sleepwatcher ☆

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Description:
Monitors sleep, wakeup, and idleness of a Mac

Type: Formula | Tracked Since: Dec 28, 2025

Links: Homepage | formulae.brew.sh

Category: System utilities

Tags: macos automation system-utility sleep idle daemon

Install: brew install sleepwatcher

About:
Sleepwatcher is a command-line utility that monitors system sleep, wakeup, and idle events on macOS. It allows users to execute custom scripts or commands automatically when these system state changes occur. This enables automation of tasks like cleaning up files, managing external devices, or locking the system based on user inactivity.

Key Features:

Monitors sleep, wakeup, and idle events via command-line
Triggers custom scripts or commands on state changes
Lightweight and runs as a background daemon
Configurable idle time thresholds

Use Cases:

Automatically lock the Mac when the system becomes idle
Run cleanup scripts before the system goes to sleep
Eject external drives or unmount volumes on sleep
Pause and resume media playback based on user presence

Alternatives:

Power Management Events (pmset) – pmset can schedule sleep/wake but lacks direct idle event monitoring and script execution capabilities.
launchd – launchd can run scripts on intervals or specific triggers but does not natively monitor system sleep or idle states without helper tools.

Version History

Detected	Version	Rev	Change	Commit
Sep 13, 2024 11:12pm		0	VERSION_BUMP	672f9866