If you love to collect, organize and customize Mac OS X desktop icons as much as we do, CandyBar has probably been your best friend since it launched back in 2007. Unfortunately, over the years Apple’s efforts to make OS X more secure have slowly crippled the app. Customizing icons of signed apps causes the Mac App Store not to recognize potential updates and the new release of Mac OS X Mountain Lion means it is no longer possible to customize the OS X Dock at all.
We and our good friends over at Panic have taken a hard look at the future of desktop icons on the Mac and unfortunately, the writing is on the wall. There may come a time, very soon in fact, when it won’t be possible to customize any system level icon on the desktop except perhaps folders. Apple’s push to sandbox applications, the addition of signed apps and the increasing unification of OS X and iOS mean CandyBar’s days (in its current form) are numbered.
Given all of these developments, Panic is no longer willing to charge money for CandyBar and we agree with them. As of today, the app is free to download and officially becomes unsupported. Users who purchased CandyBar in July can write to us for a full refund. To help existing CandyBar users, we’ve set up a new Iconfactory knowledge base that answers basic questions about the app, although it will remain officially unsupported by us as well.
Because Cabel and the rest of the Panic gang love the Mac and their icons as much as we do, they’ll continue to keep CB working with minor icon updates, but they cannot guarantee it will continue to function in the future. We’ll also be here, making freeware icons for you to download and enjoy as long as we can. Icons are our passion and they helped get us where we are today. We love pushing pixels and sharing our creations with you, our loyal visitors and fans. We’re hopeful that CandyBar or its software cousin will eventually return in a new form that plays well with the App Store and gives desktop icons new life, but that day is not today.
We encourage you to surf on over and read Panic’s blog post about CandyBar to get their side of the pixelated story, and where we go from here. We thank everyone who’s supported our and Panic’s efforts by purchasing CandyBar or downloading one of our iContainers. We hope you’ll enjoy our iconic creations for years to come. Onward ho!
