Mike Swope In the early days of the Macintosh, to change your icons, you either copied icons from somewhere else and pasted these new icons on top of the old ones in the Get Info dialogue box, or made a copy of your System file and used Apple's ResEdit (Resource Editor) to make the change effective system wide. The difficulties with the copy-and-paste method is that you can only change one icon at a time, and the changes have to be done manually, albeit the process is short and simple. Anyone can do it. The difficulties with using ResEdit is that a duplicate of your System file has to be made, and then you have to sift through thousands of system resources to find the single resource you want to change. Most likely, someone had already done this, and listed the resource numbers for you, and you just looked for that particular resource ID to affect the change throughout your entire system Another difficulty with using ResEdit is that, well, there's that risk of damaging your System file beyond repair, if you're not careful. This is why you should always work on a copy of your System file. For many, this last difficulty is reason enough to avoid ResEdit. The value isn't worth the risk of damaging your System file in most cases. So we copy and paste. Copy and paste. Copy and paste. Enter DragonOne's fabulous 8Tuner utility. I stumbled across 8Tuner one day while surfing the net. I forget how I found it, but find it I did, through a series of jumps from site to site to site (one of the frustrating but forgiving mysteries of the world wide web). 8Tuner is a fabulous utility for those who like to customize things about their system. I used it within minutes to change my MacOS Splash Screen (MOSS). 8Tuner works without manually duplicating your System file, and works on your active System file without rebooting from any other drive. Within a few days, I had created my own Star Wars MOSS using Photoshop, which are available here. When you first start 8Tuner, you must activate a New Session. 8Tuner reads your current resources in your active System file, and then presents you with its Main Menu. From this menu, you can choose from 6 tuning functions to customize your System: Finder Menu Tuner, System Tuner, Identity Tuner, Folder Icon Tuner, System Icon Tuner, and MOSS Tuner. One of the great user-friendly features of 8Tuner, besides its tuning functions, is that it lists instructions for using each function in a small window within that function. I found this feature indispensable, to help me trust what I was about to do to my current active System file. Another nice safety feature is that you can experiment with all the changes that you wish in 8Tuner; your System file is not altered until you click TUNE from the main menu to affect your changes. And of course, if at any time you're not happy with your selections, you can always click RESTORE to restore the current system resources from any of 8Tuner's menus. 1) Finder Menu Tuner When you select this tuning function, 8Tuner displays a list of instructions. At first, you may not notice any other change. However, the drop-down menus at the top of the screen have changed to match those menus available in the Finder. The default is the Normal Finder. But you can also select the Simple Finder. After selecting the version of the Finder menus you wish to tune, simply select the item from the menu in this tuning function, and make your changes. In most cases, you can change the name of the menu item, as well as the shortcut key strokes that activate that menu item.When you're finished making your changes, simply click SAVE. You will be returned to 8Tuner's main menu, where you can choose another tuning function. 2) System Tuner In this function, 8Tuner allows you to change the suffix of copied files/folders from copy to anything you like. You no longer have to settle for filename copy...you can now have filename whateveryoulike...when you duplicate a file or folder. You can also change the default name for new folders from untitled folder to any name you wish. Very handy features if these things bug you about your system. A third feature available in this function is the ability to make the keyboard menu, which is usually controlled by the Keyboard Control Panel, available at all times. Most users will leave this feature alone, I imagine; most users will not need to switch between languages on their systems. The final feature available in this function is the ability to change your System Font. This feature, alas, is only available for those running OS 8 and 8.1 -- 8.5, 8.5.1 and 8.6 users cannot access this feature. New Session Collect Resources Main Menu Finder Menu Detail System Tuner Identity Tuner Folder Icon Tuner System Icon Tuner MOSS Tuner 3) Identity Tuner This tuner lets you change properties of your computer's identity: Machine Model Name, Username, and "About This Computer" Menu Item Text. My Machine Model Name, which is used by some software programs, was simply Power Macintosh. Within seconds I had changed this to be Power Macintosh 6500/300. I chose not to change my username, but changed the "About This Computer" text to read "About this Power Macintosh 6500/300." I like being specific. 