Re: Download Mac Os X Screensavers
Nelson Suggs
A screensaver (or screen saver) is a computer program that blanks the display screen or fills it with moving images or patterns when the computer has been idle for a designated time. The original purpose of screensavers was to prevent phosphor burn-in on CRT or plasma computer monitors (hence the name).[citation needed] Though most modern monitors are not susceptible to this issue (with the notable exception of OLED technology, which has individual pixels vulnerable to burnout), screensaver programs are still used for other purposes. Screensavers are often set up to offer a basic layer of security by requiring a password to re-access the device.[1] Some screensaver programs also use otherwise-idle computer resources to do useful work, such as processing for volunteer computing projects.[2]
While modern screens are not susceptible to the issues discussed above, screensavers are still used. Primarily these are for decorative/entertainment purposes, or for password protection. They usually feature moving images or patterns and sometimes sound effects.
As screensavers are generally expected to activate when users are away from their machines, many screensavers can be configured to ask users for a password before permitting the user to resume work. This is a basic security measure against another person accessing the machine while the user is absent.
Some screensavers activate a useful background task, such as a virus scan or a volunteer computing application (such as the SETI@home project).[4] This allows applications to use resources only when the computer would be otherwise idle. The Ken Burns panning and zooming effect is sometimes used to bring the image to life.
The Atari 400 and 800's screens would also go through random screensaver-like color changes if they were left inactive for about 8 minutes. Normal users had no control over this, though programs did. These computers, released in 1979, are technically earlier "screen savers." Prior to these computers, games for the 1977 Atari VCS/2600 gaming console such as Combat and Breakout, included color cycling in order to prevent burn-in of game images into 1970s-era televisions. In addition, the first model of the TI-30 calculator from 1976 featured a screensaver, which consisted of a decimal point running across the display after 30 seconds of inactivity. This was chiefly used to save battery power, as the TI-30 LED display was more power intensive than later LCD models. These are examples of screensavers in ROM or the firmware of a computer.
Modern graphics technologies such as 3D computer graphics have allowed a wide variety of screensavers to be made. Screensavers with realistic 3D environments can be programmed and run on modern computers.
Screensavers are usually designed and coded using a variety of programming languages as well as graphics interfaces. Typically the authors of screensavers use the C or C++ programming languages, along with Graphics Device Interface (GDI), such as OpenGL ("Open Graphics Library", which works on many, if not most, platforms capable of 3D rendering), or alternatives such as Microsoft DirectX (which is limited to Microsoft platforms, mainly Microsoft Windows and the Microsoft Xbox), to craft their final products. Several OS X screensavers are created and designed using Quartz Composer. The screensaver interfaces indirectly with the operating system to cause the physical display screen to be overlaid with one or more graphic "scenes". The screensaver typically terminates after receiving a message from the operating system that a key has been pressed or the mouse has been moved.
As one of the first screensavers appeared in 8-bit Atari computers, forcing systemic color changes when the computer is idle lasting a few minutes (different times depending on the model), stored in the system ROM of the computer.
Monitors running screensavers consume the same amount of power as when running normally, which can be anywhere from a few watts for small LCD monitors to several hundred for large plasma displays. Most modern computers can be set to switch the monitor into a lower power mode, blanking the screen altogether. A power-saving mode for monitors is usually part of the power management options supported in most modern operating systems, though it must also be supported by the computer hardware and monitor itself.
After Dark was an early screensaver for the Macintosh platform, and later PC/Windows, which prominently featured whimsical designs such as "flying toasters". Perhaps in response to the workplace environment in which they are often viewed, many screensavers continue this legacy of whimsy by populating the idle monitor with animals or fish, games, and visual expressions of mathematics equations (through the use of fractals, Fourier transforms or other means) as in the Electric Sheep screensaver.
At least one screensaver, Johnny Castaway, told a humorous animated story over many months.[16] The ability of screensavers to divert and entertain is used for promotion, especially to build buzz for "event-based" products such as feature films.
