I am currently flooded with e-mail about Kaleidoscope. Although I do read every message that arrives in my in box, I do not have the time to respond to them all. A quick response might take only a minute or two, but if you multiply that by a hundred messages a day, it can take several hours--hours which I could spend actually improving Kaleidoscope.
What are those plug-in interface modules called?
They are called Color Schemes.
Can users design their own Color Schemes?
At this point, we are not supporting third party color schemes, but that has not stopped many people from creating color schemes of their own. Due to popular demand, we do intend to create an editor, and before then we may release the specifications for the format of the files. However, until we do so, the file format is subject to change, and any color schemes you make may break with future versions of Kaleidoscope. Also, please note that we do not have a color scheme editor of our own--we edit the color schemes by hand with ResEdit--so this is not a matter of us deciding to release a pre-existing editor.
If you insist on making your own color schemes, you must set the “System Heap” bit of all the resources. If you fail to do this, you will get garbled icons, random colors, or crashes. Also, make sure not to leave any extra resources, such as icons, in the color scheme file, as they can conflict with resources used by applications Various problems can crop up with third party color schemes, so if you design your own, be sure to test it thoroughly before releasing it. If your color scheme causes problems, people are invariably going to blame it on Kaleidoscope, not on your color scheme...
Why don't Color Schemes other than “Aaron” have Accent Colors?
First of all, this is NOT a bug or something that has been overlooked. The other color schemes were not desgined with accent colors in mind. It is better to think of this question the other way around: “Why does the Aaron color scheme have accent colors?” Phrased this way, the answer is that accent colors are an added feature of that particular color scheme which we included in order to duplicate all the functionality of the Aaron extension. That said, we hope to provide accent colors for other color schemes, particularly Eclipse, in a future version of Kaleidoscope.
Do users of Aaron or Greg's Buttons get a discount?
Registered users of Aaron or Greg's Buttons can register for the reduced price of $10. To get this discount in the “Register” program, click the “Aaron / Buttons Upgrade” check box. When this box is checked, the prices shown are the upgrade prices. (I hate to mention it, but if you take this discount and are not a registered user of Aaron or Greg's Buttons, we will bill you for the difference.)
Do users of both Aaron and Greg's Buttons get a further discount?
No, we do not offer an additional discount for people who are registered users of both Aaron and Greg's Buttons.
What's the difference between Espy and Espi?
Espy is a bitmap screen font that Apple uses with the Newton, eWorld, and AppleGuide. Espi looks essentially the same, but I have tweaked it and improved the spacing to make it work better as a system font. So, if you want to make Espy your system font, you should use my version of Espi instead. The same goes for Tekton (an Adobe font) and Tecton (my tweaked version).
Why do some dialog boxes have red backgrounds?
These dialog boxes are actually Alerts. Alerts are dialog boxes with an icon (stop, caution, note) at the top left corner and usually “OK” and “Cancel” buttons on the bottom right. Alerts require immediate attention, and so they are given red highlights to help them stand out. In the “Aaron” color scheme, alerts have just a red tinged border. In the other color schemes, alerts have red backgrounds.
Should the Eclipse scroll bar track change color when scrolling?
Yes, the scroll bar track is supposed to turn red in Eclipse. This is a feature, not a bug. Isn't it cool?
Why can't I use Kaleidoscope's Balloon Help?
If ATM is running, turning on Balloon Help for the Kaleidoscope control panels causes the Finder to freeze or restart. There do not appear to be any other conflicts with ATM, so you should not have a problem as long as you do not use Kaleidoscope's Balloon Help. If you simply must have the Balloon Help, change the load order so that ATM loads before Kaleidoscope. ATM 4.0 does not appear to have this problem. I am working on a fix for this.
Will there be other Color Schemes?
We are working on several additional color schemes which will appear with future versions of Kaleidoscope.
