v1.2.1

This new release includes the following:

• H.265 Video Support (#17)
  • Aerial now supports Apple's H.265 videos in both 1080p (for lower file sizes) and 4K
• There are now two ways to have Aerial avoid launching when playing other videos: (#114)
  • Use aerial.scr to install using the system screensaver API (There is a possibility you will encounter high CPU usage and low performance and some app features, like launching with a global shortcut won't work.)
  • Or configure Aerial to run as an administrator
• Minor bug fixes (#149, #138)

See the version history for more information

How to Install

Self Launching App

Download Aerial Setup 1.2.1.exe (or download the .zip and extract it) and run it. Aerial takes care of the rest. A configuration window will open where you can adjust the settings.

Windows Screensaver

Download aerial.scr, copy it to a folder where you won't delete it, right click, and click on install. Use the dialogue to configure settings.

Things to note

• Disable any other screensavers before installing
• Set your computer sleep settings to longer than the screensaver start time
• If you want your computer to download and cache the videos, you must set up the video cache manually

v1.2.0

This update brings lots of new feature to Aerial including: multi-line text, video transitions, random text location, and a new icon. Enjoy!

New Feature Summary

• Multi-line text (#26)
  • Text can now be displayed on up to 4 lines
  • Customize each line's type and font
• Multi-monitor text (#112)
  • Choose which monitor a line can be displayed on
• Random/moving text locations (#124)
• Video Transitions
  • Dissolve, fade, wipe, circle, and more!
  • Customize the speed
  • Randomize the type and direction of the transition
• Improvements to starting and closing Aerial
  • A keyboard shortcut to start the screensaver (#71)
  • Aerial will not run when the computer is sleeping or locked
  • Aerial will automatically close itself when your computer locks or unlocks
  • You can now set a Aerial not lock your computer if you wake it up immediacy after it starts
  • You can now configure Aerial to not run on battery power
• New Icon (congratulations to @TheFreshPrins for wining our vote!)
• New display category: images
• Stretch or crop option for special screen sizes (#119)
• Font selector now shows all the fonts when empty (#45)
• Fixed two issues where a popup was showing on startup for some users (#131 and #132)
• Increased video loading performance
• You can now customize the video skip key
• Added a button to access the config files
• Smoothed out the config menu
• Updated dependencies

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

Download Aerial Setup 1.2.0.exe and run it. A configuration window will open where you can adjust any settings. Make sure you disable any other screensavers on your PC and set you system screen & sleep setting accordingly.

v1.2.0-beta1

This is a beta preview of v1.2.0. Because of major changes to how Aerial loads videos and text in this new version, I would like to some people take some time to test it for any bugs before a wide release. This is not the full release, there are still other features that will be added before the update.

⚠️ Do not download unless you want to beta test new features. This release is unstable.

New Feature Summary

• Better transitions
• Multiple line text
• Display images on top of the screensaver
• Can now crop image for non 16:9 monitors

See (commits)[https://github.com/OrangeJedi/Aerial/compare/master...v1.2.0] to the v1.2.0 branch before this release for a full long.

Create an issue with the beta label or comment on this release's discussion for any bug or problems you find. Thanks!

v1.1.0

This new release includes the following new features:

• Update notifier
  • Aerial will now send a push notification on startup if a new release is available
  • A notification badge with a link to the GitHub releases page will also show in the config menu
• A new (long-overdue) About tab
  • Contains about, versioning, and licensing information
• Automatic sunrise & sunset times based on GPS coordinates (see #61)
  • This setting can be found under the new Time & Location tab in the menu. It must be set manually
• A new text type, Astronomy
  • Display the sunrise/sunset or moonrise/moonset time on your screensaver!
• Enhanced suspend features
  • Use the tray menu to temporarly suspend Aerial for 1 or 3 hours. Useful for when you don't need your gorgeous screensaver to run every few minutes. (See #114)

It also fixes the following bugs:

• Misc development issues
• #110 - video not playing on multiscreen. A big thanks to @Alexyoe for finding and fixing this bug!
  • If you were having troubles, check the Alternate Render Method setting under the Multiscreen menu
  • This fix also adds a custom FPS setting when enabled
• #116 - cannot read undefined error
• Multiple repairs related to custom videos

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

Download Aerial Setup 1.1.0.exe (or download the .zip and extract it) and run it. Aerial takes care of the rest. A configuration window will open where you can adjust the settings.

🚨Disable any other screensavers before installing and make sure to set your computer sleep settings to longer than the screensaver start time.

v1.0.2

• Fixed a bug where Aerial would re-start after sleeping the computer (fixes #105)
• Shrunk installer size

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

Download Aerial Setup 1.0.2.exe (or download the .zip and extract it) and run it. Aerial takes care of the rest. A configuration window will open where you can adjust the settings.

