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DBAlex

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 4, 2006
111
4
Hey, In a lot of Mac screenshots ive seen people who have iTunes displaying track info on there desktop like this:

mynewmacbykoltp3.jpg


How do they do that?

Is it a plugin for itunes or an external app?

Thanks for any help! :)
 
Mitthrawnuruodo:

Thanks, But im after whats in the screenshot!

Do you happen to know what that is?

Uploaded the screenshot to imageshack for now...
 
DBAlex said:
Mitthrawnuruodo:

Thanks, But im after whats in the screenshot!

Do you happen to know what that is?

Uploaded the screenshot to imageshack for now...
Well, now I see the image... the image (which was just a dead link) wasn't working when I posted above, so I just provided a link to what I use... :)
 
MenuTunes will also display it, although not for the entire length of the song, and I don't think it can put it on the desktop window. You can, however, set a hotkey to show the info.
 
I use "you control tunes". It has loads of customiseable features, and allows you to have different things pop up when a song starts. (I have it set so that it shows exactly what you have in the screenshot- artwork, album etc)

When you download it, you need to register, but it's free,
 
have there been any apps that have the type of float shown inthe screenshot but also have controls on the float to control iTunes playback? Synergy and sizzling keys if i remember correctly, both have the float, but the controls are located in the menubar. I'd like to stay away from using 2 apps to do the trick (ie. don't use a app for the float, and use a separate app to place buttons on the desktop)
 
Synergy - track info on the desktop

You can get the floater to stay on the desktop. From the Synergy website:

-----------------------------------
Floater on the desktop

This was implemented in version 1.3 (September 2004):

New "power user" feature (accessible from command-line), display floater on desktop.

To activate, enter "defaults write org.wincent.Synergy desktopFloater -bool true" in the Terminal and restart Synergy.

To deactivate, enter "defaults write org.wincent.Synergy desktopFloater -bool false".

Due to lack of space in the preferences user interface I made this a command-line only customization.

-----------------------------------

Here's the link:

http://wincent.com/a/support/forums/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=982&an=0&page=0#982
 
gauchogolfer said:
I use iTunesBar, another Konfabulator widget, to display iTunes info on the desktop. It has controls as well, and looks like this:

picture2sq0.png

I know it's off topic, but what weather widget are you using? I've seen it before but never asked because I only recently started using the Yahoo! widget engine myself...
 
j3tang said:
have there been any apps that have the type of float shown inthe screenshot but also have controls on the float to control iTunes playback? Synergy and sizzling keys if i remember correctly, both have the float, but the controls are located in the menubar. I'd like to stay away from using 2 apps to do the trick (ie. don't use a app for the float, and use a separate app to place buttons on the desktop)

SizzlingKeys offers keyboard shortcuts to control iTunes. I would guess that Synergy might do the same.
 
There is a simple version of this kind of thing already in iTunes if you click on the green 'traffic light' at the top left.
 
That's a pretty slick Adium skin for the contact list.

Think I'll give it a try once again. I've been using the official MSN Messenger 5.11 client instead of it.
 
kingjr3 said:
SizzlingKeys offers keyboard shortcuts to control iTunes. I would guess that Synergy might do the same.

calculus said:
There is a simple version of this kind of thing already in iTunes if you click on the green 'traffic light' at the top left.

thanks for both replies, SizzlingKeys does have shortcut keys, but i was hoping the floater would have those buttons built into it. I'm aware of the green traffic light .. but it's not quite what i'm looking for.

I'd like to have the floater that's got the album artwork and title with buttons.
 
j3tang said:
thanks for both replies, SizzlingKeys does have shortcut keys, but i was hoping the floater would have those buttons built into it. I'm aware of the green traffic light .. but it's not quite what i'm looking for.

I'd like to have the floater that's got the album artwork and title with buttons.

I don't know of a floater that looks like what you get with Synergy or SizzlingKeys that has the controls on there... but iTunes Bar in the Yahoo Widget Engine can be setup similar:

itunesbar.jpg


It has the controls, scrolls the name, and shows the album art. You can configure it all to where it scrolls the song info or not, how big the album art is, etc
 
This is some sick stuff guys. Got me all working on making my osx look sassy! I dled the weather widget, but the extension is .widget? How do install that? lol
 
n8236 said:
This is some sick stuff guys. Got me all working on making my osx look sassy! I dled the weather widget, but the extension is .widget? How do install that? lol
Did you also download and install the Yahoo Widget Engine...? :)

Then you can place the widget anywhere (I've made myself a folder called - wait for it - Widgets in my home folder) and just start it by double-clicking the widget or use the Open Widget... function in Yahoo widget engine.
 
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