Which was/is the best Raspberry Pi Audio/Video Recording, OSD Motion Detect Program. It was made to run perfectly on a RPI Zero with its limited CPU and memory.
If you're looking for an OSS project to contribute, GKrellM needs your help!
It is still using GTK2 which is deprecated and will go away sooner or later.
I used this back in the days and it was awesome. Sadly after the dawn of tiling window managers this is obsolete since you will never really see it as windows always takes full screen. If anyone knows how to make it play well with i3wm or awesome wm, let me know, would gladly use this again.
IIRC AwesomeWM has the option to define the area of the screen used for tiling. It's called workarea[0] I think. So in theory you should be able to just make the screen a bit smaller and free some screen estate for other things.
This lets it act as a sort of toolbar, present on all workspaces.
in .spectrwmrc add
#shrink the region by 112 to allow space for the widget
region = screen[1]:2448x1440+0+0
#add quirk to remove from normal workspaces
quirk[Gkrellm] = WS[-1]
then start on right side of screen
gkrellm -geometry -0+0
I normally would probably just put that in my .xsession
but there is an option to auto start it with spectrwm, untested
Aahh this brings back memories. I first started out using Linux on my desktop and I found this fancy system monitor that made my desktop look cool. There's a section which displays filesystem usage with a button that allows mounting/unmounting with a click. I used it to mount floppy disks but it wasn't working for me, so I read the source to figure out what was wrong, then emailed Bill to contribute a patch to fix it.
It was one of my first open source contributions, and it was then that I understood the value of open source - being able to read the code, debug and then fix it yourself (and for others).
I had no issues running these kind of monitors on crappy single-core Pentium 3 laptops, yet these days I avoid monitoring widgets because I feel they're too heavy and unnecessary bloat. To be fair, these days they're probably written in Electron or Python, compared to efficient C.
I used to run this, but once systems started having 20 cpu cores, and 12 hard drives, it wouldn't fit on the screen anymore... sadly conky has the same issue.
Just scale down the chart size. For my 16 core system each CPU chart is just 5px high, it works great because you still have the horizontal indicators.
I think perhaps I’m old school, but I’ve been using xosview with a patch that shows ccx utilization (on AMD) instead of per core. Treats me pretty well, but it’s a very unloved project.
Wow, it’s funny because the last time I ran gkrellm was 23 years ago when I first started using Linux and I thought I was a l33t h4x0r…
And just today, now that I actually write code for a living and use Linux on my work machine, I found myself really wanting a good display to tell me when my memory usage was growing.[0] I was using the gnome activity monitor but it takes up way too much screen space and was always behind the window I was using. It looks like this could actually be useful for me to run now!
[0] I was running a local kubernetes cluster with an opentracing implementation, where I hadn’t quite worked out the configs for memory usage yet, and it kept spiking and OOMing when I wasn’t looking. It’s fun when your mouse cursor just stops moving and you’re wondering whether you need to hold down the power button or what…
The original author of gkrellm, Bill Wilson, also made PiKrellCam. <https://billw2.github.io/pikrellcam/pikrellcam.html>
Which was/is the best Raspberry Pi Audio/Video Recording, OSD Motion Detect Program. It was made to run perfectly on a RPI Zero with its limited CPU and memory.
I was very sad to learn that Bill passed away in Oct 2021. <https://github.com/billw2/pikrellcam/issues/78#issuecomment-...>
I'm glad gkrellm got a new maintainer and continues to exist.
The eulogy from his brother is worth a read https://github.com/billw2/pikrellcam/issues/78#issuecomment-...
If you're looking for an OSS project to contribute, GKrellM needs your help! It is still using GTK2 which is deprecated and will go away sooner or later.
Patches are welcome! https://git.srcbox.net/gkrellm/gkrellm/issues/1
I used this back in the days and it was awesome. Sadly after the dawn of tiling window managers this is obsolete since you will never really see it as windows always takes full screen. If anyone knows how to make it play well with i3wm or awesome wm, let me know, would gladly use this again.
