alexzielenski / mousecape

Cursor Manager for OSX

Mousecape

A free cursor manager for Mac OS 10.8+ built using private, nonintrusive CoreGraphics APIs.

How it works

Mousecape works by calling the API calls that Apple uses to initialize the system cursors in the system and it registers a daemon that will automatically apply the cursor on login and when cursors get unregistered.

It is unintrusive and works in the background. You just need to open the app, click Mousecape --> Install Helper Tool, apply your cursor and you're done!

Where do I get cursors?

A pack of cursors in Mousecape is called a cape, each cape contains a multiple scales of representations of many cursors. For example, the Arrow cursor can have 1x, 2x, 5x, and 10x representations while the Wait cursor can have 1x, and 2x.

There is an example cape file included in this Git Repo located here for download. It is a remake of Max Rudberg's loved Svanslös cursors generously crafted by Max for us to use. Simply double click the cape file with Mousecape on your system and it will be imported into your library.

How can I create my own cape?

You can create a new cape document in the Mousecape app by hitting ⌘N (Command-N) and editing it with ⌘E. Click the "+" button to add cursors to customize and symply drag your images into the fields provided.

How do animated cursors work?

When you want to animate a cursor, change the value in the frames field in the edit window and make sure frame duration is how you want it. Next, create an image that has all of your cursor frames stacked on top of each other vertically. Mousecape will traverse down the image for each frame, using a box the same size as whatever you put in the size field.

How can I say thanks?

Tell your friends.

Where can I get a copy of this sweet tool?

In the releases section of this GitHub page. There are stable reases there. The current version is 1813.

There's now the beginning of a wiki

Look for the wiki symbol in the toolbar here on this GitHub page or through here wiki section

LICENSE

I worked very hard researching the private methods used in Mousecape and creating this app. Please respect me and my work by not using any of the information provided here for commercial purposes.

Copyright (c) 2013-2014, Alex Zielenski All rights reserved.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

• Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
• Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
• Any redistribution, use, or modification is done solely for personal benefit and not for any commercial purpose or for monetary gain

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

mousecape's Issues

Copy current image from MCScaledImageView

Draw a focus mask and listen for cmd-c!

Link Mouse Doesn't Change

So, I went to add a custom "link" cursor, and his apply and all of that, but it didn't change. To make sure it wasn't just me messing up, I tested it with a few other cursors and they work fine. Is this a bug?

Suggestion: hooks or utility for quickly switching cursors?

For people using more than one character set / language, having visual feedback (in the form of, say, differently colored I-beam cursor) on which keyboard is enabled would be really nice.

Hooking up cursor switch to the keystrokes that switch keyboards could be a simple way to do it (e.g. via Karabiner) - if there was, say, a command line utility to load a particular cursor (or cycle between two or more in a set).

Or perhaps deeper magic is possible.

Importing a cape cold turkey is broken

If you double click a cape from finder and Mousecape is not running the application just opens and doesn't import the cape.

Size of icons / format?

Hi, I just found Mousecape and want to make a left handed cape, all the same icons as the default Yosemite one, but flipped. I found the "Dump" action, but I can't figure out how/if I can get the cursors from Mousecape as image files, or copy them and paste them into Photoshop etc. Would really appreciate any tips!

resort library with name change

Find out the index to move it to, really move it to the index, and then animate the table. Do this by starting and stopping observing each individual library name in addDocument and removeDocument, respectively.

FEATURE REQUEST, change cursor based on apps

Can you add the ability to change cursor based on apps?
I've turned Terminal.app's background to black(thinks it looks cooler),
and I can't see the IBeam cursor(which is basically black) on the screem.

So I want to change to another IBeam cursor just when using Terminal.app
Tried to edit Terminal.app itself, no luck. And I don't want to affect other apps' cursor.

Helper tool not installed, yet shows "ininstall" in Mousecape menu...

