Adobe Transient Witticisms

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A diagram indicating the location of "Adobe Transient Witticisms" on the alternate splash screen of Photoshop CS2

Adobe Transient Witticisms is the name coined for an Easter egg appearing in several versions of Adobe Photoshop. The easter egg can be viewed by accessing the alternate splash screen (in Mac OS this involves holding down the "command" key while choosing "About Photoshop" in the application menu; in Windows, hold Ctrl) and then option-clicking in the white space immediately above the scrolling credits. After the credits scroll through completely, the witticisms appear as a series of phrases in that particular spot. Holding down the option key makes the witticisms come faster as well as making the credits scroll more quickly.

The witticisms first appeared in Photoshop 3.0 and are said to be the idea of engineer Kevin Johnston, who recorded humorous sayings from the other engineers on the project and inserted them into the program code for posterity.

Traditionally, the witticisms include a list of "The Top Ten Signs the Engineering Team Has Been Working Too Hard," which changes from version to version, and end with the phrase, "The funny bits are done.", with the exception of Photoshop 7.0.1, which does not include this phrase, but ends after the "The Top Ten Signs the Engineering Team Has Been Working Too Hard". In Classic versions of Mac OS, the entire contents of the witticisms can be found in Photoshop's resource fork.

In Photoshop 7.0.1 there are also humorous comments in the scrolling credits, including a reference to the licence holder as their favorite customer at the end.