I don't know what changed their minds over at Kaliedoscope. It sounded like they wanted to make a OS X version but, then they decided not to. Maybe they couldn't wait for OS X to settle down code wise or maybe they thought they might get a lot of flack from Apple. Or maybe they had made their money and just wanted to get on with their lives. Damn shame though, I really liked Kaliedoscope.
Kaleidoscope couldn't be "ported" to OS X: it affects the system at such low levels it would basically need to be rewritten from scratch, and the classic Kaleidoscope took a lot of fiddling and reverse-engineering to get it as good as it is. Reading Greg Landweber's public comments in the wake of OS X's release, he didn't seem very enthusiastic about the prospect of going through it all again.
<strong>Reading Greg Landweber's public comments in the wake of OS X's release, he didn't seem very enthusiastic about the prospect of going through it all again.</strong><hr></blockquote>Saddest day of my life
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I can think of a few reasons, the biggest one for me are all the horizontal lines... they're everywhere! They're in my menubar, my window titles... they're even the background in the system prefs, in AIM, etceteras. They're giving me a headache, and make me feel like I'm using an interlaced display sometimes ;-)
Furthermore, I think some of the transparency effects need to be toned down. This should be a user controllable preference. I think the menus are too transparent at time, and it decreases readability.
I've used Duality, and it fixes the above problems to some extent.
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote>I wholeheartedly agree with M3D Jack. Basically, that Aqua looks sucks big and really needs to be toned down. Bleech.
Thanks for the pointer towards visual sanity, kelib.
[ edit: Forgot to say that Duality works very well, and even comes with some themes, one of which, Silverfox, is very cool, so one doesn't even have to look far to get rid of that ghastly Aqua scheme. It even almost makes the fuzzy Menu Bar font acceptable. Duality is also almost free, just send a few bucks if you feel it's worth something to you. It's worth $10 to me for sure. ]
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote> Now, why didn't I think of that
I was actually thinking just yesterday that with the wonders of Aqua it'd probably be a b!tch of an easy time to make an antialiased (mayeb even semitransparent) cursor. Maybe they stick with the old one for responsiveness (win 2000 handles a shaded cursor just fine O_o), but you have to agree it'd be hella-cool.
Comments
But you can check some sites for themes that work under X.
Like these:
<a href="http://xthemination.maccustomise.com/themes/" target="_blank">http://xthemination.maccustomise.com/themes/</a>
<a href="http://www.doghouseonline.com/" target="_blank">http://www.doghouseonline.com/</a>
<a href="http://www.desktopper.net/theme/" target="_blank">http://www.desktopper.net/theme/</a>
<a href="http://www.desktopper.net/izawa/" target="_blank">http://www.desktopper.net/izawa/</a>
<a href="http://homepage.mac.com/c__c/" target="_blank">http://homepage.mac.com/c__c/</a>
<a href="http://homepage.mac.com/groovyt" target="_blank">http://homepage.mac.com/groovyt</a>
Trust the Japanese . . .
The themes I have checked out so far somewhat make the look of X a bit more bearable. IMHumbleO.
Thanks again.
<strong>Reading Greg Landweber's public comments in the wake of OS X's release, he didn't seem very enthusiastic about the prospect of going through it all again.</strong><hr></blockquote>Saddest day of my life
Well, almost.
<strong>I use Duality too, right now I haven't seen that many themes for it, but it works well.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Any themes I've downloaded work wit it.
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I can think of a few reasons, the biggest one for me are all the horizontal lines... they're everywhere! They're in my menubar, my window titles... they're even the background in the system prefs, in AIM, etceteras. They're giving me a headache, and make me feel like I'm using an interlaced display sometimes ;-)
Furthermore, I think some of the transparency effects need to be toned down. This should be a user controllable preference. I think the menus are too transparent at time, and it decreases readability.
I've used Duality, and it fixes the above problems to some extent.
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote>I wholeheartedly agree with M3D Jack. Basically, that Aqua looks sucks big and really needs to be toned down. Bleech.
Thanks for the pointer towards visual sanity, kelib.
[ edit: Forgot to say that Duality works very well, and even comes with some themes, one of which, Silverfox, is very cool, so one doesn't even have to look far to get rid of that ghastly Aqua scheme. It even almost makes the fuzzy Menu Bar font acceptable. Duality is also almost free, just send a few bucks if you feel it's worth something to you. It's worth $10 to me for sure. ]
[ 03-12-2002: Message edited by: Member ]</p>
<strong>They're giving me a headache, and make me feel like I'm using an interlaced display sometimes ;-)</strong><hr></blockquote>
LOL
<strong>Why would you want to change Aqua? Just switch it to Graphite if you don't like it, it looks great.</strong><hr></blockquote> Now, why didn't I think of that
Oh, for the days of OS 9 customization . . . <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />