Power Mode Switcher for Linux

A simple and elegant bash script to switch between system power management profiles on Linux systems. Designed for Linux Mint but compatible with any Linux distribution that uses power-profiles-daemon.

🚀 Features

• Easy Power Profile Switching: Toggle between available system power profiles
• Colorful Output: Clean, color-coded terminal interface
• Multiple Usage Modes: Toggle, cycle, or set specific profiles
• Smart Profile Detection: Automatically detects available power profiles
• Comprehensive Status Display: Shows current profile with descriptions
• Error Handling: Robust error checking and user feedback

📋 Requirements

• Linux system with power-profiles-daemon installed
• Bash shell
• powerprofilesctl command available

Supported Distributions

• ✅ Linux Mint
• ✅ Ubuntu 20.04+
• ✅ Fedora 34+
• ✅ GNOME-based distributions
• ✅ Most modern Linux distributions with systemd

📦 Installation

Quick Install

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/mahdidevlp/power-mode-switcher.git
cd power-mode-switcher

# Make the script executable
chmod +x power_mode_switcher.sh

# Run it
./power_mode_switcher.sh --help

System-wide Installation (Optional)

# Copy to system-wide location
sudo cp power_mode_switcher.sh /usr/local/bin/power-mode-switcher

# Now you can use it from anywhere
power-mode-switcher --toggle

🎯 Usage

Basic Commands

# Show current power profile status
./power_mode_switcher.sh --status

# Toggle between available profiles
./power_mode_switcher.sh --toggle

# Set specific power profile
./power_mode_switcher.sh --profile balanced
./power_mode_switcher.sh --profile power-saver
./power_mode_switcher.sh --profile performance

# Show help
./power_mode_switcher.sh --help

Command Line Options

Option	Description
-s, --status	Show current power profile status
-t, --toggle	Toggle between available profiles
-c, --cycle	Cycle through common profiles (performance → balanced → power-saver)
-p, --profile PROFILE	Set specific power profile
-h, --help	Show help message

Power Profile Types

Profile	Description	Use Case
Performance	Maximum CPU performance, higher power consumption	Gaming, video editing, intensive tasks
Balanced	Balance between performance and battery life	General daily use
Power Saver	Optimize for battery life, reduced performance	Extended battery life, light tasks

🖼️ Screenshots

Status Display

=== Power Management Status ===
Current Profile: balanced

Available Profiles:
  ● balanced (active)
    Balance between performance and battery life
  ○ power-saver
    Optimize for battery life, reduced performance

Profile Switching

Switching from 'balanced' to 'power-saver'...
✓ Power profile set to: power-saver
  - Optimized for battery life
  - Reduced CPU performance
  - Best for extending battery life

⚙️ Advanced Usage

Creating Keyboard Shortcuts

GNOME/Cinnamon Desktop Environment

1. Open System Settings → Keyboard → Shortcuts
2. Add custom shortcut:
   • Name: Toggle Power Mode
   • Command: /path/to/power_mode_switcher.sh --toggle
   • Key: Ctrl+Alt+P (or your preference)

KDE Plasma

1. Open System Settings → Shortcuts → Custom Shortcuts
2. Add new shortcut with the command above

Integration with System Tray

You can integrate this with system tray tools like zenity for GUI notifications:

# Example wrapper script for GUI integration
#!/bin/bash
RESULT=$(./power_mode_switcher.sh --toggle 2>&1)
zenity --info --text="$RESULT" --title="Power Mode Switcher"

🔧 Configuration

Customizing Profiles

If your system supports additional power profiles, the script will automatically detect them. You can extend the script by modifying the profile descriptions in the show_status() function.

Adding Custom Profiles

# Check available profiles on your system
powerprofilesctl list

# The script will automatically work with any available profiles

🛠️ Troubleshooting

Common Issues

1. "powerprofilesctl is not available"

   # Install power-profiles-daemon
   sudo apt install power-profiles-daemon  # Ubuntu/Debian
   sudo dnf install power-profiles-daemon  # Fedora

2. "Permission denied"

   # Make script executable
   chmod +x power_mode_switcher.sh

3. "Profile not available"

   • Check available profiles: powerprofilesctl list
   • Your system may not support all profile types

Debug Mode

For troubleshooting, you can check the power-profiles-daemon status:

# Check daemon status
systemctl status power-profiles-daemon

# List available profiles
powerprofilesctl list

# Get current profile
powerprofilesctl get

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit issues, feature requests, or pull requests.

Development Setup

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch: git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature
3. Commit your changes: git commit -m 'Add amazing feature'
4. Push to the branch: git push origin feature/amazing-feature
5. Open a Pull Request

Code Style

• Follow bash best practices
• Use meaningful variable names
• Add comments for complex logic
• Test on multiple distributions when possible

📄 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

🙏 Acknowledgments

• Thanks to the power-profiles-daemon developers
• Inspired by the need for simple power management on Linux
• Built for the Linux Mint community

📞 Support

If you encounter any issues or have questions:

1. Check the Issues page
2. Create a new issue with:
   • Your Linux distribution and version
   • Output of powerprofilesctl list
   • Error messages or unexpected behavior

🗺️ Roadmap

• GUI version using zenity/kdialog
• Desktop environment integration
• Battery percentage-based automatic switching
• Custom profile creation support
• System tray indicator
• Notification support

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Made with ❤️ for the Linux community