Glidel is a system extension that extends the Finder's drag-and-drop abilities within System 7 and beyond. You can select any icon currently visible, either on your Desktop or in an open folder, and drag it to:
* The Open, Print, Get Info, Sharing..., Duplicate, Make Alias, Put Away options (and Reveal Original starting with system 7.5) on the File menu;
* Any application or folder in the Apple menu, including those accessible via a third-party hierarchical menu utility such as BeHierarchic, NowMenus, HAM, or OtherMenu;
* Any currently running application, via the Application menu on the right-hand side of the menu bar.
Requirements
Glidel operates with any version of System 7 or beyond.
However, some problems are known to occur with Finder 7.1.1 as delivered on certain Powerbooks.
Installation
Installing Glidel is easy. Just drag its icon to the System Folder, and it will be automatically installed in your Extensions folder. Then, restart your Mac, and Glidel will be in operation. If you use an extension manager, such as InitPicker or Now StartupManager, be sure to turn on Glidel in the manager before you restart your Mac.
Using Glidel
Glidel is only in operation when the Finder is the current application. However, you do not have to return to the Finder (by clicking on the desktop or using the Applications menu) to use Glidel, as long as the item(s) you want to access is visible. If you're in another application, clicking on a visible item will switch you to the Finder for the purposes of using Glidel. This switch will be immediately visible if you're using System 7.0, 7.01, or 7.1; if you're using System 7 Pro, it will not be visible till you reach the menu bar, as described below.
Here's how to use Glidel:
1) Make a selection by clicking on the icon of a document, folder, or application, but don't release the mouse button after
you've made your selection. Multiple selections are also permitted by Glidel, using any of the standard selection
mechanisms;
2) Drag the selection up to the menu bar. When you reach the menu bar, your cursor will immediately become a curved
arrow--the Glidel cursor--indicating that Glidel is ready to operate on your selection.
3) Use the Glidel cursor to select the appropriate action or destination for your selection, as described in the following
sections.
File Menu Services
If you move the Glidel cursor to the File menu, you can select any of the following options: Open, Print, Get Info, Sharing..., Duplicate, Make Alias, or Put Away. When you release the mouse button with the Glidel cursor points to one of these options, the matching action will be performed on your selection.
This may seem not all that useful, but it allows you to perform File menu operations without lifting your finger from the mouse button. Also, it eliminates the need for pseudo-applications, such as the drag-and-drop printer icons you can create with QuicKeys. Moreover, why not use it ?
Opening Documents
If you move the Glidel cursor to the Apple or Applications menu, you can then Browse these menus for an application program or its alias. If you release the mouse button when the Glidel cursor points to an application or its alias, the application will open the document(s), if it is able to do so.
This allows you to easily open a document with an application that is not its
creator, without having that application's icon visible on the desktop.
Note that if a selected item -- one you're dragging -- is itself an alias, the application will open the original. If you want the application to open the alias itself, first depress the Option key.
This may seem not so useful to owners of Macintosh Easy Open, SpeedyFinder, or NowMenus. However, these brilliant tools become active only when a document's original creator is unavailable. Sometimes, though, you may deliberately want to open a document with a program other than its creator, even though you have the creating application available (e.g., opening a Word document with ResEdit). In situations like this, Glidel becomes extra-handy.
Moving and Copying Selections
If you release the mouse button above a folder, volume, or alias in the Apple menu, the selected item(s) will be moved to that location. As in the Finder itself, if you'd rather copy a selection than move it, hold down the Option key. Note, too, that you can drag fonts and DAs to the appropriate suitcases. Furthermore, if the Control key (Command key with system 7) is depressed, the destination window will get opened.
Making Aliases
To make an alias of your selection in a new location, hold down both the Option and Command keys (Control key only in system 7) as you select a folder, volume, or alias in the Apple menu. Unlike the previous cases, if the item you're dragging is itself an alias of another item, the newly-created alias will “point” to the first alias. With system 7 only, if you'd rather have the new alias point to the original item, hold down both the Option and Control keys when you drag your selection to the destination.
