Old plugin system#

This page is for Envision’s old plugin system.

❗ Important

The old plugin system was removed shortly after the v3.2.0 release. This page is only relevant for those who are using this version or older.

This v3.2.0 is still the current release, so you might actually be on this version if you installed Envision from your distro’s package manager.

Overview#

The plugin system for Envision allows you to launch anything (usually OpenXR overlays) alongside the Monado session.

Open the Plugins window by clicking ⋮ (three vertical dots) at the top of the Envision window, and clicking “Plugins”. Here, you can install overlays like WayVR or Stardust XR (or a custom plugin — see below). After installing plugins and toggling them on, once you start a profile, the enabled plugins will start alongside it.

Plugins are the replacement for the “autostart” feature from older versions.

Adding a custom plugin#

The plugins included in the store are just a quick front-end to release AppImages. They may not be the latest releases anymore, though.

For everything else, you can create a custom plugin that runs any given executable script or binary. For example, if you installed WayVR from AUR or built it from source, you can disable the original WayVR plugin and create a custom plugin to run it:

  1. Create a new file ~/.local/bin/wayvr-from-system (creating the ~/.local/bin directory if it does not exist).

  2. Give it the content:

    #!/usr/bin/env bash
/usr/bin/wayvr --openxr

  3. chmod +x ~/.local/bin/wayvr-from-system

  4. In Envision, open the Plugins window.

  5. Add a custom plugin by clicking the ➕ plus button.

  6. For the executable file, point it to the script you just created.

  7. Name the plugin “WayVR from system”.

  8. Save, and then enable the new plugin.

Now, starting the profile will also execute this script, which will start the version of WayVR you’ve installed.

Plugin troubleshooting#

Breaks with AppImageLauncher#

On some systems, a built-in plugin may not launch. This can happen for a number of reasons, but one in particular is so obtuse that it’s worth a mention:

Please uninstall AppImageLauncher. It intercepts the normal AppImage starting behaviour in a dirty way that we can’t predict.

You can tell if you are affected if, when you run the WayVR AppImage in terminal (whether in plugin form in ~/.local/share/envision/plugins, or downloaded directly from GitHub), you only get the output execv error: No such file or directory.