Neofetch is a command-line system information tool written in Bash. It gathers information about your system, such as OS version, hardware specifications, and software versions, and then displays it in the terminal as ASCII in an aesthetic and visually pleasing way.
For a long time, this tool has been a favorite for anyone looking to check their system’s details quickly. Additionally, it’s especially popular among customization enthusiasts who love to show off their setups to the rest of the Linux community.
Neofetch emerged in late 2015 and quickly became super popular, almost a must-have for every Linux user. But now, it looks like it’s reached the end of its journey.
Sadly, the project hasn’t been updated since August 2020, and after almost four years without any new developments, it was recently placed in read-only mode and archived just a few days ago. What does this mean?
When a GitHub repository is marked as “read-only,” it means that the repository can be viewed and its contents can be cloned or downloaded, but no changes or new contributions can be made. In other words, users cannot push new commits, merge pull requests, or create issues or branches in a read-only repository.
In practice, this means that the Neofetch tool can be considered closed from now on. Yes, it’s a bit sad, but there’s no need to worry because there are plenty of alternatives out there that will continue to offer the same functionality.
Who are they? Well, the closest, literally 1:1 with the functionality of Neofetch but written in the C programming language, is Fastfech. Described by its developers as “like neofetch, but much faster because it’s mostly written in C,” it is actively developed and can be found on all the major Linux distributions.
On top of that, there are also other options, like Hyfetch, NerdFetch, and more. Which one do you like best? Drop your favorite in the comments below—we’d love to hear from you!
