Fine-Tuning iSleep

Choosing a Mode

By default, iSleep uses iTunes to play your music. But it can also use Whamb, a next-generation MP3 player, or your DVD Player : instead of playing music while you try to get asleep, it will play your DVD and stop it when it's finished (check the "Wait for the movie to end" box) (you can also use the countdown feature, instead of waiting for the movie to end, as in other modes).

To use the Whamb mode or the DVD mode, just select it in the Mode menu. If either one is greyed out, it means that iSleep can't locate the application ; for the Whamb mode, you need Whamb, for the DVD mode, you need the DVD Player application from Apple (shipped with your Mac if you have a built-in DVD drive).

Choosing what iSleep will do after the end of the music or of the film

iSleep can do a number of things after having faded the music out, or when your DVD is over. By default, it just stops the music player (iTunes or Whamb) or pauses the DVD. But just click on the little button at the lower left that looks like the Eject button of your CD player, and you will be able the change this.

You can, for example, pause the music in your player, quit it, quit iSleep, put the computer to sleep (might be something to try if the noise that your computer makes prevents you from sleeping), shut it down, restart it...

Of course, if you ask iSleep to quit itself after having faded the music out, or if you ask it to shut down or restart the computer, you won't be able to use the Alarm Clock function.

If you ask iSleep to put you computer to sleep (useful if your computer is noisy !) and if you also want to be woken up in the morning, iSleep will need your administrator password to ask your Mac to wake up. Normally, it should only ask for your password the first time you use this feature ; but if you move the iSleep application, it might ask again.

If you chose to log out, restart, or shutdown your computer, make sure that nothing will prevent it, such as an unsaved document.

Tuning your fading out

In the drawer (in Whamb or iTunes modes) there also are two sliders to set how fast iSleep should fade the music out : the "Volume to step" is the value of the volume that will be deducted every time the volume changes. Set it to "1 %" to get a very long fade out, and "10%" to decrease volume more abruptly.

On the right, you will see "Seconds between volume changes". This works with the previous option, it represents the amount of time between each decreasing volume step. Set it to "1" for a very quick fade out, and to "10" for a longer fadeout.

Tuning your Preferences

You can further configure iSleep in its Preferences window (in the iSleep menu). In the first tab, "Fade Out", you can choose at what volume iSleep should wake you up. By default, it will just use the sound volume set in the music player before going to bed ; but if you're a sleepyhead and need a very LOUD music to wake you up, you can set a custom volume. You can also ask iSleep to fade the screen to black as it fades the volume out. In this case, just move your mouse to go back to your normal screen brightness, if you want to use your Mac during the fade out, the night, or the next day.

In the second tab, "DVD Player", you choose what music player you want to use when it is time to wake up if you're in DVD mode.

In the third tab, "Alarm Clock", you can choose how fast iSleep will wake you up. Choose what's best for you : some people like to be quick and not lose any time, others prefer to be woken up more slooowly :-)

If you're tired and want iSleep to stop the music for some time and wake you up later, you can press the Space bar when it wakes you up. In the Alarm Clock tab, you can choose for how long you'd like the music to be stopped when you press Space. The default is 5 minutes ; you can change it to any amount you'd like.

Last but not least, in the fourth tab, "Playlists", you can choose which playlists iSleep should use to wake you up or help you get asleep. iSleep needs to launch iTunes (or Whamb) to get the names of the playlists ; just press the little arrow button at the right of the pop-up menu to do that. By default, iSleep will use the playlist you are currently using.

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