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Today's News by Cletus™ Updated: 12-30-2000 The drawing for Interarchy has ended. I have drawn one lucky winner and will announce the name next Wednesday. The winner has been sent an e-mail from me. Thank you from all at ResExcellence. Have a nice Holiday!  There is nothing as arduous as opening individual screenshots I have downloaded one by one to view them. One product I am trying out currently is iView Mulitmedia. iView is a multifaceted cataloger of images. At this point I am probably under using it greatly. I have designed several catalogs to hold my various image folders in for easy viewing. If you tend to save screenshots as I do, or are simply being overrun with images, you may want to look at this piece of shareware.
The company also plans on announcing an even more dynamic product called iView mediaPro at Macworld in January. I definitely plan on stopping by their booth (# 3240) for a look! Erik J. Barzeski from AppleScript Central has added twelve new scripts to the archive. One is for Outlook Express, and the others are for Entourage. The Featured Script, Office for Office, is by Paul Berkowitz and “will allow you to make better use of Entourage and Word - and in future editions, Excel too.” MacInstruct has posted a new tutorial entitled: “How to Download MP3s.” Confused about the MP3 legal issues or even what an MP3 file is? Head over to MacInstruct and get the low down!
Preview 2.3 of iCab is now available for PPC, 68K and Mac OS X. It will expire in April 2001. This very popular web browser gets better and better with each release. Below is a small selection of changes with this version: - Using the InScript settings you can now select which JavaScript code iCab should execute. Additionally, there is a new filter option for JavaScript that will prevent JavaScript code from moving or resizing an existing window.
- New entries, separators and folders are now added after the selected entry in the hot list window.
- Added new entry; Prefetch in the File menu. If this is checked, iCab will load all the links of the currently displayed page in the background. iCab will start loading the links when the current page has finished loading.
- The Link Manager can also be called from the main View menu now.
- iCab now displays the ALT text of missing images in the status bar while the mouse is over the placeholder image.
- iCab now supports crash protection tools.
- In the plug-in settings you can now tell iCab how much RAM from the iCab heap should be reserved for Plug-ins.
Themes and Schemes: Kei has posted updated versions of Silencio con Konicons and Junio K-Schemes. The schemes will take advantage of the new transparent effects provided by Kaleidoscope 2.3 and Power Windows 2.4.3. These schemes are very well done. Michael Rabe is doing some “DogHouse” cleaning at his site, but still had some time to prepare the release of GlassWorks Blueberry v4.0 and Theme Viewer. Good job Michael! Submit Software News Suggestions!
Calendar & Appointment Scheduler for Mac OS X
X-Tips
Brian Ellis Sends this terminal command line tip:
Just found a nifty Mac OS X Dock hack I haven't seen anywhere at ResEx yet... it was buried deep in MacOSRumors, but amazingly it actually works. Typing...
defaults write com.apple.dock showforeground true
...will cause the active application to be highlighted in the Dock by a blue arrow instead of a black one. It's not exactly the coolest looking thing in the world (I personally would have sprung for a nice alpha-blended glow, but that's me) but it comes in REALLY handy, especially considering the fact that OS X has bugs where sometimes the front most window can be covered over by other windows but still be front most. :)
Remove individual items from the Finder's Contextual Menus by Derek Scott
I saw the recent hack "Shorten the Finder's Contextual Menus" and it made me wonder if you could get rid of individual menu items. I tinkered with the fmn2 resource in ResEdit and figured it out.
Like the "Shorten the Finder's Contextual Menus" edit, you start by opening IDs 14612 of the fmn2 resource. In this example, we will delete the Encrypt contextual menu option. (Continued...)
 Converting gif to png under LinuxPPC
This whole adventure started because KDE2 prefers its icons in the png format over gif and xpm. Some of my favorite icons are made by Hide Itoh, who is kind enough to release most of his sets as tar gif packs.
A command line program that can quickly perform the conversion is cleverly called gif2png. Download the source code and built the application. (Continued...)
User Contributed Splash Screens:
- Kevin Fyure put together a stylish black and white MacOS X Login panel of a patchworked city skyline.
- She's baaaack! Jessica Alba is featured in this MOSS from David Messick.
- This would drive me crazy on my desktop! Patrick Stuard created a cool Interarchy Interface with dozen desktop icons. If you are easily distracted like me, there's a simple version included. ;)
- A new Office 2001 splash set was contributed by Keith Mason. All the screens feature the Graphite iMac.
- Snow is the color of the latest Netscape 6 splash by Anthony Wu
Snapshots by Jeremy Hoesly My Snapshot Picks for the month of November are finally out. Stop on by and take a look.
Need intravenous feedings of snapshots to get you through the weekend? Have no fear. Twenty milligrams of Friday’s dose ought to meet the need: - This snapshot from The Janitor touts EndEffect’s “Inspirational” desktop picture. Audion, outfitted with Jake Rodkin’s Cutting Edge face, is dishing out tunes in the lower left-hand corner. Icons from Perfect Yosemite’s High-Level Abstraction iPack as well as selections from power/Mac are also showcased.
- Britney Spears is the star of this snapshot from Paul Mobilio with a Desktop Girls desktop picture and Akio’s Big RED K-Scheme. Audion, equipped with Akio’s SlickCorner Graphite face, is serving up music in the lower left-hand corner. Icons are provided by icons.cx, MacAkio, and Perfect Yosemite.
- The “Gundam DeathScythe SD” desktop picture and the LCD Theme debut in this submission from Richard Rice. Cool!
