Wallsaver
Put Your Screen Saver On Your Desktop!
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Download Complete (at no charge ;)
If you have some spare change on you today, consider donating a bit to this project.
Every donation is greatly appreciated and is the most convinient way to contribute to the on-going effort. It also helps motivate the development of future releases & improvements.
The Wallsaver widget now dynamically lists all the Screen Savers installed on your system (no more static lists). It also allows you to check for new versions via AJAX (at your request of course). Full updates in the release notes.
The Wallsaver widget allows you to run the Screen Saver of your choice on your desktop, right behind all your icons. Simply select which Screen Saver you’d like to see from the back of the widget, flip it over and click the large green button on the front. To stop, click the same button which will have turned red.
Main Features
- Lists all your Screen Savers.
- Uses no third party applications.
- Only uses stuff already built into the OS.
- Free!
Things to Note While Wallsaver Is Enabled:
Front Row cannot be activated.- Your normal Screen Saver is disabled.
- Under normal conditions, Screen Savers are invoked when little or no activity is occuring on your computer (i.e., you leave for 10 minutes) and are terminated upon your return. Since the Wallsaver widget allows you to continue working as a Screen Saver is being run, be aware of the implications this can have. But don’t worry; on average, most people will be able to continue to working normally.
FAQ
How do I run a slideshow of an iPhoto or Aperture album on my desktop?
In your System Preferences, select your album of choice and set the Wallsaver to run the “Default” Screen Saver.
How much processing power does this take?
The Wallsaver widget contains no extra applications or plugins and simply runs your regular old Screen Saver on your Desktop. Therefore, it takes the same amount of CPU processing power as the regular Screen Saver does. If you’re concerned or experience abnormal slowness of your system, check the Activity Monitor application located in your Utilities.
Help! I can’t turn off a Wallsaver that I’ve started!
First of all, take a deep breath—your health is more important. Open the Activity Monitor application and quit the process called ScreenSaverEngine. That should do it. A simple log out will also get rid of any rogue Wallsavers that might be running around…or a reboot.
For the power user, a rogue Wallsaver process can be killed manually in the Terminal with the following command as well:
$ killall ScreenSaverEngine
Your widget is tiny! How does it work?
Your Screen Saver is invoked and controlled by an application called ScreenSaverEngine located in a Framework of your System’s Library. By default, this application runs the Screen Saver in the foreground (as you would expect it to). However, if you pass the correct arguments, you can force it to run behind all your icons and applications. This widget is minimalist in the sense that it is simply a wrapper for the following command:
$ /System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/ScreenSaverEngine.app/Contents/MacOS/ScreenSaverEngine -background
Release Notes
Version 1.2 — September 15, 2008
- Dynamically lists all your installed Screen Savers.
- Improved the functionality when checking for new verions.
Version 1.1 — September 12, 2008
- Displays current version on the back.
- Checks for new versions when current version is clicked.
- Removes any saved preferences when removed from Dashboard.
- Reduced size!
Version 1.0 — August 18, 2007
- Initial release
The Wallsaver widget is provided as is and is free for personal use. By downloading the Wallsaver widget, you agree that there is no warranty associated with its functionality or impact it may have on your system.
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