Making a full screen Cocoa app

Question

I want to create a full Screen Cocoa application, however my app is slightly different from a conventional fullscreen app.

This app would be below everything else, so underneath the menu bar and the Dock, etc. It would have a large image covering up the Desktop and icons, with a custom NSView in the middle with a table view, etc. If this concept is hard to understand then here is an image:

http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/6308/mockupo.png

The only part that might be a bit confusing is the background image. This background image is NOT the wallpaper of the computer, but part of the app. So when the app is launched, it goes into full screen mode and puts itself underneath the dock and the menu bar, and underneath all other windows too. So it draws the background image to cover the screen (including Desktop and icons). Then has a custom NSView in the middle containing my controls.

What's the best way to go about doing this?

Thanks

Answer 1

Make a borderless window, the size of the menu-bar screen (screen 0—not [NSScreen mainScreen]), positioned at 0,0, with window level kCGDesktopWindowLevel.

Remember that you will need to observe for screen frame-change notifications (when the user changes the screen dimensions), and that you should correctly handle the case of no screen at all (headless Mac).