- Joseph Simenstad has seen plenty of OS X screenshots but none that really display the power lurking under the hood. This screenshot shows 30 — count them, 30 — QuickTime movies playing at once along with a taskbar full of running native and Classic applications. One of those is Audion overhauled with a custom face which is supplying the music in the upper right-hand corner.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Icon/Desktop News 12-29-00 Icon & Desktop News by Dan  Racing headlong into a new year, wow, time is really flying! Many of you are on vacation now, and I might suggest you take some time and cruise through all the ResExcellence Icon and Desktop Archives. The year 2000 was a banner year there and you'll find tons of great things to dress up your Mac for the new year.
Icons - Desktops - Postcards: For today's update we have the good fortune to have 2 Excellent Icon Sets, both submitted to the Iconfactory's Pixelpooloza contest, and 6 new desktops. Enjoy! Your editor is STILL looking for some reader feedback on whether or not you would like to see the ResExcellence Postcard section expand to become a year round feature? So far I have only received one reply on this. If so, it would include all holidays, birthdays, thank you cards and such. Drop me a line and let me know what you think.
- Dylan Daniélou of Switzerland sends us his work entitled Another Aqua Desktop , in 800x600 resolution.
- We've got two new desktops from Matt Hunt, Grandma's Cloth, and Blue Brain. Both come in the extra large size of 1280x1024 resolution.
- This handsome but orphaned desktop showed up in our FTP dropbox the other day, with no creator's name or title. I've taken pity on this one and named it Cicero's Apple. Comes in 1280x1024 resolution. *UPDATE: turns out that this one is actually an altered version of one of Akio's excellent desktops. He has been so kind as to let it be, but make sure to visit his site to view the originals and more.
- Daniel Fernandez submits a stylish 3 picture set of backdrops for your approval. The one I've selected one for today is titled 003GIRL. Comes in 1024x768 resolution
- 'MacEdge Graphics submits Red-hot Chili Peppers, a rock and rollin desktop with a right handed dock. Comes in 1024x resolution.
- On display as promised are Catharine Welsh's Mac Centric Icons. She describes this 19 piece set as just a little bit of whimsical indulgence of her passion for Macs.
- 'Pixel Monkey Studios (opening Jan.1) presents Wacker Doodles Icons. This Pixelpooloza entry by Von R. Glitschka features 34 wonderful and wacky icons, a carnival for the eyes!
News From Around the Web:
Mike Davidson's Mac File Library has been updated. Included in this update are numerous fractal images, Escher images, and a bunch of other cool transparent desktops to grace your desktop. Check it out at http://homepage.mac.com/mikedavidsonsfiles Live Pencil updates with 3Wallpapers: (Noah in Winter, Movies and Crystal ball) and 4 Animation's ( from the Advent Calendar ) in different sizes.
Trixicons updates with four new sets of paper doll icons. The IconFactory now has 16 entries to their Pixelpolooza contest. While not all of them are on display, check out the most recent submissions. If you are a Kineticon user, visit the website and grab the most recent "Kines". We also feature the Kineticon software and more "Kines" in our ResExcellence Software section for downloading. The Scott Gray Memorial Desktop Contest Rules have been posted at Appleholics-Anonymous. Visit the site for more details on how to enter your work.
Visit Alley's Wonderland and download the last icon set made for 2000 "King Froggy." So what's up WWW? Icons? Desktop pictures? News? Inform us! We'll post it!
Visit the Mac Experts!
12/28/00 Snapshots by Jeremy Hoesly Satisfy that snapshot craving with Tuesday’s offering: - Akio’s “Abbey Dive” desktop picture and Peter Harte’s Aqua III K-Scheme debut in this submission from Caveman. SoundJam, retro-fitted with Akio’s SlickCorner skin, is dishing out tunes in the lower left-hand corner, while Audion, equipped with Akio’s Sharpe Tang face, is sitting in as digital DJ in the lower right-hand corner. Icons from Top Icons, icons.cx, and Icon Factory abound.
- This contribution from Jeremy Kemp features Akio’s “The Matrix” desktop picture with MacSurfshop’s MadMac K-Scheme. SoundJam, outfitted with the Elmo skin, is serving up the music in the upper left-hand corner.
- This screenshot from Peter McHugh sports a custom desktop picture in conjunction with Joshua Belland’s Inverse Blue K-Scheme. Interesting.
- Melissa from MAJArch Studios contributed this snapshot touting the custom “White Christmas” desktop picture and Flash’s Christmas the Next Generation K-Scheme. Audion, overhauled with Ady Pratioto’s Besherung face, is strung near the bottom. Icons by Andrea Longhurst along with others from Saho’s IconRoom are also displayed.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on! Applescripts 12-28-00 Applescript/Scripting by Michael Jeremy Hoesly, the ResExcellence Snapshot editor, uses this folder action script to determine a file's type and then renames the file with the last word of the enclosing folder and a suffix unique to that file type. The script is activated when items are added to a folder. This allows him to more efficiently manage the dozens of submissions he receives each week.
Visit the Mac Experts!
Today's News by Cletus™ Whoosh! We are back, and I hope everyone had a very nice holiday. Two big announcements before we get started with the update. First, I have posted the winners of the PCalc Contest. Congratulations to the winners and a big thank you from James Thomson and ResExcellence to all who entered.  Let's have another giveaway. Andrew Tomazos has offered to giveaway one copy of Interarchy to a lucky ResExcellence reader. I think Michael Coyle pretty much sums up our feeling of Interarchy when he writes:
"Interarchy is (IMHO) the best ftp client for the MacOS. At ResExcellence, we handle dozens of large files everyday to and from the server. Interarchy quickly opens and closes every connection and never keeps us waiting." Remember to stop by the Interarchy Interface page to pick up some really well done interfaces for customising Interarchy. A-Dock received an update fixing several problems with Mac OS versions 8.5 and 8.6. The current version of this dock type launcher stands at 2.2.1. The relaxation software Forest, has undergone an update to version 1.5 for the Classic Mac OS and version 1.1 for Mac OS X. Both versions received the following updates: - Forest can now read sound files (any QuickTime supported format) and loop them forever!
