XOSVIEW(2.3.4)

NAME
xosview - X based system monitor

SYNOPSIS
xosview [OPTIONS]

DESCRIPTION
xosview is a program which displays system based parameters. These include CPU usage, load average, memory usage, swap space usage, network usage, interrupts, file system capacity and more. Each parameter is displayed in an X11 window as a horizontal bar graph, scrolling chart or an array of colored bits. The type of graph depends on the nature of the data being displayed and the configuration of xosview. Typing a 'q' in the window will terminate xosview. If xosview was built with the SM and ICE libraries, then it will communicate with the session manager when asked to do so. At the moment xosview runs on platforms including (Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, dragonflyBSD, solaris, cygwin, minix and GNU). Not all of the meters described below are supported on all platforms. Some of the meters may appear different depending upon the platform xosview is running on. Note that *BSD is used as an abbreviation for all of the free BSD operating systems.
Supported Meters
Meter | Linux | *BSD | Gnu | Minix | Solaris | Cygwin
Load Average | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes
CPU | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes
Memory | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes
Swap | yes | yes | yes | no | yes | yes
Page xfer | yes | yes | yes | no | yes | yes
Disk xfer | yes | yes | no | no | yes | yes
Filesys | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes
Network | yes | yes | yes | no | yes | yes
Wifi quality | yes | no | no | no | no | no
Interrupt rate | yes | yes | no | no | yes | yes
Interrupts | yes | yes | no | no | no | no
Temperature | yes | yes | no | no | no | yes
Serial | ? | no | no | no | no | no
Battery | yes | ? | no | no | no | no
RAID | yes | no | no | no | no | no
NFS | ? | no | no | no | no | no
Note: A marker of ? indicates an untested meter. Reports on the status of these are welcome!

OPTIONS
Almost all of these command line options are just a convenient way to set one or more of xosview's resources. All resouces set on the command line will override those specified anywhere else. Please see the RESOURCES section for more details on what the resource is for and for the overall scheme of how resource values are used.
--help | Displays usage information to stdout and exits.
-h |
--version | Displays the version information and exits.
-v |
--display name | Sets the X display to name.
-display |
--title name | This option sets the name xosview will tell the window manager to use for the X window and icon. This option overrides the xosview*title resource.
-title |
-geometry geometry | Sets the X geometry to geometry_string. This option overrides the xosview*geometry resource.
-g |
--foreground color | The color to use for the foreground.
-fg |
--background color | The color to use for the background.
-bg |
-font fontName | Specifies the fontName xosview will use for labels. This option overrides the xosview*font resource. Not all fonts currently work well with xosview. For more details see the RESOURCES section.
-fn |
--iconic | Request to start in an iconic state.
-iconic |
--name name | Sets the Resource name xosview will use (same as the -name option for typical X applications like xterm). When performing resource lookups, xosview will look under name, and then under ``xosview''.
-name |
-xrm spec | This switch allows any of xosview's resources to be set on the command line. An example of how the xosview*memFreeColor could be set using this option is shown below (Note the use of " to prevent the shell from expanding '*' or from creating two separate arguments, 'xosview*memfreeColor:' and 'purple'): -xrm "xosview*memFreeColor: purple"
-x |
--option spec | This option is exactly the same as -xrm except that you do not need to specify an instance name (such as xosview*). It will be prepended for you. So, this will also set the xosview*memFreeColor to purple: -o "memFreeColor: purple"
-o |
--config fileName | Load an XResource file. This file will override (not replace) any previous resources. See the RESOURCES section for more details.
-c |
--xrm-dump | Dump the X resouces seen by xosview to stdout and exit. This will show a final list of all resources seen after loading and merging is finished.
-xrmd |
--smid sessionID | Starts xosview with the provided sessionID. This option will allow xosview to work with window managers that find the simple XSetWMProperties() method of saving session information uninteresting (looks at KDE). If configured with libSM/libICE xosview will arrange for it's restart in a new session with this argument. There should be no need for a user to use this option. It is documented here for completeness.
-smid |

X RESOURCES
The following is a list of X resources supported by xosview. Each has a default value assigned to it. These values can be found in the file Xdefaults which can be obtained in the source distribution of xosview. This file is installed in the XAPPLOADDIR ($prefix/share/X11/app-defaults) when xosview is installed. The resources can be overridden in the usual places used by X applications (XAPPLOADDIR, $HOME/.Xdefaults, etc.). Individual options can be set on the command line of xosview with options such as -xrm and -o and files containing multiple options can be specified with the -c switch. The default values of many resources are set to enable many of the exsisting features. This allows new users to see that these features exist without having to read the documentation. Most users will probably want to customize the defaults to their own taste by adding a few lines to their It should be noted that it is OK to have a resource defined for a port of xosview that does not support the feature the resource configures. Xosview will simply ignore the resources that are set for it but not supported on a given platform.

