Stripe Earnings in GNOME Top Bar

Display today's Stripe gross volume in your Ubuntu/GNOME top bar using Argos.

Auto-refreshes every 5 minutes. Plays a coin sound on new sales. Click to see details or open Stripe Dashboard.

Requirements

• Ubuntu / GNOME Shell
• Argos extension
• Python 3.6+
• Stripe account with API access

No external Python packages needed - uses only the standard library.

Setup

1. Install libsecret-tools

Required for secure API key storage in GNOME Keyring:

sudo apt install libsecret-tools

2. Install Argos

Install from GNOME Extensions or via CLI:

gnome-extensions install argos@pew.worldwidemann.com

3. Create a Stripe Restricted Key

In Stripe Dashboard create a Restricted Key with minimal permissions:

Resource	Permission
Core > Balance	Read

Everything else can stay at None. This way the key can only read transaction amounts - nothing else.

4. Store the API key securely

The script reads the key from GNOME Keyring (encrypted, unlocked on login):

secret-tool store --label="Stripe API Key" service stripe type api-key

Paste your key (rk_live_...) and press Enter.

5. Install the script

git clone https://github.com/hexplor/stripe-earnings.git
ln -s "$(pwd)/stripe-earnings/stripe_gross.5m.py" ~/.config/argos/
chmod +x stripe-earnings/stripe_gross.5m.py

The 5m in the filename means "refresh every 5 minutes". Argos will pick it up automatically.

Changing the refresh interval

Rename the symlink in ~/.config/argos/:

Filename	Interval
stripe_gross.30s.py	30 seconds
stripe_gross.1m.py	1 minute
stripe_gross.5m.py	5 minutes
stripe_gross.10m.py	10 minutes

cd ~/.config/argos
mv stripe_gross.5m.py stripe_gross.1m.py   # switch to 1 minute

How it works

1. Reads the Stripe API key from GNOME Keyring via secret-tool
2. Fetches today's balance transactions (charge + payment types) from the Stripe API
3. Sums up gross volume, grouped by currency
4. Compares with the previous amount — if it increased, plays a coin clink sound via paplay
5. Outputs in Argos format for display in the top bar

Handles pagination automatically if you have more than 100 transactions per day. The coin sound is generated as a WAV file on first run (pure Python, no external assets) and cached in ~/.cache/stripe-earnings/.

Dropdown menu

Clicking the top bar item shows:

• Gross volume breakdown by currency
• Transaction date
• Link to Stripe Dashboard
• Manual refresh button

License

MIT