Photoshop 3.0 provides a flexible way to organize your plugin files. You can make use of folders and aliases to categorize and share plugins. This System Extension brings the same kind of flexibility to Painter.
Normally, Painter's plugin folder must contain the actual plugin files. When this extension is installed, you can place aliases to plugin files in the folder, and the aliases will be resolved before using them. Even better, you can group your plugins using folders. And aliases to folders are also recognized. If a file, folder, or alias begins with '¬' (option-L) then it (and anything it contains or refers to) will be skipped.
To install, just drag to your System Folder and the system will install it in the extensions folder. (It requires System 7.)
There are a number of points to keep in mind:
(1) You must have at least 1 non-alias plugin file in Painter's plugin folder. (In other words, the folder can't contain only aliases and folders.) There's a technical reason for this (which I won't go into) and a practical reason.
The practical reason is that Painter sets its plugin folder by asking you to select a plugin file from the folder. If you select an alias, however, the system resolves the alias first. Therefore, Painter's plugin folder will be set to the folder containing the real file and not the alias.
(2) When using aliases, it is possible to refer to plugins on remote volumes or CD-ROMs. The system should prompt you for the necessary password or to insert the right volume, but accessing plugins in this way will slow you down.
Also, the actual plugin must be available when it's time to use it. If you eject the CD-ROM containing the plugin then nothing will happen when you try to use it.
I haven't testing this with many different machine configurations, but it does work well for me (Quadra 700 with 20mb of RAM and Painter X2, 3.0, or 3.1). I have also verified that it works a PowerMac 8100/80. But any System Extension that patches the MacOS can cause compatibility problems, so use this at your own risk.
And of course Fractal Design can't possibly support something like this, so if you have a problem with Painter after installing this, you should remove it and reboot.
This is a freeware program. If you have any comments (good or bad) please send the to me at:
Larry Rosenstein
lsr@taligent.com
(or LarryR9 on AOL, although I don't sign onto AOL as frequently)