As before, if the Control key (Command key with system 7) is depressed, the destination window will get opened.
Deactivation
Glidel can be disabled temporarily when dragging the selection, by holding down the Shift key. This can be handy when using a programme enabling the screen to be wrapped, such as with the control panel WrapScreen.
Hierarchical Menu Utilities
Glidel gets along well with most third-party hierarchical menu utilities. If your Apple or Applications menu is “extended” by such a utility, you will be able to select any item accessible via the utility as Glidel's destination for moving, copying, making aliases, and starting applications.
Currently, Glidel is known to work with BeHierarchic (version 1.0.5 and beyond), MenuChoice (version 1.8), HAM (Hierarchic Apple Menu) (1.0), NowMenus (3.0.2 and beyond), Super Boomerang (4.0.1p and beyond), Power menus, PopupFolder and Apple Menu Options. In addition, Glidel works with OtherMenu (1.2.2 and beyond), AliasMenu (version 1.1 and beyond), Finder Windows (version 1.1) and WinMenu, as well as with the Finder windows in the Applications menu using either ApplWindows (2.0.2), PowerBar (1.1), or OtherMenu Windows external.
Where will Glidel's author stop? See the section on limitations later in the document.
Shortcuts
During a move, copy, or alias operation, you can take advantage of several shortcuts. By releasing the mouse button when the Glidel cursor points to an icon in the menu bar, you'll immediately select the destination folder, as follows:
Icon Folder
- The apple : Apple Menu Items,
- The macintosh (Applications menu title) : System Folder,
- OtherMenu icon : OtherMenu Folder,
- AliasMenu icons : The relevant sub-folders in the AliasMenu Items folder
Limitations
1) Glidel cannot open a document with an application program if (a) the application is already running AND (b) the
application cannot handle high level events) AND (c) the application is not the document's creator. This complicated and
rare situation only occurs with very old applications that are not System-7 friendly;
2) With NowMenus 4 and beyond, Glidel cannot use the pull-down menus (the ones that can appear below the bottom of
the menu bar) because they are not standard; this is the same with Now Menus 5 Now Utilities menu and drive menu;
3) With ApplWindows, the windows must ordered Front to Back. This is ApplWindows default mode;
4) MenuChoice uses the Option key to make aliases. For both the Finder and Glidel, this key is used for copying. Since
Glidel can make aliases on its own, the Aliases option should be unchecked in the MenuChoice control panel;
5) Glidel cannot (yet) access the sub-menus related to the items Desktop, Deeper, and Recent in MenuChoice Apple menu;
6) Glidel does not deal with the catalogs and mailbox on the desktop when PowerTalk is installed. In this case, there is no
alert;
7) Glidel does not make aliases of the following PowerTalk objects: find in catalog, group, personal catalog (preferred),
user. In brief, every ones of which the creator is kl03. Again, there is no alert;
8) Glidel cannot (yet) access the sub-menus related to the items Desktop Folder, Recent Folders, and Recent Items in
BeHierarchic Apple menu;
9) To be able to use its option Make mouse sticky when selecting from menus, the control panel Church Windows 2.0
must load at startup after Glidel;
10) With system 8, the Control key is used to drop the local menu when the mouse button is depressed. For Glidel, the
same key is used to open the destination window. For Glidel to be able to distinguish this case, the key must be
depressed when the button is released;
11) With system 8, when the Finder selection is dropped onto the system folder shortcut in the menu bar, the destination
window opening feature previously described is not supported because there can be several destinations.
Incompatibilities
. The hereabove limitations,
. The Finder (not the System!) version 7.1.1 that comes with some PowerBooks.
If you wish Glidel to work with other products, please feel free to send the author a registered copy of the software so he can experiment and develop the needed capabilities.
Translations
Glidel exists in french, german and japanese versions as well. The french and english versions are followed up by the author, the japanese version by Kuniyuki Tashiro (tashiro@imasy.or.jp), the german version by Rainer Lanz (http://www.dvz.fh-koeln.de/~bf070/MeineHeimat/).
