Create a console window in Terminal

Most of the time, I like having a window open to display system messages. Apple provides a program to do this with: /Applications/Utilities/Console.app However, it lacks certain features that I’d like to have, including transparency, as well as necessitating launching another application and taking up space on the dock. I recently ran through most of the ware that’s out there, with these being standouts:

• BetterConsole
• DesktopConsole
• FileMonitor

I especially liked BetterConsole, but had some problems getting font preferences to stick. In any case, I decided to DIY it myself (DIM? LOL) using a program I already have open all of the time: Terminal.

Terminal allows you to create custom .term files that predefine the settings you want to have in a window. To learn how to do this, look up article 86134 in Apple’s KnowledgeBase. (Bonus hint: search by that number in the AppleCare section of Sherlock, and you’ll go straight to the article. Boss!) I set up my custom console window at 125x12 dimensions, nestled it at the bottom of the screen, and made it transparent. You can play with the font/color combos to get a nice unobtrusive look that you like. Then I created a new window which will be my regular terminal window. With both of those ready, I do the Save As… and make sure launching at startup is selected, as well as saving all open windows. Et voila! :)

For the advanced section of that article, I used this for my ExecutionString:

<string>tail -f /var/tmp/console.log</string>