🚨Disable any other screensavers before installing, you don't need two running at the same time.

v1.0.1

• Added a option in the tray menu to suspend Aerial. This makes it easy to turn off Aerial for a short period of time.
• Fixed an issue where having opening a preview window would prevent the screensaver from closing later. (#100)
• Fixed an issue where if Aerial was set to only play videos from a certain time of day it would crash. (#101)
• Fixed the logic to determine what time of day it was.
• Fixed a massive video loading issue that would cause a crash if a low number of videos was selected.
• Fixed an issue where Aerial would crash every time it opened after moving the cache location. (#74 & #90)

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

Download Aerial.Setup.1.0.1.exe (or download the .zip and extract it) and run it. Aerial takes care of the rest. A configuration window will open where you can adjust the settings.

🚨Disable any other screensavers before installing, you don't need two running at the same time.

v1.0.0

A big number to represent a big change! Aerial is now at version 1.0.0! But first, a bit of an explanation.

TL;DR

I took a break, came back, and now Aerial is now an independent application. Also the new videos have been added!

The Longer Story

About two years ago some things happened in my life that caused me to step a away from coding. At around the same time this project came to a standstill. The problem was that when Aerial was launched by Window's screensaver tool it often took up way to much processing power to display a simple video (see #36). Without a way to resolve this it didn't seem wise to move the application forward at the time. If I was going to build something as awesome as Aerial I wanted people to be able to use it. So, sadly, Aerial took a backseat in my mind at the same time I stepped back from coding.

Then, earlier this year, I started to do more development. Eventually my mind turned back to Aerial and I got fixated with trying to solve the issues from before. After reading through your issues and reading about alternative methods, I decided Aerial was worth another try. What you see here in v1.0.0 is that result.
To solve the high-power issues (and to future proof the app) I decided to make Aerial a standalone app that would take care of all the scrensaver launching itself. (Thank you to @richardmalone in #65 for the inspiration) After lots of hard work and failed tests I finally got it to work. Aerial is now a full application that can run on its own.

Before I start listing out the new features in this update I'd like to thank everyone who has contributed and use Aerial. I never though hundreds, let alone thousands, of people would want to use this. So thank you.

v1.0.0 Changelog

• Aerial is now a stand-alone application. It installs itself, launches itself on bootup, and launches itself after the user is idle (See #36, #65, & #80)
• Aerial also now closes itself. You can choose whether to have it blank the screens or sleep the computer after a set time. (Default: dim the screen after 30 minutes and sleep the computer) (See also #51)
• The new AppleTV videos have been added! Enjoy stunning view of the Grand Canyon, Iceland, Yosemite, and Patagonia.
• The types category for videos has been updated. Every video now has a category and the Aerial category has been split into Cityscapes and Landscapes
• Aerial now has the option to lock the screen when it quits. Let your friends see your awesome screensaver without granting them access to your whole computer.
• You can now launch Aerial by opening the app tray, right clicking on it, and selecting Start Aerial. (Not quite #71, but it's close)
• Aerial now very effectively hides the cursor when it's running. (See #78 & #96)
• Updated logic for displaying on non-16:9 monitors. (See #30) Thanks to @Ivan0xFF for writing the code!
• Added a start up message for first time users
• Redid the video choosing logic to better support the same videos on all screens and not replaying videos across screens.
• Upgraded all the behind the scenes dependencies
• Various other bug-fixes and improvements

See the version history for more detailed information

Install Instructions

Download Aerial.Setup.1.0.0.exe (or download the .zip and extract it) and run it. Aerial takes care of the rest. A configuration window will open where you can adjust the settings.

🚨Disable any other screensavers before installing, you don't need two running at the same time.

Beta 0.5.4

• Added a new type for displaying text over a video: HTML! You can insert your own HTML code to be displayed over a video just like text. Use it for inserting widgets like clocks, weather, or images, or for additional customization.
• Various updates to the caching system. See #42, #49, and #56
• Re-write of the logic to display the same video on each screen. (#46)
• Added a preview button to the config menu. (#35)
• Added refresh and reset buttons to the menu. The refresh button will cause Aerial to check all configured values on the next start up and the reset button will remove all configured values. Use if you are getting unidentifiable errors.
• Various bug-fixes

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

.zip (recommended)

Download aerial-v0.5.4.zip
Extract the .zip file and navigate into the aerial-v0.5.3 folder
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window

.scr

Download aerial-0.5.4-scr.zip
Extract the .zip file
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window

Beta 0.5.3

• Adds #24. You can now change the max width for displayed text.
• Fixes #25. The scrollbar on the video tab no longer goes out of bounds.
• Updates the radio buttons on the text position selector to show that text has been added to a position
• Various bug-fixes

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

.zip (recommended)

Download aerial-v0.5.3.zip
Extract the .zip file and navigate into the aerial-v0.5.3 folder
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window

.scr

Download aerial-0.5.3-scr.zip
Extract the .zip file
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window

Beta 0.5.2

• Adds #15. You can now change the cache location
• Improves the fix for #12
• Massive performance increases to address #10
• Fixes #16
• Allows for fallback the HTML video element
• Better handling of unloaded videos

See the version history for more detailed information

How to Install

.zip (recommended)

Download aerial-v0.5.2.zip
Extract the .zip file and navigate into the aerial-v0.5.2 folder
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window

.scr

Download aerial-0.5.2-scr.zip
Extract the .zip file
Right click on aerial.scr and click install
Configure your screen saver settings in the pop up window