Copyright 1993-2005 Seraline Pty. Ltd., Sydney, Australia All Rights Reserved.
What is Seraline
Screensaver
Settings
Saving an image
License
Customer Support & FAQ
Web Site & Other Screensavers
Uninstall
Disclaimer
Seraline Screensaver is a screensaver for Windows 95/98/NT.
Using mathematics and random drawing effects, Seraline ScreenSaver creates an endless variety of wild kaleidoscopic and modern-art-like images, which are always changing and never repeating.
Recommended minimum: 486 CPU, 256 colors.
General
The settings screens have sliders which you may use to control the types of drawings Seraline does.
| Speed | The further the slider is to the right, the slower the designs will be drawn. |
| Delay between drawings | Normally there is no delay between drawings. But you may like a short delay if you are taking screenshots, or if you prefer to be able to look at the designs before they are possibly wiped by the next drawing. |
| Minimum Time per Drawing, Maximum Time per Drawing |
Use these to control how long before a new drawing is started. |
| Reduce disk activity after an hour | If this option is selected, after an hour Seraline will attempt to stop actions which cause disk access, including no longer displaying text messages or images. The reason is to be able to leave Seraline on all night, but allow other processes to run, such as disk defragmenting, which are interrupted by any disk access. The lack of disk access is not guaranteed, as Windows itself may do some memory swapping to disk while Seraline is running. |
| Ignore mouse for wake-up | Selecting this option means only use of the keyboard or clicking the mouse will stop the screensaver. It's useful if your mouse likes to move of its own accord, or is easily bumped. Not available under Windows NT, unless you are running the screensaver manually via a shortcut. |
Styles
Seraline does a wide variety of drawings which can be divided into the following major categories. The best way to see what each does is to turn them all off, and then try each of them, one at a time. You can turn them off by moving the sliders all the way to the left.
| Solid Designs | The designs are drawn one point at a time, from top to bottom. It includes fractals and other wavy designs. |
| Designs made up of dots | These designs are made by drawing points in different positions. The points are not adjacent or joined. |
| Images | You can display your own JPEG or Bitmap images. Use the Images tab to specify the location of your images. After drawing a JPEG or 24-bit color bitmap, the next series of drawings will be done using colors from that image. |
| Text | Various text messages are displayed - see the Text and Messages tabs for details. |
| Patterns made from lines | These designs are made from drawing various kinds of straight and curved lines. |
| Distorting current display | The other drawing styles create new patterns on top of existing ones. The Distortions create new designs by changing whatever is already on the screen - eg, changing its colors or warping its shape. This style is usually slower to draw than the others, and it is not used in the first minute to ensure that there is a design to work on. |
| 3D shapes | Draws objects such as cubes, spheres and cones. |
| Overlapping shapes | Draws shapes such as circles and spirals which intersect with each other. |
| Draw designs with a single point | Seraline uses a variety of 'brush' types, from a single pixel to larger splashes of color. The larger brushes can lead to 'messier', more painterly images. You can reduce this effect by increasing the amount of drawings done using a single pixel, which will produce tidier images, although they take longer to draw. |
Reduce chaos
Seraline produces its images by combining different drawing styles. Depending on personal taste, you may prefer tidier images. Each relevant tab on the Settings screen has a button labeled 'Reduce Chaos'. Clicking this button will adjust the sliders on the tab to settings that produce 'tidy' images. On the Styles tab, the sliders are changed to produce just Solid Designs using a single pixel.
Images
Seraline can display your own images. The file formats supported are JPEG and Windows Bitmaps. JPEG images have file names ending in jpg, jpeg and jpe. Bitmaps end with bmp.