IIRC AwesomeWM has the option to define the area of the screen used for tiling. It's called workarea[0] I think. So in theory you should be able to just make the screen a bit smaller and free some screen estate for other things.
[0] https://awesomewm.org/doc/api/classes/screen.html#screen.wor...
Does not help you but the question nerd sniped me to try it as an exercise in my preferred tiling WM spectrwm.
https://github.com/conformal/spectrwm
This lets it act as a sort of toolbar, present on all workspaces.
in .spectrwmrc add
then start on right side of screen I normally would probably just put that in my .xsession but there is an option to auto start it with spectrwm, untestedAahh this brings back memories. I first started out using Linux on my desktop and I found this fancy system monitor that made my desktop look cool. There's a section which displays filesystem usage with a button that allows mounting/unmounting with a click. I used it to mount floppy disks but it wasn't working for me, so I read the source to figure out what was wrong, then emailed Bill to contribute a patch to fix it.
It was one of my first open source contributions, and it was then that I understood the value of open source - being able to read the code, debug and then fix it yourself (and for others).
What a blast from the past! Stoked it’s still under development!
Had a look for the etymology of “Krell” - in the readme it mentions “GKrellM - keeping an eye on your computer’s Id”.
Seems to be a reference to this 1956 movie, Forbidden Planet / Monsters from the Id: http://guidetomonsters.com/html/50s/Id%20Monster.html
Can I get a fact check?
The Wiki says you're spot on. Impressive sleuthing.
https://archive.ph/20120710180815/http://members.dslextreme....
I had no issues running these kind of monitors on crappy single-core Pentium 3 laptops, yet these days I avoid monitoring widgets because I feel they're too heavy and unnecessary bloat. To be fair, these days they're probably written in Electron or Python, compared to efficient C.
I ran this thing with slackware and window manager back in the day. My goodness, I have forgotten about this entirely.
I might have to spin it up for fun.
For all the nix fols, "nix run nixpkgs#gkrellm" works =P
I have been using this software continuously for close to 20 years. My desktop doesn't feel right without it. Thank you Bill Wilson!
I used to run this, but once systems started having 20 cpu cores, and 12 hard drives, it wouldn't fit on the screen anymore... sadly conky has the same issue.
Just scale down the chart size. For my 16 core system each CPU chart is just 5px high, it works great because you still have the horizontal indicators.
I think perhaps I’m old school, but I’ve been using xosview with a patch that shows ccx utilization (on AMD) instead of per core. Treats me pretty well, but it’s a very unloved project.
Do you have a link to that patched version?
Thanks for the memory lane drive. I used to run this on FreeBSD desktop under fluxbox wm wayyy back, I think in 2004. So cool.
It has a client/server mode. I used to run the server on my wrt54g and the GUI client on my desktop.
Wow, it’s funny because the last time I ran gkrellm was 23 years ago when I first started using Linux and I thought I was a l33t h4x0r…
And just today, now that I actually write code for a living and use Linux on my work machine, I found myself really wanting a good display to tell me when my memory usage was growing.[0] I was using the gnome activity monitor but it takes up way too much screen space and was always behind the window I was using. It looks like this could actually be useful for me to run now!
[0] I was running a local kubernetes cluster with an opentracing implementation, where I hadn’t quite worked out the configs for memory usage yet, and it kept spiking and OOMing when I wasn’t looking. It’s fun when your mouse cursor just stops moving and you’re wondering whether you need to hold down the power button or what…
https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/3010/system-monitor-n... is good.
You might also consider Conky: https://github.com/brndnmtthws/conky
I loved this tool. Always ran it with fluxbox as the WM.
These days it is one of the most underrated tool! I never has a problem with it under any DE or WM.
FWIW, it is still bundled with Slackware.
To be fair, everything is still bundled with Slackware.