New Skin: Chameleon

[Fatman_do]

Well it is new to this forum anyway.

See the Wiki page for screen shots and more info.

http://gbpvr.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Skin/Chameleon

This skin is the first skin by me, and I am a total newbie at this.
I decided to make a public skin shortly after reading into MixMan's advisor series and playing around with appearance manager. This is a good test bed to see how those tools can work with skin design.

The intention with Chameleon is that it is a master of disguise, able to change colors. It has no real identity other than it is intended to look like "Blue" and the user can go from their.

Give any feedback you can so I can learn from this.

Read the readme for image and other credits.

Enjoy.

[MixMan]

Hello Fatman_do

Clever skinning of AM you got there.
I have updated the BaseSkin sub dirs xmls. Fixed som "bugs"
You can use the sub dirs skin.xmls for your Chamelion.
This BaseSkin version has another skinpack "BlueGold" this time.
I have implemented BlueMCE "TitleLogos" by disabling ScreenName with the included font Blank.ttf
I will use batch files for theme changing with skinpacks....later.

[Old Dog]

Hi Fatman_do,

Chameleon looks very nice. You have a good eye and a fine attention to detail.

Your skins will go far.

Best Regards,
-David

P.S. Could I "borrow" your AM instructions?

[Fatman_do]

Hello Fatman_do

Clever skinning of AM you got there.
I have updated the BaseSkin sub dirs xmls. Fixed som "bugs"
You can use the sub dirs skin.xmls for your Chamelion.
This BaseSkin version has another skinpack "BlueGold" this time.
I have implemented BlueMCE "TitleLogos" by disabling ScreenName with the included font Blank.ttf
I will use batch files for theme changing with skinpacks....later.

Your Advisor method and SharperEdge skin helped with the groundwork.
I will "convert" the skin over to the BaseSkin guide and change the credits to reflect it instead of SharperEdge. I did have to change some elements to make it more compliant with AM skin effects (se.png). Overall, it is a fantastic starting point for a beginner to follow and I recommend it for use by others.

(A note to everyone also)
I did include various task images in the distribution that can be installed by using the batch file from the Advisor. They are located in sub-directories right under the chameleon directory (not appearance).

[Fatman_do]

Hi Fatman_do,

Chameleon looks very nice. You have a good eye and a fine attention to detail.

Your skins will go far.

Best Regards,
-David

Comments like that from you mean alot.

I don't feel it holds a candle to the other skins out there, but it is not intended to replace those. If this is nothing more than a "demo" skin for Mixman's advisor and your AM I will be happy with that.

P.S. Could I "borrow" your AM instructions?

Please feel free to do so. You can certainly do a better job presenting it graphically than I can.

[Fatman_do]

Just mostly a re-organization of the image files to work better with the latest version of Appearance Manager.

Also started on mixman's suggestion about using Baseskin. Now includes a work in progress of the weather plugin.

Added a variant of the water buttons with a driftwood texture selection button.

Due to relocating images, it is best if you delete or rename previous version before installing this one.

[MixMan]

Do you want to make an AdVisor ThemePack of the Chameleon skin ?
I just uploaded a new BaseSkin and ThemePacks in the Wiki
http://gbpvr.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Skin/BaseSkin

[Fatman_do]

I have a "bug" or two to iron out in chameleon (bug as in I have to find it). Then I plan on making "theme packs" and "skin packs" of various things. Since I have your attention. Can you (or anyone) point me in the direction of fixing this.

[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

What .xml file drives this popup? I can't see the wall before my eyes probably.
I want to move the description text to the right, or shrink the buttons.

I started with the .xml files from SharperEdge and tweaked a few like BaseSkin.

I plan on a release tommorrow that is mostly .xml "set", just tweaking as I use it more. Then I will start in a few plugins that I might try out and see (mostly I use "out of the box" stuff besides weather)

[MixMan]

There is not much control over that popup.
It is the Normal Buttons that is used for the buttons.

You will find the popup in the tvguide xml and the controls are these

<!-- popup - also adjust spacing between popup buttons
-->
<SpecialElement name="ProgrammePopupButtons" loc="35,130" spacing="-1" />
<SpecialElement name="ProgrammePopupTitle" loc="205,130" size="440,25" />
<SpecialElement name="ProgrammePopupDesc" loc="205,160" size="475,50" />

[Fatman_do]

I thought I had checked this before.

I saw it was using plugin menu buttons, but I was hung up on looking for popups with button descriptions.

Thanks for the help.