  Loading X Resources
The resouces used by xosview are located and loaded in the following order. Each layer overrides the previous. And, of course, the best match is used. For example ".xosview*font" overrides the more generic "*font".
    From first loaded/searched to last:

        An embeded copy of Xdefaults used to build xosview. So, xosview always has a default and complete set of resources even if all other options fail.

        Standard X11 search paths and mechanics (XAPPLRESDIR, .Xdefault, xmodmap, etc). For full details see the X documentation. The following is a short summary:

        •   From the class file (XOsview) found in the app-defaults directory configured into xosview at compile time.

        •   From the class file (XOsview) in the XAPPLRESDIR (environment variable).

        •   From resources loaded onto the Display of the X server (by xrdb for example).

        •   From resources loaded onto the Screen of the Display (again by xrdb or the like).

        •   From the .Xdefaults file in the users HOME (environment variable) directory. Xosview loads this file even if your X session did not.

        •   From resources found in the file specified by the XENVIRONMENT environment variable.

        Resource files specified by the -c, --config command line arguments

        Resources set by using the -xrm command line argument(s).

        Command line options (such as -display) that set resources.
  Note that since xosview always starts off with a complete set of resources it requires then you only need specify those options you would like to change from their default values. For example your .Xdefaults file could simply contain the line "xosview*background: blue" if all you wish is an "stock" xosview with a blue background.

  General Resources
xosview*title: name
    The string that xosview will use for the X window title. Normally xosview will use 'xosview@machine_name' for a title. This resource overrides the default behavior.
xosview*geometry: geometry_string
    This is a standard X geometry string that defines the size and location of the X window used by xosview.
xosview*display: name
    The name of the display which xosview will use to contact the X server for creating it's window.
xosview*pixmapName: name
    The filename of an X pixmap (xpm) file for use as a background image.
xosview*transparent: (True or False)
    If True set the window background to transparent. Xosview will attempt to locate and use a 32 bit ARGB visual. If the server does not support one then the background will not be transparent.
xosview*captions: (True or False)
    If True then xosview will display meter captions.
xosview*labels: (True or False)
    If True then xosview will display meter labels.
xosview*meterLabelColor: color
    The color to use for the meter labels.
xosview*usedlabels: (True or False)
    If True then xosview will display labels that show the percentage of the resource (or absolute amount, depending on the meter) being used. This option requires that the labels option also be set to True.
xosview*usedLabelColor: color
    The color to use for "used" labels.
xosview*font: font
    This is the font that xosview will use. Currently the xosview text rendering code assumes that a mono spaced (fixed width) font. So, things will most likely look poor with a non mono spaced font. If the build system supports Xft then xosview will switch to using freetype2 fonts. Otherwise core X11 fonts are used.
xosview*background: color
    This is the color that will be used for the background.
xosview*foreground: color
    This is the color that will be used for the foreground.
xosview*enableStipple:    (True or False)
    Change to true to try stipple support. This is primarily for users stuck with 1-bit monitors/display cards. Try setting enableStipple true. Please give us feedback on this, if you use it. It needs some more work, but no one has given us any feedback so far.
xosview*graphNumCols: number
    This defines the number of sample bars drawn when a meter is in scrolling graph mode. This also has the side-effect of defining the width of the graph columns. This is only used by meters which have graph mode enabled.

  General Meter Resources
    Meters that display their values as scalar fields generally support the following options. Every meter has a prefix name. For example the CPU meter's prefix is cpu. So, you would specify the resources for it by using cpu instead of prefix. For example cpuPriority instead of prefixPriority.
xosview*prefixPriority: value
    This number (which must be an integer >= 1) sets the number of tenths of a second that the meter waits between updates. A value of 1 has xosview update the meter 10 times per second (the fastest). A value of 600 would cause xosview to update the meter once a minute.
xosview*prefixUsedFormat: (float, percent or autoscale)
    This resource tells xosview how to display "used" labels. The formats work as follows:
    float | Display the value as a floating point number.
    percent | Display the value as a percentage of the total.
    autoscale | Display the absolute value and automatically print the units (K, M, or G) as appropriate.
prefixDecay: (True or False)
    If True then the meter will be split vertically in two. The top half will show the instantaneous state, while the bottom half will display a decaying average of the state.
xosview*prefixUsedDecay: (True or False)
    If True then xosview will display the used labels as an average over the last N samples. N is a vague number set at the factory. It reduces the text drawing load on the X server.
xosview*prefixGraph: (True or False)
    If this is set to True then the meter will be drawn as a horizontally scrolling bargraph showing the state value verses time.