- Improved bass & treble support. This works with both Forest worlds and sound files.
- Different sound format to improve sound quality for little speakers (such as internal Macintosh speakers).
- You can now use Forest 25 times in the demo version!
- Fixed a bug that caused iMacs to crash when SRS was enabled.
- The crash that caused Forest to sometimes bomb when you quit, is now fixed.
- The Forest engine was rewritten for better cache handling and full QuickTime support.
Mac Unicorn Software has also released a bundle for Forest users containing 9 new worlds. They can get it for $12.95. Unregistered users can get the bundle plus Forest (total: 14 worlds) for $19.95!" Sound Warehouse by Takashi Suzuki underwent an update to version 1.0.3. Sound Warehouse is an application for the Macintosh, that allows you to play and manage sound files in many formats. This version provides the following fixes: for AIFF files with non-compressed data the player window shows realtime waveforms and the database window sample sizes are now correct for AIFF files greater that 16-bit. Themes and Schemes: Maury McCown from RAILhead Design use to be fairly prolific when it came to Kaleidoscope Scheming. It is not unusual to find one of his creations gracing my machine either. Recently, he has been rather quiet except for the occasional update to his Aqua Scheme. Could things be changing? Doghouse Online has been anything but quiet over the holiday. Look for GlassWorks v4.0 to be available today and an announcemnet for Theme Viewer and Theme Checker. Submit Software News Suggestions!
Click here to learn more about Toast 6 Titanium
Polling Place
 Almost 70% of ResEx readers have a CD Burner. After Santa's arrival at his house, you can add Cletus to that majority. It appears Apple's marking has missed the boat by not having burners in every Mac. Hopefully we'll discover how they plan to remedy this at the Macworld Expo.
So what do you do with your CD Burners? Make a selection in this week's Polling Place.
Tools of the Trade
You may have noticed the new navigation bar at the top of the page. It's a direct result of reader feedback during the recent reader survey. Several new items have also been added in preparation for MacOS X. Login Panels and Boot Panels now have their own sections. There is also a section for Darwin, but there isn't much there yet.
KDE2. Click to view.
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I used some of my free time this long weekend to update the Linux partitions on my Powerbook. The most dramatic addition was KDE2. I've included a snapshot to show some of its snazzy features. In the directory listings, text and image previews are created on the fly. This is something that would make a great feature addition to MacOS X.
Animation feedback is everywhere. Click on a URL or icon and ripples travel through the object. The behavior of the file manager is greatly improved too. No longer do you have to refresh the directory listing after every change. It all happens dynamically.
The latest binaries (compiled by Ian Geiseri) can be downloaded here. Take your time, solving dependency problems as they arise. Start with QT, then kdelibs, support, and base. I found I also needed to add the PATH to KDE and QT in /etc/profile. Search the LinuxPPC Lists for help.
X-Tips
Many readers recently sent this, but Charles Saeger was the first:
I'm a little surprised no one has bothered to mention this, but one CAN view package contents in the OS X Finder. Control-click on an application to see a contextual menu ... one of the options is Show Package Contents. It does exactly what one would expect.
User Contributed Splash Screens:
- Nicolas Cardot created a great looking MOSS called faBLUE.
- A nice 3D AIM splash was sent by Dan Semaya.
- Do you speak Klingonese? If so, then Frank created a Photoshop splash that you can relate to!
- A fully coordinated set of splashes was sent by Dhruv Kalra. The set contains one for Explorer, and a full kit for Office 2001.
- Sage is the color of the latest Netscape 6 splash by Anthony Wu
Snapshots by Jeremy Hoesly It’s time to get back to work. Here’s Wednesday’s snapshots: - Exit Music’s “Earth” desktop picture debuts in this contribution from Matthew Aaron. Audion, equipped with the Hurricane face, is dishing out tunes at top. Icon Factory’s Space Icons are in orbit.
- Windows transformer Roberlan Borges is back with another submission, this time featuring a custom desktop picture and Masatoshi Ueji’s Drawing Board WindowBlinds skin. CoolPlayer is tickling the eardrums along the bottom, and icons from Etherbrian, Mozco Garash, and Icon Factory are scattered throughout.
- This classy OS X Beta snapshot from Fearandil sports Akio’s Graphite Theme. The Cocoa browser OmniWeb is surfing on the left and the gorgeous HappyDrives icons from HappiCon are shown off on the right.
- Zhi Hao submitted this holiday snapshot with “R’s December Calendar Girl” desktop picture and Albie Wong’s Pussy Galore K-Scheme. Audion, retooled with Chaos Design’s G3 Strawberry face, is kicking out soundwaves in the lower right-hand corner. Icon Factory’s Kidcon Holidays and SketchCons Christmas icons line the right edge.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Icon/Desktop News 12-27-00 Icon & Desktop News by Dan  Hoping everyone had a great holiday, and that Santa gave your heart's desire.
Icons - Desktops - Postcards: Thanks to all of you who used the ResExcellence Postcard section and sent in cards. Now that Christmas is over, your editor is looking for some reader feedback on whether or not you would like to see the ResExcellence Postcard section expand to become a year round feature? If so, it would include all holidays, birthdays, thank you cards and such. Drop me a line and let me know what you think. On the other hand, we have 6 new desktop pictures on display for today's update. Enjoy! - Soren Laulainen sends us his Aqua Flame backdrop to fire up your desktop. Comes in 1024x resolution.
- Christopher Harvey took the cover of Detective Comics #753 and reworked into a Desktop Picture. Comes in 1280x resolution. Visit his website where he has some nifty startup screens posted as well.
- SoulRocka "Nasty Nene" returns once again with his Apple/Dedication in 1024x resolution. This piece is dedicated to The Rock Steady Crew - Original Bronx B.Boyz.
