NAME
lavaps -- a lava lamp of currently running processes
WHAT'S NEW
30-Oct-01 1.20
NEW: Port to NetBSD contributed by Hubert Feyrer, the NetBSD lavaps
port maintainer.
DESCRIPTION
LavaPS is an interactive process-tracking program like ``top'',
but with a much different attitude. Rather than presenting lots of
specific info in digital form, it tries to present certain important
information in a graphical analog form. The idea is that you can
run it in the background and get a rough idea of what's happening
to your system without devoting much concentration to the task.
LavaPS was inspired by Mark Weiser's idea of calm computing in
this paper:
``The Coming Age of Calm Technology'' by Mark Weiser and John Seely
Brown. A revised version of Weiser & Brown. ``Designing
Calm Technology'', PowerGrid Journal, v 1.01,
http://powergrid.electriciti.com/1.01 (July 1996). October, 1996.
http://www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/acmfuture2endnote.htm.
(This program dedicated to the memory of M.W.--I hope you would have
thought it a good hack.)
REQUIREMENTS
Building LavaPS requires C++, STL, and Tcl/Tk. LavaPS is necessarily
system-specific. It currently runs under Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris,
Irix, AIX and NetBSD. Ports to other systems are encouraged.
AVAILABILITY
The latest version of LavaPS should always be available from
http://www.isi.edu/~johnh/SOFTWARE/LAVAPS/.
Mailing lists for LavaPS are
lavaps-announce@heidemann.la.ca.us and
lavaps-talk@heidemann.la.ca.us
To subscribe to either, send mail with "subscribe" in the *BODY*
of the message to:
lavaps-announce-request@heidemann.la.ca.us or
lavaps-talk-request@heidemann.la.ca.us.
RELEASE HISTORY
21-Mar-99 1.0
Initial release to a few friends. Runs on Linux and FreeBSD.
29-May-99 1.1
Fix some Linux build bugs
6-Aug-99 1.2
Portability, correctness, and warning fixes for FreeBSD from Ted
Faber. (Thanks!)
I fixed the space leak...previously blobs only got bigger, never
smaller, so eventually the whole lamp filled up with emacs.
Added support for selecting VM or physical memory.
Version now shows up in about.
There's a lingering bug: sometimes I get into an infinite loop on
some blobs. I catch it and break out, but you'll see error messages.
20-Aug-99 1.3
Mailing lists for LavaPS are
lavaps-announce@heidemann.la.ca.us and
lavaps-talk@heidemann.la.ca.us
To subscribe to either, send mail with "subscribe" in the *BODY*
of the message to:
lavaps-announce-request@heidemann.la.ca.us or
lavaps-talk-request@heidemann.la.ca.us.
Splash text now stays on top of any blobs.
Fixed some blob ordering bugs (and made all redrawing lazy), but
probably introduced some more bugs.
Changed hash function arbitrarily to make Netscape, emacs, and Vmware
not all be different shades of green.
Preliminary resource support (only xdb, not .Xdefaults): set
lavaps.geometry, .what, .who. (Bug: what/who don't work currently.)
Can display both physical and virtual memory at the same time.
6-Sep-99 1.4
Bugfixes in ``both'' mode: a sev-1 problem with leaking blobs and
a problem where a default resource "lavaps.what: both" didn't work.
Internal process-to-blob API is now absolute, hopefully reducing
gradual blob expansion over time (when the program runs for
weeks). Also, I fixed a bunch of internal places where size could
leak.
Info about processes now includes user names in addition to user ids.
Autoresizing!
Autoresizing revealed a bunch of corner cases with blob sizing.
Hopefully they're all now fixed.
To nail ``any'' remaining bugs, a whole bunch of validation code is
turned on. This makes things run slower and will mostly be turned
off in the next week.
8-Sep-99 1.5
Make install bug fixed on systems where it's not installed setgid.
(Thanks to Mark Yarvis for identifying the problem.)
A work-around for a FreeBSD header bug from Ted Faber.
A debug resource (lava.debug) now enables debugging info. Very useful
if you think real sizes don't match expected.
Clicking for info now makes the splash text go away.
The Tk ``appname'' is now set.
What I thought was lazy in the 1.3 release, wasn't (due to 3 bugs).
Things are better now, and LavaPS should consume less CPU.
9-Sep-99 1.6
Typo in about window fixed (thanks Ted).
Bug in the splash text repetition suppression fixed (thanks Mark).