Images will look their best when running in High/True Color mode - under 256 color mode, the images are shown using a restricted range of colors.
| Folders to search for images. | This is the list of folders in which
Seraline will search for images. You can add a folder by clicking
the Add button and browsing to a folder, then click OK. If you only ever want one particular image to be displayed, you need to create a folder for it, and it must be the only image in that folder. |
| Add browser cache | For variety, you may like Seraline to display any images which happen to be in your browser cache of recently downloaded images. Only JPEG images are shown. Seraline will attempt to add the folders used for your browser cache. This may not be possible if you are using a browser other than Internet Explorer or Netscape, or if the location of the cache has moved from that expected by Seraline, eg a new version of the browser may store the cache somewhere else. If no folders are added, you can search for the cache or images and use the Add button. |
| Display order | Images can either be displayed at random, or sorted alphabetically. When sorted, the folders are sorted alphabetically, and all images in the first folder are displayed in order before the images of the second folder, and so on. Seraline remembers which image is next between runs. You can force it to restart at the first image by clicking on the button labeled "Start at first image next run". This only applies to the very next run, and subsequent runs will proceed through all the images, and then start again at the first. |
| Pause after displaying an image | The default is to pause for 2 seconds after an image is displayed before starting the next drawing. |
| Minimum period between images | The default is to not show more than one image per minute. You can increase how often images are displayed by sliding to the left, or by increasing the period up to 5 minutes. |
Text
Seraline will display various kinds of text messages.
| Your own messages | Displays messages you have entered into the Messages tab. |
| Date & Time | Shows the current date & time, eg 13 Jan 9:30 |
| A single character | Shows a single letter, number or special character. |
| Random statistics | For variety, various numbers, such as the number of drawings done or how long the screensaver has been running. |
| Use SeraSpel | SeraSpel(TM) is a spelling unchecker, which makes mistakes in the spelling of text messages as they are displayed. Why? Wel, wyh nog? |
Layout
Seraline selects a section of the screen to do its drawings, and then sub-divides that section into small areas in which it repeats the drawings.
| Full screen | The entire screen is used for the drawings. |
| Random section | A random sub-section of the screen is selected. |
| Centered section | A part of the screen is selected which is centered. |
After selecting the section of the screen to draw in, the section is sub-divided into areas:
| Full area | A single drawing is done which covers the entire section. |
| Smaller rectangles evenly covering the whole area | The section is sub-divided evenly into small areas. |
| Column or rows | Only part of the section is used, and that part is sub-divided into a series of rectangles that form a row or column in that section. |
Reduce chaos:
Clicking Reduce Chaos on this tab selects the full
screen for drawing, with sub-areas being evenly spread.
Outline
Within the areas created as above, drawings can be further restricted:
| Rectangle | The entire area is used. |
| Circle | A circular area is used. |
| Triangle | The drawing is restricted to an upper or lower triangle. |
| Slant | The drawing will form a slanted line across the area. |
| Wavy | The drawing will be restricted to an area with curved sides, such as a wine-glass outline. |
After a drawing is finished, the areas can have their size reduced:
| Shrink areas evenly | The next drawings in the areas will fit into a small, centered part. |
| Shrink areas randomly | The next areas will be a unevenly placed. |
When the areas are created, they are not always all drawn in:
| Checkered | Use this slider to select how often just alternative areas will be used, which gives a checkered pattern effect. |
Adjacent areas may have their drawing reflected, to give a more seamless look:
| Symmetric | Use this slider to select how often a mirrored, symmetric effect is used. |
Reduce chaos:
Clicking Reduce Chaos on this tab selects a
rectangular area, with full symmetry.
Colors
You can
alter how often the palette of colors is changed, and how much black is
used. Different parameters can be used for 256 color mode and for High/True
Color modes.
Reduce chaos:
Clicking Reduce Chaos on this tab increases the
amount of time between changing colors in High/True Color mode.
Messages
You may enter up to 9 text messages. They will displayed at random while the screensaver is running. How often they are displayed can be controlled by the Your Own Messages slider on the Text tab, and by the Text slider on the Styles tab.. The default messages when you install the screensaver include your system's registered name, "Seraline Screensaver", and our web address. You may remove or change these messages. To delete a message, just clear the field by deleting its characters. The other messages will be moved up to fill the gaps automatically when you save them.