- While Robert Evans doesn't claim to be a professional photographer, this set of beautiful photos are well worth displaying on your desktop. Both were taken near his home of Gorham Illinois, showing various parts of the Shawnee National Forest. In 1280x resolutions.
- 'MacEdge Graphics submits Casta Dock, a provocative and sexy desktop with a right handed dock. Comes in 1024x resolution.
News From Around the Web:
Our long lost mystery man "Frank" writes to let us know he has finally reopened Frank's Corner. Flax Creations updates over the holidays with 5 new desktops. So what's up WWW? Icons? Desktop pictures? News? Inform us! We'll post it!
Visit the Mac Experts!
12/25/00
ResExcellence is read each month in over 90 countries. I'd like to believe that on this day, all these corners of the World are a little more peaceful. From the Staff of ResExcellence and our families to you and yours, Happy Holidays!
Today's News by Cletus™ The Pcalc contest has come to an end. I have forwarded the last winner to James Thomson. On Wednesday I will list all three winners. On an aside, James Thomson has also updated PCalc because of a reported bug found in version 2.2 that could cause a freeze. You can get the download from here. Is it the cold weather? Perhaps it is the holidays? Maybe it is the MacWorld Expo in January! In any case it is very slow in the GUI software arena. Do you use Kaleidoscope or do you prefer the plain old Platinum theme that came with the operating system? This ResExcellence forum thread seems to have this very debate going on currently. Years ago I purchased OneClick and always loved it. When the update for Mac OS 9.0 was delayed I stopped using it. It has undergone a lot of revisions since then and MacWorld has a review on version 2.0 you may wish to check out if you have never heard of this excellent launcher/macro utility. McAfee has posted their Virex virus definitions for January already. If you use this virus protection system, be sure to get the update. Themes and Schemes: Michael Rabe notified me and so I relay the message to you all that DoghouseOnline is now an official dot com! You can check out the new home here!  But there is still more from DogHouse. Michael is working on a new project. It is still very much in its infancy. In fact it is a beta release, but he wanted to get some input from readers about it. Appearance Strip is a Control Strip Module that will let you choose themes from your ControlStrip. At this point it will simple open the Appearance Control Panel. Have to start somewhere! Give it a try and let him know what you think.
Wait! Not done yet. They are also releasing the Pastel Red theme. Additionally, new DogHouse member Adam Betts is releasing 3 theme previews. They are: Artificial World, Fancy Angel and iSmooth. Desktopper again posts some more schemes for your Kaleidoscoping endeavors. Emboss Platinum 2.5.3 and IZAPPY-D1.1 have both received updates. Go get them now! Themes.org continues posting some really nice screenshots and themes. Take some time over the weekend to look around at the new and old the site has to offer. Submit Software News Suggestions!
Complete Cable Management For The Home & Office.
Tools of the Trade
 One of the big obstacles to installing LinuxPPC has been repartitioning the hard drive. If you have been interested in experimenting with an XWindows system, you're in luck if you have the MacOS X Beta installed on your Mac. If you don't, you can instead use the open sourced Darwin 1.2 with the following instructions.
The recently released XFree 4.02 officially supports Darwin and the MacOS X Beta. After downloading the 61 meg distribution, run a simple Xinstall.sh terminal command, and a very sophisticated shell script installs and configures the Xserver package.
Because the MacOS X Aqua interface is also a 'windowing' system, you will have to exit it and log back in on the text console. It's easy. At the MultiUser Login Panel, type >console and the root password. You'll be dropped into the text console.
Follow the instructions at this site to set up some PATH variables. Then type startx to see the crappy twm window manager. Yuck!
The Ice Window Manager and AfterStep are also available for Darwin. I just downloaded AS and haven't installed it yet, but Ice installed easily and configures just like its Linux counterpart.
I have found Darwinfo.org to be the definitive site for info on X and Darwin. While there are not a lot of applications ported yet, the ability to install an X system without partitioning you hard disk for Linux makes it much easier to experiment and get your feet wet in this unix-type OS.
Because this Xserver runs under Darwin, it's easy to access all your Mac partitions (HFS and HFS+). If you have ethernet internet connection configured under MacOS X, the settings are use by XFree/Darwin. If someone gets around to porting Mac-on-Linux to Darwin, the MacOS X/Darwin platform will become a very interesting place to be! Without a restart, you could switch between Aqua and XFree, and have Classic MacOS emulation under both!
So if you find yourself with a few hours this holiday weekend and already have MacOS X Beta installed, give XFree 4 a try. It's very easy to install and will keep those brain cells active after that big holiday dinner!
Iconographer 2.0.1 has been released! This is my favorite standalone icon editor. It provides great tools for the MacOS X 128x128 format.
Changes in Version 2.0.1
- "Open Recent" command for access to the five last used files
- Proxy icon support under Mac OS 8.5 and above
- Inclusion of Photoshop Actions to ease use as an external editor
- Fixed bugs in "Icon Info" window
- Works again under Mac OS 8.1 and older
- Many other bug fixes and usability tweaks.
ExitMusic has updated with 6 new desktops, a few throbbers, and some icon sets. Merry Christmas.
User Contributed Splash Screens:
Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Merry Christmas and God’s blessings to all as you celebrate this joyous season!
Another boatload of Christmas snapshots has arrived in time for Friday: - Agrapha Design’s “Merry X-Mas” desktop picture bids a merry Mac Christmas with the Pastel Blue Theme backing it up in this submission from Jade Barton. Icons from Icon Factory, icons.cx, Xicons, and Perfect Yosemite are scattered throughout.
- What looks like OS X is actually Windows 2000 in this snapshot from Mike Morkes! The “Oni Xmas” desktop picture provides the Christmas cheer, while DesktopX emulates our beloved OS-in-waiting.
