Develop Bugs

chome could we do this

could we do this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IMtkNSjuhQ&feature=related

Definitely would be awesome!
Look here for possible needed files
http://allshadow.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=3

This is so cool! : ).
I can't wait to see it on my phone.

Can "we"? Yes, all the shadow glamour is powered by ( and probably funded 6.1) the funky new silverlight tech that powers Chome.
But do we want nice large photoes and album covers on our home screen? Do we want my fave loading with Flash-like slowness? Some yes, some, not so much...
There is a *load of possibilty in this .1 release, beyond what we've seen so far. SmartPhone Cube? Excalibur-exclusive UI functionality exploiting the unique hardware I assume is only days away, if everyone is as rapid-fire as you, Rick.
Replace * with your favorite word

I think, the people must have a choice, what to install and what is important - performance or effects. This is personal choice, and if there are many variants, technologies, etc, the people will be happy.
You see what happen when sliding panel come - everyone like it! .

The interface on the Juno... which is what you're seeing that in video... IS Chome. It's even the same CLSID on the home screen's .xml... the same GUID's... etc I'm thinking the .dll's are different to make it "special" for the TMobile Shadow (the HTC Juno).
I thought it was just a matter of formatting, like changing the .cpr file or something. I don't think it is so though... as I've searched the file system on a TMobile Shadow phone and couldnt find any .cpr files whatsoever...

All CHome interface in bronze.dll (i think so...)

yep.. true.

this cmhomeaddon plugin is only for portrait screen,and only for neo display style(another display style of chome)

Oh, sh....
Neo have weather plugin, and current CHome - no

Any recommendations for what to pick apart and repack bronze.dll with? ResHack isn't giving me anything too friendly.

Profezza said:
Any recommendations for what to pick apart and repack bronze.dll with? ResHack isn't giving me anything too friendly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
use this PE Explorer

PE is much friendlier! Thanks for the tip!
When I replace the images, the file is nearly 4x larger. When I replace bronzeres on the phone it kills Chome-based screens. Is there something I have to do to force a file-size match, or sign it, or something?

Profezza said:
PE is much friendlier! Thanks for the tip!
When I replace the images, the file is nearly 4x larger. When I replace bronzeres on the phone it kills Chome-based screens. Is there something I have to do to force a file-size match, or sign it, or something?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
unsign the dll first then once done resign

i think it would be real neat to have a shadow interface on the dash it would make the excaliburs unique and for people in the barbershop with the same phone as me can envy lol

It works, it works! And boy, does this quick test version look like crap--- but it works, so I think I will try again, but with feeling now. Woo hoo hoo...
So, how shall we get this working on the same phone with an existing bronzesres.dll? I notice that thehome.xml calls only 2 plugins, iconbar and "Bronze". Anyone know how to dupe Bronze, and have it call the new dll?
Off to Google I go...

Ok, it's closer, and much stronger than the first experiment. In fact, the black is too strong. Back to the 'shop to tweak it again...
UPDATE: Closer still... (#6 & #7)

Got it
Ok, here it is, a nice, dark, but not too dark Sliding Panel set. At this point, it will REPLACE your regular sliding panel's soft translucent white bubble look.
Although a simple script to unload any current Chome-based homescreen and swap the dll's is probably trivial for someone to write (hint, hint), it is not for me.
Directions:
Be running WM6.1, and have Sliding Panel (Chome) working.
Switch to any homescreen that does not use Sliding Panel.
Backup your existing bronzeres.dll
Overwrite with the BrightNight version.
Load a Sliding Panel style homescreen. For best results, use black text and a bright and light background, or a medium text and a dark background for a low output "night mode". Hence the name.
CAUTION: This .dll is experimental. Use at your own risk. Look both ways when crossing the street. Floss. For those of you who didnt follow directions, the original bronzeres.dll is available earlier in this thread. It is in use and cannot be overwritten while chome is running.
UPDATE: Added some bright wallpapers, since they are hard to find around here. © someone else. If you need directions on what to do with them, just skip this whole topic.

That's tight! Maybe we can "join efforts" and make the top of the rectangle darker also, like I did in a previous thread around here. Oh... what do I do with those backgrounds ?!

send me the pic. I was toying around with making a whole new image, if I ever get a day off, too.

WM6.5 and Background wallpaper question.

Hey
wanted to know if the WM6.5 allows you to use full res and quality wallpaper?
not like on the regular HD wallpaper that shows only 512X512...
tnx =]

WM 6.5 allows you to use full screen images and they are crystal clear.

liav12 said:
Hey
wanted to know if the WM6.5 allows you to use full res and quality wallpaper?
not like on the regular HD wallpaper that shows only 512X512...
tnx =]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's not WinMo that's causing the problem with Touch HD background wallpapers, it's Touch Flo 3D.
So, if you would disable TF3D you could probably get nice quality with WinMo 6.1.
I have been digging around this issue and I do have a solution to get full resolution wallpapers with TF3D. Unfortunately, this process now requires a lot of messing around with Manila files, so it might not be for everyone. But I'm thinking about publishing my custom Manila wallpaper files, which basically require simply copy+paste into Windows directory and then restarting TF3D.

