Put Conky behind the desktop icons

Question

Maybe I am trying do something impossible, but after hours of Googling I didn't get 100% answer yet.

So - it is possible put Conky on Desktop backgroud (behind desktop icons)?

The usual config:

own_window yes
own_window_type normal # (desktop, override) - I have the same result for all this attributes
own_window_transparent yes
own_window_hints undecorated,below,skip_taskbar,sticky,skip_pager

Is giving me Conky with (pseudo)transparent background in front of icons (they are completely hidden behind it, even if in background of Conky is shown background image), while I am trying achieve opposite...

My system:

• SuSE 11.4
• KDE 4.4 (Release 3)
• x86_64

Answer 1

The pseudo-transparency of conky is achieved by repainting the part of the wallpaper that is covered by conky. Therefore conky can't show desktop icons behind it.

Note that conky is a normal window whithout border and titlebar.

You can, however, make a screenshot of your Desktop without conky and use it as wallpaper so you can see the desktop icons behind conky, but you won't be able to click on them.

Answer 2

Yes. you CAN do this.

own_window_argb_visual yes

Answer 3

After trying to work around this issue for a long time I've finally got my desktop icons working normally with conky overlapping them. Turns out the issue was the new syntax.

My conkyrc had originally had own_window_type = 'desktop' (which is the new syntax) but changing it to own_window_type desktop allowed my desktop icons to become clickable through the conky overlap.

If own_window_type desktop doesn't work for you then try own_window_type = 'desktop',.