重點資訊
The classic After Dark Fish screensaver, a staple for PC users in the early '90s, originated from a simple observation about dentist offices. Ed Fries, a co-founder of After Dark, recounted that an artist working on a scene featuring a dentist's office wanted to include an aquarium. This request prompted Fries to offer his skills as a video game programmer to animate fish on the screen.
Fries initially created a looping animation using simple characters like parentheses to simulate water and o's to represent bubbles. After developing larger fish characters, he expanded the project by filling his entire screen with the animation. The screensaver gained popularity among his colleagues, eventually leading to the development of the official version that became synonymous with Windows during that decade.
While learning to work in Windows, Fries developed the screensaver and later created a Mac version at the request of a Microsoft Word team member. This collaborator also produced a fish editor, allowing users to customize their virtual tanks. These efforts emerged from an informal group of Microsoft employees who referred to themselves as bogus software and enjoyed creating unconventional projects.
