osd_cat(1) [debian man page]
XOSD(1) General Commands Manual XOSD(1) NAME
osd_cat - X on-screen file displayer SYNOPSIS
osd_cat [OPTION] [FILE]... osd_cat -b percentage|slider [OPTION] DESCRIPTION
Display FILE, or standard input, on X screen. -p, --pos=POS This option tells osd_cat where to display the text. POS can be top, middle, or bottom. The default is top. -o, --offset=OFFSET This option specifies the offset from the top or bottom of screen the text is displayed. The default is 0. -A, --align=ALIGN This option tells osd_cat where to display the text. ALIGN can be left, right or center. The default is left. -i, --indent=OFFSET This option specifies the INDENT from the left of screen the text is displayed. The default is 0. -f, --font=FONT This option specifies the FONT to be used for displaying the text. The default is fixed. -c, --color=COLOR This option specifies the COLOR to be used for displaying the text. The default is red. -d, --delay=TIME This option specifies the number of seconds the text is displayed. The default is 5 seconds. -l, --lines=LINES This option specifies the number of LINES to scroll the display over. The default is 5. -s, --shadow=OFFSET This option specifies the OFFSET of the text shadow. The default is 0, which means no text shadow is created. -S, --shadowcolour=COLOUR This option specifies the COLOUR of the text shadow. The default is black. -O, --outline=WIDTH This option specifies the WIDTH of the text outline. The default is 0, which is no outline. -u, --outlinecolour=COLOUR This option specifies the COLOUR of the text outline. The default is black. -a, --age[=SCROLL_AGE] This option affects screen redrawing. If SCROLL_AGE seconds pass before a new line is ready (for example, you're reading from a pipe), all lines are cleared at once instead of being scrolled off as new lines replace old lines. The default is 0. When no SCROLL_AGE is explicitly given, the current value from DELAY is used. -w, --wait This option also affects screen redrawing. When there is data ready to be put on screen, this option will cause osd_cat to wait until the display is clear. An alternative to scrolling. -b, --barmode=TYPE Lets you display a percentage or slider bar instead of just text. TYPE may be percentage or slider. In this mode no text is read from any file, but the following options can be used: -P, --percentage=PERCENTAGE This option specified the position of the percentage / slider bar. PERCENTAGE may be in the range from 0 to 100, the default is 50. -T, --text=TEXT This option specifies an optional TEXT which gets displayed above the percentage bar. The default is empty, so no additional text is displayed. -h, --help display help (which is often more up to date) and exit With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input. AUTHOR
Martijn van de Streek <martijn@foodfight.org>, Some patching done by Malcolm Valentine <farkit@iprimus.com.au> and Tim Wright <tim@ignavus.net>. xosd was written by Andre Renaud <andre@ignavus.net> and is maintained by Tim Wright <tim@ignavus.net> SEE ALSO
More information on the X OSD Library and its author can be found on http://www.ignavus.net/software.html <http://www.ignavus.net/software.html> COPYRIGHT
It is distributed under the GNU General Public License. X OSD cat January 2001 XOSD(1)
Check Out this Related Man Page
ROOTTAIL(1) General Commands Manual ROOTTAIL(1) NAME
root-tail - print text directly to X11 root window SYNOPSIS
root-tail [-g|--geometry GEOMETRY] [-fn|--font FONTSPEC] [--color color] [--reload SEC COMMAND] [--shade] [--outline] [--minspace] [--noflicker] [-f|--fork] [--reverse] [--whole] [--partial] [--update] [--cont STRING] [--wordwrap] [--justify] [--noinitial] [--frame] [-id ID] [-i|--interval SECONDS] [-V] file1[,color[,desc]] [file2[,color[,desc]]] DESCRIPTION
Displays a given file anywhere on your X11 root window, i.e. it is kind of tail -f for multiple files using your desktop background as out- put window. All non-option arguments on the command line are files to be logged. A null desc (example: "/var/log/messages,red,") will prevent the printing of a description and the []'s. General Options --color COLOR Use COLOR as default. --font | -fn FONTSPEC Use font FONTSPEC. This can be either a fixed width font like -fn fixed or any font using -fn '-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*' with the appropriate fields filled out (see xfontsel). Specifying a different FONTSPEC before each filename will cause each file to be displayed in a different font. -f | --fork Forks to the background. --reverse Display the files in reverse order, with the newest lines at the top. --whole Only display whole lines. If the last line of a file doesn't yet end with a newline character then wait until it does before dis- playing it. This is the default if more than one file is being displayed. --partial This is the opposite of the --whole option (see above). It displays lines even if they don't yet have a newline at the end. This is the default if only one file is being displayed. --update Update partial lines 'in place' if they are still on the screen when they are updated in their files. Using --update automatically turns on --partial. --cont STRING When partial lines are broken into two lines in the display, prefix the 2nd line with STRING. Defaults to "|| ". Specify the "--whole" argument to ensure partial lines are never displayed, or specify "--update" to attempt to "repair" broken lines in-place. --cont-color COLOR Use COLOR when displaying the continuation string (as optionally specified with the --cont option above). --wordwrap The default behaviour is to fit as much as possible onto each line of output, even if this means splitting a word between one line and the next. The --wordwrap argument splits lines at spaces if possible. --justify After wrapping long lines, attempt to justify the text to produce a smooth right-hand margin. Implies --wordwrap. --reload SEC COMMAND Re-display the file(s) and run COMMAND every SEC seconds. The default is to never re-display the file(s). --shade Add black shading to the font. --outline Add a black outline to the font (making redraws quite a bit slower). --minspace Use minimum linespace even when using shading or outlining. This might result in leftover pixels (dependign on font and logfile con- tent). --noflicker Use slower but flicker-free update. --noinitial Don't display the end of the file(s) initially. -id ID Use the given window ID for output instead of the root window. -i | --interval SECONDS Use the specified sleeping interval between checks instead of the default 2.4 seconds. Fractional values are OK. -V Print version information. --frame Draw a frame around the selected area. This is useful when trying to find the perfect geometry. EXAMPLE
root-tail -g 800x250+100+50 -font 10x20 /var/log/messages,green -font 12x24 /var/log/secure,red,'ALERT' BUGS
Some desktop environments open a virtual root window and make it difficult to share it. If you cannot see anything after starting root- tail, try to find a setting "allow programs on desktop" or similar, or manually specify a window id. Should you happen to find any bugs please fix them and send me a diff. NOTE: This program was modified by Marc Lehmann <pcg@goof.com>, who couldn't reach the original author. Please direct bug-reports etc. to pcg@goof.com. http://root-tail.plan9.de/ 4.2 Berkeley Distribution 2004-03-27 ROOTTAIL(1)