The screensaver is also a creative outlet for computer programmers. The Unix-based screensaver XScreenSaver collects the display effects of other Unix screensavers, which are termed "display hacks" in the jargon file tradition of US computer science academics. It also collects forms of computer graphics effects called demo effects, such as were originally produced by the demo scene.
On August 5, 2006, the BBC reported that "free screensavers" and "screensavers" respectively were the first and third most likely search terms to return links to malware, the second being BearShare.[17]
I browsed through the default set of screensavers and the most are ugly, a couple are decent and the only quality ones are Flurry, GLSlideshow, MetaBalls are PopSquares. Where does one find more nice screensavers for Xubuntu? APT repository or xfce-look.org doesn't seem to have it. Or would you recommend running gnome-screensaver instead of xscreensaver? What options are there so that my screen doesn't display rough (not antialiased) visualizations of mathematic obsessions?
Xscreensaver is a dated application and you would not find too many good good looking screensavers for it. I would personally recommend that you use gnome-screensaver. Look here if you have any problems.
Please take note that, for Ubuntu 12.04 and in order to be able to run several screensavers using images from the harddisk (e.g., Carousel, Gleidescope, GLSlideshow, Jigsaw, or XAnalogTV) , I had to install some additional packages.
Setting it to update every 24 hours has not helped. All aerial themes are turned on. I have also checked that I have sufficient storage space (I have fewer downloaded apps now than I did before the factory reset when I had all the screensavers available).
XScreenSaver is a collection of 229 free screensavers for Unix, macOS, iOS and Android. It was created by Jamie Zawinski in 1992 and is still maintained by him. The free software and open source Unix-like operating systems running the X Window System (such as Linux and FreeBSD) use XScreenSaver almost exclusively.[citation needed] On those systems, there are two parts to XScreenSaver: the collection of screen savers, and the framework for blanking and locking the screen.[citation needed] In r...
I have seen the stories about drones and helicopters being used for filming the apple TV screensavers... Yet... something is just a bit odd. One BIG anomaly (for me) is the Golden Gate Bridge... Lovely... BUT... there are NO cones separating traffic visible. No concrete barriers.. yet.. according to wikipedia, since 1968 there were cones to separate traffic, that is changed due to traffic... Since Jan 11,2015 it has a movable concrete barrier... So is this all CGI? a combination? But a bit doubtful that this is real unadulterated video. Also, watch the cars. They behave too well. And the flow is always 3 and 3... not changing depending on traffic times..... I have googled and found several threads in reddit... but they all talk about drones and act as if this is REAL... I suspect it is not... or.. if real then definitely adulterated. I look forward to learning from your comments.
As to which one I was looking at.. -all-the-apple-tv-aerial-video-screensavers#b4-3 is one where NO cones or concrete barriers are visible, all cars are generally behaving.. Nice spacing between cars. Just looks.... odd.
To elaborate on Jon Custer's comment: yes, for protecting the display against burn-in, a black screen would do just as well or better as any "screensaver". However, the graphical effects displayed by screensavers had two important purposes:
Of course, purpose #2 should also not be neglected. Screensavers were simply cute, and often showcased the graphics capabilities of the computer (such as they were, at least). Many people would download and install fancy custom screensavers just to personalize their computer or to show off what it could do.
Computer and OS manufacturers would also use fancy screensavers to showcase their products, particularly since computer stores would often have demo computers running for customers to try out, and naturally those computers would spend a lot of their time idle and showing a screensaver. I'm sure the Flurry screensaver on OSX, for example, got Apple a bunch of sales in the early 2000s just by looking a lot fancier on the store shelf than anything likely to come preinstalled on a Windows box at the time.
A blank screen would have been just as effective for protecting the CRT from the burn-in associated with a static display. However, for a time in the late 80's through 1990's, certain popular screensavers would become highly-recognizable, iconic, imagery cemented in the brains of the by-then-mainstream-computer users.
The commercial After Dark software was a very popular mainstream computer application in this period, with the "Flying Toasters" screensaver probably being the most iconic. Another example was the selection of screensavers included with Microsoft Windows, which could be found running on nearly all office computers for many years in the 1990s.
aa06259810