Even more fun was the fact the wallpaper widget had a little pixel editor built in that let you make your own tiling pattern. I seem to recall that it updated the desktop in realtime as you changed the pixels so you always knew exactly what your pattern looked like tiled.

Oh, memory unblocked! Didn't Windows 98 had something similar? It could be Win95 but I think it would be too much for that time, and for XP we already had background images in "good quality".

I don't think Windows ever included anything like it with the OS. Windows 95 switched to having a giant JPEG background for the wow factor. Certainly there could have been a third party program that implemented that functionality, but I don't think Microsoft ever shipped it with the OS. Maybe as one of those optional fun pack things they used to offer?

Windows 3.1 and 2000 definitely had a pattern editor. I think it was removed in XP.

System 7... it didn't become Mac OS until 7.6 or something, and then Mac OS 8 came out very soon after that.

Also conveniently made sure that clone manufacturers (who only had a license for System 7) didn't have a modern Mac OS anymore.

Right except that one clone maker they bought IIRC?

Yeah, they bought out Power Computing.

Repeating bears in overalls is all I can see when I think System 7 desktop pattern.

For me it’s the grass, stones, and star patterns. They look way too busy on modern displays but at 640x480 or 800x600 they weren’t too bad.