macmon 1.1.3

Real-time Mac system monitoring dashboard with smart optimization recommendations

macmon — Mac System Monitor

A dashboard that lives in your browser and tells you exactly what your Mac is doing — and what to do when it slows down. Runs locally. No account. No internet. Nothing leaves your machine.

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Quick install

pip3 install macmon
macmon start

Browser opens automatically. Done.

pip3 and pip are the same thing on modern Macs — both install Python 3 packages. Use whichever works on your system.

New to this? Skip to the step-by-step install guide below.

Want to run from source?

git clone https://github.com/jagangirisaballa/macmon.git
cd macmon
pip3 install -e .

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Why use this instead of Activity Monitor?

Activity Monitor shows you what's happening. macmon tells you what to do about it.

	Activity Monitor	macmon
CPU / RAM / Disk at a glance	Scattered across 5 tabs	One screen
Stop a background service cleanly	No — force-kill only	Yes, one click
Start a stopped service	No	Yes
"What should I do right now?"	Nothing	Ranked recommendations with fix buttons
Free up inactive memory	No	Yes (with one click)
Lives in a browser tab while you code	No	Yes

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What's on the dashboard

Four metric cards (CPU, Memory, Swap, Disk) — colour-coded green/yellow/red, updated every 2 seconds.

Alert banner — appears when macmon detects a problem, with a plain-English explanation. Example: "Swap at 45% — memory pressure building".

Dev Services panel — lists every Homebrew service, Node server, Python server, and MCP server running on your Mac, with a toggle to stop or start each one. Background services quietly consume RAM even when you're not using them — this panel makes it trivial to free that memory.

Recommendations panel — macmon reads your current state and tells you exactly what to do. Examples:

• "Redis using 48 MB — stop if not actively developing" → Execute button stops it
• "Chrome using 1.2 GB across 14 processes — close tabs to free RAM" → manual action

Top Processes — the 10 heaviest processes on your Mac right now, sortable by CPU or Memory, with a kill button (asks for confirmation first).

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Step-by-step install (for everyone)

What you need first

• A Mac running macOS 12 (Monterey) or newer
• Python 3.9 or newer — this is the only thing you need to install yourself. Everything else is automatic.

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Step 1 — Open Terminal

Terminal is a built-in Mac app. You type commands into it, press Enter, and things happen.

• Press Cmd + Space
• Type Terminal
• Press Enter

A window opens with a blinking cursor. Leave it open — you'll type everything here.

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Step 2 — Check if Python is installed

Type this and press Enter:

python3 --version

What you'll see:

• Python 3.9.x or higher → you're good, skip to Step 3 — Install macmon
• command not found or Python 2.x → you need to install Python (see below)

Installing Python (only if needed):

1. Go to https://www.python.org/downloads/ in your browser
2. Click the big yellow "Download Python 3.x.x" button
3. A .pkg file downloads — open it from your Downloads folder
4. Click Continue → Continue → Agree → Install — enter your Mac password if asked
5. When it says "Installation was successful", click Close
6. Press Cmd + Q to fully quit Terminal, then reopen it (Cmd + Space → Terminal)
7. Run python3 --version again — it should now show Python 3.x.x

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Step 3 — Install macmon

pip3 install macmon

What's happening: This downloads macmon and everything it needs directly from the internet. Lots of text will scroll by — that's normal. It takes about 30 seconds.

When your cursor comes back with no red error text, and you see Successfully installed macmon somewhere in the output, you're done.

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Step 4 — Start the dashboard

macmon start

Your browser opens automatically and shows the macmon dashboard. You're done.

The address is http://localhost:9999 — this is like a website, but it only exists on your own Mac. Nothing outside your computer can see it.

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Daily use — cheat sheet

What you want to do	Command
Start the dashboard	macmon start
Open the dashboard (already running)	Go to http://localhost:9999 in your browser
Stop macmon completely	macmon stop
Check if macmon is running	macmon status
View logs (for troubleshooting)	macmon logs
Start on a different port	macmon start --port 8080

Tip: Bookmark http://localhost:9999. As long as macmon is running you can open the dashboard any time without touching Terminal.

macmon runs in the background — you can close Terminal after macmon start and the dashboard keeps working. Use macmon stop when you want to shut it down completely.

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Troubleshooting

macmon: command not found Close Terminal fully (Cmd + Q), reopen it, and try again. If that doesn't fix it, run pip3 install macmon again.

error: externally-managed-environment Your Mac is blocking the install to protect its system Python. Run this instead:

pip3 install macmon --break-system-packages

Browser doesn't open automatically Open your browser manually and go to http://localhost:9999. If that shows nothing, run macmon stop then macmon start.

Dashboard stuck on "Connecting…" The server stopped unexpectedly. Run macmon stop then macmon start.

Port 9999 is already in use Something else is using that port. Run macmon start --port 8080 and open http://localhost:8080 instead.

Something else went wrong Run macmon logs and look at the last few lines. If you're filing a bug report, paste that output into the issue.

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Optional: macOS notifications

macmon can send you a native Mac notification (like the ones from Messages or Mail) when your system is under memory pressure.

Requires Homebrew. If you have it:

brew install terminal-notifier

If you don't have Homebrew, skip this — macmon works fine without it.

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Requirements

• macOS 12 (Monterey) or newer — Apple Silicon or Intel
• Python 3.9+ (free at python.org)
• Homebrew (optional — enables service stop/start and notifications)

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Contributing

PRs welcome. Open an issue first for anything major.

License

MIT © Jagan Girisaballa