This is mainly for developers, but if you’re a Quicksilver user and want to get a taste of the upcoming Fumo interface, feel free to tune in.

Nicholas Jitkoff, aka Alcor, the developer of Quicksilver has been extremely generous in providing assistance and code. A developer by the name of “ytrewq1″ has also been very gracious. Sincere appreciation to both of them.

Well, let’s take a look at how Fumo is shaping up. I’ve added a sliding transition for when it’s activated so it shoots down from the top of the screen. I’ve also made the contentView of the window transparent, and added a custom view to which the rendering of the background is done. Trust me, it’s easier that way.

The transition for the window exiting (by sliding out) is very crude and you’ll notice that I’ve had to use the “reallyOrderOut:” method on the window since orderOut makes it fade out, and it looks weird if the window slides out of the screen, then reappears and fades.

Final thing, (actually the first real thing I did) was the subclassing of the “activateInTextMode:” method. Try activating the interface in text mode (you’ll need to have a trigger for Command Window in Text Mode). Hopefully you get a very nice warping effect.

Next on the agenda is changing the background and text color of the actual searching views. Take a shot at it if you like. Here’s the source code:

Fumo Source

Update: Download a (still unstable) version of Fumo from this post.

Having been contact by the creator of the Fumo interface concept, Pavel, I am starting work on creating the a brand spanking new interface for Quicksilver. Take a look at the mockups he’s created.

While various difficulties (trying to write a plugin on top a system that I can’t see, using subclasses that I can’t see the implementations for, etc.) are proving to be tough challenges, Alcor (Nicholas Jitkoff) and ytrewq1 have been and are continuing to be most helpful in providing help when I need it. Alcor has already provided code for the “window” interface that I will be building on top of on, and ytrewq1 has assisted in overcoming various programming hurdles and provided some welcome encouragement.

That’s what’s so great about the Apple Mac Developer community - they’re ready to help people out and provide whatever assistance they can. Sure beats the “read the incoherent documentation” or “Google it” approach employed by various other operating systems regarding development troubleshooting.

And if you don’t know what Quicksilver is, or don’t use it, it’s time to get up and walk out of that dusty cave. Trust me, it’ll relegate Finder, Automator, and System Preferences to “lost somewhere in the HD”. It’s the best thing that happened to productivity, and once you start to tap into it’s power, you realize how much more it has. For example, I had a workflow to scale images. While playing around with the Quicksilver’s preferences, I found that you not only scale images, but also convert images to/from psd, jpg, png, gif, and a plethora of other formats. You can change your desktop background, move / copy / rename / delete files, add and delete lines from files without opening them, get into, do a Spotlight search. You can also add triggers (hotkeys), and integrate it with just about any application that exists. I mean, seriously, this thing is powerful. Get it now, use it now, and wait for Fumo.

Update: Download a (still unstable) version of Fumo from this post.