ddd8602

# Confirm interactively before clearing everything
ins clip clear

# Clear without prompting (for scripts)
ins clip clear --yes

Global instantCLI output options work here too:

ins --output json clip list
ins --output json clip status

JSON list output includes each entry's ID, summary, and complete content, so scripts do not need to know which backend is active or read its private data.

Compatibility

The old instantclipmenu executable remains as a compatibility shim for existing shortcuts. New integrations should call ins clip --gui; the old instantclipmenu delete action maps to ins clip clear.