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quandarry · Mar 17, 2004, 07:49 PM

...roll some of its' other haxies into shapeshifer.

i'm gonna start up a little sh!t here.

i'm looking at what kaleidoscope did and what shapeshifter does and

shapeshifter comes up short. sure it was ok for a developing project but

now i think the time has come to roll in some of the other haxies such as

windowshades and shadows, xounds and whatever into one.

sure they have the right to do whatever they want but we as their customers

also have a right to ask for an all in one tool at an all in one price.

i'm sure they know shapeshifter should include these features but as of yet zero

competition has kept them from doing this. but extender may force them to do

this. should they do it now?

this is for intelligent discussion...if you don't fall into this category, please move on.

the others, please read and comprehend what i have written and then...

give us your thoughts.

orangep0ny · 10:01 PM

.

zachs · Mar 17, 2004, 08:00 PM

I don't think they should incorporate existing haxies.
But other features, like Dock skinning, desktop pictures, icons, etc. should definately be included.

mac15 · Mar 17, 2004, 08:06 PM

Its a nice idea but in a way they lose out on bling bling. And they area a company after all

Holigen · Mar 17, 2004, 08:42 PM

Wow, pony, you have surpassed a level of stupidy I had thought that only Bush could achieve. Good job!

Anyways, I think it would be cool to have an all in one package, but keep all of the apps different, sounds, themes, cursors, and window stuff all in one pane would be too confusing!!!

rhythmicmoose · Mar 17, 2004, 08:49 PM

I'd love to see Mighty Mouse incorporated into ShapeShifter, or I'd at least like to get a discount on it for owning SS. The wonderful thing about APE is how well the haxies work in their separate pieces, and I can definitely understand selling them separately.

But Mighty Mouse for ten dollars doesn't quite seem worth it, considering I only paid twice that to theme my entire OS.

::maroma:: · Mar 17, 2004, 08:59 PM

Personally, I would really like to have all of Unsanity's relevant haxies in one nice tight package. To be able to customize your ENTIRE system from one application or pref-pane would be really nice. But...

Like others have said, Unsanity is a business. They need to make money to survive, and to continue to bring us great apps and haxies. They could conceivably up the price on the pimped out ShapeShifter to make up for the lost revenue, but that might not go over too well with the customer base.

I would be very happy if they just added things like Dock Skinning, cursor replacing (Might Mouse), and system icon replacements (a'la CandyBar).

But I'm also willing to wait on these things. I would rather Unsanity get SS 1.5 out the door (so we can get those great themes we're waiting for!), then have them start adding a ton of new features.

So, in conclusion, I'd love it, but in the end it's up to Unsanity. And whatever they decide, I'll be happy with.

orangep0ny · 10:05 PM

since your pm box is full.
Here is my response to your silly posts.
Lets go back and look at a few of your previous post shall we? Have I not seen you post +1 over 20 times over and over in the past week?? Yes. It gets old looking at and it is annoying just like I showed you in your thread. A thread that basically has been done over and over and covered again and again. If you like to see yourself post please goto the lounge. You are the one abusing things here. Stop with the +1 crap, they should do away with post counts because of you.
So in review, +1 is old and annoying and I was showing how annoying it is.

a holck · Mar 17, 2004, 10:03 PM

Why not include a basic set of haxies within shapeshifter.

The theme developer would get the full range of options thruh themepark eith the right license, but the interface in shapeshifter, as standard, would only show a simple toggleswich for each haxie.

When the user selects a theme in shapeshifter the theme developer has already selected the mouse set, the soundset and the windowshadow, with only the basic shapeshifter license these settings cannot be tweeked: its on on or off for each.

When the user then upgrades the license with mighty mouse or some other haxie, the
advanced options can be selected.... or a new set can be selected or created...

It would be cool for a theme developer to be sure all aspects of the theme would be possible with only the "basic" shapeshifter package.

