trouble working with Conky

I recently decided to try out a desktop system monitor. I thought that I should start with TyopoytaORvelo System MOnitor (Torsmo). After I was told that it was unmaintained, it was suggested that I move to Conky. I run Sabayon, so I used portage to get the application, and It works great; save one problem. I don't know how to configure it. I found where the files were located (/usr/share/doc/conky-1.4.5/) and I was given the option to extract, I extracted to my home folder (/home/<user>). I could then preceed to edit the file, except nothing took. I honestly am lost as to what to do, I have spent the past five hours researching, they might be speaking english, but its all greek (or geek. OY!) to me.

Please help.

I also apologize for the bad, bad pun. I am shame faced.

No worries. :)

Conky reads the config file usually from ~/.conkyrc

all you have to do is make that file the way you want it. Dont know how? Im sure man conky will tell you. Are you like me and are too lazy to start from scratch? google .conkyrc and steal someone elses, then modify it.

Its really pretty straightforward. The most complicated part is knowing what network device you connect to so conky can tell you how much bandwidth your using. The second most complicated part is knowing hex colour codes to make it look perdy :P

Yep, everything you need to know to configure it is on the conky website:

conky

Conky Variables

~/.conkyrc settings

Conky is all manually configured, so it will take a while to get it the way you want.

Okay, still having problems. I thought that perhaps I misnamed the file. whenever I typed $gedit ~/.conkyrc I got nothing. However, when I left the period out, I got the file. I tried to rename the file with the period, It disappeared. Perhaps I am just not experienced enough to use this yet, because I have read, re-read, and struggled with this for hours on end. I know that something should have worked, because I copy-pasted someone else's conky code into the file.

I am gonna go punch a mattress right now.
Please help if you can. Thanks.

The period means that it's a hidden file. You can set gEdit to see hidden files, though. Look in the menu in gEdit.

Aha, that did it.
though i need a new matress now.

oops