• a system-friendly, human-friendly colloquial clock •
Featured in AMUG BBS-in-a-BOX, MF51, German MacMagazines and lots of other places already!
What is Does:
Displays the time in a human-friendly format in a tiny, unobtrusive window which hugs the bottom-right corner of the screen (even if you change screen resolutions!)
How you say Colloque:
"Coll - lok" or "ker - lock" with the emphasis on the second syllable.
To use it:
• Copy the application to your hard drive (I recommend you drop it in your 'Startup Items' folder in your System folder) and double-click to run.
• Drag the window whereever you want it and leave it there.
• Unfortunately no preferences are remembered (the price you pay for such a tiny app). If people ask, I'll make other auto-positioning options available.
NB. If you find that there is a beep whenever you start up, try putting just an alias of Colloque in your Startup Items folder and leaving the original somewhere else. I don't know why the beep happens or doesn't happen but that's how to stop it.
What it needs:
• Mac System 7 or later on a 68020 processor or better.
(Not Mac Pluses. Sorry! I could do a special version for them, if asked nicely enough.)
• Any size of screen! (from version 3)
Hacker's Guide:
I store all of the text in resources so Colloque can be easily modified/internationalised. Just look in the Str# resources with ResEdit and hack around. Please leave everything else alone and don't distribute you modified versions.
Window colours can be changed as well, but no longer can you change the position of the window — it's done automatically. The text colour can't be changed either. If someone asks, I'll make this hackable in version 4.
-- Email me if you want to know more.
What's so good about it:
Disk space: < 9K
Working RAM: < 28K
It doesn't hog system resources (disk space, memory, screen space and processor time) and best of all: IT'S FREE!
Future Development:
Colloque has a long way to go. I revise it when I receive feedback from users and when I want a change myself, so better ones will be out — probably by the time you read this. Please contact me at the addresses below for the latest version.
Things that will be included in future versions are:
• other rounding options
• speak time (using PlainTalk TTS)
• more interesting approximation text
Please write and tell me what you want to see in the next version!
I do not guarantee that Colloque is free of faults and cannot be held responsible for any loss of data or problems incurred due to the use or inability to use Colloque. Please report any bugs to me.
Author Info:
I'm just beginning to get into proper Macintosh programming having spent years writing educational software in HyperCard and SuperCard. Look out for my big educational projects as they are still developing -
Journeys, -- create your own educational role-play games
The Hajj, -- a movement simulator for Religious Education
Book, Chapter & Verse -- teaching people to use the Bible
World Religions QuizBase
and some of the other utility software I've produced:
FontGuide -- automatic type sample sheets (1500 downloads in it's first 2 months)
Metronome
and there's lots more exciting shareware and freeware available where this came from.
In real life I'm an 18 year old Scottish High School student, in my last year before I start a Computer Science course at Uni - hopefully Cambridge. Sometimes I have a web site address - when free trials on ISPs permit, but you should be able to contact me at my email address below most of the time. If you like Colloque and want to contribute to the starving students' fund, feel free to send even 1 or 2 pounds, dollars or equivalent to the snail-mail address below. Postcards are most gratefully received and I may manage to send one back if you give me your address!
• 1 April 15:00 alternative version including minutes TO the hour and quarters. File size up 22 bytes!
• 21 April 23:24
-- window updates properly (whole window at a time, not just bits)
-- it now resizes itself (makes it more localisation-friendly)
-- colours changed (more red/blue)
-- stability improved (took out silly extras in the about box)
-- file size reduced (took out some code & resources)
• 7 May 22:00
-- time updates more frequently (30 seconds not 1 minute) so time is more accurate
— at last, colloque hugs the bottom-right corner of the screen. If this is a problem, I can make versions which hug other corners/areas, but I like it there. Thanks to Apple’s Toolbox Assistant CD for helping me work this one out!
— fixed a bug which made the system go berserk due to a line of code being out of place!
