Please read this entire document — believe it or not, it might just help you! I know Mac users hate manuals, but please read this one. It can’t hurt!
Requirements
Aurora needs System 4.1 or above and works with all varients of System 7 (including 7.5 and 7.5.1). In reality, I haven’t (lately) tried Aurora with anything before Sys 6.0.7 (simply because I can’t get a hold of any of those systems!), but there’s really no reason why it shouldn’t work. If you try it and it doesn’t, let me know and I’ll try and deal with it. For now, I might politely suggest upgrading to Sys 7.5.
I’ve run Aurora on my Mac IIcx and a my PowerMac 6100. It runs great on both, but its not PowerMac native -- there’s truly no need for the little that it does, and it's fast enough already!
What is Aurora 3.1?
Aurora is a cdev (Control Panel device) that sits in your System Folder. With it, you have full control over the colors used to draw your windows, buttons, scroll bars, and menus. Ever wanted a mauve menu bar? No problem! Ever wanted puce scroll bars? Now’s your chance! It’s also very easy to do — as simple as choosing colors from the standard Apple color wheel — and you’re off to colorizing (and personalizing!) your desktop.
Aurora is not an INIT (system extension). It does not load at boot time, and if you remove it from your System Folder, it will still work. Later, I'll go into how to "de-install" Aurora.
Installation
It's simple. Just drop it in your System Folder. If you are using Sys7, you will be asked if Aurora should be placed in the Control Panels folder. Click OK. Have fun!
How to Use Aurora
When you open Aurora, you will see three main buttons. Click the button corresponding to what you’d like to change: “Change Window Colors” for windows; “Change Control Colors” for controls (buttons, scroll bars); and “Change Menu Colors” for menus. I told you it was easy!
If you try to open Aurora with your monitor set to 2 colors, Aurora will beep and gray out the Control Panel window (or refuse to open if running Sys 7.X). Just change your screen depth (preferably to 256 colors) and re-open it.
An Example of Use
Let’s say you want to change the title of your windows to a dark blue (as I have mine). Click the “Change Window Colors” button and you are presented with a dialog full of buttons. There is also a picture of a standard window, colored appropriately, on the right. The window is originally drawn with the current system settings and is updated as you make changes. The buttons on the left allow you to change the colors of the different parts: title bar, frame, content, title highlight and title bar text color (for a detailed explanation of these buttons, see below). We want to change the title bar text, so click that button. Up comes the color picker wheel, pick out a nice blue, and click OK. Notice that the title of the window on the right is now the color you picked.
Click in the drawing of the window to save your changes, and with the next application you open (Sys 6.X), the title of all windows will be blue! These same steps work for both menus and controls. Under Sys 7.X, the colors will immediately propagate to all currently open applications.
Sys7 Note: The process is the same for picking colors, only the colors you are allowed to change are different. Some, like frame, content, and title bar text, are the same, but new attributes, dealing with tinges, are also available for modification. Others, like title bar color, are not changeable as they are under System 6. For a full description of what colors can be changed, see below.
Other Fun Features
Save reminders
If you try to exit Aurora (choose another cdev or close the Control Panel) and you have not saved your changes, you will be presented with a dialog that allows you to save them. This makes sure you don’t lose any of your changes because you forget to save them. Turning off the computer, however, will not prompt this message - but we all use Shut Down, right?
Revert to black and white
The normal black and white colors are restored. These are always present as an option because they are stored in the cdev where no one can fiddle with them. This is how you would "de-install" Aurora.
Sys7 Note: Under Sys7, this button is called Revert To Original. This will restore the original colors (grayscale shading, etc.) not a true black and white. I decided that the shading Apple provides looks much nicer than the old-style black and white so there is no way to get those colors under Sys7. Menus are still black and white, since that is Apple's default.
Revert to System colors
Sort of an Undo feature. It restores the colors from the time you opened the cdev, regardless of how many times you have saved new colors.
Consolidate [Sys7 only]
This feature, available in the window and control color selection dialogs, allows you to copy the tinge colors between the windows and controls for a more unified look. If the tinge colors are the same, the scroll bars blend in better with the windows they are in. Clicking this brings up a dialog with two buttons: Controls->Windows and Windows->Controls. The button you pick decides the direction that the tinge colors are copied (source—>destination). You cannot explicitly undo this command, but you can use the Revert to System Colors button and start over.
Revert To Saved & Save Into Cdev
If you have more than one System file (at home and at work, or multiple boot floppies), synchronizing colors between them might seem difficult. However, Aurora provides a feature that allows you to save the color set you are currently using in the cdev and to load this color set at a later time (even on a different machine) as long as you use the same copy of Aurora. This feature is also useful when your System file becomes corrupted and you get a fresh (uncolored) copy from the installation disks.
In the save dialog, there is a check box labeled "Save colors into cdev” at the bottom that is normally un-checked (no ‘x’ in it). If you want to save the colors into the cdev, check this box. No matter what, however, the colors will always be saved into the System file. There is no way to save only to the cdev. Sorry. Aurora can keep track of one set each of control, menu, and window colors, but you must do each individually. Clicking the checkbox only saves whatever colors you are saving into the system file, not any of the others.
To get the colors back, use the "Revert to Saved" button in the color selection dialog. This will replace the current colors with those saved in the cdev.
In the next version of Aurora, you will be able to save and restore multiple color sets. Now I just need to find some time to do it!
Important Interface Notes
This works by replacing the ‘wctb’, ‘cctb’, and ‘mctb’ ID = 0 resources in the current System file. That means that different Systems can have different window, control, and menu colors. Also, if you use the Installer to update your system version, your colors should remain intact as the Installer does not (normally) touch these resources. I’ve kept the same colors going from 7.0 to 7.1 to 7.5 and even to 7.5.1!!
