Retain customizations when upgrade?

[dshoup]

This is probably an impossible request...but here it goes anyhow. I would love to have a way to identify customizations I have made to skin files so that when I upgrade to new versions of CS or plugins that install skins I can either see what changes I need to make to get my customizations back...or better yet, it keeps the changes automatically (unless both the new skin and my skin were changed from the original...then use the new skin's change). I realize I can simply keep the old skin file, but this has two problems. First, some times the old skin will be incompatible with some change made in a plugin/CS (even though the lines I have customized still work in the new skin version). Second the updated skin may have changes I'm interested in, but I'll never see these changes if I don't use the new skin.

Can anyone think of a way to identify these differences...perhaps a plugin that scans all skin files and systematically lists the differences? Feel free to tell me I'm just dreaming...

[Hairy]

I suppose it depends on the customizations. You can save your own versions of any of the editable formatting options in the CS plugin (TV Guide.xml, Baseskin.xml, Mainmenu.xml) and place them in the relevent "..\Plugins\SkinPlugin" folders, these would then be selectable from within Gbpvr.

But as you say things move on, changes to GBpvr and to plugins mean sometimes xml's have to be altered for compatibility. The low tech approach would be to use an xml editor with a compare function (like Notepad++), that will show you what's different between the two and let you easily copy over the relevent lines.

As for a plugin/software to do that automatically, I think that falls firmly into the wish category. I think they have a list for that around here somewhere .

[Fatman_do]

Also of note, I will be posting on the wiki page, individual plugin xml files from this point foward as a way for users to do incremental updates. I will note in the release notes if they were updated due to new versions of plugins, or just formatting improvements.

[Fatman_do]

Oh, and one more thing. If anyone does custom changes and wants to compare new to old, I would suggest renaming your customized skin to something else, like MYCS3. Then you can do a new install and compare the two side by side. Even renamed, you would have full skinplugin support.

[dshoup]

Thanks for the ideas. Notepad++is a great little program. And I also like the idea of the incremental updates...thanks Fatman do. I think the combination of these two things pretty well covers what I'm after.

'Just one question...

Even renamed, you would have full skinplugin support.

do you mean there is a way to have the community program skin recognize the renamed xml as the "skin" file to use (even with a "skin.xml" file present)? How is this done?

[Fatman_do]

I mean copy the \Skin2\Community3\ folder as \Skin2\MySkin\. The skinplugin doesn't care what the skin name is.

[dshoup]

Thanks!