The K Desktop Environment

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3. General Usage

Changing device
This is done at the bottom of the options menu under the Device submenu. There are predefined settings for eth0, ppp0, ippp0 and lo devices. If the device you want to read from isn't one of theese, choose Other from the bottom of this menu and you will be prompted for a input line where you can define your device.
Changing the diagrams scaling
Choose Scaling from the menu to change this. The scaling should be set to the connection speed you have. It's from this scaling parameter the diagram get it's dimensions and figure out in what way to show different throughputs. If you have a connection speed which isn't listed or if you want to use a unlisted value, choose other from the bottom of the menu, and you will be prompted for a speed, make sure you define this speed in KBit/Sec, Kilo bit per second, otherwise the scaling won't be correct.
Changing diagram style
The Style option in the main menu will let you change the look of the diagram. There are a single line option, which only draw a stright line across the diagram, a filled option, and a third shaded option which shades the diagram in a nice Black To Color tone, this is probably the most decent look :)
Changing the update speed
Choose speed from the main menu to change the update interval of the diagram. This value is defined in MS, tousands of a second, and there are presets from 100ms up to 5000ms. Choose a lower value to get a more responsive diagram, choose a higher to get a slower, but much more stable and less flickering one.
Changing Diagram Colors
Choose Color In or Color Out from the menu to change theese settings.
Clear and Active
Theese two functions are located near the top of the options menu. The Clear option will erase all readings in the diagram and set the values to zero, with other words, it will become all black. The Active option is the powerswitch for the whole program, this can be used to shut down the diagram so that it don't measure any readings.
Grid and Labels
Theese two functions, are also located near the top of the options menu. Grid will toggle a background gridplate of lines to make the diagram look a bit better (actually it only looks really messed up with that grid on :), the Labels option is more usefull, it will turn on small text labels in the upperleft corner of the diagram showing which one of the two directions (in or out) the diagram stands for.
Soft diagram curve
This option at the top of the menu, will turn on smooth curve, this means that the curve won't even show very fast changes, but instead move slowly up and down with a little delay on the movements. This feature is really nice and makes the diagrams look a lot better, especially when the update speed is set to a low flickering rate.
Popup Dialog Info
Leftclick on one of the diagrams to bring up a small Popup Infobox. To hide it, Leftclick on the diagram again, or Rightclick on the Popup itself. While the Popup is shown, you can move it around with the Left mouse button. This Popup is both sticky and allways on top, so that you can have it in a corner all the time if you like.
Sessionmanagement
If the program is still running when KDE is shut down, it will restart when KDE is restarted.
Settings saving
The settings choosed in the configuration menues are saved to the programs own configurationfile right away at the same monent as they're set, this means you don't have to care about saving the settings since this is done automaticlly.

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