Developing plugins

[Jeff]

If you were willing to use the CommonGBPVRUtilities dll it has a built in error dialog box. You can see an example of how to use this in the weather plug-in source code on the wiki.

Jeff

[Old Dog]

If you were willing to use the CommonGBPVRUtilities dll it has a built in error dialog box. You can see an example of how to use this in the weather plug-in source code on the wiki.

Jeff

I know, and I would love too but doesn't it depend on a common dialogs directory in the current skin? If so, that's something I can't depend on.

-David

[sub]

Dont use IPluginHelper.ShowMessage(). It was abandoned about a year ago.

[Old Dog]

If you were willing to use the CommonGBPVRUtilities dll it has a built in error dialog box. You can see an example of how to use this in the weather plug-in source code on the wiki.

Jeff

Can we promote these utiities and the dialog boxes to "core components" and have them included in the distribution?

[sub]

No, I'd rather not.

[Old Dog]

Okay

[Jeff]

I know, and I would love too but doesn't it depend on a common dialogs directory in the current skin? If so, that's something I can't depend on.

-David

What I would suggest you do is install the files as part of your skin collection and, in your plug-in, copy them from your known installation location to the current skin if needed. Again, if you look at the weather plug-in as an example you will see how it does this. The weather plug-in will work with all skins by copying the default skin files form the blue skin if none is found in the currently active skin.

Jeff

[Old Dog]

Thanks Jeff, I appreciate your offer, and will probably take you up on it. However, this brings to mind another issue which has been concerning me.

When I first introduced the Appearance Manager, there were many comments about extending it, somehow making it work with other skins. While I currently don't know what that really means, if something could be done, I can imagine the desirability of a common shared resources area.

It is too early for me to actually propose such an area, but I would like to hear some feedback on the idea. I'm pretty sure there are pros and cons.

Whats your opinion?

[KingArgyle]

Some of this should work it's way out as Sub gets his skinning/plugin guidelines document out. Without a set of rules or best practices on how things should be done, there is no way to get the compatibility established.

All you can do is set the guidelines on how the Appearance Manager is going to work, and what it expects. It is then up to the various Skins to conform to that, so that they work with it. Long run it is best for all the skins to have Appearance Manager compatibility, as it is just a good user friendly feature, and something in my opinion that GBPVR is lacking when compared with Meedio.

I created a schema at one time for an Plugin / Skin update/download XML file format, but it never went anywhere. If I could figure out a way to hook it into the wiki and have the file generated as a web service the appearance manager could hook into that to get notified of new or updated skins.

[Fatman_do]

Here are some proposals.

1. Have an "Appearance" folder (with sub-folders) that act as a depository for background images, task images, button images, ect.

2. Appearance manager reads config.xml to identify current skin. Then read baseskin.xml for a tag like <AppearanceManager>True</AppearanceManager> to check for skin compatibility (relies on skinner using defined guidelines).

3. Changes then could be done (which is so far file moving & renaming?) in that skin directory.

Of course I know nothing of writting plugins and such, so I might make that sound easier than it really is.