6 conky - A system monitor for X originally based on the torsmo code, but
7 more kickass. It just keeps on given'er. Yeah.
13 Conky is a system monitor for X originally based on the torsmo code.
14 Since it's original conception, Conky has changed a fair bit from it's
15 predecessor. Conky can display just about anything, either on your
16 root desktop or in it's own window. Conky has many built-in objects,
17 as well as the ability to execute programs and scripts, then display
18 the output from stdout.
20 We are always looking for help, and anyone interested in becoming a
21 developer is welcome. Please use the facilities at SourceForge to make
22 bug reports, feature requests, and submit patches.
24 Thanks for your interest in Conky.
27 For users compiling from source, make sure you have the X development
28 libraries installed. This should be a package along the lines of
29 "libx11-dev or xorg-x11-dev".
31 Gentoo users -- Conky is in Gentoo's Portage... simply use "emerge app-
32 admin/conky" for installation. There is also usually an up-to-date
33 ebuild within Conky's package or in CVS.
35 Debian,etc. users -- Conky will be in Debian's repositories soon (by
36 mid-September, hopefully), and then Ubuntu shortly thereafter. Until
37 then, "dpkg -i" the .deb package to install.
39 To compile and run Conky with all optional components:
41 sh autogen.sh # Only required if building from CVS
43 ./configure --prefix=/usr --mandir=/usr/share/man
44 --infodir=/usr/share/info --datadir=/usr/share --sysconfdir=/etc
45 --localstatedir=/var/lib --enable-double-buffer --enable-own-window
46 --enable-proc-uptime --enable-mpd --enable-xft --enable-seti
50 make install # Optional
54 Conky probably doesn't compile with compilers other than gcc and icc.
55 It doesn't compile with C89 compiler and not even with pure C99. It
56 uses a few things that might not exist: strdup(), strcasecmp(), strn-
57 casecmp(), optarg variable with getopt() and long long (not in C89).
58 Crashes in file system statistics stuff when compiled with icc, I don't
61 You can disable 'drawing to own window' feature in case you don't need
62 it by passing --disable-own-window to configure -script.
66 Conky is generally very good on resources. However, certain objects in
67 Conky are harder on resources then others. In particular, the $tail,
68 $top, $font, and $graph objects are quite costly in comparison to the
71 If you do use them, please do not complain about memory or CPU usage,
72 unless you think something's seriously wrong (mem leak, etc.).
74 An easy way to force Conky to reload your ~/.conkyrc: "killall -SIGUSR1
75 conky". Saves you the trouble of having to kill and then restart.
77 IMPORTANT: For previous Conky users, Conky 1.3 no longer supports the
78 metar stuff. mdsplib was causing way too many problems. Hopefully
79 there'll be a better solution in Conky 2.x...
82 Command line options override configurations defined in configuration
86 Prints version and exits
90 Text alignment on screen, {top,bottom}_{left,right} or none
93 -b Use double buffering (eliminates "flicker")
97 Config file to load instead of $HOME/.conkyrc
100 -d Daemonize Conky, aka fork to background
107 -h Prints command line help and exits
110 -o Create own window to draw
114 Text to render, remember single quotes, like -t ' $uptime '
133 CONFIGURATION SETTINGS
134 Default configuration file is $HOME/.conkyrc (can be changed from
135 conky.c among other things). See conkyrc.sample. If installing from
136 Debian package, this should be in /usr/share/doc/conky/examples ("gun-
137 zip conkyrc.sample.gz" to get conkyrc.sample).
139 You might want to copy it to $HOME/.conkyrc and then start modifying
140 it. Other configs can be found at http://conky.sf.net
143 Aligned position on screen, may be top_left, top_right, bot-
144 tom_left, bottom_right, or none
148 Boolean value, if true, Conky will be forked to background when
153 Set conky on the bottom of all other applications
157 Border margin in pixels
161 Border width in pixels
165 The number of samples to average for CPU monitoring
169 Default color and border color
173 Default shading color and border's shading color
176 default_outline_color
177 Default outline color
181 Use the Xdbe extension? (eliminates flicker) It is highly recom-
182 mended to use own window with this one so double buffer won't be
187 Draw borders around text?
198 font Font name in X, xfontsel can be used to get a nice font
201 gap_x Gap between right or left border of screen, same as passing -x
205 gap_y Gap between top or bottom border of screen, same as passing -y
210 Substract (file system) buffers from used memory?
214 Mail spool for mail checking
218 Maximum width of window
221 minimum_size width (height)
222 Minimum size of window
226 Hostname for mldonkey stuff, defaults to localhost
230 Mldonkey port, 4001 default
234 Mldonkey login, default none
238 Mldonkey password, default none
254 The number of samples to average for net data
258 Force UTF8? requires XFT
262 Boolean, create own window to draw?
265 own_window_transparent
266 Boolean, set pseudo-transparency?
269 own_window_colour colour
270 If own_window_transparent no, set a specified background colour
271 (defaults to black). Takes either a hex value (#ffffff) or a
272 valid RGB name (see /usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt)
276 Pad percentages to this many decimals (0 = no padding)
280 Border stippling (dashing) in pixels
284 Total number of times for Conky to update before quitting. Zero
285 makes Conky run forever
289 Update interval in seconds
293 Boolean value, if true, text is rendered in upper case
297 Adds spaces after certain objects to stop them from moving other
298 things around. Note that this only helps if you are using a mono
299 font, such as Bitstream Vera Sans Mono.
