Linux / UNIX Desktop Fun: Let it Snow On Your Desktop

Feeling lonely this holiday season? Try Xsnow. This little app will let it snow on the Unix / Linux desktop. Santa and his reindeer will complete your festive season feeling with moving snowflakes on your desktop, with Santa Claus running all over the screen.

I first installed this 13 or 14 years ago. It was was originally created for Macintosh systems in 1984. You can install it as follows:

Install xsnow

Debian / Ubuntu / Mint users type the following command:

$ sudo apt-get install xsnow

Freebsd users type the following command to install the same:

# cd /usr/ports/x11/xsnow/
# make install clean

OR, try to add the package:

# pkg_add -r xsnow

A Note About Other Distros

Fedora / RHEL / CentOS Linux desktop users may find the package using rpmfusion repo.
Gentoo user try Gentoo portage i.e. emerge -p xsnow
OpenSuse Linux user try Yast and search for xsnow.

How Do I Use xsnow?

Open a command-line terminal (select Applications > Accessories > Terminal), and then type the following to starts xsnow:

$ xsnow

Sample outputs:

Fig.01: Snow for your Linux and Unix desktop systems

You can set the background to a blue color and lets it snow white, type:

$ xsnow -bg blue -sc snow

To set the maximum number of snowflakes and runs as fast as possible, type:

$ xsnow -snowflakes 10000 -delay 0

Do not display the trees and Santa Claus running all over the screen, enter:

$ xsnow -notrees -nosanta

For more information about xsnow and other options, please see the manual page by typing man xsnow from the command line:

$ man xsnow

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Linux / UNIX Desktop Fun: Let it Snow On Your Desktop

Install xsnow

A Note About Other Distros

How Do I Use xsnow?

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