Status
Glidel is a shareware program. It can be freely distributed, provided that (a) it is not modified without the author’s prior consent and is distributed along with this User’s manual file, (b) no fees are paid other than those related to shipping, disk copying, or transmission/online time costs, and (c) the french version is proposed with the american one.
Under no circumstances, including negligence, shall the author be liable for any incidental, special or consequential damages that result from the use or inability of use this software or its related documentation, even if the author have been advised of the possibility of such damages.
Registration
If, after a fifteen days trial period, you decide to keep using Glidel, you order a license. Each license is valid for a single individual or legal entity, and covers usage of the software on a single computer. The license fee is FRF 100, or USD 20.
License fees should be paid directly to the author, at the following address:
Gilles Berkovitch
48 rue Jean Bonal
92 250 La Garenne Colombes
France
Please do not send check from a foreign, that is non french, bank. The easiest way from foreign countries consists in sending an international postal money order, or cash into an envelope.
Please report Glidel version number and, if available, your electronic address so that you can get Glidel key more rapidly.
Already licensed people do not need to get reregistered.
Advanced Setup Features
If you'd like to “fine-tune” Glidel for your own system, you can use ResEdit or a similar program to edit the contents of the STR# resource (on a COPY, of course!), as follows:
- The first string in the STR# resource #128 should contain the name of the folder used by PopupFolder. Normally, this
folder is named PopupFolder‚Ñ¢ Items.
- The second string in the STR# resource #128 should contain the name of the folder used by OtherMenu. Normally, this
folder is named OtherMenu Folder,
- The third string in the STR# resource #128 should contain the name of the folder used by AliasMenu 1.1. Normally, this
folder is named AliasMenu Items; AliasMenu 2 and beyond uses another mechanism enabling Glidel to automatically
locate the folder,
- The invisible file used to store the custom icons for a folder, floppy, or drive is normally Icon followed by a carriage
return. This is the fourth string,
- Windows is the name of the OtherMenu external which lists the windows. It is stored in the sixth string,
- With system 7 only, New User is the first item of the File menu when the Users & Groups control panel is opened
and when its window is frontmost. It is the seventh string,
- Finally, About Glidel… is the first item of the Apple menu when the Finder selection is dragged. It is the eighth string.
If there are other strings not documented, whether empty or not, it’s on purpose. They are reserved and must not be modified.
For the tuning to become effective, Glidel copy must be installed as described above in the Installation paragraph.
Deinstallation
To deinstall Glidel, just:
1) Remove the Glidel icon from the Extensions folder, taking care not to put it in either the System Folder or the Control
Panels sub-folder, then
2) Restart your Mac.
Acknowledgements
Paul Mercer for his icon display algorithm during startup, Fred Monroe for the original dropple menu, Quinn and his partners for Internet Config and Jean-Francois Sygnet.
English-language documentation edited by David M. Axler (afadaveax@aol.com).
Localized for Japanese Macintosh community by Kuniyuki Tashiro (tashiro@imasy.or.jp).
German version by Rainer Lanz (http://www.dvz.fh-koeln.de/~bf070/MeineHeimat/).
Future Prospects
1) Eliminate the limitations discussed earlier;
2) Take into account your suggestions, who knows ? But this is only the second priority !
3) etc.
History
Soon after System 7's release came a wonderful system extension named dropple menu. It still worked with system 7.0.1 and with the System 7 Tune-up. Unfortunately, it stopped working with System 7.1 because the Finder's internal structures changed at that time. After having unsuccesfully tried to reach Fred Monroe, the author of dropple menu, I wrote Glidel to provide similar services, plus those of AKA.
Comments
Any comments can be mailed via electronic mail to gberkovi@imaginet.fr, or via ordinary mail at my above address.
Operation
Before install itself in memory during startup, Glidel checks a bunch of requirements. If they are not met., Glidel will not be installed, and you will see an X-ed icon. Furthermore, Glidel does not add, modify, remove anything to the System file. Therefore if you deinstall Glidel, you will find your System file just as it was before Glidel installation.