All the haxies usanity has would still keep its value, as a customer that wants to tweek the settings or create his own would have to buy a license for that particular haxie.

Holigen · Mar 17, 2004, 10:04 PM

Mine or my good friend quandarry's? Anyways, lighten up dude. Dan is definitely the king of +1s if you ask me... lol, look at his sig.

orangep0ny · Mar 17, 2004, 10:07 PM

Originally posted by Holigen:
Mine or my good friend quandarry's? Anyways, lighten up dude. Dan is definitely the king of +1s if you ask me... lol, look at his sig.

Yes, I wish I had online friends too. Then I could sleep next to my computer in anticipation of an IM. Now. Back to the thread.

Holigen · Mar 17, 2004, 10:23 PM

I was just kidding around little horsey. Maybe I should sleep next to my computer for a nice post from you...?

I'mDaMac · Mar 18, 2004, 01:50 AM

Originally posted by Holigen:
Wow, pony, you have surpassed a level of stupidy I had thought that only Bush could achieve. Good job!

Anyways, I think it would be cool to have an all in one package, but keep all of the apps different, sounds, themes, cursors, and window stuff all in one pane would be too confusing!!!

You've never used Kaleidoscope eh? If i remember correctly Kaleidoscope did all those things and was very intuitive. Then you could have a feature to save customized sets instead of going to each different pref pane and change every little thing to get it just the way you want it. I don't think it would be confusing if all UI customizations were under one pref pane. Good idea but I doubt we'll see it. Whatever happened to Greg Landweber anyway?

Holigen · Mar 18, 2004, 02:08 AM

I did use Kaleidoscope actually. If the folks at Unsanity can do for OS X what Kaleidoscope did for the good old days, then I would worship them as gods.

tiredraven · Mar 18, 2004, 02:48 AM

I for one would like to see ShapeShifter get some more Kaleidoscope like functionality, but I do realize that Unsanity is a company as others have said.

But I think a good idea might be to have Shapeshifter act as a master control that can manage other haxies if they are installed. Very similar to how their own APE Manager preference Pane works now. This way they could sell special plugin versions of other haxies at a discounted price that would only work if you already had ShapeShifter.

That said, I would like to see Clear Dock, Mighty Mouse, and icon functionality rolled into the basic ShapeShifter package. I think that combination would work quite well and still leave plenty of room for other add on haxies for Unsanity to sell us.

tr

Holigen · Mar 18, 2004, 03:02 AM

Ya, those plugins are a good idea.

BurningBright · Mar 18, 2004, 03:29 AM

Personally, I have to say a great compromise would be SS adding in the mightymouse support, maybe desktops built into themes (I know it's easy already, but hey!) soundsets for those who like them(xounds), fonts (I understand fonts are a pain in the arse in OS X) more importantly though, IMO are boot screens/loginwindows etc. I think they look fine but certainly could benefit. Let's leave fruitmenu et al out there so unsanity can keep the cash flow up and so we don't get a bloated app.

mac15 · Mar 18, 2004, 03:40 AM

But then again if they did bundle the apps together, wouldn't it be cool if say each app had its own shadow settings? Themes like FatalE looks great without one. The option to change shadows would be kickass and thats only a small WDSX feature.

BurningBright · Mar 18, 2004, 03:41 AM

But then, if this thread turns (as it almost inevitably will) into just a suggest-a-feature thread, perhaps someone should collate it and email it to our friendly neighborhood unsanity peeps?

kovacs · Mar 18, 2004, 03:47 AM

Worst Poll Ever....

slava · Mar 18, 2004, 04:14 AM

Thanks for a great poll -- I'll be monitoring it closely and it's interesting how it'll end up.

Personally, let me rant a little bit here. To clarify, I am speaking right now as an individual, not as an official company voice, but since the company is not all that big, my opinion can very well be counted as a semi-official company position.