Window resize now does sensible things. Horizontal and vertical
orientation is automatically determined.
13-Sep-99 1.7
Fixed a bug created in 1.4 where blobs drift slowly to the left.
Fixed a bug where resizes (after a while) would crash in
blob::redraw_all().
Documentation: a man page, and the README and internal help are all
generated from a central source.
12-Oct-99 1.8
Fixed an inefficiency where resizing happened more frequently than
it needed to.
Fixed several typos in the documentation.
Fixed a bug in using -fpermissive on FreeBSD.
Rolled a RedHat RPM.
Fixed a FreeBSD port.
27-Dec-99 1.9 (the millennial release)
The X resource lavaps.pollInterval now sets how frequently to check
process status. Suggested by Hue-Bond hue@cyberchat2000.com.
The licenses on tcl2cc.c and color.c have been changed to GPL (thanks
to Ron Frederick and Jamie Zawinski for releasing their code, and
Tommi Virtanen of the Debian Project for pointing out these possibly
problematic licenses).
Shrinking-on-startup bug fixed with tkstep.
Some standard command-line arguments now work: -display and -geometry.
LavaPS triggers a memory leak on some Debian systems (see bug #49828
in their database). The problem appears to be in a library, not in
LavaPS, so I cannot fix it.
11-Feb-00 1.10
The LavaPS memory leak under Debian Linux (but not on RedHat or
FreeBSD, see Debian bug #49828 for details) has been found. The good
news is that the Tcl/Tk Debian port maintainer has found the problem
(in a patch against stock Tcl/Tk-8.0.5) and it should be fixed in
their next release (thanks Kirk!).
Pop-up windows near the edge of the screen now are adjusted to stay
on the screen. (Bug raised by Brett Neely and Michael Talarczyk.)
Solaris port contributed from Alan Coopersmith.
3-Jun-00 1.11
Configuration handling slightly changed (config.h.in added).
--with-tcltk-lib-suffix-type={dot,nodot,none} now lets you control
what the libraries are called (they seem to vary a lot).
Port to Solaris 2.5.1 contributed from Angus Mackay.
The display can now be lozenge-shaped (the way a real lava lamp is).
This is controlled by the "lozenge" resource.
FreeBSD now drops setgid privileges (patch from Kris Kennaway).
Fixed bugs in handling .lavapsrc files.
In some cases LavaPS would go into infinite blob growth or shrinkage.
Bug and fix applied from Nick Bailey.
5-Jun-00 1.12
Process control (nice, renice, kill) added.
Some of the "halo" around lozenge windows fixed.
6-Jun-00 1.13
Dependence on an external ``whoami'' program removed.
Process name added to proc menu (suggested by Mark Yarvis).
Gcc-2.95.2 compilation problem work-around (since 1.11).
Handling of window decorations (the ``halo'' bug) mostly cleaned up
(it works on at least fvwm2, enlightenment, and kde (kwm?)).
27-Jul-00 1.14
Shaped windows can now be disabled completely. (Change suggested by
Mark Yarvis.)
Patch to work around a compiler bug triggered in tcl_blob.cc on the
line: Tcl_SetResult(interp, shaped_window_ok() ? "1" : "0", NULL);
(Problem raised by Andrew Moise and Brian Bresen.)
Patch to lavaps.spec to allow builds by unprivileged users based on
contribution by Chris Dent.
Fix to Solaris build problem (process_scan multiply defined) from
Donald Hutcheon.
FAQ-like "How do I" section added to the documentation.
29-Jul-00 1.15
Fix for the "infinite growth on start" bug that occurred if no
geometry was specified (reported by Kees Cook and Jeremy Brooks).
19-Apr-01 1.16
NEW: memory sizes now are self-scaling (141MiB rather than 144660KB),
like GNU df ``-h'' and use the IEC power-of-two abbreviations (like
KiB == kibibytes, see http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
for what those are).
BUG FIX: signaling text neatened up from a suggestion from Alan
Schmitt alan.schmitt@inria.fr.
NEW: Johann Visagie, `johann@egenetics.com', is the new maintainer
of the FreeBSD port of LavaPS.
BUG FIX: fixes compile bug in 1.15 on Linux 1.15 (reported by Simon
Schoar simon@schoar.de).
31-May-01 1.17
BUG FIX: Several people have reported problems with lozenge mode
having a black border around it, although I didn't observe the
problem. With sawfish-0.36 I now see the problem and developed a
work-around. If anyone out there really understands shaped windows,
please let me know.
