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Author Superdrop - anyone using this System 7 feature? (Read 9133 times)
Bolkonskij
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on: August 29, 2022, 08:53

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This is a little trick you can do in the Finder under System 7.  I call it "Superdrop."

In order for this to work you have to first turn on the "Always snap to grid" option in the Views control panel.  Do that now if it's not already on.

Now take a look at the four icons provided.  Each one depicts a small button, and if you look at the buttons carefully, you'll notice that they are placed in 4 positions relative to the overall icon grid:  Upper left, upper right, lower left, and lower right.  Each of these custom icons is pasted onto an ordinary folder.  You can double-click one of them to see this.

Now, click on the "button" in the icon called "Folder 2", and begin to drag it.  Drag it over to the general vicinity of the "Folder 1" icon, but don't drop it yet.  Notice that when the tip of your cursor is touching the "Folder 1" button, the button becomes dark.  If you were to let go right now, Folder 2 would be placed inside Folder 1.  This is not what you want to do.  Instead, move your cursor so that it is just slightly to the right of the Folder 1 button, like this:

http://revontulet.org/2022/08/29/superdrop1.jpg

Now you can let go.

Hopefully, you'll now see the two little buttons sitting neatly next to each other.  If you only see one button, it means that you dropped Folder 2 into Folder 1, and you have to double-click Folder 1 to get it out. 

Now do the same with the other two button icons.  Drop them onto the Folder 1 / Folder 2 conglomerate, but make sure they don't actually go inside the folders.

With any luck, you now have what appears to be a single large icon comprised of 4 little buttons arranged in a square like this:

http://revontulet.org/2022/08/29/superdrop2.jpg

This is a Superdrop.

If the usefulness of this is not readily apparent, read on. 

Now click on any file or folder you have hanging around on your hard disk, and drag it over to the Superdrop.  As your cursor passes over each little button, the button will darken and the name of the Superdrop will appear to change to the name of that particular folder.  What you have here is four folders, all fully accessible, yet consuming the space of only one icon.  Isn't the Mac wonderful?

Enterprising souls will soon realize the potential for making Superdrops out of application aliases, for quick launching or drag-and-drop convenience. 

In any case, it's something I really like, and I you do too.  But don't thank me.  Thank Apple.


I wonder how many such "superdrops" one can concatenate and how intuitive that'd end up being :-)

Anyone been using that in the past? Sounds like something very useful with few screen 'real estate' aka on the compact Macs like the SE, SE/30, Plus.
Last Edit: August 29, 2022, 08:56 by Bolkonskij
cballero
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Reply #1 on: August 29, 2022, 13:46

I've seen (and used) one set of little tools that binned and unbinned and un hexxed hqx files and it used a superdrop icon scheme.. it was the coolest thing! :D

After years, I think I misplaced those cool little archiving and unarchiving tools that worked their icon magic and allowed me to unbin and unhex a ton of downloaded share and freeware :(

there may have been up to six or eight of them too for other less used, at least by me, archival functions! :o
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Reply #2 on: August 30, 2022, 23:02

Aha! It took me a while to understand what this was about so perhaps some further explanation may be useful.

It's about creating and using a custom set of icons, and has nothing to do with conventional buttons.

The Snap to grid function means that all icons in close proximity get snapped to the same grid position. Normally, lots of icons sitting on top of each other is unhelpful!

However, if your custom icon has some transparency, you can see through to the other icons that may be below it.
So if you created say 2 icons, one with the bottom half transparent, and the other with the top half transparent, you can see both of them (and access either of them) when they're in the same position.

I guess in theory, with a 32*32 icon, you could have 1024 items all accessible via a single pixel each.

It's an innovative idea to save screen space. The trade off is the increased mouse precision requirement.

Actually, I wonder if you could use an Applescript for positioning instead of having to turn on Snap to grid...something like...

select "item 1"
set position of selection to {10, 10}
select "item 2"
set position of selection to {10, 10}
etc.

Not sure I'll be using it myself though, when my icons get a bit crowded, I just switch to small ones, or use List view for files of the same type.ˇ
cballero
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Reply #3 on: August 31, 2022, 02:56

I know, right? :)

I loved how simple those tiles were, they were small and grey with the first letter telling you what each one did. I might have added aliases of my favorite archiving tools to the frey to make the ultimate stack of mini icon groups! ;)

Now that was a fun multi-function set of tools, simple and oh so much Mac fun to use, especially via drag-and-drop since each section would highlight both the square and each letter! :D
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Reply #4 on: September 01, 2022, 21:22

Too picky & tricky for my taste. You drop your file on the wrong icon pixel and all hell might break loose.

But to each his own.
Bolkonskij
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Reply #5 on: September 02, 2022, 08:28

Yeah, definitely nothing for people who drink too much coffeine / with shaky hands and stellar resolutions :-D

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But to each his own.
Thin ice, my friend, thin ice :-D
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