Terminal Tips: Make your Screensaver a desktop background

Have you ever wanted your screen saver to appear as a background image? Probably not. But if you like to show off to your Windows-using friends, then this tip can definitely help you out. By typing the following command into Terminal (Applications > Utilities), all on one line, and hitting enter, you will instantly see your screen saver displayed as a desktop background:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/ScreenSaverEngine.app/Contents/MacOS/ScreenSaverEngine -background

To get things back to normal (which you probably will want to do, as many screensavers will put undue load on your processor), either close the Terminal window, press control + C, or restart your computer. If you are running Leopard and have the clock overlay active, it will appear above all windows, which can get a little annoying.

Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 and Terminal Tips sections.