I decided to poke around inside the Lightroom app since I wanted to swap out a picture used in the UI (pinstripe background) and since it's a developing app it might show some clues as to what the developers are doing.
Since I already typed out a
blog entry so I'm just going to cut-and-paste:
A disc burning framework is probably the most noteworthy. Inside the disc burning folder lay a single file creatively dubbed “DiscBurning” filled with mostly cryptic code. Intermingled with that was some legible text hinting at the obvious disc burning functions as well as disc recording. So for those hoping for DVD slideshow functions in Lightroom, this at the very least indicates that the LR engineers are playing with the idea of utilizing a burner in one way or another.
As I mentioned in my last post, George Jardine was very admit in correcting my habit of using the term “plugin” in reference to third-party additions and instead to use the term “module.” Well, I got a kick out of the fact that all the modules are found in a folder called “plugins.”
The database seems to be SQLite based.
Back to my mission, I found quite a few graphic files strewn about but couldn’t find the pinstripes. Either they are cryptically named, or hard to see or perhaps it’s not even a graphic after all. Whatever the case, I got distracted when Wane’s World came on TV. I’ll have to continue the investigation at a latter date.
I did learn however that you can edit a graphic in the LR app and things will still work (assuming dimensions remain the same I’m sure). I confirmed this by converting the background image for the preview pane in the develop plugin module to Sepia. Wheeee!
If you want to pull a good prank on a friend, then open the app (right-click on it and select “Show Package Contents”) and browse to Contents/Frameworks/Shadowland.framework/Versions/A/Resources/ Give the UI images a nice hot-dog stand color scheme. Or better yet, make them solid black so they all blend in nicely with the black background of the application. Don’t worry, everything can be undone with no harm by restoring the Lightroom application from the DMG you downloaded at Adobe’s site (or a backup you should make before fiddling).
I'm not a terribly resourceful hacker so allot of what I saw was over my head (or more accurately, beyond my attention span). My hacks typically follow instructions given by someone smarter but maybe this will encourage some to start tinkering.
