Crepuscular Life screen saver for Mac OS X

Version 1.0
April 1, 2007

Written by Josh Freeman

Copyright (c) 2007, Twilight Edge Software

All rights reserved.

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LICENSE:

This software is distributed under the BSD License

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, 
are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

    * Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, 
      this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
    * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, 
      this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation 
      and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
    * Neither the name, "Twilight Edge Software", nor the names of its 
      contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this 
      software without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS
"AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT
LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR
A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR
CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL,
EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO,
PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR
PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING
NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS
SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

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ABOUT:

Crepuscular Life shows a pleasant, starry twilight scene filled by fluttering
fireflies... with serious personal-space issues.

In reality, it's a full-resolution version of Conway's Game of Life, and the 
'fireflies' are actually just Life gliders. 

This version of Life is slightly different from others (that I've seen)
in that it begins with an empty board and all life is a result of randomly 
placed gliders added at regular intervals. This keeps the game from settling
into a stale or repetitive state.

The user can control the rate at which the gliders are generated as well
as the speed of the game.

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SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS:

- PowerPC/Intel Mac running OS X Panther 10.3.9 or later*

* This was built with a deployment target of 10.3, but 10.3.9 is the oldest 
version it's currently been tested on. It may or may not run on earlier 
versions.

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TO INSTALL:

- Double-click the file, "Crepuscular Life.saver"
- When the system dialog comes up, select whether to install for a single user 
  or for all users
- When the Screen Saver preferences come up, choose "Crepuscular Life" from 
  the screen saver list. (It will appear part-way down the list, after the 
  built-in OS X screen savers and before your iPhoto albums)
  
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INSTRUCTIONS:

With Crepuscular Life installed as the active screen saver, press the "Options" 
button on the Screen Saver preferences dialog to bring up the options sheet.

GLIDER FREQUENCY
The frequency at which new gliders are added can be controlled by moving the 
upper slider. The pop-up button above it will let you choose between adding 
multiple gliders each generation ("Every generation add:") and waiting multiple 
generations to add a single glider ("Add a new glider every:").

GAME SPEED
The bottom slider controls the speed at which new Life generations are drawn. 
The number translates (roughly) to the inverse of the delay between frames: 
An "Animation Speed" value of 60 means it will wait about 1/60th of a second 
before calculating & drawing the next generation.
The pace at which the game runs also depends on your computer's speed, so 
older Macs might not see any speedup past certain Animation Speed values.

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TO UNINSTALL:

- Select a different screen saver in the Screen Saver preferences
- Move the "Crepuscular Life.saver" file out of the "Screen Savers" folder
  it was installed to:
  - If you installed it for a single user, it can be found in the 
  "Screen Savers" folder in your home directory's "Library" folder
  - If you installed it system-wide, it can be found in the "Screen Savers"
  folder in the "Library" folder at the top level of your hard disk

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CONTACT: 

Josh Freeman
crepuscular@twilightedge.com