  Load Meter Resources
    This color is used when the load exceeds the loadWarnThreshold.
    This color is used when the load exceeds the loadCritThreshold.
xosview*loadWarnThreshold: int
    This number (which must be an integer >= 1) sets the value at which the loadmeter changes its status and color from "normal" to "alarm".
xosview*loadCritThreshold: int
    This number (which must be an integer >= 1) sets the value at which the loadmeter changes its status and color from "normal" to "alarm". It is also the value that will be used for the peak of the meter. The meter will still show the total load in the used level when peaked.
xosview*loadCpuSpeed: (True or False)
    Display the current CPU speed in the load meter.

  CPU Meter Resources
xosview*cpuFormat: (auto, single, all or both)
    Controls the number and type of cpu meters for SMP systems.
    single | one meter which combines all cores.
    all | seperate meter for each core. No combined meter.
    both | seperate meters for each core plus a combined meter.
    auto | a single meter on single core systems else both.

  Memory Meter Resources

  Swap Meter Resources

  IRQ rate Meter Resources
xosview*irqratePeak: peakIRQRate
      This number is the peak value for the field meter in irq/sec. The used label will still report values over this peak.

  Page Meter Resources
xosview*pageBandWidth: peakVal
    This number is used to specify the expected maximum bandwidth (in bytes / sec) for the page meter. When the expected maximum bandwidth (peakValue) is exceeded then the page meter will display the relative percentage of page swapping (25% in, 75% out).

  Wireless Link Meter Resouces
    This meter shows wireless link quality. What is quality you might ask? It is a number between zero and 70. Beyond that you are on your own. Anway Linux systems will display this value and let you set a warning threshold when it is "low". If this meter is enabled and no wireless connections exists it will just sit there and display zero.
xosview*wlinkBackground: color
      The color to use to display the background area of the meter.
xosview*wlinkPoorValue: value
    The threshold value to use to switch between wlinkGoodColor and wlinkPoorColor.

  Network Meter Resources
xosview*netBandwidth: maxBytes
    This number is used to specify the expected maximum bandwidth (in bytes / sec) for the meter. When the expected maximum bandwidth (maxBytes) is exceeded then the network meter will display the relative percentage of network usage (25% incomming, 75% outgoing).
xosview*netIface: interface
    If False, xosview will display the data received/transmitted by any of the network interfaces. Otherwise, xosview will only display the data received/transmitted by the specified network interface.
xosview*netBackground: color
    This is the color that the network meter will use for the "idle" field.

  NFSStats (Client) Resources

  NFSDStats (Server) Resources

  Serial Meter Resources
    For this to work on Linux xosview needs to be suid root in order to have access to the ports. See the file README.linux which comes with the xosview distribution for more details. Running xosview as root may not be a good idea and this meter is slated for a re-write or removal.
    The ttySx portbase will be autodetected. Because autodetection can fail, (if the port is locked by ppp/slip for example) you can specify the portbase instead of "True". If a portBase is used then xosview will use it instead of trying to autodetect.

  Interrupt Meter Resources
xosview*intFormat: (auto, single, all or both)
    Controls the number and type of int meters for SMP systems.
    single | one meter which combines all cores.
    all | seperate meter for each core. No combined meter.
    both | seperate meters for each core plus a combined meter.
    auto | a single meter on single core systems else both.

  Thermal Zone Resources
    Linux supports WAY TOO MANY ways to read temperature. This is yet another one. It was my hope to read the hot and critical thermal trip points out of /sys directly. But based on my tests (with a sample size of two) this is inconsistant. So, this meter supports configuratble values that are shared by all thermal zones.
    Enabling this creates a seperate meter for each thermal zone found.
xosview*tzoneForeGround: color
    The foreground color for temperatues below the hotTrip point.
xosview*tzoneBackground: color
    The background color.
xosview*tzoneHotTrip: value
      The temperature (in degrees C) to start displaying in the hot color.
xosview*tzoneCritTrip: value
      The temperature (in degrees C) to start displaying in the crit color.
xosview*tzonePeak: value
    The value to use as a max for the meters. Note that the used legends will still report the value read from /sys even if the graphical display hits this peak.