4 & 5) Folder Icon Tuner & System Icon Tuner These are two of the coolest features about 8Tuner. They have a great deal of potential for making me happy with the default appearance of my system. At work, I have added -- by the ubiquitous copy-and-paste method -- Star Wars icons to my hard drive, 2nd hard drive, external hard drive, and folders on our network. I have changed the colors in the Appearance control panel to red and orange, and have a large desktop image of the White City from Star Wars: Episode I.. I'm happy with this. Except I'd really like to have all the icons in my system adhere to a Star Wars theme autoatically! With Folder Icon Tuner and System Icon Tuner, this is entirely possible without much difficulty! To use either the Folder Icon or System Icon tuning functions, simply select them from 8Tuner's main menu. 8Tuner presents you with a catalogue of the current folder icon and system icon resources in your System file. To view a description of each resouce, move your cursor over each icon and its description is displayed at the top of the dialogue box. To change these icons, click on CHOOSE and open a set of 8Tuner icon sets. DragonOne offers several sets for download from their site, and others are available from other sites linked from Dragon One's. Select the set you'd like to view and 8Tuner displays a catalogue of that set's available resources. To change an icon, click on the icon that you'd like to appear in your System file. If you'd like all of the icons in that set to appear in your System file, click ALL. Once you've made your selections from that set, click SAVE. The resource set catalogue for your system now displays the new icons you've selected in place of the old ones. You may now open another set and make selections from that set. Again, click SAVE when you've finished with your seletions. You may pick and choose from icons across different sets, until you've compiled the set of resources you'd like to appear in your System file for folder and system icons. When you've finished making all the changes you desire, click DONE. 8Tuner returns you to its main menu. 6) MOSS Tuner This is another very cool feature of 8Tuner: the ability to replace your startup splash screen from the boring MacOS to anything you like! As with the Folder Icon and System Icon tuner, you will need 8Tuner files with the resources already embedded in them to change your MOSS. As before also, you can download assorted 8Tuner MOSS files from the net, links found at Dragon One's web site. As I mentioned earlier in this review, I created my own MOSS file for 8Tuner and changed my MOSS to show a Star Wars image at startup. This was a simple task to do, and I have made these and other MOSS available at inetreviews. (To access these MOSS, you will need to locate the 8Tuner software review on inetreviews, and click on the link that will take you to the MOSS.) To change your MOSS, select the MOSS Tuner. 8Tuner displays your current system resources for this feature. Click OPEN and select a MOSS file. That file's resources are now displayed. If these are the resources you want to use, click SAVE. 8Tuner now saves these resources to change them in your active System file. Click DONE when you've saved the MOSS file you wish to use. 8Tuner takes you back to its main menu. Each tuning function, when completed, takes you back to 8Tuner's main menu. After you've selected all the resources you wish to change, you have 4 choices: CLOSE, which closes that session without changing the resources in your System file or saving the resources you've selected; RESTORE,which allows you to set the resources back to their original state without changes so you can make your selections again; and TUNE, which activates 8Tuner's tuning feature. 8Tuner then displays a warning to encourage you to check your hard disk before tuning your system. If you click through this warning, another warning is displayed that your system will be restarted after the tuning process. If you click through this warning, 8Tuner creates a System copy, tunes your system, making the necessary changes in the active System file, then restarts your Macintosh. Your new resources will now be available. If you've changed your MOSS as I have, it will be the first change that you notice. You'll notice that at no time did I make reference to 8Tuner's User Guide. This is because I have not had to consult it. 8Tuner is intuitive and simple enough to use that few users will need to consult the User Guide. Nevertheless, an electronic User Guide is included with 8Tuner. The User Guide is broken into 18 chapters (if you can believe that!) and is clearly and concisely written, particularly for the novice user who is likely to be hesitant about tuning his/her System. The User Guide also notes a few compatibility issues with 8Tuner, none of them major, as well as some unique circumstances with OS 8.5 when creating your own icon sets. After using 8Tuner for more than a month now, I have only had it crash on me with OS 8.6 -- I solved this problem by temporarily disabling extensions before tuning my System. The changes that I have selected have all been made effectively without problems, and my Mac has run as rock solid as it always has. This is a testament to the careful programming that has gone into 8Tuner. In messages to DragonOne, they have always been very responsive, and have always responded within 24 hours to my inquiries. At $18, 8Tuner is a bargain for Mac users who tire of looking at the same old interface. What about other versions of the MacOS? For System 7-7.6 users, DragonOne offers 7Tuner with similar tuning functions, minus MOSS tuner. For OS 9 users, DragonOne has said that they will likely release 9Tuner in spring 2000. 8Tuner was reviewed on a Power Macintosh 6500/300 running OS 8.5.1 (and OS 8.6) and 128mb RAM. 09/99 updated 01/00 Publisher: Dragon One Software URL: www.dragonone.com Version: 3.5 Price: US$18 Shareware Category: System Utility Target Audience: Users who like to customize their Macs but tire of using ResEdit. System Requirements: Mac OS 8.x Only. Compatible with Mac OS 8.6. PowerPC or 68K Macintoshes. RAM: PowerPC™ - 1,141K (2,165K recommended); 68K - 1,024K (2,048K recommended). Rating: 5 (out of 5) Mike Swope is publisher of inetreviews.com, a site that will shortly be launched and also the vice-president of MacWichita Macintosh User Group in Wichita, KS. He runs his own graphics design business, Swope Design, that provides professional and affordable graphic design, printing, and consultation services/training to businesses, organizations and individuals.