Mac OS X Hacks

Prying the Chrome Off Cocoa Applications

Metallifizer paints and strips the brushed-metal appearance of any Cocoa application.

There are two types of Mac users: those who find the brushed-metal look-and-feel of iTunes, Address Book, iChat, and the like just plain fab and those who wonder what some of these app designers are thinking with all this futuristic nonsense. Thank heavens for Metallifizer (http://www.unsanity.com/download.php?product=metallifizer) (freeware), another terrific haxie from the folks at Unsanity. Give any Cocoa application that brushed-metal appearance if you’re so inclined. Or pry the default chrome right off that otherwise-favorite app.

Tip

Perhaps a quick recap of the three Mac OS X application types is in order. Classic refers to applications built pre-Mac OS X; these run in Classic mode, effectively a Mac OS 9 emulator. Carbon applications have been modified to run under both Mac OS X and Mac OS 9; examples include: iMovie, Internet Explorer, QuickTime, and iTunes. Cocoa applications — like iChat, iPhoto, and the Address Book — are built specifically for Mac OS X. Metallifizer works only on the last category of applications.

Installation

Metallifizer is a module for Unsanity’s Application Enhancer (APE) haxie (http://www.haxies.com/ape/). You’ll need to download and install it before you can use Metallifizer. Figure 4-47 shows the APE preference pane.

Figure 4-47. The APE preference pane

With APE installed, download and install Metallifizer by dragging ...