changing program names

[iChan]

does anyone know how to change the name of some programs?

I wanna do this purely for aesthetic purposes...

Is it infringing on copyright to change program names?

 

[4409723]

Re: changing program names

Originally posted by iChan
does anyone know how to change the name of some programs?

I wanna do this purely for aesthetic purposes...

Is it infringing on copyright to change program names?

Click once of the name of the program and wait, or select it and press return.

You can call your programs whatever you want.

 

[iChan]

oh... sorry, I should have been more clear...

you can change the app name like that but when you open it up, the original name still shows up in the menu bar...


I want to be able to change it at base level.

 

[cubist]

Originally posted by iChan
...you can change the app name like that but when you open it up, the original name still shows up in the menu bar...

This is basic in the Unix world, where programs are supposed to use argv[0] (AKA $0) to display their program name. Unfortunately this hasn't caught on in the Mac world yet.

 

[iChan]

 

[Felix_the_Mac]

I understand your need precisely!
For ages I wanted to do the same ... and then I found the tools to do it.

If you are running Panther and have installed XCode then you will have a program called Property List Editor.

Using this program you can open the info.plist file of any application. You then modify the setting "CFBundleName" to whatever you like.

But where is the info.plist file you ask? Well ...

Each OS X application is actually a folder which contains all the parts of the application.

You can see these contents by right-clicking an application and selecting Show Package Contents.
This will open a new finder window which has a folder called Contents in it.
Open this folder in the normal way and you will find more folder and files such as:
Resources (folder)
MacOS (folder)
info.plist
version.plist
Pkginfo

The .plist files are XML files. There are probably plenty of other programs with which you can edit these files, but if you have got Panther & XCode then you should have Property List Editor installed on your system.

Try opening info.plist and see if your machine knows what to do with it.

 

[iChan]

nothing

hey...

I did what you said... but I don't have Xcode even though I have Panther, I just can't find it anywhere on my system and didn't get the dev tools cd either...

so, you said that the .plist file is simply an xml file so i opened up in textedit.

I changed
<key>CFBundleName</key>

to

<Key>Hello</key>

but nothing happened...

I also changed the next line to "hello"

<string>Program_Name</string>



any other pointers?

 

[Felix_the_Mac]

Yeah .. doesnt seem to work does it?
I remeber now that I tried thaty myself a couple of months ago

I will send you Property List Editor.
(It is part of Apple Developer Tools which can be downloaded form Apple ... but I dont think you can download the parts individually)

Let me know your email address.

 

[iChan]

my email

hey, I just you a PM with my email... cheers bud!

 

[Felix_the_Mac]

Does the the Property List Editor work at all for you?

If you open a info.plist file, modify and save it and then open it again is your change saved?

 

[iChan]

no, there is no way i could get it to work...

the property lisst editor really just does the same job as textedit...

thanks anyway.

 

[robbieduncan]

To change the name that appears in the menu bar you need to change the resource that loads that item. Most recent programs use nib files in the Resources directory (possibly in a Localized variant like English). The one you want may well (but does not have to be called) MainMenu.nib. It is possible to build the menu programtically in which case it is impossible to alter the name without the source code.

To edit a nib file you need the developer tools installed. The program you need is Interface Builder.

Hope that helps,

Robbie

 

[Felix_the_Mac]

Originally posted by iChan
no, there is no way i could get it to work...

the property lisst editor really just does the same job as textedit...

thanks anyway.

What can I say? It works for me.

Maybe a full install of XCode would get it working.

Sorry.

 

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by cubist
This is basic in the Unix world, where programs are supposed to use argv[0] (AKA $0) to display their program name. Unfortunately this hasn't caught on in the Mac world yet.

These aren't command line/graphical hacks--they're graphical applications.

As has been said, the information is embedded in the resources, whether a resource file (.rsrc) or an Interface Builder file (.Nib). Of course, to get all of them, you'll have to change the .Nib file for each language (.proj) used.