conky

Conky is a desktop system monitor that draws live information directly onto your screen, typically in a corner of the wallpaper area. You configure what it shows and where it appears, and it updates continuously while you work. It is lightweight by design and does not require a full taskbar or notification area to function.

It can display more than 300 different types of information out of the box. Common uses include showing CPU usage, memory consumption, disk space, network activity, and a list of running processes similar to a task manager. It also supports email checks via IMAP or POP3, status from certain music players, custom text from your own scripts, and drawn elements like progress bars and graphs using graphics libraries called Cairo and Imlib2.

Conky originally targeted the X window system used on Linux and other Unix-like systems. It now also runs on Wayland (the newer Linux display system, with some limitations), macOS, and can output to a terminal, a plain text file, or even over HTTP. It supports Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, Haiku, and macOS.

Installation is available through most Linux package managers, or you can download a self-contained AppImage that runs without installation. A Nix flake is also provided for users of the Nix package manager. Configuration is done through a plain text file called conkyrc, and the project wiki hosts a collection of community-contributed configurations with screenshots showing a wide variety of display styles.

For developers, Conky can be extended using Lua, a lightweight scripting language, giving full access to the graphics drawing APIs for custom visualizations. The project is licensed under the GPL version 3 and is maintained by volunteers.