303 Use Xft (anti-aliased font and stuff)
306 TEXT After this begins text to be formatted on screen
310 Colors are parsed using XParsecolor(), there might be a list of them:
311 /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb.txt. Also, http://sedition.com/perl/rgb.html
312 [http://sedition.com/perl/rgb.html]. Color can be also in #rrggbb for-
313 mat (hex). Note that when displaying bytes, power is 1024 and not 1000
314 so 1M really means 1024*1024 bytes and not 1000*1000.
317 IP address for an interface
321 ACPI ac adapter state.
329 ACPI temperature in C.
333 ACPI temperature in F.
337 CPU temperature from therm_adt746x
341 Fan speed from therm_adt746x
345 Right-justify text, with space of N
353 Display APM AC adapter status (FreeBSD only)
357 Display APM battery life in percent (FreeBSD only)
361 Display remaining APM battery life in hh:mm:ss or "unknown" if
362 AC adapterstatus is on-line or charging (FreeBSD only)
366 Remaining capacity in ACPI or APM battery. ACPI battery number
367 can be given as argument (default is BAT0).
371 Amount of memory buffered
374 cached Amount of memory cached
378 Change drawing color to color
382 CPU usage in percents. For SMP machines, the CPU number can be
383 provided as an argument. cpu0 is the total usage, and >=cpu1 are
387 cpubar (cpu number) (height),(width)
388 Bar that shows CPU usage, height is bar's height in pixels. See
389 $cpu for more info on SMP.
392 cpugraph (cpu number) (height),(width) (gradient colour 1) (gradient
394 CPU usage graph, with optional colours in hex, minus the #. See
395 $cpu for more info on SMP.
398 diskio Displays current disk IO.
401 diskiograph (height),(width) (gradient colour 1) (gradient colour 2)
403 Disk IO graph, colours defined in hex, minus the #. If scale is
404 non-zero, it becomes the scale for the graph.
408 Download speed in kilobytes
412 Download speed in kilobytes with one decimal
415 downspeedgraph net (height),(width) (gradient colour 1) (gradient
417 Download speed graph, colours defined in hex, minus the #. If
418 scale is non-zero, it becomes the scale for the graph.
421 else Text to show if any of the above are not true
425 Executes a shell command and displays the output in conky. warn-
426 ing: this takes a lot more resources than other variables. I'd
427 recommend coding wanted behaviour in C and posting a patch.
431 Same as exec, except if the first value return is a value
432 between 0-100, it will use that number for a bar. The size for
433 the bar is currently fixed, but that may change in the future.
437 Same as execbar, but graphs values.
440 execi interval command
441 Same as exec but with specific interval. Interval can't be less
442 than update_interval in configuration. See also $texeci
445 execibar interval command
446 Same as execbar, except with an interval
449 execigraph interval command
450 Same as execigraph, but takes an interval arg graphs values
454 Specify a different font. Only applies to one line.
457 freq Returns CPU frequency in MHz
460 freq_g Returns CPU frequency in GHz
464 Returns CPU frequency in MHz, but is calculated by counting to
465 clock cycles to complete an instruction. Only available for
470 Returns CPU frequency in GHz, but is calculated by counting to
471 clock cycles to complete an instruction. Only available for
475 fs_bar (height),(width) fs
476 Bar that shows how much space is used on a file system. height
477 is the height in pixels. fs is any file on that file system.
481 Free space on a file system available for users.
485 Free percentage of space on a file system available for users.
493 File system used space
496 head logfile lines (interval)
497 Displays first N lines of supplied text text file. If interval
498 is not supplied, Conky assumes 2x Conky's interval. Max of 30
499 lines can be displayed, or until the text buffer is filled.
503 Horizontal line, height is the height in pixels
507 I2C sensor from sysfs (Linux 2.6). dev may be omitted if you
508 have only one I2C device. type is either in (or vol) meaning
509 voltage, fan meaning fan or temp/tempf (first in C, second in F)
510 meaning temperature. n is number of the sensor. See
511 /sys/bus/i2c/devices/ on your local computer.
515 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
516 whether ac power is on, as listed in /proc/i8k (translated to
517 human-readable). Beware that this is by default not enabled by
522 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
523 the bios version as listed in /proc/i8k.
527 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
528 the volume buttons status as listed in /proc/i8k.
532 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
533 the cpu temperature in celsius, as reported by /proc/i8k.
537 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
538 the cpu temperature in farenheit, as reported by /proc/i8k.