Personally, I don't like the idea of incorporation of other existing haxies into SS for one reason: code bloat. The codebase for SS (already not the smallest one out there) will grow significantly, thus increasing the time required to develop and debug each new update we're doing. This is not necessarily a bad thing, especially given some of the advantages given to our users, but as I said, it is going to be gradually harder to support all-in-one �ber-tool that support 4-5 smaller ones.

I can perfectly see the advantages from a user standpoint, and I think here's what will happen over time: haxies, like Apple's iLife apps, will know about each other and talk to each other, so it'll be possible to, say, change xoundsets from ShapeShifter as a part of a theme install, or adjust shadow settings in WindowShade X by using these from a guiKit.

The big question is price here, of course -- these little things tend to add up and you end up paying more than $20 for the functionality you want. I think we will be doing some steps towards bigger discounts on bundles, so you can get exactly the tools you want for the right price -- and this is definitely coming in the next few months as we're improving our online store system.

Keep the comments coming -- and you know we will take them into account while doing our planning.

Oh, and thanks for kicking a** -- we love you! =)

iNeusch · Mar 18, 2004, 05:00 AM

Originally posted by zachs:
I don't think they should incorporate existing haxies.
But other features, like Dock skinning, desktop pictures, icons, etc. should definately be included.

Exactly

bluevertical · Mar 18, 2004, 05:50 AM

yes! totally yes, to me they should create one app and just charge a bit more. they have way too many haxies and they take up way too many pref panes. as i see it, they could make just as much money combining them into one cohesive app that is the 'super bowl' of mod apps....
i say YES,, oh YES!!!

quandarry · Mar 18, 2004, 06:16 AM

thanx for the input slava.

i own pretty much everything that unsanity has. it started with xounds...

i just could not stand an interface that gave no audio feedback. then i got

windowshade...i had to have it...even now with expose i still use it often...

and on and on...

as a member of the gui community i'd like to see shapeshifter on every computer...

this would get more people involved and expand our little group and inspire

more people to be creative.

from a marketing standpoint if one wanted audio feedback this person would

need to buy shapeshifter if it was a feature...as it stands now only xounds needs

to be purchased.

i guess i should have had my third choice as a haxie package option...

hey slava what about an app to edit sounds for xounds.

i'm sorry orangepony if i have upset you in some way...thanx for you response.

slava · Mar 18, 2004, 08:26 AM

Originally posted by quandarry:
hey slava what about an app to edit sounds for xounds.

Since all Xounds sounds are really AIFFs, any sound editing app would work fine, I think. What's the point of a new one? =)

orangep0ny · Mar 18, 2004, 04:22 PM

Originally posted by quandarry:
thanx for the input slava.

i own pretty much everything that unsanity has. it started with xounds...

i just could not stand an interface that gave no audio feedback. then i got

windowshade...i had to have it...even now with expose i still use it often...

and on and on...

as a member of the gui community i'd like to see shapeshifter on every computer...

this would get more people involved and expand our little group and inspire

more people to be creative.

from a marketing standpoint if one wanted audio feedback this person would

need to buy shapeshifter if it was a feature...as it stands now only xounds needs

to be purchased.

i guess i should have had my third choice as a haxie package option...

hey slava what about an app to edit sounds for xounds.

i'm sorry orangepony if i have upset you in some way...thanx for you response.

no prob im sorry too. hugs.

fireside · Mar 18, 2004, 04:35 PM

Originally posted by quandarry:
thanx for the input slava.

i own pretty much everything that unsanity has. it started with xounds...

i just could not stand an interface that gave no audio feedback. then i got

windowshade...i had to have it...even now with expose i still use it often...

and on and on...

as a member of the gui community i'd like to see shapeshifter on every computer...

this would get more people involved and expand our little group and inspire

more people to be creative.

from a marketing standpoint if one wanted audio feedback this person would

need to buy shapeshifter if it was a feature...as it stands now only xounds needs

to be purchased.

i guess i should have had my third choice as a haxie package option...

hey slava what about an app to edit sounds for xounds.

i'm sorry orangepony if i have upset you in some way...thanx for you response.

you dont need
to hit return
after every couple
off words that
you type.
it gets really annoying
after a while.

and weren't you
the person that
said that you
don't use shapeshifter
yourself? so why
do you think
shapeshifter will inspire
creativity?

