Samurize equivalent for OSX?

A

ar1550

2[H]4U
Joined
Aug 21, 2001
Messages
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I just got my new PB a few days ago, and I've been doing a bunch of compiles and downloads playing around with a ton of open source software. So it would be great to have an easy way to monitor network (mostly using airport, I've copied some larger stuff I had pre-downloaded on my tower via gigabit), CPU, HDD, RAM, etc. I guess I'm addicted to having Samurize always running, taking up half of a 1600x1200 monitor on my desktop. Even something simple would get me by on the Powerbook, though. I know the Activity Monitor can display a stat in the Dock, but the idea is that I can just Expose the desktop and view everything I want at once, rather than opening the monitor and clicking through each tab. I'm sure there must be something like this available, I just haven't found the right Google search to find it yet.

Oh, for the morbidly curious, here's why my samurize config takes up so much screen real estate http://thebeacom.net/forumstuff/samurize_massive.gif
 
For minimalistic menubar monitoring of network/CPU/RAM/HDD, there's MenuMeters. I recomend that one. I use it myself to monitor CPU usage.

There's also the very useful GeekTool (or was that GeekTools?). It can display files, the result of shell scripts and images and update the, on a set interval. Combine that with some graph-generating software (there's plenty of open source software that does that for network monitor etc) that produces and image that GeekTool displays for profit. Combine it with AppleScript and you can do pretty much anything, you could even display emails and such with it, directly from Apple's Mail. I used it to display the current song in iTunes via an AppleScript, but I stopped that when I realized I'd rather have the extra CPU cycles for something useful. ;)

It can display everything on desktop level, if you want to, so you just use Exposé to see the desktop and info. I guess Samurize is very easy to config, with GeekTool you have to do a little work to get exactly what you want, but it's not very hard.

Oh, and unlike Samurize, GeekTool can be made to look good. ;)

Did I mention that AppleScript + perl/python/whatever + GeekTool can really kick ass?

There are more of the same (I guess you can use Konfabulator for it...), but those are my favorites. Both applications can be found at Google, or Macupdate.
 
Thanks guys, MenuMeter it is. It's almost perfect, the only other feature I'd like to see is multiple network interface support. I'd heard of Konfabulator before and just didn't remember it. I'll probably play around with it down the road, but for now it's free software for me (Mr. Jobs cleaned out my bank account).
 
Just remember: in Tiger, you may not even need Konfabulator, since the Dashboard can hold all kinds of different widgets (including user-created ones).
 
Aurelius said:
Just remember: in Tiger, you may not even need Konfabulator, since the Dashboard can hold all kinds of different widgets (including user-created ones).
Click to expand...
Yeah, that's why I'm hesistant to plop down cash for Konfabulator. Menumeter is quite sufficient to get me by for now. Hell, it's always present, which is definitely an advantage over even what Dashboard could do, or using Expose to view the desktop.
 
Konfabulator is free. You get a box that pops up suggesting you buy it when it loads. But you don't have to.
 
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