24-Jul-01 1.18
BUG FIX: Configure fix for gcc 3.0. (There are still warnings in
some of the platform-specific code, though.) (Problem detected by
Murray Smigel.)
15-Aug-01 1.19 (the "congratulations to Karen" release)
NEW: Port to AIX contributed by Nigel Griffiths of IBM U.K.
BUG FIX: Another fix for STL with gcc-3.0 (namespace issues).
TO DOS
* On Linux, LavaPS doesn't properly track the process names of
processes that change at run-time (because it uses /proc/*/stat
rather than /proc/*/cmdline). (Bug identified by Murray Smigel.) *
Add a scaling factor to CPU speed. (Also make the default time-step
proportional to CPU speed.) * (BUG) Autoconf of tcl is not very
good. On some systems (Debian Linux, for example), all the tcl stuff
has the version numbers appended. (Bug raised by *many* people. Does
someone want to try integrating the expect autoconf code?) *
(BUG) Lozenge-shaped windows don't always properly draw the border.
For people who understand borders, please look at the comment in
tcl_blob_shape.cc and give me advice. * (BUG) Lozenge-shaped windows
flicker for me on FocusIn/FocusOut events (with sawfish-0.36-7).
* A --root option to run in the root window. (Unfortunately this
isn't as simple as just using wish's -use.) * should have an
option to label things with the hostname * window shrinks to zero
on startup with tkstep installed * flag to force directionality *
Show all processes but those by these uids (root, http, etc.). Also
some way to exclude the (large) mfs image under FreeBSD. * set-able
default scaling of blob size. * should verify that blobs can occupy
the whole, whole screen. (Possible bug raised by Mark Yarvis.)
* When things are resizing they should probably maintain some
relationship between visual space and memory that is not affected by
odd horizontal:vertical ratios. * pop-up sliders to adjust scaling.
* LavaPS steals lots of colors on a pseudocolor display. I hoped that
Tcl would do reasonable color mapping for me, but apparently not.
* The info window should be pinnable (like in OpenLook), and then
auto-update. http://www.debian.org/Bugs/db/49/49884.html * The Solaris
port needs support for detecting command lines. * This should work
as a Gnome panel applet. It works in Afterstep's panel, but not Gnome
1.1. * Finish clickelessInfo (it doesn't yet work). (Idea suggested
by Yermo Lamers). * Add a resource to control the directionality of
blob movement. * Should allow LavaPS to show absolute memory usage,
not just relative memory usage (suggested by several people including
Johannes Nix). * Non-linear scaling of memory usage (to accommodate
the wide range of process sizes). Suggested by Johannes Nix. *
Option to suppress mem grow/shrink messages. (Suggested by Jerrad
Pierce.) * Background transparency. (Suggested by Jerrad Pierce.)
* Configuration pop-up dialog. (Suggested by Jerrad Pierce.) * It
would be nice if it looked like the lamp was actually filled with
fluid and had a light down the bottom. So the background would be
shaded with some color that followed a gradient of high intensity
at the bottom to low intensity at the top, and this background
gradient color would add the blob color of blobs that are floating
in the background. (Suggested by Matth Lowry.)
COPYRIGHT
LavaPS is Copyright (C) 1998-2000 by John Heidemann.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License, version 2,
as published by the Free Software Foundation.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU
General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307,
USA.
AUTHOR
John Heidemann, `johnh@isi.edu'.
The idea of doing a lava lamp arose in discussions with David Taylor
at USC. Although he didn't end up taking it on as directed research,
the idea of a top-like lava lamp seemed too good not to follow-up on.
Thanks to two enthusiastic early users (Ted Faber and Mark Yarvis)
for encouragement, suggestions, and bits of code.
LavaPS includes a small amount of code from xscreensaver by M. Dobie,
Patrick J. Naughton, and Jamie Zawinski. On Linux it uses Chuck
Blake's /proc scanning library. Building LavaPS uses tcl2cc by
Ron Frederick, from tclcl (see http://www.isi.edu/nsnam/tclcl/ for
details). Thanks to these authors for releasing their code to LavaPS.
Johann Visagie, `johann@egenetics.com', is the current maintainer
of the FreeBSD port.
Hubert Feyrer `hubert.feyrer@informatik.fh-regensburg.de', is the
current maintainer of the NetBSD port.
