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InstantStorm 1.5 now available + history

June 10, 2007 | 10:13 pm | Tags: instantstorm

I know I’m coming up with this post a little bit late but OndÅ™ej and I were pretty busy with publishing this InstantStorm release and planning a brand new freeware project. For those who don’t know what this piece of software is all about, I’ll make a short introduction.

About 6 years ago, I was pretty impressed by all things Macromedia Flash. I spent many days making some silly Flash applications for my school magazine cover CD. One day I came across a promotional screensaver of my favorite video game and downloaded it. It was amazing. Then I found out it had been made with Flash and started wondering: “How do I turn a Flash animation into a screensaver?!”. I searched the Internet and found a couple of nice tools for this but they were all extremely expensive. Spending like $50 for this kind of program was just too much (I was 11 y.o.), I only wanted to make a few savers for my school magazine CD. A couple of years later, my friend OndÅ™ej and I figured we should make something free for authoring Flash screensavers. The codename of our project had been “Flash Dash”, then we renamed it to InstantStorm.

This is what InstantStorm 1.5 interface looks like

To find out more about InstantStorm, go to its homepage at www.instantstorm.com. To download the latest 1.5 release, go to the Download page. More info about InstantStorm history is available in this forum topic.

InstantStorm 1.5 next week

May 26, 2007 | 2:24 pm | Tags: instantstorm

You may have heard of InstantStorm. It was the first Flash screensaver maker to be released as freeware and it’s developed by my friend OndÅ™ej and I. Anyway, we expect the new version (1.5) release date to be sometime next week. Here’s a brief list of major changes since InstantStorm 1.0.2:

• Customizable screensaver exit behavior
• Customizable screensaver screen resolution
• Password protected screensaver installer
• Custom license agreement text for screensaver installer
• Custom Readme file for screensaver
• Ability to create screensaver uninstaller shortcut in Start menu
• Ability to open Display properties window when screensaver is successfully installed
• Improved Windows Vista compatibility
• SWF files in screensaver settings dialog (with ability to save settings using local object)

The program is almost finished, we just have to write a few pages of the new features’ documentation, re-test dual monitor support in Windows Vista and compile localized language packs.