Skip to content

chrome-sway

Recipe card from the charly-selkies plugin (Images — the deployable catalog).

chrome-sway – Chrome browser on Sway compositor

Section titled “chrome-sway – Chrome browser on Sway compositor”
Property Value
Dependencies sway
Candies (includes) chrome
Install files task:, chrome-sway.conf
# charly.yml -- typically included via sway-desktop composition
my-browser:
candy:
- chrome-sway

Part of /charly-selkies:sway-desktop composition.

Chrome is launched by Sway’s exec directive (autostart) via chrome-wrapper. It is not a supervisord service – Sway owns the Chrome process. This means:

  • Autostart: Chrome starts when Sway starts (via exec chrome-wrapper in sway config).
  • Crashes/exits: Chrome does not auto-restart. If Chrome exits, it must be relaunched manually.
  • Manual restart: Relaunch Chrome with a wl: exec step running chrome-wrapper (the wl: verb dispatches out-of-process via candy/plugin-wl). Do not use charly shell with bare swaymsg – the shell may lack the correct SWAYSOCK path.
  • On-demand launch: The browser-open helper auto-launches Chrome if it’s not running (see /charly-selkies:chrome for details).

Use when the user asks about:

  • Chrome running in Sway desktop
  • Browser autostart in compositor
  • CDP (Chrome DevTools Protocol) in desktop containers
  • Chrome-sway configuration
  • /charly-image:layer — candy authoring reference (charly.yml schema, task verbs, service declarations)
  • /charly-check:check — declarative testing (check: block, charly check box, charly check live)