A system extension that will automatically quit an application when its last window is closed.
Description
Quit It is a system extension that automatically quits an application when its last window is closed by the user. This can be very useful when novice users are working on a computer, who often close a window by clicking on the close box of a document window, thinking the application is quit. This can easily lead to confusion, or memory shortage.
Quit It can be fully configured through its control panel, with individual settings for installed applications.
Requirements
• PowerMac or 680x0 Macintosh
• System 7.6 or higher (some features may require MacOS 8)
Short Manual
Installing Quit It
Quit It is installed by dragging it onto the system folder. This will automatically put it in the Control Panels folder. After the next restart Quit It will take effect. You can see that Quit It is loaded through the icon that is displayed during the startup sequence.
Note 1: If you have a previous version of Quit It installed (either Quit It PPC or Quit It 68K), make sure it is removed from the control panel folder before installing the new one! The PPC and 68K extensions are removed as starting with v2.0.2 there is only a single version which works on both architectures.
Note2: Don't rename the control panel to a different name, as this will prevent proper functioning. The correct name is Quit It.
Preventing Quit It from loading at startup
By holding down the Q key during startup, Quit It will not be loaded. The icon that is displayed during the startup sequence will have a red cross drawn on top of it in this case.
Settings
All Quit It settings are specified in its control panel. Here you can activate/deactivate Quit It completely, and specifiy default settings plus settings for individual applications. The default settings apply to all applications for which no specific settings are specified. To make Quit It active for just a few applications, you would disable it in the default settings, and enable it for the applications you want it active. On the other hand, to make Quit It active for most applications, you would enable it in the default settings, and disable it for any applications that you want to leave untouched. There is a maximum of 99 application specific settings.
All changes made in the control panel take immediate effect. If Quit It is not loaded on startup, the settings will be stored in the Quit It preference file and used the next time Quit It is loaded.
For all items on the control panel Balloon Help is available.
Activating/deactivating Quit It
With the on/off button located in the upper right of the control panel you can activate and deactivate Quit It. A green light indicates that Quit It is active, a red light indicates it is inactive.
Temporarily disabling Quit It for an application
When the user is asked for a confirmation before an application is actually quit (see also Application settings - Action), besides choosing Yes or No, he/she also has the option to select 'No, and don't ask again'. Selecting this option will leave the application running, and will prevent Quit It from attempting to quit the application for as long as it's running. As soon as the application is quit in a normal way, and started again afterwards, Quit It will again start functioning for that application.
Adding an application to specify special settings
To add an application for which you want to specify special settings, select Add application... from the Quit It menu, or click on the Add button located above the application list. This will show a dialog box in which you can select an application (or multiple applications if your system support Navigation Services). Alternatively, you can drag an application icon from the Finder onto the application list.
A newly added application will initially inherit the default settings.
Removing special application settings
To remove the specific settings for an application, select it in the application list, then select Remove application from the Quit It menu, or click on the Delete button located above the application list.
Default and application specific settings
To change default or application specific settings, select the entry you want to modify in the application list. The various settings will be filled in and enabled for modification. The default settings are used for all applications that don't have an application specific settings.
Application settings - Enable Quit It
With this toggle you can enable or disable Quit It for individual applications.
Application settings - Quit when
From this pulldown you can specify when Quit It should quit an application. There are three options:
1) all windows closed - Quit It will quit the application when all of its windows are closed.
2) all windows with closebox closed - Quit It will quit the application when all windows that have a closebox are closed.
3) all document windows closed - Quit It will quit the application when all document windows are closed. It will ignore any floating windows (utility windows) that may still be open.
You can experiment for the ideal settings for your own needs.
Application settings - Action
From this pulldown you can specify what Quit It should do when the last window of an application is closed. There are four options:
1) Quit immediately - Quit the application without confirming with the user.
2) Confirm quit - Ask the user if the application should be quit.