- Polerix sent in this contribution featuring a Cognitive Distortion desktop picture. Audion 2, outfitted with the BiPolar face, is cleverly placed in the snowman’s arms.
- This holiday screenshot from Trevor Pressman sports a custom blend between Visual Paradox’s “Snowman” and Digital Blasphemy’s “Santa and Reindeer.” Very well done.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Icon/Desktop News 12-22-00 Icon & Desktop News by Dan  My greatest wish this time of year above all else is for all of you to have a most happy, safe, peaceful and loved filled holiday. Please don't forget to use the ResExcellence Postcard section for those last minute greetings, lots of nice cards to choose from.
Icons - Desktops - Postcards: Your editor has decided to give you an extra dose of goodies for the holiday, since we will not be having our usual scheduled update on Monday. Ten new desktop pictures, and one set of icons submitted to "Pixelpoolosa" will hold you over till Wednesday the 27th. Enjoy! - Steve Sobek submits his own version of Water World. This desktop comes in 1024x resolution, and gives you an excellent idea of just what a person can do with the new Photoshop "Flood" filter by Flaming Pear.
- Our Snapshot editor, the one and only Jeremy Hoesly, a.k.a "Taz" has been so kind as to share a number of his beautiful photographic desktops with us. The third picture in this installment is titled "Depths of the Forest" in 1024x resolution. This photo was taken at an aquatic museum in Norfolk, VA during the summer of 2000. A gorgeous walkway several miles long cut through forest and marshland habitats.
- As promised, one more excellent backdrop from Toma Marcello. For today, I've chosen the elegant Red Ivy, which comes in 1152x resolution.
- Gigi hopes you get "spaced out" with this two picture set of Fractals. "Fractal Fly" and "Vortex 1" come in 1024x resolution, and are downloaded as a pair.
- My all time favorite set of Photoshop filters are Kai's Powertools. You often can come up with some very cool effects with these filters as I have with "Inner". Comes in 1024x resolution. Visit Flax Creations for more desktop artwork to beautify your Mac.
- One more 3-D flavor to complete the set from Jason Maki's "Birth" series. Tangerines Birth comes in two resolutions. The other's in this set are to be found in our Stylish Desktops section. Visit his website for more spectacular 3-D work.
- No matter how you look at it, Kevin Faulhaber thinks OSX is a Perfect 10. This sexy set of desktops comes in 3 large sized resolutions.
- Jason Wohlstadter of EpochIcons kindly lets us preview his latest creation, Ensigma Icons. These icons have also been entered into the Iconfactory's Pixelpoolosa contest, and can either be downloaded from there for a limited time, or direct from Jason's site.
- We have two very beautiful Christmas desktops from Melissa of Marjach Studios. Adorn your desktop with Annunciation, or Raphael for the holidays.
News From Around the Web:
Mando Gomez of mandolux.com wants us to know that he's back on his crusade to post mega amounts of new desktop pics on his site while he has a break school. Wanting your very own mini Christmas tree on your desktop? Visit "Your Head" and download the very cute Christi's Tree. This tiny digital tree can be decorated in your favorite lights and colors. So what's up WWW? Icons? Desktop pictures? News? Inform us! We'll post it!
Need more workspace? Get Virtual Desktop!
12/21/00 Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Have a Christmas snapshot waiting in the wings? Send it on over!
We’re having a Christmas rollout for Thursday’s snapshots: - Taz like Christmas snapshots. Caveman submitted this cool contribution touting the custom “TazXmas” desktop picture coupled with Peter Harte’s Aqua III K-Scheme. SoundJam, overhauled with Akio’s Tight skin, is spinning out tunes in the lower left. Various icons from Top Icons, Perfect Yosemite, Xicons, icons.cx, Icon Factory, and MacAkio also make their debut.
- Matt Grans brings Christmas cheer with this screenshot bearing a Wallpaper.com desktop picture combined with Janet Parris’ Let It Snow! K-Scheme. Holiday Lights strings lights around the edges. At least you don’t have to untangle these!
- This holiday snapshot from Mick Szirmay sports an ArqAngel desktop picture along with the Hi-Tech Theme. Audion, retro-fitted with Scott Raleigh’s Wetware face, is setting the tone along the left edge.
- Digital Blasphemy’s “Yuletide” desktop picture and Maury McCown’s Aqua X II K-Scheme debut in this submission from Paul Thiem. SoundJam, equipped with the Aqua X II skin, is playing “Nutcracker” to set the Christmas mood. Icon Factory’s Christmas Glassies and RAILhead Design’s Generic Aqua icons deck the desktop.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Visit the Mac Experts!
12/21/00 Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Have a Christmas snapshot waiting in the wings? Send it on over!
We’re having a Christmas rollout for Thursday’s snapshots: - Taz like Christmas snapshots. Caveman submitted this cool contribution touting the custom “TazXmas” desktop picture coupled with Peter Harte’s Aqua III K-Scheme. SoundJam, overhauled with Akio’s Tight skin, is spinning out tunes in the lower left. Various icons from Top Icons, Perfect Yosemite, Xicons, icons.cx, Icon Factory, and MacAkio also make their debut.
- Matt Grans brings Christmas cheer with this screenshot bearing a Wallpaper.com desktop picture combined with Janet Parris’ Let It Snow! K-Scheme. Holiday Lights strings lights around the edges. At least you don’t have to untangle these!
- This holiday snapshot from Mick Szirmay sports an ArqAngel desktop picture along with the Hi-Tech Theme. Audion, retro-fitted with Scott Raleigh’s Wetware face, is setting the tone along the left edge.
