Flash on the Desktop

Monday, May 3, 2004 by ByteDreams | Discussion: WinCustomize Talk

I recently read about a new product called SWF Destop ( http://www.screentime.com/ ) so I'm wondering if anyone here is or has used that program. It's $199! for a single user, which is very high in my book. Does anyone know of similar apps/components like this that are comparable?
Hus
Reply #1 Monday, May 3, 2004 6:29 PM
You can use DesktopX to load flash files directly on the desktop, and it will do it for $20. Alternatively, there are already DesktopX objects that do all of the things shown in the examples for SWF Desktop.

http://www.desktopx.net
zybi
Reply #2 Monday, May 3, 2004 7:10 PM
javascript:smilie('')
Frogboy
Reply #3 Monday, May 3, 2004 8:38 PM

Where did you read about this?

I just downloaded it, I can't get it to work though. The sample directory is wrong (it points to documents) but even when I compiled their samples nothing happened when I tried to "apply" them.

As far as I can tell it can't even do as much as DesktopX can do which is only $20.

MarkMcQ
Reply #4 Tuesday, May 4, 2004 5:19 PM
Seems like robbery charging 200 for a prog which, from the way they describe it on that site, can be done for free using active desktop.
Essencay
Reply #5 Tuesday, May 4, 2004 5:37 PM
Appears to me to be more of a corporate marketing/advertising vehicle vs. an end-user product to customize your desktop. Probably the reason for the pricetag Though examples of the end product, screensavers, albeit advertising is free http://www.screentime.com/newweb/gal_showcase.html
paxx
Reply #6 Wednesday, May 5, 2004 8:36 AM
It's actually a neat product.  And it can't be compared with the $20 version of Desktop X, as it's a tool to generate standalone EXE files that will install a SWF (Flash) file in the wallpaper list of the Display Properties. A user would not need to install SWF Desktop to use the thus created Flash background. So, if anything, it would be comparable to Desktop X Pro ($500). As Essencay said, it's a corporate marketing vehicle more than a end-user product. I just gave it a try, and I find it very cool. Of course it doesn't have all the possibility of Desktop X, but nevertheless can be quite powerful. And since it's in Flash, the desktop can be in vector format, thus adjusting to every resoution/size without quality loss.
paxx
Reply #7 Wednesday, May 5, 2004 8:54 AM
OK, I just tried it with a Flash file I just finished. The one bummer I found is that it doesn't support Actionscript 2.0 yet (released with Flash 7). It will probably come.

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