delaneyg@wnre.aecl.CDN ("H. Grant Delaney") (10/06/89)
Some notes on Icons and the GS Finder - Courtesy of Rob Moore and Jim Merritt.
1. Avoiding the dreaded "Disappearing Trashcan syndrome"
a) Do not alter the GS Finder.Icons file in any way. There are better
ways to accomplish the same functions. These will be explained
later.
b) Do not have any icons assigned to filenames with wildcards that also
do not have the filetype specified. In fact, we highly recommend
specifying a filetype for all icons you add to the icons folder. It's
a rare case when you can specify a name and not also know the filetype.
The subtype may or may not be specified.
c) Above all, do not attempt to replace the "generic document" icon in
Finder.Icons, that is used when no other icon matches the file name or
filetype. This icon serves a special purpose in the Finder icon
structure and must not be altered or moved.
2. How to properly modify the Finder.Icons. (Wait a minute - We said you
couldn't do this!)
a) Make a copy of the Finder.Icons file and delete all of the icons
you don't want to change. You _Must_ delete the Generic Document
icon. It's last in the file. The Finder gets really upset if there
is more than one of these.
b) Edit the icons you want to change and save the file with a new name
of your choice. Your edited icons will be used in place of the
corresponding icons in Finder.Icons.
c) You can change the Trashcan's image but you can't increase its size
much. Don't try to change any of its other characteristics.
3. Fun with Folders. Want customized folder icons? It's easy.
a) Open Finder.Icons and copy the Directory folder icon - labeled DIR.
b) Open a new or existing icon file of your own and save the copied folder
icon there. _Close_ the Finder.Icons file.
c) Edit the icon to add a picture or whatever and change the
filename for the icon to the name of the folder you want this icon to
represent.
d) Now you have a customized folder icon. To do more, use copy and paste
to duplicate the icon in your file and edit the copies.
4. Some general info:
Other than Finder.Icons, icon files are loaded by the Finder in directory
order. If there are multiple icons that could match a given file or
filetype, the last one loaded will be used. This happens because the
Finder loads the icons files as they're found in the directory and then
searches the list of icons backwards from last to first looking for
the first match it can find.
If none of your custom icons match a given file, the Finder will always
find a match of some sort in Finder.Icons, with the Generic Document Icon
being the match of last resort.
So if the Icon you see is not the icon you expected, you probably have
more than one icon that matches your file and the one shown is farther down
in the directory than the one you wanted. You can rearrange the directory or
better still, just delete the duplicate icons you don't want.
It's smart to delete any icons that you're not using. They're all
loaded by the Finder and each uses a certain amount of memory, whether it's
displayed or not.
Have fun.