Rozenthal said:
It's not WinMo that's causing the problem with Touch HD background wallpapers, it's Touch Flo 3D.
So, if you would disable TF3D you could probably get nice quality with WinMo 6.1.
I have been digging around this issue and I do have a solution to get full resolution wallpapers with TF3D. Unfortunately, this process now requires a lot of messing around with Manila files, so it might not be for everyone. But I'm thinking about publishing my custom Manila wallpaper files, which basically require simply copy+paste into Windows directory and then restarting TF3D.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That would be great.
I hate how the quality is degraded once you set the Wallpaper.
There is so much difference in quality when viewing a picture in "albums" as opposed to the home screen wallpaper.
I wonder why TF3D lowers the resolution on the home screen.
Please publish a solution. thanks

bigjee said:
That would be great.
I hate how the quality is degraded once you set the Wallpaper.
There is so much difference in quality when viewing a picture in "albums" as opposed to the home screen wallpaper.
I wonder why TF3D lowers the resolution on the home screen.
Please publish a solution. thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I actually started a thread in General > Dev and Hacking about this very issue. It didn't get a lot of attention from people with Touch HD's, but none the less, I managed to get down to the bottom of the mysterious TF3D behavior and I can see that the info from that thread got to the people working on visual enhancements for Touch HD.
Basically, it's insanely stupid solution some lazy HTC programmer implemented.
Imagine that TF3D can display images that have maximum size of 512x512. Now imagine you have screen size that's 480x696 pixels (this is how big the wallpapers are). See the problem? The maximum image you can use is 184 pixels short to cover the whole screen.
And then you get a genius idea to use two 512x512 images to cover the screen area and allow full resolution wallpapers to be used. So you take the default HTC wallpaper, split it in two parts, align them perfectly on the screen so it looks as if they're one image - and problem solved!
Right?
Well, not quite. Yes, it will work for default background image, but what about custom wallpapers? Well, they were too lazy to make an automatized script that would split the images in two and align them on the screen.
Instead, they opt for a more convenient solution in form of taking custom wallpapers, shrinking them down into a single 512x512 box and then stretching this downsampled image back to 480x696 area.
And that's whats causing all these problems.
If you want a temporary solution, create 512x512 image - I bet it will look sharper then your 480x800 image.
A true solution is to cheat TF3D and import manually FOUR separate images that together form portrait and landscape wallpapers.
This can be done, and I will explain it in a separate post here when I get some free time. At the moment I'm too busy with FingerKeyboard

Wow, Rozenthal! That would be very interesting! It´s almost a dream I have: to see a quite sharp image on my TF3D Home screen.
A lot of people would be very glad with you if you teach us how to do this.
Thanks a lot in advance

It's not a dream I have it on my screen now...
The problem is in the fact that changing skins cannot be done through Settings tab. It requires editing the appropriate Manila files by using a Manila graphic editor on your PC. Also, this is something that will require at least moderate knowledge of some good graphic editing software (read: Photoshop), because you need to manually prepare split png files for portrait and landscape.
Then you take these files, load them into Manila files, compress them into a special TF3D graphic format, copy them to Windows directory overwriting the old files, turn off TF3D and then pick "Use default wallpaper" in your Settings / Wallpaper tab.
So, it's major pain in the a$$, and it's not something you would be doing on the road, or every day. But, as I said - it CAN be done.
The way I see it, we could probably get some users here to team up, learn the procedure and then simply offer zip-ed Manila files that other people can download and copy into Windows folder. That part is easy, it can be done by anyone. Preparing the wallpapers, however, isn't that simple.
Anyway, I will try to make a tutorial on how to do all this tomorrow.
In the mean time, you can check the thread I mentioned earlier. Altough, be warned that some of the final conclusion posts from that thread were lost during last sunday hack attack on XDA.

Tell me About Themes

I am very seriously interested in designing skins or themes or whatever for my blackstone but there really is nowhere to start. There are no definitions for the things people talk about and it makes it super hard to break into this developers world.
But I guess I am looking for a few answers and tips about Themes.
What is the Top Curtain?
What is the Bottom Curtain?
Flip Background? Flip Digit?
Slider?
How to create Icons for the slider and the task bar at the top?
Details like pixels sizes, formats and ect.
Just anything about themes.
Is there a book about this? haha.
I will probably be yelled at for this post and referred to the search function but from what I have seen, there is nothing about this topic. Hmmm, Maybe this is something to add to the Wiki? These are probably the questions developers do not want to answer because this is all probably fudamental and kindegarten but I have to try.
Thanks to anyone who can post some links to guides or some tips and answers.
I feel retarded.