- Digital Blasphemy’s “Yuletide” desktop picture and Maury McCown’s Aqua X II K-Scheme debut in this submission from Paul Thiem. SoundJam, equipped with the Aqua X II skin, is playing “Nutcracker” to set the Christmas mood. Icon Factory’s Christmas Glassies and RAILhead Design’s Generic Aqua icons deck the desktop.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Today's News by Cletus™ Another day, another chance to win! I have uploaded the new question for another chance to win a free registration for PCalc. I have also randomly selected a name for Monday's winner and sent it along to James Thomson. He will be contacting you shortly. I will wait to announce the winners at ResExcellence until next Monday. According to the number of entrants, all of you really get into to these contests. Cool! Mac Unicorn Software have released v1.1 of Press Volume. Details are listed below.  Added new sound shortcut keys: to increase the sound (press Apple- +), to decrease the sound (press Apple- -) and to mute (press Apple- *)
- Added a sound status window with graphic volume display, increase & decrease button (press Apple-Control to display it).
- Changed the sound shortcut keys for a more efficient volume changing (from Control key to Apple key).
- Added new feature in the Preferences window: you can now disable depth-switching to avoid manipulation errors.
- A few bug fixes and a few internal changes.
REAL Software announces the availability of REALbasic 3.0a15. The list of changes is enormous and can be found here.  OnceDaily v1.3 by Kanzu Software is a free applet that has just been updated. In particular, Once Daily Startup runs startup items only the first time you turn on your Mac each day. It will not run every time you startup or restart. Uses for Once Daily Startup includes checking email, backing up, and other tasks that may be required only once a day.
Element K Journals is running a new tutorial on "Creating a rice paper texture" in Adobe Illustrator. "Vector illustrations are quite frequently flat and lacking in texture. This is because it's difficult to create vector textures in Illustrator. However, Illustrator does have one filter to help you create effects that will add a degree of texture to your graphics..." Read more. MacHome has posted a new selection of "Tips" for December/January. They are: Flag Important Messages with Outlook Express, Using Explorer’s Page Holder and Banish the Desktop. Previous months are also listed on the page. Themes and Schemes: Desktopper has posted a ton of favorite K-Schemes. I imagine they all now take advantage of the transparent menus provided by the new Kaleidoscope and Power Windows Greg Landweber has provided all of us. Updated are: Klassik, Sigh, IZA SA Spirit 1.1, IZA Shock Absorber 1.1, Hi-Tecue Transparent menu 1.9 and Hi-Teque 1.9. DogHouse Online has a couple of nice announcements. First they will release a new theme called Pastel Orange today. This is the fourth of the Pastel Collection. Michael Rabe also would like to announce the arrival of Adam Betts to the fold. Adam will also be making themes for Doghouse. Nice! Submit Software News Suggestions!
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Tools of the Trade
One of our biggest sponsors, SmallDog Electronics, is servicing the Mac community in a new way. If you have a technical question, an inquiry about a product, or maybe you just want to sat "Hi", you can now do it with an Instant Messenger. Launch AIM or Yahoo Pager and add smalldoghelp to your buddy list for instant support. Personally, I prefer to call on the phone because you can sometimes hear the dogs barking in the background. (True, employees are encouraged to bring their dogs to work everyday.)
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Antonio Flores Aldama has been whipping up little applications again! This time he sent me a little utility called SendMyIP. Launching it brings up a little window with the current IP address of the machine. This would solve a problem I have been anticipating. I would like to install VNC on a friend's computer to aid in trouble shooting, but the computer is on a dialup connection and the IP is constantly changing. How do I quickly find the IP address from my not-so-savvy buddy? SendMyIP would do the trick. It's much easier than talking someone through the TCP/IP or Remote Access control panel.
Antonio also updated his whimsical desktop utility, Dogberto.
Space Imaging is a site that sells high quality satellite images for the US Government. As an aside, they also post a cool image each week on their site for you to use as a desktop picture The images are cool jpegs in three resolutions.
Chris Johnson offers this solution to the AIM Ad Patcher problem:
The patch which removes ads in AIM linked to on your site will not allow itself to work with version of AIM higher than 4.1, but it technically works with the newest version of AIM (4.2.1193). You mention that one can extract resources from the patch, but there is a much easier way of getting the patch to work with 4.2.xxxx.
BEFORE patching, open the AIM application in ResEdit, open the VERS resource, and edit the first resource ID (ID=1). At the top, there are 3 text boxes, with the numbers "4", "2", "0" in that order. Change the middle box from "2" to "1", save and quit, and run the patch, which will now work successfully.
User Contributed Splash Screens:
- The 95% of ResEx readers who are male will appreciate this Jessica Alba MOSS from SuperBeef.
- Niko Nyman created a new Interarchy Interface. This one is also in the style of Aqua, but it sets out to be a simpler interface.
- Another splash for Netscape 6 users from Anthony Wu. Try this Indigo image on for size.
- A very pretty Photoshop splash was submitted by Toma Marcello.
- The original was submitted several months ago, and now Seb Carley has updated his great looking Aqua styled MOSS.
Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Christmas is only a few days away; so get your holiday snapshots in. Don’t delay!
Wednesday’s batch of snapshots are coming at ’ya: - This snapshot from William Bart touts a complete Kaleidoscope/interface makeover he calls “BBX Platinum.” Over 200 hours of work is provided from dropdown menus to replacement icons in a makeover kit which will be available at Kaleidoscope.net. Also displayed but not included with the kit is a developmental SoundJam skin featured in the lower right-hand corner.
- Tim Meehan submitted this screenshot sporting Anime Wallpapers’ “Dragonball GT” desktop picture combined with Toren Valimir’s I/OS X Graphite K-Scheme. Audion, overhauled with Jeremy Bailey’s Widget face, is taking music requests in the upper left.