  Lm Sensors Temperature Resources
xosview*lmstempHighest: value
    Highest temp value displayed, default 100.
xosview*lmstempN: filename
    Name of temperature file from /proc/sys/dev/sensors/*/*, N=1..
    Note if more files with same name exists, only the first is found. There is currently no possiblity to configure equal named files on different busses (which would be rarely necessary, I hope).
    eg.
    xosview*lmstemp1: temp xosview*lmstemp2: remote_temp
xosview*lmstempLabelN: Labelstring
    N-th label for above temperatures, default is TMP.

  Coretemp Meter Resources
    Intel Core / AMD K8+ / VIA C7 Temperature Sensor Resources.
xosview*coretempHighest: 100
    Highest temp value displayed, default 100. If CPU throttling temperature (tjMax) is supplied by the operating system, it is used instead.
xosview*coretempHigh: number
    Value to use as alarm temperature, default is coretempHighest. If a usable value, such as the temperature for which maximum cooling is required, is supplied by the operating system, it is used instead.
xosview*coretempDisplayType: (separate, average or maximum)
    This resource tells xosview how to display the CPU temperature. The formats work as follows:
    separate | Display one meter for each CPU core of a multi-core CPU. This is the default.
    average | Display the average of core temperatures of a multi-core CPU. On multi-socket machines, one meter per physical CPU is displayed.
    maximum | Display the highest core temperature of a multi-core CPU. On multi-socket machines, one meter per physical CPU is displayed.

  BSD Sensor Resources
xosview*bsdsensorHighest: number
    Highest value displayed. If not given, or too small, the meter will adjust to fit actual and alarm values. Can be overridden for any meter with bsdsensorHighestN.
xosview*bsdsensorN: name.type
xosview*bsdsensorHighN: name.type
xosview*bsdsensorLowN: name.type
    These define where the actual value, high alarm value and low alarm value for meter N=1,2,3,... will be read from. The name is the sensor driver, and type is the wanted value. Both alarm values are optional, and can also be given as static numerical values.
    You can find the correct pair for OpenBSD and DragonFly BSD with systat command, e.g.
    xosview*bsdsensor1: it0.temp1
    xosview*bsdsensorHigh1: 100 On NetBSD, you can find the driver name with envstat command. Value name for the actual reading is typically 'cur-value' and for high alarm 'critical-max' and for low alarm 'critical-min', e.g.
    xosview*bsdsensor2: coretemp0.cur-value
    xosview*bsdsensorHigh2: coretemp0.critical-max For all possible NetBSD value names, refer to envstat source code. FreeBSD has no usable sensor drivers as of version 9.0. However, ACPI thermal zones can be used by defining the sysctl node below hw.acpi.thermal, e.g.
    xosview*bsdsensor1: tz0.temperature
    xosview*bsdsensorHigh1: tz0._CRT
    ACPI thermal zones can be used like this on DragonFly BSD as well.
xosview*bsdsensorLabelN: string
    N-th label for above meters, default is SENN.
xosview*bsdsensorHighestN: number
    Override default bsdsensorHighest for meter N.

  Battery Meter Resources

  Disk Meter Resources
xosview*diskBandwidth: bandwidth
    This number is used to specify the expected maximum bandwidth in bytes per second for the disk meter.

  File System Meter Resources
xosview*filesysMounts: list
    This value can be either auto or a space seperated list of mount points. If a mount point is not actually mounted then the meter will display the background using filesysNoneColor and continue to monitor the location. When a mount is made on that location then the meter will display normally. If the value of filesysMouts is auto, then meters will be created for every filesystem that has an absolute path as a source. For example "/dev/sda1 -> /" would be monitored but "tmpfs -> /tmp" would not be.