Algernnon · Mar 18, 2004, 06:42 PM

My only comment would be that there are elements that I don't want changed by a theme. I like my icons and cursor the way I have them, and if I want them changed I want to do it myself, not have a theme do it for me. If they ever are included, I would like the ability to turn them off.

wibs · Mar 19, 2004, 01:38 AM

Originally posted by Algernnon:
If they (icons, cursors, etc) ever are included, I would like the ability to turn them off.

I completely agree.

quandarry · Mar 19, 2004, 01:53 AM

Originally posted by fireside:
you dont need
to hit return
after every couple
off words that
you type.
it gets really annoying
after a while.

and weren't you
the person that
said that you
don't use shapeshifter
yourself? so why
do you think
shapeshifter will inspire
creativity?

i sense you have much pent up hostility...which belies your nic which in

a way is very relaxing. sitting by the fireside curled up and cozy reading

a good book...ahhh, if only i had a fireplace with a warm crackling fire.

so what are your thoughts, fireside? are you happy with the way things

are shaping up with the os x gui happenings?

NetworkShadow · Mar 19, 2004, 02:04 AM

I was thinking Metallifizer should be put into SS since it really has to do with themeing, sure maybe have a separate free haxie too, but it's kinda annoying to have 100s of different haxies for every little thing.

quandarry · Mar 19, 2004, 04:38 AM

Originally posted by kovacs:
Best Poll Ever....

fixed.

best post ever...kovacs you need to take one of your pills...one of those nice pink

ones you count all day long and call me in the morning.

the pic isn't showing up for me.

fireside · Mar 19, 2004, 07:09 PM

Originally posted by quandarry:
i sense you have much pent up hostility...which belies your nic which in a way is very relaxing. sitting by the fireside curled up and cozy reading a good book...ahhh, if only i had a fireplace with a warm crackling fire. so what are your thoughts, fireside? are you happy with the way things are shaping up with the os x gui happenings?

ahh, much better.
actually, i dont have any pent up hostility, i just find it highly annoying when people hit return when they get to the end of the text box. it makes posts hard to read.

no, i never said i was or wasn't happy with the way things are shaping up in the community. i think that they're shaping up fine. i hope with the release of XTender we will see how the community truly acts when faced with different possibilities and competition. while i would like to see the gui being messed around with (widgets in different places, etc) i think things will happen in due time. i think XTender is the next big thing, and it has my full support. so does ShapeShifter, but i don't want to see conflicting file formats, which will more than likely lead to the demise of the themeing community. i dont think saying that one app has the better format, i just hope that a standard format will be reached with Unsanity and Carpe so we can use which ever skinning application we want. i dont think that having two formats is a good thing, because this is a very close community, and i dont think this town is big enough for two sherifs, in a matter of speaking.

bbxstudio · Mar 19, 2004, 07:50 PM

Originally posted by NetworkShadow:
I was thinking Metallifizer should be put into SS since it really has to do with themeing, sure maybe have a separate free haxie too, but it's kinda annoying to have 100s of different haxies for every little thing.

I agree that Metalfizer would be nice incorporated into SS. The only other haxie I think would apply is Mightymouse... make SS support cursors (and play nice with Mightymouse files) but still sell Mightymouse as a separate package for those who just want their cursor customized.

quandarry · Mar 19, 2004, 07:52 PM

Originally posted by fireside:
ahh, much better.
actually, i dont have any pent up hostility, i just find it highly annoying when people hit return when they get to the end of the text box. it makes posts hard to read.