- Christmas greetings are sent in this screenshot from Scott Piekarczyk featuring a desktop picture from Northern Images combined with the MXmas99 K-Scheme. Holiday Lights from Tiger Technologies lines the edges, and Icon Factory’s SketchCons Christmas icons are nestled along the right edge. Audion, retro-fitted with the MacPlus face, is kicking out Christmas cheer in the lower right-hand corner.
- Customize.org’s “Death Star” desktop picture and Akio’s Graphite Theme are showcased in this OS X Beta contribution from Thomas. Icons from Xicons and Perfect Yosemite are also featured.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Icon/Desktop News 12-20-00 Icon & Desktop News by Dan  I hope you're not getting to sick of me hawking the new ResExcellence Postcard section, which now has four pages full of beautiful and tastefully done Holiday Greetings. Send them to your customers, family, friends and loved ones. It won't take as long as sending a paper card, costs nothing, and will brighten someone's day considerably!
Icons - Desktops - Postcards: Six new desktop pictures, and one extra fine icon set on display for our Wednesday update. Enjoy! - Alessio Corradini of Visual Design pushes the design envelope with his Macromedia 2001 icons. This set includes thirteen icons created for use with Macromedia products such as Dreamweaver.
- Our Snapshot editor, the one and only Jeremy Hoesly has been so kind as to share several of his beautiful photographic desktops with us. The second picture in this installment is a "Wreath" in 1024x resolution. This photo was also shot while on a visit to Husdon Wisconsin for Thanksgiving this year. Visit Hoeslyvista for more great photography as well.
- Toma Marcello sends us a couple more of his excellent backdrops. For today, I've chosen "Inusual", which comes in 1152x resolution. Look for more of Toma's work on Friday.
- SoulRocka "Nasty Nene" is back with his Rock It desktop. Download this beauty in 1024x resolution.
- "Black Swirl" by Jeff Hoogmoed, is an elegant Mac backdrop in 1152x resolution.
- Take a look at Jason Maki's Aquas Birth and Rubys Birth , two desktops from his new "Aqua Birth" series. Visit his website for more spectacular 3-D work.
News From Around the Web:
Very quiet on the news front today. My guess is that everyone is out shopping? Consider this spot your community link to a multitude of Mac users around the globe. I promise you, whatever you send in will get noticed! So what's up WWW? Icons? Desktop pictures? News? Inform us! We'll post it!
Calendar & Appointment Scheduler for Mac OS X
12/19/00 Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Have a Christmas snapshot waiting in the wings? Send it on over!
Here’s Tuesday’s installment of snapshots: - This festive screenshot from our chief Windows transformer Roberlan Borges touts the custom “Viva La Manzana” desktop picture. WinMac provides the platinum appearance. Icons from Etherbrian, Mozco Garash, and Icon Factory are also on display.
- Cletus, our very own Software Archive editor, submitted this snapshot sporting a desktop picture named “The Matrix.” Very cool!
- This snapshot from faithful contributor Peter McHugh displays what I assume to be a desktop picture from his Deepest collection in combination with RAILhead Design’s MacQNX K-Scheme. Various custom icons are also scattered about.
- A custom desktop picture and Arlo Rose’s Onyx K-Scheme debut in this contribution from Ken Schneidman. Audion, equipped with Brian Coates’ Speakers face, is kicking out soundwaves in the lower right.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on! Applescripts 12-18-00 Applescript/Scripting by Michael Do you use the Location Manager to switch your Powerbook settings between work and home? Adam Hinshaw wrote this little script to simplify the change between two Location Manager sets. It requires the Akua Sweets Scripting Addition for handling dialog boxes (not necessary but makes it a bit more hands free).
12/19/00 Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Have a Christmas snapshot waiting in the wings? Send it on over!
Here’s Tuesday’s installment of snapshots: - This festive screenshot from our chief Windows transformer Roberlan Borges touts the custom “Viva La Manzana” desktop picture. WinMac provides the platinum appearance. Icons from Etherbrian, Mozco Garash, and Icon Factory are also on display.
- Cletus, our very own Software Archive editor, submitted this snapshot sporting a desktop picture named “The Matrix.” Very cool!
- This snapshot from faithful contributor Peter McHugh displays what I assume to be a desktop picture from his Deepest collection in combination with RAILhead Design’s MacQNX K-Scheme. Various custom icons are also scattered about.
- A custom desktop picture and Arlo Rose’s Onyx K-Scheme debut in this contribution from Ken Schneidman. Audion, equipped with Brian Coates’ Speakers face, is kicking out soundwaves in the lower right.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on! Applescripts 12-18-00 Applescript/Scripting by Michael Do you use the Location Manager to switch your Powerbook settings between work and home? Adam Hinshaw wrote this little script to simplify the change between two Location Manager sets. It requires the Akua Sweets Scripting Addition for handling dialog boxes (not necessary but makes it a bit more hands free).
Today's News by Cletus™ Lots of K-Scheme activity! Everyone is probably awaiting the announcement of the winners in the A-Dock giveaway. Jerome Foucher has indeed sent in the list of winners. He had to choose from close to 1000 entries. The complete listing of winners can be found here.  Is everyone be up for another freebie? James Thomson wants to giveaway 3 copies of PCalc 2.2. This scientific calculator application for both Classic and MacOS X could be yours by answering a question about the software. There will be a different question on Wednesday and Friday giving you three opportunities to win.
Forest has ungone some more revisions. Mac Unicorn Software now brings you version 1.4.2 under the Classic environment and version 1.0.2 for Mac OS X. - Forest now supports stereo.
- The few Relax environments-related bugs have been fixed.
- An improved interface when viewed with the Chicago font.
John Monemi further writes; Now that we fixed almost every bug, we are preparing Forest 2.0. We'd like to ask our users their opinion. Here are our suggestions: - Forest could also support MIDI files, allowing people to build custom musical Worlds. Is it a good idea? Will this bloat Forest?
