Mac OS X may not be as easy as Ubuntu to customize, but thanks to GeekTool, you can make your desktop background a little more useful than just eye-candy. I’ll show you how to easily add a calendar, multiple clocks (display both relative and non-relative time), a live system processes chart, and a system up-time timer (with load averages) to your desktop. Of course you can easily add more items, but this should be enough to get you started.

Sounds completely geeky (and it totally is), but GeekTool makes you and your desktop look awesome – it also increases sexual pleasure and makes you last longer in bed.

Get Your GeekTool Ready

Obviously none of this action would be possible without GeekTool, so go download yourself a copy and install it. The install should take you 30 seconds or less. Skim over the Introduction to give yourself a quick overview of your new best friend.

Add The Goods To GeekTool

Now that you have GeekTool installed, it’s time to add some magic to your desktop. (You can reference my desktop screenshot above as you add your GeekTool components.)

For each component you add, you can drag and resize the window in which they appear – you’ll see what I mean once you begin.

To add a new component, click “New Entry” in GeekTool and under the main configuration frame drop-down menu (#3 in the screenshot), choose “Shell”, then insert the following code into the “Command” textbox. The “Refresh” input box can be changed to rerun the Shell command every number of seconds.

Here we go from bottom to top of my desktop screenshot:

System Uptime Stats

uptime
Set refresh to ten.

System Processes Chart

top -l1 -u -o cpu -S -n 15
Edit the number “15″ at the end of the string to display more or less processes.

Local Time

date +%H:%M
You can change the format in which the date is displayed using these nifty conversion symbols.

Non-Relative Time

TZ=Pacific/Honolulu date +"Honolulu: %H:%M"
To change the timezone, edit the TZ variable above to something like “America/Los_Angeles” – a full list of possible TZ variables can be found here:
http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/xtra/tzdatepick.html

Calendar

cal | sed "s/^/ /;s/$/ /;s/ $(date +%e) / $(date +%e | sed 's/./#/g') /"

My Exact GeekTool Setup

Want to completely copy my style? Be my guest!

Colors and Font

White – Monaco
The font size is variable depending upon the component – it varies from 9, the uptime and system processes, to 71, the local time.

Text

Right-justified

Image Background

I can’t remember where I download the background from, but it’s called “Flow” and it insanely rules. (If you know to whom I should give credit, please let me know.)
Download Flow (~3MB)

Enjoy!

Tags: beauty, customize, desktop, howto, Mac, typography