no, i never said i was or wasn't happy with the way things are shaping up in the community. i think that they're shaping up fine. i hope with the release of XTender we will see how the community truly acts when faced with different possibilities and competition. while i would like to see the gui being messed around with (widgets in different places, etc) i think things will happen in due time. i think XTender is the next big thing, and it has my full support. so does ShapeShifter, but i don't want to see conflicting file formats, which will more than likely lead to the demise of the themeing community. i dont think saying that one app has the better format, i just hope that a standard format will be reached with Unsanity and Carpe so we can use which ever skinning application we want. i dont think that having two formats is a good thing, because this is a very close community, and i dont think this town is big enough for two sherifs, in a matter of speaking.

good post fireside...i'm much in agreement with your thoughts on the gui front.

_
now about my hitting return, that's for a reason...to get double spacing. i have

dyslexia and this allows me to read and type it better without getting a migraine.

so i apologize that my handicap is your annoyance. when one has a handicap one

develops all kinds of tricks to overcome it and try and hide it from people. i have to

read my posts over several time to make sure the spelling is ok and the grammer

makes the post make sense. the double spacing makes this a wee bit easier.

quandarry · Mar 19, 2004, 08:03 PM

is there anyone else out there who wants to attack me....

jeez starting threads and posting in here is becoming a real chore. keep an eye

at the top of the page for all the names of the people who come in here but never

contribute...they would like to but they know that some peeps will be ready for the

attack. attacked for what? anything.

Holigen · Mar 19, 2004, 08:09 PM

^^
Very true

wibs · Mar 19, 2004, 09:20 PM

Originally posted by fireside:
i don't want to see conflicting file formats, which will more than likely lead to the demise of the themeing community.

different file formats have come and gone, but they never changed the community. just because company X doesn't make anything that works with company Y doesn't mean I won't want to make and apply themes, it just means that I'll only use/support the format that works best. That's why .theme is a footnote in theming's history, while theming itself carries on.

goMac · Mar 19, 2004, 09:37 PM

Originally posted by wibs:
That's why .theme is a footnote in theming's history, while theming itself carries on.

The problem has really been theme formats that do not scale. The first theme formats where wiped out when Apple began changing the Extras in each OS revision. Now theme formats are being outdated because they only could handle files. If a format scales well, it will hold.

XScheme for example has hook-ins that allow developers to add in any type of object they need, without redefining the file format. Hopefully things like this will keep file formats solid as time passes.

fireside · Mar 20, 2004, 12:39 PM

Originally posted by wibs:
different file formats have come and gone, but they never changed the community. just because company X doesn't make anything that works with company Y doesn't mean I won't want to make and apply themes, it just means that I'll only use/support the format that works best. That's why .theme is a footnote in theming's history, while theming itself carries on.

yes, but i'm fairly certain you could apply those theme formats with any of the themechangers out at the time, correct? with ShapeShifter's guiKit, you can only apply the guiKit with ShapeShifter. so i see that when XTender comes out and people start supporting it themers are going to have a choice between which format, and the users will ultimately have to pay, since both apps cost money. so lets say i want to use Swiz's JetBlack because i only paid for XTender. or the same could be said if i bought ShapeShifter and i want to use a theme thats xscheme only.

totally understandable quandarry (about the double spacing).

goMac · Mar 20, 2004, 12:55 PM

Originally posted by fireside:
yes, but i'm fairly certain you could apply those theme formats with any of the themechangers out at the time, correct? with ShapeShifter's guiKit, you can only apply the guiKit with ShapeShifter. so i see that when XTender comes out and people start supporting it themers are going to have a choice between which format, and the users will ultimately have to pay, since both apps cost money. so lets say i want to use Swiz's JetBlack because i only paid for XTender. or the same could be said if i bought ShapeShifter and i want to use a theme thats xscheme only.

totally understandable quandarry (about the double spacing).

Traditionally most formats have been human readable to prevent this situation. XScheme is not human readable, but provides a framework in order to read XScheme's in Cocoa.

This is the biggest difference so far with guiKit. Its not human readable. Even I'm not sure what it really is.