Hi, and thanks for this awesome job. Still in Alpha this tweak gives good satisfaction :)

So I clicked to install the helper tool once. Asked for PW, ok. But then nothing seems to happen. Next reboot, no new cursor. Well... I open mousecape again, double click my favourite one, and try to deinstall/reinstall the helper tool again. And then I realize that "ininstalling" do nothing, ask for PW but that's it, the label stays the same and no way to try and reinstall again.

I'm on Mavericks 10.9.2 on late 2011 MacBook Pro.

Uninstall instrunctions

Can you please add uninstall instructions to the Read.me?

Mousecape either/or

Excellent product, except it seems I'm only able to create one active cape, i.e. either a new "arrow" or a new "pointer" cape at one time, when I try to have both working at the same time, Mousecape only allows one to function, and the other doesn't change, and remains as the Mac default cape?
I hope this makes sense, and if there is a solution, please provide.
Thank you

Install mousecloak menu item

Add mousecloak to the path

Kill the combo box

It complicates things. Just give the user a pop up button with pretty titles that correspond to an identifier

Unable to edit my capes with 0.0.3 and dev release

I'm unable to edit any of my capes with 0.0.3 or latest dev release. Either new capes or imported capes.

I'm also unable to choose Edit, Apply or any other menu item in the right click menu for a cape. They are greyed out.

Last good known Mousecape I have that can edit is 0.0.1.

What's the solution?

Noob question: How do you build without a paid membership @ Apple?

I, like others, have a problem seeing the I beam cursor in my Pro profile in Terminal. I would like to build your project to see how it can help me, but I can't seem to do so.

1. I don't have a certificate.
2. The Sparkle dependency is missing from the Zip and Tar.gz files.

Sorry to have to ask such a question,
Nap

How do you actually install the software on a mac

the file Install Mousecape is not in the folders?

Resizing sidebar with long names

Fix it.

Animated cursors horizontally

Finally I have found a replacement for MightyMouse (by UnSanity) for changing my cursors! Thank you so much.
When trying to create a new mousecape, I ran into the 'issue' that my cursors are horizontally layed-out instead of vertically. Could this be placed on the to-do-list?
This is my forst time on GitHub, so please forgive me If I have done something inappropriate.

Information about needed image size

I can't find any information on what size the png's for 1x have to be.
Also, how do I extract one Cursor image back to the desktop? For example one from an Cursor Dump?
From looking into the .cape file I only have an xml file with data-glibberish...

Mouse cape- window not showing- stuck with cape

Hey i got mouse cape and it was working for a bit, but now it opens and shows no window. Ive tried to delete and reinstall it. Ive also tried other versions. Nothing works and I'm stuck with a mouse that i don't really want. Please help me out. Thx.

Cursor reset to default size after reboot

I set my cursor a little bigger than default, 1.6x to be specific, and I have installed helper tool. However after I reboot. The cursor theme is correct but the size is reset to default. I have to go to system's preference -> accessibility, or Mousescape's preference, to set it again.

Change cursor when mouse clicked?

Hi great tool! I was wondering how to change the mouse image when the user clicks?

I changed my cursor but when I left click I want it to be different so I can see when I click. Any help?

renaming identifiers doesn't stick

it moves the file but the contents of the file which contain the cape ident don't change meaning the next app launch the change will revert.

Link

The "Link" type on Mousescape doesn't seem to work. Please fix the problem alexzielenski!

Row height too low when many cursors

When there are more than 20 (or 30 depending on the window width) cursors, a horizontal scroll-bar obscures the lower part of these cursors:

drag & drop

into the cursor editing window. Shouldn't be too hard

A couple of issues with current release.

There's some things with the current Mousecape release 0.0.2 that I have some questions about.

Can you change the helper so that it actually installs and that Mousecape cursors are automatically applied on login? Also rename the "Ininstall Helper Tool" to "Install Helper Tool" ? My attempt of creating a LaunchAgent by myself is unsuccessful.

