What do I need to run Calenz ?

Calenz runs on the Windows platform and is tested on Windows 95/98 and a Pentium machine is recommended. But I have not tested it on Windows NT or Windows 2000 at all, so drop me a note if it works. Calenz also needs a 16-bit colour display mode to be viewed properly and the recommended colour depth should be 24-bit or 32-bit for best display results.

How do I use Calenz?
Check out the help in Calenz by clicking on the 'Options' button and clicking on the 'Help' tab to access the help. You can also enable or disable the float-over help on the main window when the mouse pointer moves over a component. For a more comprehensive guide on using Calenz, click on the 'More help...' link on the 'Help' tab.

How do I create my own skins?
The skin files are basically stored in a ZIP file. Unzip a skin file to display its contents. Calenz uses 3 bitmap files (.bmp) and a colour information file (.ini) file for loading. The Calenz Designer software bundled with Calenz will greatly assist you in creating your own skins and it has a quick help which you can refer to.

How do I create my own visuals?
Calenz is programmed in Delphi 3 and the visual file (.v) is actually a library file (.dll). Download the sample visual source from the 'Downloads' section. The file (.dpr) is a Delphi project file and it documents the variables and other lines of code. Compile the file using Delphi 3 or above and rename the output file (.dll) to a new file (.v) and copy it to the 'vis' directory of Calenz. Load your visual file and see the result. You can refer to the Calenz Help file for more information.

How do I create my own schemes?
Change the skin colour and the font colours from the 'Skins' tab in the options window as desired. Click the 'Save Scheme...' button to save the custom colours to a new file. Experiment with different colours!

How do I submit my designs?
Email to submit@calenz.com and provide the following:
- Skin/visual/scheme name
- Date created
- Your name
- A short description
- Your email or website (optional)
- In addition, for visual files, indicate the type (Paletted/RGB)
- For scheme files, indicate the suitable skin(s) for the scheme, if any.
Your designs must be original and should not be variations from any design on this web site unless you are the original author. No objectionable or copyrighted material in the designs are allowed.

Some things to note:

- Calenz runs in the background when it is minimized but is given a idle process priority so that more processor speed is released for other programs.
- When using the 'random visuals' option, Calenz will load a random visual file for the interval specified. If you are using Scandisk or Disk Defragmenter, it will interfere with them because it reads from the hard disk every interval. Close Calenz or uncheck the 'random visuals' option when you need to run disk-maintenance programs.
- Calenz will only run a copy from any directory. To run multiple copies of Calenz on the same PC, install Calenz into different directories. Then, you refer all other Calenz programs to access the skins, visuals and schemes from one Calenz directory by editing the skins, visuals and schemes paths in the calenz.ini file.