When you change the window/control/menu colors, the current application (or, if under MultiFinder, all OPEN applications) will change only under certain circumstances: If window or control colors were present before, they will be updated in all open applications without rebooting. If no previous colors existed (i.e. you've never run Aurora or Kolor before), or if you are changing the menu colors, you must RESTART or open a NEW application to get the new colors, and then only the new application will have the new colors. Even though the changes may not be visible on the screen they are saved in the System file.
For better looking (and faster) screen updates, keep the window background color white. Some applications (such as the Finder and Microsoft Word) don’t like the background color to be anything but white — so they EXPLICITLY paint it that way. This means that whatever color you pick for the background color WILL BE PAINTED OVER WITH WHITE! This is NOT a bug in my program!!! The application calls the shots, not the cdev (isn’t that how it should be?).
If you don’t want the title bar to be inverted (black on white) when you switch to 2 colors, keep the Title Bar Color either white or a light color. Some people might think an inverted title bar is neat - to each his own....
If the window was not designed to be color (by the actual programmer), the control colors will act funny: The frame color will be matched to the closest ORIGINAL color (red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, yellow, black, white) no matter what you tell it to be. The text color, body color, and thumb color (for scroll bars) will also behave the same way. This is a limitation of the Macintosh - not of my program. If a window is created to take advantage of color (such as some in Word 5.0 and the Control Panel), everything will work as specified.
Try to stick as closely as possible to the normal menu colors. Keeping all item and menu names black makes for easier reading. Also try to keep the menu background color as light as possible for easier reading of the items. Menus are made to be used, and even though they may look nice, if you can’t read them, they’re useless.
When using System 7, try to keep the tinge colors the same for windows and controls (see Consolidate above). It looks better, IMHO.
Control Parts
Frame Color : Outside border of the control.
Body Color: Shading of the scroll bar when it is active
Text Color : Text color for check boxes and radio buttons.
Thumb Color [Sys 6 only] : Controls the color of the scroll bar thumb.
ScrollBar Light [Sys7 only] : Arrow colors in scroll bar.
Tinge Light/Dark [Sys7 only] : Determines highlights for arrows and scroll bar thumb.
Window Parts
Content Color : Everything but the title bar and border — the guts of the window. Some applications explicitly paint this white. 8-(
Frame Color : Outside border of the window.
Title Bar Text Color : Text color of the title of the window.
Title Bar Hilite Color [Sys 6 only] : Color of the horizontal lines in the title bar.
Title Bar Color [Sys 6 only] : Name says it all.
Tinge Color [Sys 7 only] : Determines highlights for close/zoom boxes and the grow box. Also mixes with the border of the title bar.
Menu Parts
Menu Title Color : Color of menu titles, of course.
Menu Background Color : Color of background when menu is pulled down.
Menu Item Color : Color of the individual menu items when menu is pulled down.
Menu Bar Color : Guess.
What’s New Since 3.0 and 3.1?
This (for now) is mainly a performance release. Aurora now saves colors into the System file 30 times faster than 3.0 (this is on my IIcx). I’ve also cleaned up a lot of the code and added a lot of error handling and checking for things going wrong.
3.2 is mainly a port from MPW to CodeWarrior. This should make further upgrades faster.
What's In Store For Future Versions?
There's a huge "wish-list" that I have for Aurora, but my busy schedule keeps me from doing it all! Some of the major items on it include (in no particular order) :
• Full balloon help for all the dialogs and buttons
• Reorganization of the dialogs to make it easier to use and figure out what colors go
with which parts.
• Ability to save multiple color sets for windows, menus, buttons.
With Copland a year away, I think Aurora has a good amount of life left, especially on 68K based machines who won't be able to run Copland. I'll continue to upgrade it as long as peopple tell me that they like it.
Bugs?
Aurora seems pretty bug free when I use it - it has yet to crash on me. This program has been evolving for 5 years now, so it should be pretty stable.
There is one bug that I discovered just recently involving Greg's Buttons. If you have the "Substitute System Font" feature on, the window in the Change Window Colors dialog will not draw correctly some of the time. If this happens to you, just turn off the "Substitute System Font" feature while Aurora's Control Panel is open. During normal use, there is no conflict between the two. I've contacted Greg Landweber and if we can figure it out, we'll release the appropriate patches.
Thank You’s
I want to thank all the people who tested my earlier cdevs. I would have been lost without you. There are too many to list here, but I know who you are!
SHAREWARE NOTICE (I thought that would get your attention)
This program is now sort of Shareware. This means that I’m charging for it and I retain all the rights to the program and its documentation, but the idea behind Shareware sets out to make people feel guilty about not paying for software - almost a “Big Brother Is Watching You” type of deal - I don’t want to do this to people! I want people to feel good about using my software!
I have spent a lot of time and effort on this so if you like it (or anything else with my name on it for that fact), I’d appreciate it if you sent me what you think it is worth - a better name would be Pay-If-You-Use-It-Ware. The only reason 3.2 came out (and I keep toying with this damn computer) was because a good number of people sent checks (usually about $15) and ideas to me!!
Mike Pinkerton
2136 Owls Cove Ln
Reston, VA 22091
INTERNET: pinkerton@UCSD.edu
The StuffIt file on here is for distributing these files anywhere you please
under the following conditions:
1. This document accompanies ANY OR ALL files
2. My name is not removed from any program IN ANY WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM
3. The code is not changed, fiddled with, or eaten.
4. You tell me how you like it and how well it works.
5. You MAY decompile this cdev to see how it works, but you may not alter the code or any of the resources. You learn a lot that way.
6. You may include this in a book or CD-ROM containing other Shareware, but let me know if you do! I'm always interested to see the different places Aurora is popping up!