Don't feel retarded.
If someone is retarded it's the Microsoft and HTC programmers who figured that absolutely everyone will just love their default colors / icons / wallpapers, and so they didn't provide any support for making new skins and themes.
To cut the long story short - yes, it can be done, and yes it's kindda frustrating but if you're serious about it and you know how to work with graphics, I'm sure you'll be able to figure it all out.
First of all, you need a Manila editor. There are a few, I recommend CFC GUI and M9EDITOR, the first one being intended only for graphics, and the second one having the same but also additional things too. If you only want to skin the graphics, then you'll be ok just with CFC.
Then go to your device Windows folder and copy over to your PC any file that ends with _manila. There's like a few thousand of them, so it will take a while.
Run CFC GUI and point it to the folder where you copied all those _manila files. It will then show you a list of all the files that contain ANY graphic elements.
Browse it through and you'll soon recognize the familiar graphic items from your device. You will also notice there's a "Save as PNG" option - that will create a transparent PNG in the appropriate resolution, which you can then open up in Photoshop, edit, colorize or whatever you like.
When you're done, you save the PNG, go back to CFC, select "Replace with", load your newly edited PNG, press "CFC Compress" and voila!
The 12345_manila file you just edited has been updated!
Now you take the 12345_manila file, copy it back to Windows folder and restart TF3D.
You will see your new graphic has been integrated into the system.

First of all, Thanks a Ton!
Thousands of them eeeek. Does it take a long time to make a theme?

No problem... I've just started messing around with all of this, so I'm no pro skinner either.
Does it take long... Well, depends on your skills. And also on what kind of extent you want to cover with the skin.
The biggest problem is that most of the graphic files are a complete mess. There's no logical pattern, and they've managed to complicate things beyond reason - for example, some of the most common graphics you see on the screen are actually made out of two or more separate bitmaps, and it's up to you to figure out what is what, etc.
For example, when you click on the flip-clock on your Home screen it glows up in green - well that "green background" is made out of THREE images!
Also, some of the files are coded into Manila format, while others are just plain BMP or PNG or even GIF. Then there's a lot of stuff that's controlled through XML files...
So, when you start with all this, keep your ambitions modest - it's not something you can overcome in one day. But it can also be very rewarding

Took like 50mins to copy over. Wow. I opened it up in CFC and I can not believe anyone who has made a theme. I am trying to figure out a pattern with the file names. Sooo confusing but thanks a ton again for your help. Now I just need to find a graphics editor.

Shival said:
Took like 50mins to copy over. Wow. I opened it up in CFC and I can not believe anyone who has made a theme. I am trying to figure out a pattern with the file names. Sooo confusing but thanks a ton again for your help. Now I just need to find a graphics editor.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that is why i am full of respect for these peeps...

Rozenthal said:
Don't feel retarded.
If someone is retarded it's the Microsoft and HTC programmers who figured that absolutely everyone will just love their default colors / icons / wallpapers, and so they didn't provide any support for making new skins and themes.
To cut the long story short - yes, it can be done, and yes it's kindda frustrating but if you're serious about it and you know how to work with graphics, I'm sure you'll be able to figure it all out.
First of all, you need a Manila editor. There are a few, I recommend CFC GUI and M9EDITOR, the first one being intended only for graphics, and the second one having the same but also additional things too. If you only want to skin the graphics, then you'll be ok just with CFC.
Then go to your device Windows folder and copy over to your PC any file that ends with _manila. There's like a few thousand of them, so it will take a while.
Run CFC GUI and point it to the folder where you copied all those _manila files. It will then show you a list of all the files that contain ANY graphic elements.
Browse it through and you'll soon recognize the familiar graphic items from your device. You will also notice there's a "Save as PNG" option - that will create a transparent PNG in the appropriate resolution, which you can then open up in Photoshop, edit, colorize or whatever you like.
When you're done, you save the PNG, go back to CFC, select "Replace with", load your newly edited PNG, press "CFC Compress" and voila!
The 12345_manila file you just edited has been updated!
Now you take the 12345_manila file, copy it back to Windows folder and restart TF3D.
You will see your new graphic has been integrated into the system.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yet more thanks for this post!
Very useful and informative.
(and a refreshing change from the "do a search" unfriendliness that often befalls these forums ).

