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rich_75034 · Mar 8, 2005, 08:19 PM

I want to change my dock background and opacity. I know that it can be done, just not sure how. I'd like to give that longhorn glassy look....and much more transparent.

Thanks..

MacDog · Mar 8, 2005, 08:26 PM

Originally posted by rich_75034:
I want to change my dock background and opacity. I know that it can be done, just not sure how. I'd like to give that longhorn glassy look....and much more transparent.

Thanks..

Use ClearDock from Unsanity. It allows you to change the color and opacity of the dock, as well as the little traingles for the open apps in the dock.

Anubis IV · Mar 8, 2005, 10:12 PM

Or, if you're one of those people that would rather not install APE just for the purpose of making your Dock look pretty, there's also Transparent Dock, that actually does more than just make your Dock transparent. It can handle the triangles under the applications, the transparency, the coloration, even the Dock poofs that you get when you drag an icon off the Dock.

Banghazi · Mar 8, 2005, 10:14 PM

Be careful with TransparentDock. It changes permissions it shouldn't change, so repair permissions after each use.

aristotles · Mar 9, 2005, 12:18 AM

I don't get people who speak out against APE (which is non-permanent) and recommend applications that directly alter the resources.

MacDog · Mar 9, 2005, 08:37 AM

Originally posted by aristotles:
I don't get people who speak out against APE (which is non-permanent) and recommend applications that directly alter the resources.

I've found that 99% of the people who complain about APE (which is a small number compared to the people who have no problem at all) usually have more problems with their computer than not. They tend to want to blame *something* for the fact that they aren't takin care of their baby!!

siMac · Mar 9, 2005, 01:02 PM

I think people get confused because there's a reference to APE in almost every crash report on a system where it is installed. This doesn't, however, mean that APE had anything to do with the crash.

Anubis IV · Mar 9, 2005, 08:01 PM

Originally posted by aristotles:
I don't get people who speak out against APE (which is non-permanent) and recommend applications that directly alter the resources.

Just in case you were referring to me (which I'm unsure of, since I did recommend a competing program), I don't have any major issues with APE. As far as I'm concerned, it works fine, seems to be bug free, and does exactly what it says it will do...and it does it well at that. I just offered another alternative since I know that there are people out there that do have issues, whether merely perceived or actual, with APE. And yeah, I think that most of the misconceptions come from the fact that a referrence to APE shows up in all those crash logs.

As for me personally...sometimes I prefer to directly alter the resources (so long as you know what you're doing) because altering them directly removes any processor overhead that you might incur while using APE or something else of that nature. For instance, if you use a .dlta file with ThemeChanger as opposed to a .guikit with Shapeshifter, you can remove the (negligible) extra time that it takes to launch applications with Shapeshifter. The downside is that you are playing a risky game since altering resources is rarely a safe thing to do.

Anyway, all I really wanted to do was make sure that the topic creator had as many viable options as possible. As far as I can tell, I didn't offer my opinions on the matter in my initial post.
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