･････ Make sure you trash your old Pattern Manager Preferences before running 1.5.2 ･････
New in version 1.5.2:
･ Pattern Rotater should work much better now.
･ Various minor fixes for compatability with MacOS 8, and a new e-mail address.
･ MacOS 8's new Desktop Pictures stores the standard set of patterns in a new place. See below (under MacOS 8 notes) if you want to use the (boring) patterns that ship with MacOS 8.
Introduction
With the myriad of other desktop pattern installers out there, why another desktop pattern manager? Simple: none of them had the features that I wanted. None are native for the Power Macintosh; only MacOS 8's control panel supports drag and drop; and most don't import pictures as well as I would like. Worst of all, with every desktop pattern installer out there, there is no easy way to preview all the patterns in a file at once, or to import many clipping files in at once. So I wrote one.
Pattern ManagerﾑﾒPatManﾓﾑdoes all those things. It displays patterns with their names in a user-sizable grid, installs patterns into the System File, and sets the utilities pattern (which other desktop pattern installers don't do). It fully supports drag and drop between files, the Scrapbook, the Finder, and any other program that supports drag and drop. Just click on a pattern and drag it where you want it. It fully supports cut and paste (of course). It has the best PICT importer available, and, remarkable for a desktop pattern manager, it has resizeable windows. It also has a nifty pattern information window, and can change the background pattern periodically.
Using PatMan
Programs like this are pretty straight-forward, so I won't explain every menu option, just a few more hidden features.
PatMan automatically opens the System Pattern File when you launch it without other documents. The file is called "Desktop Pattern Prefs".
Drag and Drop: PatMan supports drag and drop if you have System 7.5 or the Clipping Extension. Just drag a pattern where you want it to go, to another PatMan window, to the Finder, to the Scrapbook, any program that has implemented drag and drop.
Finder-Style Renaming: To rename a pattern, just click on the name and go.
Desktop Preview: To see what a pattern would look like on the desktop without actually installing, just double-click it. PatMan will restore the desktop when you quit. You can option-double-click on a pattern to actually install the pattern on the desktop.
Picture Importer: Because MacOS patterns must have certain dimensions, the picture importer will appear when you import a picture to allow you to set the color-depth, dimensions, scaling, cropping and view the seams between the repeating portions of the pattern. Drag inside the frame to position the pattern if you are cropping it. Drag the frame's handle to resize it it. Click around other places to see some other options. PatMan imports PICT files, PICT resources, PICT clippings, as well as the less common, but more efficient ppat type. If you turn off the picture importer, PatMan will scale the picture to the closest acceptable dimesions and choose the best bit-depth it can for the picture.
Setting the utilities pattern: Select a pattern, and use the pattern menu. The next time a System Utility (like the Calculator or the Find File dialog) is opened, it will use the selected pattern for the background. If you end up installing a utility pattern that looks terrible, try one of the nice neutral gray patterns that ship in the file "From Eric's Desktop Patterns".
Marking questionable patterns: A bug in the Mac OS prevents some patterns from displaying properly, see "The Large Pattern Problem". PatMan marks those patterns in red and warns you when you are importing a picture that has this problem.
Pattern Information Window: You can see a summary of pattern information by choosing Get Pattern Info from the Pattern Menu.
Pattern Rotater: Drop Pattern Rotater into your System Folder. It will change the background pattern according to the preferences set in the Pattern Rotater Preferences Dialog Box. To Open this dialog box, inside Pattern Manager, choose "Pattern Rotater Prefs" from the Preferences Menu. Pattern Rotater only requires 128K of memory to do it's thing, and it is a Faceless Background Application, not an extension. So it shouldn't hurt stability the way many Extensions do.
Notes on MacOS 8
MacOS 8's new Desktop Pictures control panel changed where the default set of patterns are stored. It now stores them inside itself. This makes it harder for PatMan to look at them, but not impossible. If you just cannot live without these standard (and boring) patterns, do this:
1. Open PatMan
2. Pick "Open Any File" from the File Menu
3. Find "Desktop Pictures" in the Control Panels Folder inside the System Folder and Open it
4. There they are.
I recommend creating a new file, selecting all the patterns from Desktop Pictures, and then copying and pasting the default set into the new file.
The Large Pattern Problem--or "Questionable Patterns"
There is a limitation in the MacOS that prevents patterns with relatively large dimensions from displaying properly at certain bit-depths. Essentially, if the total area of the pattern (in pxels) multiplied by the monitor depth (in bytes) is greater than 64K, then the pattern's display will get cropped by the OS. It may not scroll right in the information window, and it may be cut-off when displayed. There is currently no work around. The larger the pattern, the less chance it has of displaying properly. If you get a warning, just set your monitor to the depth you would like to display the pattern at, and see if it looks good.