Animation
When running in 256 color mode, Seraline animates the color, giving a sliding, hypnotic effect. The slider controls how often animation is used. If chosen, then animation is used for the entire run. If your computer's display is set to High Color or True color mode (16 or 24-bit color), then normally color animation is not possible, as those modes do not support it. However, if you have the Microsoft DirectX drivers installed on your machine, then Seraline can use them to temporarily shift your machine to 256 color mode, and back again at the end of the run. If you don't want this to happen, then turn animation off by sliding the control all the way to the left.
If you do not have DirectX installed, then your can download the DirectX End User Software from the Microsoft DirectX web site. The download is about 5.5 Meg.
Animation using DirectX is not available under Windows NT for Seraline.
Press the Print Screen key while the screensaver is running. This will Copy the image into your clipboard, and you can then Paste it into a paint program for saving or printing. The image, or part of it, could then be used as a background for your screen's desktop or a web page. Under NT, you may need to run the screensaver from a shortcut on your desktop.
Seraline Screensaver is NOT a public domain program. It is copyrighted by Seraline Pty Ltd. This software and accompanying documentation are protected by Australian copyright law and also by international treaty provisions.
The registration fee will license Seraline Screensaver for use on any computers in your home, and on one computer at work on which you are the main user.
You may not use, copy, rent, lease, sell, modify, decompile, disassemble, otherwise reverse engineer, or transfer the licensed program except as provided in this agreement. Any such unauthorized use shall result in immediate and automatic termination of this license.
You may not provide the software to any other user, nor may you upload the registered version to any online service, such as a bulletin board or internet ftp site or web site.
Seraline Pty Ltd may revoke any permissions granted here, by notifying you in writing. All rights not expressly granted here are reserved to Seraline Pty Ltd.
This software is based in part on the work of the Independent JPEG Group.
Answers to Frequently Asked Questions are available on-line from http://www.seraline.com/faq.htm. Please consult this page before emailing for support.
Seraline provides its registered users with free support via email. If you have a question, please send an email message to support@seraline.com.
Other screensavers are available on Seraline's WWW Home Page:
3aline Screensaver - draws dynamic 3D shapes which move and hover around your screen, creating stunning colorful images with beautiful backgrounds and realistic lighting.
Seractal Screensaver - displays beautiful full-screen fractals.
Adrift Screensaver - draws floating lines across the screen, creating beautiful patterns.
Photo Mishmash Screensaver - stretches, squeezes and swirls your own photographs.
Serandom Screensaver - a screensaver manager, or randomizer, which allows you to specify how often and how long each of your selected screensavers should run.
If you used a full Seraline Setup procedure to install, then you will be able to uninstall Seraline by using Control Panel / Add/Remove Programs.
Otherwise, delete the file Seraline5.scr from your Windows\System folder. You can find the file using Windows Explorer.
SERALINE SCREENSAVER IS SOLD "AS IS" AND WITHOUT WARRANTIES AS TO PERFORMANCE OR MERCHANTABILITY OR ANY OTHER WARRANTIES WHETHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED. BECAUSE OF THE VARIOUS HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE ENVIRONMENTS INTO WHICH THIS PROGRAM MAY BE PUT, NO WARRANTY OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE IS OFFERED. IN NO EVENT SHALL SERALINE P/L OR ANYONE ELSE WHO HAS BEEN INVOLVED IN THE CREATION, PRODUCTION OR DELIVERY OF THIS SOFTWARE BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, SPECIAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES RESULTING FROM THE USE OF THE SERALINE SCREENSAVER. IN NO EVENT SHALL SERALINE P/L'S LIABILITY FOR ANY DAMAGES EVER EXCEED THE PRICE PAID FOR THE LICENSE TO USE THE SOFTWARE, REGARDLESS OF THE FORM OF CLAIM. THE PERSON USING THE SOFTWARE BEARS ALL RISKS AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE SOFTWARE. THIS AGREEMENT SHALL BE CONSTRUED AND ENFORCED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS OF THE STATE OF NSW, AUSTRALIA, AND ANY ACTION BY EITHER PARTY SHALL BE BROUGHT ONLY IN A COURT LOCATED IN NSW, AUSTRALIA.