BaseSkin Tutorial Comments.

[Fatman_do]

All the latest code and images are now on the wiki download.

Up next in the tutorial:

CutAway - The "Mayhem 3" special effect, drawing an image over the top of task images. (covered)

Playing games with the Video Archive panel - Draw a recording indicator anywhere on the main menu. (covered)

BaseSkin background masks and Chameleon SkinEffects - Who dat? Why? How?

ScreenNameShadow, ButtonTextShadow - Ideas and outlining text. (And why I use it for Chameleon.)

International Considerations - (optional) Allow largest amount of area for languages that translate "simple" english words into a 15 letter nightmare for spelling bee kids.

Horizontal main menu - Give your up/down buttons a break. Sorry, no cool PSP horiz/vert combo's.

Any other topics?

[ShiningDragon]

Hi ho :-D

I have a question/problem with the inset Panel within MainMenu. The Placement was easy and it's working really good... for Live TV or DVD's.

Is there displayed a visualisation, than this Vis is more a DIA-Show, than a Visualisation. It stutters very bad, and i don't like this.

The same with the News-Feed Panel: If the Inset-Window is in use by Main Menu (LiveTV, DVD or Visualisations), than the Ticker "stops" and don't move. But the crazy thing: If i move the Cursor or walk through the Buttons, THEN the Ticker would be redrawed... but only while the movement of the cursor.

Why this? Is the error on my side, or is this a Problem of GB-PVR Core?

Than there's another Problem, hope you could reproduce this: I have the following Menustructure:

Main
Live Medium
Live TV
FM Radio
Net Radio

etc. pp, like you can see, i have "two" MainMenu's. And here's the Problem: All is working fine, but not the Inset Panel! If i am within the Main Main Menu and see a Movie or anything else in the Inset and switch into the Group Folder "Live Medium" or any other, than the Inset remains black; but sound is running continued.

Is this something i can change, or are these bugs, that sub has to fix?



Another Point:
I discovered the "Common Dialog" folder and found the "Prompt Box Skin.xml". I wanted to change the look and like of these Boxes just like my new ErrorPanel; i can write, i can do... but where can i check the results? SkinEdit can't display this one properly with skinned Buttons... -.-



Hope these aren't too much questions :-D

[Fatman_do]

Hi ho :-D

I have a question/problem with the inset Panel within MainMenu. The Placement was easy and it's working really good... for Live TV or DVD's.

Is there displayed a visualisation, than this Vis is more a DIA-Show, than a Visualisation. It stutters very bad, and i don't like this.

I really don't understand the last line. You say it works good for Live TV and DVD's. When is it stuttering, during playback of Music?

The same with the News-Feed Panel: If the Inset-Window is in use by Main Menu (LiveTV, DVD or Visualisations), than the Ticker "stops" and don't move. But the crazy thing: If i move the Cursor or walk through the Buttons, THEN the Ticker would be redrawed... but only while the movement of the cursor.

Why this? Is the error on my side, or is this a Problem of GB-PVR Core?

There is nothing skinning-wise that controls this, other than the memory requirements for the skin being really high. What are the file sizes of the images on screen? Are they .jpg's and .png's?

I will not be able to reproduce the newsfeed stoping until tommorrow. I don't think I had this problem. Again, it could be a performance issue.

Than there's another Problem, hope you could reproduce this: I have the following Menustructure:

Main
Live Medium
Live TV
FM Radio
Net Radio

etc. pp, like you can see, i have "two" MainMenu's. And here's the Problem: All is working fine, but not the Inset Panel! If i am within the Main Main Menu and see a Movie or anything else in the Inset and switch into the Group Folder "Live Medium" or any other, than the Inset remains black; but sound is running continued.

Is this something i can change, or are these bugs, that sub has to fix?

There is nothing you can change for sub-menus. It is just the main menu redrawn. Again, Saturday I will try to reproduce these things to see if it is a bug in GB-PVR or not. (You could try using 'Blue' to see if all these things happen under it. You just have to add the news-ticker to it.)

If all these things work under blue, then your skin may have too high of a performance hit.

Another Point:
I discovered the "Common Dialog" folder and found the "Prompt Box Skin.xml". I wanted to change the look and like of these Boxes just like my new ErrorPanel; i can write, i can do... but where can i check the results? SkinEdit can't display this one properly with skinned Buttons... -.-

Hope these aren't too much questions :-D

When button locations are controled by special elements (or anything controled by special elements), those objects are shown in relation to 0,0 of those elements. That is why buttons or other items show up in the upper left corner of SkinEdit. That really isn't a limitation of skinedit, because it cannot know what composite images are controlled by what element.

Anyway, those dialog boxes are only used for plugins that use CommonGBPVRUtilities.dll

(Video Archive, is the primary one that uses these.)

You can test those dialogs out using that plugin to delete a video.

I will answer as many questions that I can. Weekends are the hardest for me though.

