CHAppKit is a small collection of classes and widgets that give the Cocoa developer extra control over the graphical aspects of their programs. The Kit is made up of a framework that can be compiled into a shipping application, an Interface Builder palette, and a set of sample applications.

Once the framework and IB palette have been copied onto your system you can simply drag the widgets onto your application windows in Interface Builder to start using them. CHAppKit is currently comprised of the following widgets:

• CHColorMapControl
  • Allows editing of NSColorLists as colormaps and gradients. Supports alpha transparency.
  • Here's a screenshot of CHColorMapControl in action.
• CHQuickColorWell
  • An alternative to the standard NSColorWell, allows quick selection of a color from a popup view. Eliminates the need to deal with the system NSColorPanel. Allows only a small subset of colors, although "small" is about 15,000 colors.
    The user may access the standard Apple color picker by doing and option-click on the colorwell.
  • Updated:(11/26/2002) CHQuickColorWell has had a minor cosmetic update. This update adds a small swatch to the middle of the pop-up that shows previous and new colors as you are picking them. The new well also does not change colors if you just click once and let go. This prevents people from accidentally changing the color of the well.
  • CHQuickColorWell really needs a small movie to see it in all of its glory. Note: The movie capture has changed the display of the cursor a bit. In real life, it is the much nicer looking, standard OS X cursor.

There is a sample application included that is a standalone colormap editor which can be used to save OS X-standard colormaps. These colormaps, when saved to your "Colors" library directory, can be used in the standard color picker within the OS. As far as I know, this is the only such control or application that deals with Apple's colorlist data.

Included on the disk image are the following:

• For Developers
  • Palette for use in IB.
  • Framework compiled for inclusion in other projects
  • Documentation for the CHAppKit classes
• For Everyone
  • Sample Application(s)

Programs using CHAppKit (that we know about):

• Fluid ScreenEffects

If you are using CHAppKit in your application then let us know about it and we will list your application here.

Current Version

A

Cost/License

CHAppKit is "freeware" (for the most part..see next). You may use it as much as you like. If you use the control in one of your programs we would like three things: 1) We would like to have credit for it in your application's about box; 2) We would like to have a registered copy of your program if you are charging for it; 3) Finally, we would just like to know about it so that we can put links to it here.

System & OS Requirements

Power Macintosh running OS X v10.1 or greater.