1.7.2 tour

From Conky

Conky 1.7.2 has several new features, numerous bug fixes, and performance improvements. Below is a summary of these changes (see the full change log for more changes, and the git log for all changes with details).

[edit] New Features

Drawing with Cairo and Lua

• Built in Lua bindings for Cairo and Imlib2, which allows you to draw directly to Conky's window using Cairo and/or Imlib2.
• Added format_human_readable option
• Added fancy new 'temperature gradients', enabled by passing the -t switch to graphs, such as:

${cpugraph 101010 ff0000 -t}

Graphs with 'temperature gradients'

• Added own_window_type panel
• Added io_perc, io_read and io_write to $top
  • $top_io: same as top, except sorted by the amount of I/O the process has done during the update interval
• You can now use alignment special variables with objects that span multiple lines. Example:

${alignr}${execi 300 cal}

• $to_bytes: converts a size to bytes and shows it without unit
• $blink: let 'text_and_other_conky_vars' blink on and off
• $weather: download, parse and display METAR data. Example:

Wind: ${weather http://weather.noaa.gov/pub/data/observations/metar/stations/ EBAW wind_speed}km/h

Using Lua to enhance weather output

• $swapfree: amount of free swap
• $curl: download data using Curl. Example:

${curl http://whatismyip.com/automation/n09230945.asp 1440}

• $entropy_perc: percentage of entropy available in comparison to the poolsize
• $desktop, $desktop_number and $desktop_name: current desktop number and name, total number of available desktops. Example:

${desktop_name}: ${desktop} of ${desktop_number}

• Enhanced Imlib2 cache control, by adding a global cache flush interval option, as well as a per-image cache flushing interval

[edit] Changes to Existing Behaviour

• Improved Lua API (lua_read_parse has been removed in favour of the conky_parse() Lua API call)
• $battery_short can now also display F (full), N (not present), E (empty), U (unknown)
• border_margin split in border_outer_margin or border_inner_margin
• Comments are now also possible in the TEXT section, if necessary the comment character (#) can be escaped with a backslash (\#)
• Added a different default configuration file for builds without X11