Basic black is a simple, basic screen saver. It doesn't have whizbang graphics, and, as a result, it lets everything blast along at full speed.
If you want, Basic Black will bounce a cool little analog clock around your main screen so you'll know your machine is still on. By default, Basic Black simply blacks out your screen. A lot of people prefer it this way.
*** How does Basic Black work? ***
If you don't type anything or move your mouse for a period of two minutes (or whatever you set it to), the screen will black out. Also, if you move the mouse to the upper- right corner of your main screen (or whatever corner you have defined), the screen will black out immediately.
To wake up your screen, tap a key or move the mouse. Key presses and mouse clicks are NOT passed through to the frontmost application.
If you're doing something that requires staring at the screen for long periods of time, and you don't want the screen to black out at all, just keep the mouse in the bottom-right corner of your main screen (or, again, whatever corner you've defined).
*** How do I install Basic Black? ***
Just drag the Basic Black file to your system folder, and reboot.
*** Configuration ***
Basic Black is easily configurable. Just open the Basic Black control panel that lives in your Control Panels folder. It looks like this:
Set it up to your liking. There are several things you can change:
You can set your Sleep Now and Stay Awake corners to your liking by clicking on the appropriate corners of the small boxes on the right side of the control panel window.
You can set the amount of idle time that Basic Black will wait before kicking in, and you can set the number of seconds between screen refreshes. (Seconds Between Refreshes is the interval between the times when Basic Black blacks out the screen, which it does periodically when the screen is asleep. If the analog clock is turned on, it redraws in a different place every time the screen is refreshed.)
The "Basic Black On" check box controls whether Basic Black will make the screen fall asleep or not.
The "Startup Icon" check box controls whether or not Basic Black will show it's startup icon animation.
The "Bouncing Clock" check box determines whether or not a bouncing analog clock will appear when the screen falls asleep.
The "Fade To White" checkbox is mainly for Powerbook users who need to have their screens fade to white, rather than black.
The "Menubar Patch" check box should normally be off. Use it only if you have an older System Extension or Control Panel that doesn't respect the 'SAVR' Gestalt selector. Basically, you only need to use this if Basic Black doesn't stop another extension from drawing in your menu bar. It will be obvious to you if you need it.
The "Erase Patches" check box should also normally be off. It keeps the system from erasing most things, which comes in handy if you have, again, an old extension or something that doesn't recognize the 'SAVR' selector. (Note: the "erase patches" option may cause problems with printing.) Both this patch and the Menubar patch take effect after your next reboot.
When you change a setting (other than the Menubar and Erase patches), it goes into effect immediately. Note: on systems 6.0.3 or earlier, you must reboot for any changes to take effect.
*** There's stuff drawing on the screen! What's the deal? ***
Basic Black operates under one principle, which is to save your screen from burn-in. Some things will inevitably come through. The only way around this is for me to patch half the world, and that 1) slows things down and 2) makes us less compatible with everything else. The idea here is to keep the screen mostly black, most of the time. This prevents burn-in, and keeps things simple enough so that we have a truly tiny memory footprint and take a minimum of processor time.
*** Why bother with this? ***
There are lots of screen savers out there. Is this one any different?
What makes Basic Black unique are its small size and simplicity. Basic Black takes up next to no CPU time when it runs, and it only runs during your machine's idle time. Also, Basic Black will work on any Macintosh, and will run under both System 6 and System 7. (Probably earlier versions of the system software, too, but I haven't tested this. Thoeretically it will run on a Mac 128.)
My view of screensavers is that they should be small, unobtrusive, and responsive. Basic Black is all three. If you MUST have flying toasters and QuickTime™ movies available as a part of your screen saver, then there are other free screen savers out there that will better satisfy your requirements.
If you want a full-featured application-based screen saver (that requires System 7), try out Darkside of the Mac. It's free and, as of version 4.0, it will run After Dark™ modules. (The Flying Toasters don't come with it, however.)
For myself, I prefer Basic Black, because it's simply more responsive and less of a drain on system resources. Of course, I also wrote it, which has a lot to do with it... Probably a whole lot to do with it, as a matter of fact. Don't take my word for it, though. Try it. Use it for a while. It may grow on you.
*** Licensing Agreement ***
Basic Black is free for non-commercial use only. If you wish to distribute Basic Black in aggregate with a commercial offering, please contact me to work out arrangements. My address is listed below.
Feel free to send donations if you like. I won't turn them away, but I don't require them. (Basic utilities like screen savers should be free.)
You may not modify Basic Black in any way. Basic Black is provided “as is” and without any express or implied warranties, including, without limitation, the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. I shall not be liable for any damages whatsoever arising from the use or mis-use of Basic Black.
*** Source Code ***
The source code for Basic Black is no longer publically available. If you want a reason, write to me, and I'll tell you what's what.
If you want to learn how to write a 'cdev' or 'INIT', or you want to learn how to make the beasties communicate in a nice way, write to me and I'll send you a shell that you should be able to modify and extend. (It'll be based on the shell that Basic Black uses.) I haven't written it yet, but if you hound me enough I'll get to it.
*** Annoyances and Other Features ***
The control panel won't update the numbers on-screen properly if you're running System 6 or earlier - this will be corrected by the next version. (Workaround: putting the screen to sleep and waking it up again will force the correct values to display themselves.)
Under some bizarre circumstances, Basic Black will muck about with printing. I'm hoping that the semi-radical changes in this version will correct that, as the problem is new as of 1.3.1 and this version makes some of the more radical changes optional. (Id est, if you have printing problems, check to see if "erase patches" is checked. If yes, uncheck it and see if that fixes the problem.
*** For more info or to report bugs... ***
If you come across any bugs, you can get to me at:
Internet:
mason@cis.umassd.edu (preferred)
mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us
FidoNet:
1:109/370.6
U.S. Mail:
Mason L. Bliss
18 Beach st.
Middleboro MA 02346
USA
If you email me about Basic Black, I'll put you on my mailing list, so you'll receive new versions as they come out, and stuff like that. I occasionally poll my mailing list for new ideas and suggestions for how they'd like to see me implement things in new versions of Basic Black.
Enjoy it, and send me any suggestions you have for improvements.
- Mason
*** Beta Tester Appreciation Section ***
Many thanks to my beta testers, who never cease in their unending quest to find obscure and bizarre bugs. Basic Black wouldn't be what it is without them.
They are: Albert Chou , Anders Alvers, Troy Anderson , Rickard Andersson, Greg Barron, Robert Beamesderfer , blokland, Stovy Lynn Bowlin (Jon) , Robert M. Briber, Pete Cox , Tony Doan, Sean Elfstrom, Jeff Garner , Scott Allen Gruby, Christine M. Guzorek, Don Jeffries, Joshua Juran, Jan Pieter Kunst , Andy Law, Kirke B. Lawton, Bertrand Limoges, Per Lundberg, Hanz Makmur, Cheinan Marks, Mike Uftring, Morrison, Chet Niewczyk, Franklin G. Pater, Jr., Robert Pellerin, Jason Peterson, David Quarles, Laszlo Radanyi JR, Wayne P. Robarge, Michael Rodahl, Alain Roy, Jeff Sass, Lars Kj|rsvik Schei, Beat Scherer, John Schweiger , Daniel Sears, Shahrol, Andy Shiekh, Stephen N. Spencer, Christopher Suley, Chase Tingley, Neal Tucker, Ulf Wiger, Lloyd Wood, and last, (alphabetically, anyway) Joe Zobkiw. If you should be on the list and aren't, then mail me. If I've got your name wrong, mail me.
Notes:
After Dark is a trademark of Berkeley Systems, Inc.