542 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
543 the left fan's rate of rotation, in revolutions per minute as
544 listed in /proc/i8k. Beware, some laptops i8k reports these fans
549 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
550 the left fan status as listed in /proc/i8k (translated to human-
551 readable). Beware, some laptops i8k reports these fans in
556 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
557 the right fan's rate of rotation, in revolutions per minute as
558 listed in /proc/i8k. Beware, some laptops i8k reports these fans
563 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
564 the right fan status as listed in /proc/i8k (translated to
565 human-readable). Beware, some laptops i8k reports these fans in
570 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
571 your laptop serial number as listed in /proc/i8k.
575 If running the i8k kernel driver for Inspiron laptops, displays
576 the version formatting of /proc/i8k.
580 if PROCESS is running, display everything if_running and the
585 if FILE exists, display everything between if_existing and the
589 if_mounted (mountpoint)
590 if MOUNTPOINT is mounted, display everything between if_mounted
591 and the matching $endif
594 kernel Kernel version
598 Get the link status for wireless connections
602 (1,2,3)> System load average, 1 is for past 1 minute, 2 for past
603 5 minutes and 3 for past 15 minutes.
607 Machine, i686 for example
610 mails Mail count in mail spool. You can use program like fetchmail to
611 get mails from some server using your favourite protocol. See
615 mem Amount of memory in use
618 membar (height),(width)
619 Bar that shows amount of memory in use
622 memmax Total amount of memory
626 Percentage of memory in use
630 total session upload in mb
634 total session download in mb
638 number of shared files
642 total session shared in mb, buggy in some mldonkey versions
646 tcp upload rate in kb/s
650 tcp download rate in kb/s
654 udp upload rate in kb/s
658 udp download rate in kb/s
662 number of completed files
665 ml_ndownloading_files
666 number of downloading files
670 Artist in current MPD song must be enabled at compile
674 Album in current MPD song
677 mpd_bar (height),(width)
678 Bar of mpd's progress
682 Bitrate of current song
686 Playing, stopped, et cetera.
690 Title of current MPD song
706 Percent of song's progress
710 Random status (On/Off)
714 Repeat status (On/Off)
718 Prints the MPD track field
722 Unread mail count in mail spool.
733 pre_exec shell command
734 Executes a shell command one time before conky displays anything
735 and puts output as text.
739 Total processes (sleeping and running)
743 Running processes (not sleeping), requires Linux 2.6
751 Stippled (dashed) horizontal line
754 swapbar (height),(width)
755 Bar that shows amount of swap in use
758 swap Amount of swap in use
766 Percentage of swap in use
770 System name, Linux for example
773 texeci interval command
774 Runs a command at an interval inside a thread and displays the
775 output. Same as $execi, except the command is run inside a
776 thread. Use this if you have a slow script to keep Conky updat-
777 ing. You should make the interval slightly longer then the time
778 it takes your script to execute. For example, if you have a
779 script that take 5 seconds to execute, you should make the
780 interval at least 6 seconds. See also $execi.
784 Move text over by N pixels. See also $voffset.
787 tail logfile lines (interval)
788 Displays last N lines of supplied text text file. If interval is
789 not supplied, Conky assumes 2x Conky's interval. Max of 30 lines
790 can be displayed, or until the text buffer is filled.
794 Local time, see man strftime to get more information about for-
799 Total download, overflows at 4 GB on Linux with 32-bit arch and
800 there doesn't seem to be a way to know how many times it has
801 already done that before conky has started.
805 This takes arguments in the form:top (name) (number) Basically,
806 processes are ranked from highest to lowest in terms of cpu
807 usage, which is what (num) represents. The types are: "name",
808 "pid", "cpu", and mem". There can be a max of 10 processes
813 Same as top, except sorted by mem usage instead of cpu
817 Total upload, this one too, may overflow
820 updates Number of updates
825 Upload speed in kilobytes
829 Upload speed in kilobytes with one decimal
832 upspeedgraph net (height),(width) (gradient colour 1) (gradient colour
834 Upload speed graph, colours defined in hex, minus the #. If
835 scale is non-zero, it becomes the scale for the graph.
842 Uptime in a shorter format
846 Seti@home current progress
849 seti_progbar (height),(width)
850 Seti@home current progress bar
854 Seti@home total user credit
858 Change verticle offset by N pixels. Negative values will cause
859 text to overlap. See also $offset.
863 conky -t '${time %D %H:%m}' -o -u 30
864 Start Conky in its own window with date and clock as text and 30
867 conky -a top_left -x 5 -y 500 -d
868 Start Conky to background at coordinates (5, 500).
871 ~/.conkyrc default configuration file
874 Drawing to root or some other desktop window directly doesn't work with
875 all window managers. Especially doesn't work well with Gnome and it has
876 been reported that it doesn't work with KDE either. Nautilus can be
877 disabled from drawing to desktop with program gconf-editor. Uncheck
878 show_desktop in /apps/nautilus/preferences/. There is -w switch in
879 Conky to set some specific window id. You might find xwininfo -tree
880 useful to find the window to draw to. You can also use -o argument
881 which makes Conky to create its own window.
884 http://conky.sourceforge.net [http://conky.sourceforge.net]
886 http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/conky [http://www.source-
887 forge.net/projects/conky]
889 #conky on irc.freenode.net
892 The Conky dev team. What's up now!