[Fatman_do]

Thanks to you, Fatman_do. But one question left: Which files do i need explicit for the VAPanel?
I need one .xml within the Panel folder..., but which .dll for the Plugin-Folder is needed? And has to be a file within GB-PVR root?
Because VAPabel didn't worked right for me, i kicked it from the harddisk. And i don't want to install the whole VideoArchiver, because it's an automated setup. I don't like these ones and i will never use these ^^;

You know how i install the Weather-Plugin? I move the WHOLE GB-PVR Folder to another Disk, then install the Weather-Plugin, copy the neccessary Folder/Files, deinstallate the Weather-Plugin, move GB-PVR back to it's root and integrate the copied Weather-Plugin Files ^^;

Why? All the installer does is place the plugin and 'blue' skin files in the proper place and create a uninstaller. GB-PVR and other programs install by an installer and you use them. What is your concern with installers? They only install files needed, without overwritting newer versions of certain files. Some plugins use common library files, and older plugins have older versions of those file in the zip file. If you are not careful, you could overwrite newer versions with older ones contained in older plugins. I trust the installers written by plugin authors without reservation. Other than that, VA uses quite a few folders and files. I would have to check which ones to use.

[Fatman_do]

Another question:
If i would use the VAPanel your way..., also all about the whole Screen..., would i have any crashes with the Weather-Plugin-Panel, which is integrated within my main menu too?

No problems with anything by expanding the VAPanel that size.

[ShiningDragon]

I really don't understand the last line. You say it works good for Live TV and DVD's. When is it stuttering, during playback of Music?

Yes it's exact like this. And i don't understand it. Within WMP10, the Visualisations works perfect (I think an AMD64 X2 4.200+ and 2 GB RAM should be enough for a Vis...)

There is nothing skinning-wise that controls this, other than the memory requirements for the skin being really high. What are the file sizes of the images on screen? Are they .jpg's and .png's?

Mhm, the skin folder has currently a size of ~3,5 MB, how much RAM is used i can't see. I am using 3 .jpg's (One Background, two Bars) and the rest are .png's (because of the Transparency).

I will not be able to reproduce the newsfeed stoping until tommorrow. I don't think I had this problem. Again, it could be a performance issue.

There is nothing you can change for sub-menus. It is just the main menu redrawn. Again, Saturday I will try to reproduce these things to see if it is a bug in GB-PVR or not. (You could try using 'Blue' to see if all these things happen under it. You just have to add the news-ticker to it.)

If all these things work under blue, then your skin may have too high of a performance hit.

I could send you my skin at e-mail, if you want. Just extract do Skins-Directory will work. BaseSkin is currently not working, i think. You can then see the same things like me, i hope

When button locations are controled by special elements (or anything controled by special elements), those objects are shown in relation to 0,0 of those elements. That is why buttons or other items show up in the upper left corner of SkinEdit. That really isn't a limitation of skinedit, because it cannot know what composite images are controlled by what element.

I am understand, what you're saying, but this is bad for skinning... -.-

Anyway, those dialog boxes are only used for plugins that use CommonGBPVRUtilities.dll

Mhm, so i have to find a Plugin that makes much usage of this PopUps.

(Video Archive, is the primary one that uses these.)

(I don't like Setup-Routines...; they're overwriting my Fileversions, save much trash within GB-PVR like the Uninstall-Routines...)

You can test those dialogs out using that plugin to delete a video.

Yeah, i think i have to do something like this...

I will answer as many questions that I can. Weekends are the hardest for me though.

...especially with a person like me... ^^; Sorry for this :-D You're the best, man ^^

[ShiningDragon]

No problems with anything by expanding the VAPanel that size.

Ah, perfect

[ShiningDragon]

I trust the installers written by plugin authors without reservation. Other than that, VA uses quite a few folders and files. I would have to check which ones to use.

Because i have every time the cause of a malfunction in my head. If the Plugin is from a normal Archiv, then i can reconstruct which files are new through this Plugin and could remove this.
If i am using a Setup-Routine, then i don't know for sure, if this would work perfect @ deinstallation.

GB-PVR itself is the Mainprogram; no Problem for me to use the Setup-Routine; but i'll never install any Plugin by this way..., sorry

[Fatman_do]

Yes it's exact like this. And i don't understand it. Within WMP10, the Visualisations works perfect (I think an AMD64 X2 4.200+ and 2 GB RAM should be enough for a Vis...)

Mhm, the skin folder has currently a size of ~3,5 MB, how much RAM is used i can't see. I am using 3 .jpg's (One Background, two Bars) and the rest are .png's (because of the Transparency).

I could send you my skin at e-mail, if you want. Just extract do Skins-Directory will work. BaseSkin is currently not working, i think. You can then see the same things like me, i hope

The problem may not be performance then if it is only 3.5 mb. I just was not sure since I didn't know what you have. If you want to email me the files that is fine, my email address is availible by clicking email me on my name.

Has anybody else had stuttering problems with music visualizations?

I don't use GBPVR for music playback so I will have to test this. When I do this for screen shots, it is on my laptop that I code with, which is a wimpy celeron, so I ignore all performance problems. I will try at home on my HTPC (again tommorrow).

[ShiningDragon]

The problem may not be performance then if it is only 3.5 mb. I just was not sure since I didn't know what you have. If you want to email me the files that is fine, my email address is availible by clicking email me on my name.

Has anybody else had stuttering problems with music visualizations?

I don't use GBPVR for music playback so I will have to test this. When I do this for screen shots, it is on my laptop that I code with, which is a wimpy celeron, so I ignore all performance problems. I will try at home on my HTPC (again tommorrow).

So, finally i send it to you. It's an .exe Archiv; remove my added Extension please. You Provider seems to dislike .zip's or .exe's as Attachement ^^;