  RAID Meter Resources
  The RAID meter monitors software raid devices provided by the linux kernel. These devices have names such as md0, md1, md127 and so on. Xosview uses stats provided by the md driver in the sysfs (mounted as /sys). See the md.txt file that is part of the linux kernel documentation for more details.
  The raid meter displays information for each raid device using a row for each md device it is monitoring. Each row consists of two side by side meters. The first meter displays a multi-colored bit for each device that is part of the raid. The second meter shows the progress of any active sync action the raid may have underway. The legend for the raid meter shows information such as the raid level, current active device count, fully functional device count and current sync_action.
  The number of devices that are part of each md device are updated as xosview watches the raid's status. So the number of bits will change as drives are added and removed from the md device. The color of each bit reflects the state of each device (found in the sysfs). Since a md device can have multiple states (for example in_sync + write_error), xosview attempts to show the configured color of the most relevant state.
  When a sync action is active on the md device the field meter on the right side of the bit meter shows the progres. It is a percentage of the total operation and colors are configurable.
  The raid meter is configured using the following resources: xosview*RAIDdevices: auto OR list
    If this resource is set to auto then xosview will search for and display a meter for every md device it finds. Otherwise this value is a comma delimited list of md device names (such as md127, md125).
xosview*RAIDfullColor:
    The color used to indicate a fully functional raid device (number of in_sync devices >= fully functional count).
xosview*RAIDdegradedColor:
    The color used to indicate a degraded array (number of in_sync devices < fully functional count).
  The following colors are using for the various sync sync actions. They are used by the legend and field meter when a sync action is underway.

    xosview*RAIDidleColor

    xosview*RAIDcheckColor

    xosview*RAIDresyncColor

    xosview*RAIDrecoverColor

    xosview*RAIDrepairColor
  The colors below are used for the multi-color bit meter display. Each color indicates a device state flag. If a device has more than one flag set, then xosview chooses the most relevant color.

    xosview*RAIDin_syncColor

    xosview*RAIDwritemostlyColor

    xosview*RAIDreplacementColor

    xosview*RAIDspareColor

    xosview*RAIDwrite_errorColor

    xosview*RAIDwant_replaceColor

    xosview*RAIDblockedColor

    xosview*RAIDfaultyColor

OBTAINING
The most current version of xosview can be found at the following site:
    http://sourceforge.net/projects/xosview/
  The projects source tree is also available here.

BUGS
Here is a list of known bugs. Reports of unknown bugs are appreciated and should be directed to:
    https://sourceforge.net/p/xosview/_list/tickets
        Bug tracking system.

AUTHORS
Mike Romberg (mike-romberg@comcast.net)
    Original author, Linux, HPUX, minix and cygwin ports.
Brian Grayson (bgrayson@netbsd.org)
    NetBSD port and most of the nice enhancements for version 1.4, initial work on FreeBSD port.
Scott McNab (jedi@tartarus.uwa.edu.au)
    Added the scrolling graph mode.
Tom Pavel (pavel@slac.stanford.edu)
    Most of the FreeBSD support, more resource-handling improvements.
Greg Onufer (exodus@cheers.bungi.com)
    SunOS port.
Stefan Eilemann (eilemann@gmail.com)
    IRIX 6.5 port.
Sheldon Hearn (axl@iafrica.com)
    FreeBSD libdevstat-based diskmeter support.
David W. Talmage (talmage@jefferson.cmf.nrl.navy.mil)
    Added battery-meter support to NetBSD.
Oleg Safiullin (form@openbsd.org)
    OpenBSD interrupt-meter support.
Werner Fink (werner@suse.de)
    Originator of the loadmeter.
Massimiliano Ghilardi ( ghilardi@cibs.sns.it )
    Linux pagemeter.
Carsten Schabacker (cschaba@spock.central.de)
    Made extensions to the serial-meter.
Paal Beyer <pbeyer@online.no>
    Ported the linux memstat kernel module to linux-2.1
Jerome Forissier <forissier@isia.cma.fr>
    Maintains the linux SMP kernel patch which xosview uses to display meters for each cpu. This patch can be found at the following URL:
        http://www-isia.cma.fr/~forissie/smp_kernel_patch/
Tomer Klainer <mandor@cs.huji.ac.il>
    Initial port to BSDI.
Arno Augustin (Arno.Augustin@3SOFT.de)
    Solaris disk and network meters.
Alberto BARSELLA <ishark@lsh01.univ-lille1.fr>
    Fixes for linux diskmeter + ip_chains support
Thomas Waldmann (ThomasWaldmann@gmx.de)
    Linux raid meter, bitfieldmeter. Many cosmetic fixes.
Leopold Toetsch <lt@toetsch.at>
    Linux lms temp meter.
David O'Brien (obrien@nuxi.com)
    FreeBSD 4.* updates, and a few other suggestions.
Christos Zoulas (christos@netbsd.org)
    C++ standard compliance and other NetBSD fixes.
And many others who have sent in small fixes and improvements.