Third - can you add Column cursors to Mousecape? I found this site that describes more webkit cursors: http://trac.webkit.org/export/37902/trunk/WebCore/manual-tests/cursor.html

I love Mousecape and have create a couple of capes already. Thanks.

drag out of drop zone to export issues

Feature to hold the option key to copy the file to wherever you drag it

"Cursor Dump" Feature"

Add a feature/menu item to dump all of the currently applied cursors/apple cursors to a cape file and import it into the library

Cursor resets to system cursor after computer sleep

Maybe related, cape also not applied automatically on Mousecape start

Build issue (mousecloak)

I've attempted to build Mousecape a few hundred times only to have success with the Pods project - just like you mentioned to me on Interacto's website.

I get one error repeatedly for mousecloak, this:
ld: library not found for -lToolPods
clang: error: linker command failed with exit code 1 (use -v to see invocation)

I've tried to find lToolPods everywhere and only found CocoaPods which I installed because the name sounded like something that would contain other "pods".

All in all I'm not quite certain how to navigate Xcode fully.

I'm hoping that if I'm guided through this issue that I can build Mousecape successfully.

text alignment in prefs window for segmented controls

Cant open file

I download it as a zip and I change the ending to .jar and I open it, but it won't launch. I have Java 15.0.0 and I use Yosemite.

Mark libraries as HiDPI

Need to figure out some logic for this. I think if all of the cursors have at least a 2x representation, it should be marked HiDPI

Images fade in when scrolling library

Image fade into each other..... BAM.

collection of cursors?

Hi there, first thank you for developing this tool. very useful.

My question is: where can I find a more comprehensive set of icons and cursors? Just looking for a better variety other than what's been pointed out in the readme doc.

Launch agent

Install that thing.

Make the first image dragged in set the image size

Whenever there are no image reps set, make the first image dragged in be able to set the cursor size for the whole cursor.

Minimum cursor scale

Change to 0.5

Why can't I download these cursors anymore.

Why am I unable to download these cursors anymore it says file has been removed is there somewhere I can get them from still.
Thanks Thomas

Feature request: support cur/ani files?

Is it possible for Mousecape to support windows cursor file formats such as cur/ani? My understanding is that each file contains one cursor only, and so supporting those formats would hopefully increase the adoption of the product and does not require folks to create custom capes.

sort cursors in preview somehow

figure out a good way to sort them whether its alphabetically, or by importance

add button overlaps window resize hotspot

changes the cursor to the resize one when it hovers over the app button. wont fix

Unique identifiers

Two cursor libraries as it stands can have the same identifier and two cursors within a library can have the same type. Make sure this doesn't happen.

Dump current cursor

Guess we could use this as an option – to turn the current cursors from memory into a cape.

Default mouse cursor gets reset from time to time

I cannot (yet) reproduce this when needed, but I've had this effect several times since I set up Mousecape yesterday: I applied a theme (Swanslös Blue), maybe worth mentioning that I configured the cursor to be slightly larger than the default one.

Several times after logging in after hibernation, but not sure if only after logging in, I noticed that I had the original default cursor again. Interestingly the "wait" cursor was still the one from the theme. So I had to open Mousecape again and re-apply the theme to have the styled cursor back.

accurate hotspot position

Right now the bottom corner of the red dot over the red dot is where the hotspot dot is positioned. Make the center of the dot be where the hotspot is

Move cursor document in app support folder when identifier changes

The files are named after their identifier so just move the file and change the -fileURL attribute. No need to re-save or anything.

import mighty mouse

get this working again

Not all cursors reseted to default :(

After restoring to default, the spinning wheel changed to a sand clock (like in old windows)

Is there a way to get the nice OSX spinning wheel back?

better support for animated cursors

Allow users to drag in multiple images for each cursor and hold option when dragging in an image to add a new frame