Apart from the basic functionality present in Aqua Icons, Flying Icons has some additional features. It allows you to select a folder or an IconFactory iContainer as a source of icons. In fact, for optimum performance and utility, use of an iContainer is recommended (because of less disk activity). It also features some more advanced options, that allow you to modify how the icons behave. The maximum number of icons is 100 (in Aqua Icons it was set to 30). In addition, Flying Icons can run on two screens simultaneously. Aqua Icons only supported one screen. Of course, many of these options come with performance penalties, but should run within a few percent CPU on recent high end desktops and portables (it was developed on a PowerBook G4).

Version changes (detailed)

System Requirements

Flying Icons should run on any machine capable of running Mac OS X, but OpenGL acceleration is practically a must! That may disqualify ATI RAGE II+, IIc, Pro, Pro Turbo, LT Pro and Mobility users. Those users should expect a framerate of <10 frames per second, due to the fact that the software renderer is used. If your machine becomes slow when using Flying Icons, try selecting a folder or iContainer with few icons in it, and choose to show only 10 icons on screen at a time.

As for what operating system it requires...It has only been tested on Mac OS X 10.2.4, but it is likely that it will run on any 10.2. It is also very possible that it will run on Mac OS X 10.1 as well. If you know for sure wether it works on 10.1 / 10.0, drop me a note!

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: I want to make the screensaver look as much as Aqua Icons as possible. What settings do you suggest?

A: A: The default settings should be close enough. You can restore the default settings using the button at the lower left of the Configuration dialog.

Q: Flying Icons runs too slowly on my machine. What can I do to make it faster?

Reduce the quality of the rendering.
Reduce the number of icons.
Decrease the size of the icons.
Select an iContainer as the source of icons, preferably one with fewer icons in it than the number of simultaneous icons selected. A Folder will work too, but not as well.

Q: Just when the screen saver is starting, or when I view the Preview, there is a significant delay. Why?

A: When using "All applications" as the source for icons, the program generates a list of all applications on your computer when it starts. This can take several seconds, and System Preferences or the screen saver will be unresponsive during this time. If you want to reduce the delay, select a folder or an iContainer set as the icon source. Simply setting the Applications folder as the icon source will also reduce the delay, since no other locations on your harddrive will then be scanned for applications.

Q: Is the source available?

A: No, not this time. If you want to know something in particular, feel free to ask!

Q: I want to donate less / more than what the suggested donation is. Is that OK?

A: Yes, you may donate as much or as little as you want (though less than $3 will mostly be eaten up by PayPal fees).

Q: How come Aqua Icons doesn't work in Mac OS X 10.2?

A: I don't know why Apple removed Aqua Icons from Jaguar. It is possible to extract a previous version from an old system, but there is one minor bug which prevents any icons from showing. By creating a category on NSImage (Cocoa tech-speak), you can make the issue go away. But Aqua Icons is actually inferior to Flying Icons on most counts.

Q: Flying Icons does not work on my machine!

A: Use Apple System Profiler to generate a description of your computer, and email it to me. Also, if the screensaver or System Preferences crash, check to see if you have any crash reports for either ScreenSaverEngine or System Preferences in the following location: Home -> Library -> Logs -> CrashReporter Send those to me too, and I'll see what can be done.

Q: Can you port Flying Icons to another platform?

A: In principle, it could be ported to Linux with some OpenGL library and GnuStep without too much trouble. If you want to do the work, contact me for more information. If I for some reason feel motivated, I may do it myself in the future. I will not port Flying Icons to Windows or Mac OS 9. Both are dead systems to me.

Q: I want to have more icons on the screen at the same time!

A: You can edit the preference file manually. It is located at ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.ittpoi.flyingicons..plist. Actually, Flying Icons will operate with a reasonable frame rate at up to one or two thousand icons. It would work at 5000 icons and more, if I remade the z-layer sorting algorithm. The one currently used (NSArray/qsort) is too slow on a large set of icons. The reason I haven't bothered, is that the screensaver doesn't look that good with > 100 icons anyway, IMHO. YMMV. Note that the preference file will reset to the values in the GUI if you click OK in the preference dialog (even if you didn't change it explicitly). You can modify Config.nib in Interface Builder to be able to control a huge number of icons from the real GUI (in fact, this method worked in the original Aqua Icons as well, where the maximum was set to 30 icons :-).

Q: I would like to localize Flying Icons into my native language.

A: Sure, go ahead! If you have the Developer Tools from Apple installed, you should be set to go! Remember to localize everything in the English.lproj folder in the application bundle. Send your modifications to me, and I will incorporate them as soon as possible. If you want, also translate the ReadMe.

Introduction