Life Birds screen saver for Mac OS X
- for benefit of IronCoder V

Version 1.0, April 1, 2007

Written by Robert F. Pointon

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About:

A screen saver!

Birds flock and when they land they then interact with Conway style life on the ground in such a way to ensure that life cells are always being created.

User can configure:
- the number of birds.
- whether the life is enabled on the ground.
- whether the background desktop is shown.
- whether the birds cast shadows.

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Uniqueness factors:

Flocking and Life interacting together?
Realtime transparent background in an OpenGL screensaver? - slow, but hey..
Non-standard fade in effect?

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System Requirements:

Universal, 10.4+

A semi-reasonable OpenGL card  (hmmm.. should check OpenGL capabilities)

License:
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* Copyright (c) 2007, Robert Pointon
* All rights reserved.
*
* 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 of the Robert Pointon 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 Robert Pointon ``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 Robert Pointon 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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Contact

Robert F. Pointon
rpointon@macs.hw.ac.uk