The important thing to remember is that only the dimensions of the pattern matter, not its bit-depth. A black and white pattern that is 256x256 isn't going to display properly on a 32-bit monitor, even though it only needs a one-bit monitor to look right.
Also, a patternﾕs dimensions don't have to be square, but they do have to have dimensions that are a power of two.
A Word About Pattern Compression
Desktop Textures, a program similar to PatMan, commits the Macintosh programming no-no of compressing resources of a system defined type. It compresses 'ppat' resources. This is a bad idea because that makes resource editors like Resorcerer and ResEdit crash, as well as any other program that treats standard resources types as, well, standard. PatMan is smart enough to check for Desktop Textures' faux-pas, but not smart enough to work with the patterns that it has compressed. If anyone knows Desktop Textures' compression format, I will happily add support.
Desktop Textures allows you to turn this feature off, and I highly recommend that you do so, even if you don't plan to use PatMan. Tricks like this contribute to the instability of applications, and the perceived instability of the Mac OS. A fix would be trivial, just make the compressed resources of type 'ppat' to a custom type, say 'Ppat' and the problem is solved.
Distribution
Pattern Manager 1.5 is copyright 1997-98 by Sterling Augustine, however, it is freely distributable on the internet as long as this ReadMe accompanies it, and no charges other than on-line connect charges are made to download it. If you wish to include it on a CD-ROM, or to distribute it for profit (even over the internet) you must get my permission first. I give my permission for it to be included on the Info-Mac CD-ROM, as long as I am given a copy.
The file "From Erik's Desktop Patterns" is a collection of what I consider the best patterns from the series "Erik's Desktop Patterns" (logically enough). Thanks to Erik Jongert (erjonger@is1.vub.ac.be) for permission to include them. These should be enough to get you started. Although I like desktop patterns, I don't design them; I just write software. If you would like to see a pattern of yours included in the next release, send it to me at the address below.
If you would like to use more patterns, use your favorite info-mac mirror and look in the directory /gui/_Textures/.
My favorite Info-Mac pattern URL is <ftp://mirror.apple.com//mirrors/Info-Mac.Archive/gui/_Textures/>. There are many other places on the net to get them. Have fun.
Contacting Me
You can reach me at
Sterling Augustine
Sterling_Augustine@stanford.edu
Disclaimer
I have several isolated reports of users only able to install black-and-white basic QuickDraw patterns after using PatMan. I cannot reproduce this bug, and I don't know a solution other than to reinstall your system. I'm sorry about this, but I have tried extensively to reproduce it, and I can't. So there is not much more I can do about it. All I can say is: Backup your system file before you use PatMan.
I have received about five reports of this happening. If only one out of twenty users who had the problem reported it, then about one-hundred of PatMan's users have had the problem. PatMan has been downloaded over 1,700 times from AOL, and a similar amount from the Macworld web-site. It is included on at least ten different CD shareware collections and there is no telling how many people have pulled it down from the Info-Mac Archive. It has been localized to Japanese and included in several books Japan. So there are thousands of copies out there. The bug is neither common enough nor serious enough to withdraw PatMan from circulation (as one irate user requested), but be aware that PatMan has damaged a few people's systems. There is a reason for this disclaimer:
The standard disclaimer is appropriate. I use this software every day on my own machine and have tested it on a few others, but it is not extensively tested, so I'm sure that it has bugs. While I would appreciate a bug report, if something Really Badｪ happens to your machine as a result of this software, you alone are fully responsible. Use this software at your own risk.
Version History
1.5.2 - Public Release
Pattern Rotater needed some rework of its preferences and file synchronization.
PPC versions of PatMan now communicate better with Pattern Rotater.
Pattern Rotater now requires 128K to do it's thing. A very tight memory optimization was a little too tight for MacOS 8.
PatMan by default now tries to open Desktop Pictures Prefs on MacOS 8 machines.
A couple of small other changes.
1.5.1 - Public release
Changed Pattern Rotater's filetype from 'APPE' to 'appe'
1.5 - Public release
Pattern Rotater is now smart enough to check for Compressed Patterns
Added Pattern Information Window and Pattern Rotater and associated dialogs.
1.0.2 - Extremely limited beta-release.
Redone pattern installation procedure is much more stable
1.0.1 ﾐ Display squares are exactly 64x64, 128x128, and 256x256
Now possible to hide pattern names
PatMan now sets the desktop pattern in the system file properly on 68K machines
