CrystalClear Interface - An experimental system add-on to Mac OS X that introduces transparency into Aqua.

CrystalClear Interface is an experimental system add-on to Mac OS X that introduces transparency into Aqua and lets users customize the color and transparency of window and text backgrounds. It is a Cocoa InputManager, so it functions only on applications built with the Cocoa frameworks. Nowadays Cocoa is the main tool to design Apple software, but prominent holdovers are iTunes and the Finder.

Here are some key features of "CrystalClear Interface":

￭ Manages overall window transparency (as SetAlphaValue did), plus adds separate transparency settings to window backgrounds and background colors of "views" (subcomponents of windows).
￭ Replaces the default window "frames" of Mac OS X Aqua with transparent ones that more or less reproduce the look of windows in the ShapeShifter version of Crystal Clear.
￭ The Preferences panel has numerous options that you can control. For details on what these options are and how to use them, please refer to the "Help" document that accompanies this download. Note that the "Help" document is also embedded in the Preferences panel as one of its tabs.
￭ Panels (such as the color and font panels) are designed with the "HUD" look that's become popular in Apple's software lately. Sheets are designed in a light blue, and "alert" panels appear in a gold color. The structure is in place to allow users to customize the color settings for both of these kinds of window objects.
￭ Most windows in CrystalClear Interface are rendered with a "shine" overlay that looks really cool. The shine resizes itself with its window and disposes of itself when the window is closed. The Preferences panel now lets you turn this option on and off.
￭ CrystalClear Interface can change the background text color on windows to ensure optimum contrast with your current desktop picture. This feature is improved in version 1.9.0, but further improvements are planned to continue striving to make windows of variable color and transparency readable.