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As some of you may know Leopard has thrown a curve ball to Mac theming. Shapeshifter the premiere theming application in Tiger and below hasn't materialized for Leopard yet. So far we are stuck with manually replacing system and application resource files. For basic stuff this works but for more advanced stuff like dark themes it doesn't really work. It's better than nothing while we wait for the perfect theme app to appear right? There's one thing I take a major exception to however. This comment from macthemes:
"There's the newly-appearing apps for theming, but they'll still require you to confirm changes to sysfiles because that's how a proper secure OS works."
So far a few theme changing applications from hobbyists are coming out which pretty much just automate the replacing of resource files on the hard drive. This may work but one is deluding themselves if they think it's either proper or secure. A proper secure OS should not require for you to replace theme resources in system files. I'm sorry to say this to fellow Mac users but this is where Linux and even windows has it right at least for the time being.
I think a problem here is that previously on Tiger and below the proper way for theming the OS; Shapeshifter was encumbered by it not being free. I did pay for my copy and with all the hard work they did I believed they deserved a reward. Even more so on Leopard when a proper theming tool comes out. However some people always go for the free option even if it's less than ideal because to them free is always better. Plus some people got in their heads that APE was bad even though it didn't require for you to physically change files on the hard drive and you could disable it for one or all applications. Unsanity wrote it with proper functions and security in mind.. despite what some may say.
Anyway.. the point here is that the state of theming in Leopard right now isn't either proper or secure. It's a messy dirty, kludgy hack at best. Sure it's fun if you don't mind putting in the time and effort for the hacking. I do it.. because there's no other choice. But come on! Komisar at macthemes said he and others are working on a theming application that will do what Shapeshifter and Themepark did and more. I hope that means it's the proper theming application that we all should be waiting for.
"There's the newly-appearing apps for theming, but they'll still require you to confirm changes to sysfiles because that's how a proper secure OS works."
So far a few theme changing applications from hobbyists are coming out which pretty much just automate the replacing of resource files on the hard drive. This may work but one is deluding themselves if they think it's either proper or secure. A proper secure OS should not require for you to replace theme resources in system files. I'm sorry to say this to fellow Mac users but this is where Linux and even windows has it right at least for the time being.
I think a problem here is that previously on Tiger and below the proper way for theming the OS; Shapeshifter was encumbered by it not being free. I did pay for my copy and with all the hard work they did I believed they deserved a reward. Even more so on Leopard when a proper theming tool comes out. However some people always go for the free option even if it's less than ideal because to them free is always better. Plus some people got in their heads that APE was bad even though it didn't require for you to physically change files on the hard drive and you could disable it for one or all applications. Unsanity wrote it with proper functions and security in mind.. despite what some may say.
Anyway.. the point here is that the state of theming in Leopard right now isn't either proper or secure. It's a messy dirty, kludgy hack at best. Sure it's fun if you don't mind putting in the time and effort for the hacking. I do it.. because there's no other choice. But come on! Komisar at macthemes said he and others are working on a theming application that will do what Shapeshifter and Themepark did and more. I hope that means it's the proper theming application that we all should be waiting for.
