El Bruno

⚠️ This blog post was created with the help of AI tools. Yes, I used a bit of magic from language models to organize my thoughts and automate the boring parts, but the geeky fun and the 🤖 in C# are 100% mine.

Hi!

dotnet tool install --global ElBruno.AspireMonitor
aspiremon

What it is

AspireMonitor is a Windows tray app that puts your Aspire AppHost status one click away. No browser tabs. No switching context. Click the tray icon, see what’s running, Start/Stop your app, or pin the resources you actually care about in a compact mini window.

Why it exists

If you use Aspire, you know the dashboard is useful—but you don’t want a browser tab open all day. You’re writing code, not monitoring. AspireMonitor solves the friction: a lightweight tray icon that gives you “is my API up?” and “what URL does this service run on?” without leaving your IDE.

Why it’s useful

v1.4.0 ships with two killer features:

The mini window pins only the resources you care about (configure once: web, store, gateway) with their live URLs and Start/Stop buttons. The main window shows the full resource list when you need it.

Start now works correctly—it stays disabled with ⏳ Starting Aspire... (12 / 90s) so you know when resources are actually ready. Stop actually stops. URLs are real (http://localhost:5021), not generic “Open” links.

Get it

• NuGet: https://www.nuget.org/packages/ElBruno.AspireMonitor
• GitHub: https://github.com/elbruno/ElBruno.AspireMonitor
• MIT licensed. Issues and PRs welcome.

Built with .NET 10 + WPF. Shells out to aspire describe—no third-party SDK dependency.