Decrease Font Size in Home Screen WM 6.5

I searched up and down for a solution to reduce the text size in the Titanium home screen but all went in vain, the thing is I want to be able to navigate easily between plugins, and basically use effectively the Titanium plugins.
I guess its simple, but I don' know how?
Any help is greatly appreciated.
ROM = Miri v25 WM 6.5
regards;
Will

You have to modify appropriate CPR file (it's XML format) in the \Windows directory and reload the Titanium plugin after changes.
For QVGA device there are Titanium_240x320.cpr and Titanium_320x240.cpr files, for VGA there should be e.g. Titanium_480x640.cpr etc.
Look for FontFamily or FontSize tags there...

thank you for your reply, but isn't there a cab or a Registry file that can do the job?
or what app do I need to edit the above mentioned cpr files? plus, do I have to modify the Font size in all 3 files?
Kind regards;

There are a couple of CAB files around in the forum which give small and smaller menus, if this is what you are after.Search "small menus" and they should come up.
Sorry just reread and its the home screen you want to change,my bad

Willy318is said:
I searched up and down for a solution to reduce the text size in the Titanium home screen but all went in vain, the thing is I want to be able to navigate easily between plugins, and basically use effectively the Titanium plugins.
I guess its simple, but I don' know how?
Any help is greatly appreciated.
ROM = Miri v25 WM 6.5
regards;
Will
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There are only two files you need to edit StartMenu_GridScene_480x800.cpr and StartMenu_GridScene_800x480.cpr . You don't need any special tool just change the end to .txt on your pc ant then it can be opened up to read and edit. Just change the size under FontSize= you may have to move your font left or right depending on how you want it aligned, once done just rename the end .cpr use a tool like Total commander to place it back in widows on your phone. Thats all there is to it. I hope this helps.

Thank You so much, you made my day, wish all plp. are clear as you are.
Warm Regards;
Will

Solution found, thread closed

mANILLA 2.5.19211619.0 background on all Tabs

Im running mANILLA 2.5.19211619.0 im trying to get my background to change on all the tabs. None of the cabs are working, the only one ive gotten to work adds a huge black space at the bottom of the pic it adds, and once its done I cant change that pic. I want to add a custom picture to it and be done with it, where is the original pic stored so i can replace it?

In \Windows - they're called stwater_480_800 (portrait) and stwater_808_480 (landscape).
Have you tried HD Wall though? You can create a cab file with any picture you want, it skins the top and bottom bars and is bg4all, plus it's easily uninstallable.

Hmm
Those files do contain the background I wanted, But its still showing the weird light blur circle background instead. Changing that file does nothing.

Are you using a miri rom? The background has concentric circles in almost a low res picture? You can enhance the quality of the picture by installing the neo drivers
Again, the easiest way to get bg4all in high res is to use HD Wall.

Yup
Exactly Miri's Rom damn, your good. Ok, was searching for HD Wall, Thanks for the link. I will try HD Wall and report back.

All is great only problem is Weather Tab does not change. Its a completely different background, even from before.

Sorry about that, It was calendar And i see why its different, I was in day to day view. Thanks again appreciate it! Now the background Miri uses for start menu is the background for TFlo 3d. Thanks again!

FireSokar said:
Exactly Miri's Rom damn, your good. Ok, was searching for HD Wall, Thanks for the link. I will try HD Wall and report back.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just lots of practice and lots of flashing of many different roms
FireSokar said:
All is great only problem is Weather Tab does not change. Its a completely different background, even from before.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Strange, miri must have done some coding to the weather tab to use different backgrounds. Sorry, no suggestions on that one. Perhaps try to ask in the miri thread.
EDIT: Ok, I see you were on the Calendar tab. the calendar tab on many roms has a grey backing, supposedly to make ti easier to read.

Yeah
All is good now!, Originally used Titanium but got tired of so much swiping to move around, Now to find a 20 programs menu so i can have 5 on the home screen, found a cab earlier but it messed up the wall paper

Calendar transparency courtesy of millski. Unzip the attached file and copy the files to \Windows using Total Commander and overwrite the originals (after taking a backup of course just in case it doesn't work).

Id hate to open a new thread for this so ill post it here. I've almost got my home screen how i like it, my problem now is Notifications do not show on anything except the top start bar im on build 28011, Miri's test Rom. Im trying to add notification icons above my programs like this:
http://img509.imageshack.us/img509/4192/ultimate8.jpg
I would prefer it if the bubbles showed on the home tabs/slider bar in there appropriate icon. but anyhelp is appreciate btw im on manilla 2.5
I have gotten the Text & Email bubbles working, now im working on the Call History / Missed Calls shouldnt they show under contacts? just like the text one does.

I see you did open a new one after all though

ClydeB1 said:
Calendar transparency courtesy of millski. Unzip the attached file and copy the files to \Windows using Total Commander and overwrite the originals (after taking a backup of course just in case it doesn't work).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
work only in portrait mode, no landscape :-( any way to solve?