- Playlist support. Forest could play for 15 minutes a world, then it could switch to another world so that it wouldn't annoy the end-user.
Stefano Ghielmi & Matthew Hershberger have released version 2.0 of SpeedApp. No details of the changes were given in the press release. Themes and Schemes: Akio has finished his K-Schemes for Kaleidoscope 2.3. He writes: Now I have translucent menus (with the help of PowerWindows of course), and the selected item will be solid. You can see it even over a bunch of text and stuff, and there is also a nice drop shadow. The Schemes also come with some bonus Icons, in both IconDropper and MacOS format! The Kaleidoscope Schemes page has posted 8 new and 14 updated K-Schemes. Violet by Francois Bordenave-Gabriel, Seabreeze by Martha Royer and APB Metallic Colors by Patricia Baron look like interesting schemes this time around. Peter Harte will never release his Aqua II K-Scheme at Apple request. However, if you wish to see what it looks like, especially with the new Kaleidoscope running and transparent menus in action, stop by his site here. Desktopper dot net is listing some new and updated schemes as well. Despair and IZAPPY-X 1.1 have both been updated. Stonedhead by Butt_O'sigh is new. Submit Software News Suggestions!
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The Big ResExcellence Survey
As promised, here are the results of the recent ResEx survey. Exactly 900 people responded, and two were randomly drawn to win ResEx T-shirts. Congrats to Daevad Tajkowski from Florida and James Dziedzic of Maryland!
While the data from the survey is very interesting, I really appreciate the comments, good and bad, that were added by readers. Many of the suggestions to improve the site were outstanding. Unfortunately, time and resources may prevent us from implimenting most of them, but at least they allow us to set goals for the future. Thanks again to everyone who participated. (Continued...)
Polling Place by Michael
 A surprising number of readers have paid for the update to Quicktime Pro. So far, it apprears to be a lifetime upgrade fee. I registered with Quicktime 3 and have never been required to upgrade again - even with the version 5 beta.
Steve Jobs says that Apple missed the boat by not including CD R/W units in Macintosh computers. Is the demand that great? This week's Polling Place asks, "Do you have a CD Burner?"
Shorten the Finder's Contextual Menus.
 Today's edit was submitted by Greg Sadetsky. Most people don't use many of the options in the Finder's popup contextual menus. This simple edit removes those menus, leaving you only the menus created by third party programs like FinderPop. (Continued...)
User Contributed Splash Screens:
Snapshot Gallery by Jeremy Hoesly Christmas is only a few days away; so get your holiday snapshots in. Don’t delay!
I would like to thank all you readers for the favorable responses regarding the Snapshot Archive. Monday’s crop of snapshots is ready for consumption: - iMacBabe submitted this contribution touting a custom blend of the “Meltdown” and “Stevie” desktop pictures in conjunction with the Smoke and Mirrors K-Scheme. SoundJam, equipped with a Transformers skin, is dishing out selections on the right. The Zero iPack and several other icons ranging from South Park to Looney Toons are also showcased.
- Endorphine’s “RasterPeople” desktop picture and the Neutech Theme debut in this cool dual monitor snapshot from Chris Jeffries. SoundJam, overhauled with the converted bck-Baby-D Audion face, is tickling the eardrums in the upper right-hand corner of the second screen. Various icons such as Gort’s icons are also on display.
- A “Butterfly” desktop picture from his son’s MOSS collection is featured in this snapshot from Peter McHugh coupled with the Hi-Teque K-Scheme. Various custom icons are lining the right edge.
- This snapshot from Jason Reynoso sports the “Porsche Carrera GT” desktop picture. Audion, retro-fitted with the Smoothplate face, is cranking out tunes along the top.
Like the snapshots that you see? Inspired enough to send one of your own? Read our submission guidelines, and then bring it on!
Icon/Desktop News 12-18-00 Icon & Desktop News by Dan  With the addition of three new Holiday Postcards today, the ResExcellence Postcard section now has 29 beautiful and tastefully done greetings to send to family, friends and loved ones. Special thanks to all those who sent in postcards to share.
Icons - Desktops - Postcards: Five new desktop pictures, and three postcards on display for our Monday update. We are also pleased to announce that starting today, we will be selecting one reader submitted desktop picture each week, and will be featuring it on the side bar all week long for downloading. Enjoy! - Digital artwork doesn't get much better than Scott Chitwood's "Shiny Things" desktop. Visit Rampant Mac for the download, and check out all the other great goodies to be found there.
- Our very own Jeremy Hoesly of ResExcellence has been so kind as to share a number of his beautiful photographic desktops with us. The first in the installment is a "Winter Landscape" in 1024x resolution. This photo was shot while on a visit to Husdon Wisconsin for Thanksgiving this year. Visit Hoylesvista for more great photography as well.
- For the first Desktop of the Week pick, we've selected Puernatus, by Jamie Hilario. This traditional style Xmas desktop comes in 1024x resolution only.
- Captain K. drops a hint about what he might want for Christmas this year. Star Trek Invasion is a striking backdrop/screenshot taken from the recently released video game of the same name. Comes in 1024x resolution.
- Matt Thompson submits his festive Holiday Balls desktop for your enjoyment. In 1024x resolution.
- Dylan Daniélou's Zebrapple is a set of 6 color coordinated desktops, all in 800x resolution. Dylan has also included a slick little Applescript for you to use to change the picture right from your desktop.
News From Around the Web:
Tray of Tray's Trove wishes to all a Merry Christmas, and updates his website with eight new desktop pictures. For the final update of Y2k, Scott Chittwood of Rampant Mac posts nine new desktops and two new tiles. Tomoyuki Miyano is alive and well and returns to the world of icons with the reopening of IronDevil. So what's up WWW? Icons? Desktop pictures? News? Inform us! We'll post it!
Complete Cable Management For The Home & Office.
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