3) Confirm, quit after timeout - Ask the user if the application should be quit, if he doesn't respond within the specified timeout the dialog will be dismissed and the application will be quit.
4) Confirm, leave open after timeout - Ask the user if the application should be quit, if he doesn't respond within the specified timeout the dialog will be dismissed and the application will be left running.
5) Quit after timeout - Quit the application if no new window is opened after a specified timeout, without confirming with the user.
Application settings - TimeOut
If action 3, 4 or 5 is chosen a timeout can be chosen between 0 seconds and 60 hours. If action 1 or 2 is chosen, the slider will be disabled.
Application settings - Shift overrules
When this toggle is selected, an application will not be closed when the Shift key is pressed when closing the last window.
Application settings - Quit after Cmd-W
With this toggle you can specify if Quit It should quit an application if the last window is closed via the Cmd-W keyboard shortcut.
Application settings - Quit after Close
With this toggle you can specify if Quit It should quit an application if the last window is closed via the Close menu entry. You can specify the actual menu text Quit It should look for, which can be useful if you have applications in a different language from English, where Close might read Sluit for example.
Application settings - Quit after window is closed from inside
This option is useful for some applications like telnet, where a window can be closed because what's running in the window stops, or when a window is closed from an AppleScript. Normally you should leave this box unchecked, because it will quit many applications when you don't want it.
Apple Script support
Quit It supports Apple Script to enable or disable it. Sample scripts are included in the Apple Script folder.
Shareware
Quit It is distributed as shareware. This means that you can freely try it for 30 days, if you continue to use it after that period you should pay the shareware fee. The unregistered version if fully functional, but will show a reminder every now and then when Quit It quits an application. The fee for Quit It is $10, and can be paid using the Register application that comes installed with this software. After your payment is received, you will receive a key with which you can register Quit It. Once you have registered you can freely get and use all future updates to Quit It.
Site licenses are available, see the Register program for details.
How to register
You can pay the shareware fee for Quit It through the Kagi Shareware system using the Register application.
If paying with Credit Card or First Virtual, email or fax the data to Kagi Shareware. Their email address is sales@kagi.com and their fax number is +1 510 652-6589. You can either Copy the data from Register and paste into the body of an email message or you can Save the data to a file and you can attach that file to an email message. There is no need to compress the data file, it’s already pretty small. If you have a fax modem, just Print the data to the Kagi fax number.
Payments sent via email are processed within 3 to 4 days. You will receive an email acknowledgement when it is processed. Payments sent via fax take up to 10 days and if you provide a correct internet email address you will receive an email acknowledgement.
If you are paying with Cash or USD Check you should print the data using the Register application and send it to the address shown on the form, which is:
Kagi Shareware
1442-A Walnut Street #392-RB6
Berkeley, California 94709-1405
USA
You can pay with a wide variety of cash from different countries but at present if you pay via check, it must be a check drawn in US Dollars. Kagi Shareware cannot accept checks in other currencies, the conversion rate for non-USD checks is around USD 15 per check and that is just not practical.
Payments send via postal mail take time to reach Kagi Shareware and then up to 10 days for processing. Again, if you include a correct email address, you will hear from Kagi Shareware when the form is processed.
More info
You can contact me if you have any question or suggestions regarding Quit It. I can be reached through e-mail at quitit@katoemba.com. For the latest version of this application, plus any other software I have written please visit http://www.katoemba.com.
Release Notes
See the separate Quit It Release Notes file.
Legalese
Quit It is Shareware. You may use the unregistered version for trial purpose for 30 days, if you continue to use it after that period you should pay the shareware fee.
Quit It may not be included in any for-profit software compilation or bundled with any other for-profit package, except with prior written consent from the author, Katoemba Software. Quit It may be distributed freely on on-line services and by users groups, except where noted above, provided it is distributed unmodified and including all original files.
You expressly acknowledge and agree that use of Quit It is at your exclusive risk. Quit It, any related files and documentation are provided “AS IS” and without any warranty of any kind, expressed or implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose.