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A dark skin - best compromise ...

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Chris64:
Hi folks,

get the attached file and put the content (after extraction) to the "Skins" folder.
The layout of the skin is done in english and tested with PVD 1.0.2.6 only.

I do not plan to work on further changes to it - it's a one time work to see what's
currently possible with PVD's skinning abilities. Comments are welcome though.

Have fun
Chris


A word to the developers:
---------------------------------

It took me some time to rewrite existing skins (movies and persons) for my personal
"Best Viewing Experience" of PVD. All skins supplied with the latest distribution are
not to my taste of "real eye candy".
Though I think PVD deserves just this (because it's the best multimedia DB I came
across so far), creating a dark skin is a PITA.

I will bug you now with my experiences of skinning PVD. I wished to create a dark
skin and will tell you, why it's so hard to get something useful in a simple way ...

1)   Link Check Combo Boxes:
   For a dark skin, a combo box background color of black or similar would
   allow light font colors (white on white is simply unreadable...) - such setting
   is missing!

   another solution might be to make the combo box colors (black on white) -
   independant of any color settings of the used font. Then we always get it
   ... black on white.

2)   The filmography (tree view) lacks any useful settings to handle (or overwrite)
   colors, sizes and font outlines. I guess this is related to the link property
   settings which only handle colors (but i.e. no font outlines like "bold" etc.)

3)   The handling of the "rating" controls is also missing valuable properties for
   overwriting it's defaults (from "fieldfont") like font size, outlines, color.

My best compromise (see my attached skins for movies and persons derived from
Zacca/Nostradamus) is having a fieldfont color setting of "7F7F7F" to make it
both visible (better guessable) on black and white (or light and dark) backgrounds.
The skins are IMHO "state of the art" of what's achievable with PVD as of v1.0.2.6,
and ... it's just too complex and insufficient!

One other issue that bugs me alot is with PVD itself:

   On importing a (video) file (or re-reading file information) PVD thinks it's best
   to add a JPG with similar or same file name in the same directory to the cover art.
   For me, it's a PITA (again ... uhhh..(-:) to remove these files one by one manually
   after importing any files - for I don't want to have them in my PVD DB (mostly
   screenshot thumbnails).

   SOLUTION: A switch in config to only import the relevant file and NOTHING else!


BTW, you may publish (or distribute) the attached skins with PVD if you like.
Perhaps someone might find it useful or even like it ;-)

Finally my kudos to the developers - PVD is (otherwise) just great!

Ivek23:
Welcome, Chris64.

Excellent and nice work. Skin also work on version 0.9.9.21, I checked, it is best to 1280x800 and higher resolution.

Question:
Do you agree that the skin on available via the program's auto-update system?

Chris64:

Of course! :-)

I attached preview files for all those who need some impression before downloading ...

Ivek23:

--- Quote from: Chris64 on November 01, 2013, 04:04:21 pm ---
Of course! :-
--- End quote ---

Thanks, Chris64. Now, skins on available via the program's auto-update system.

Chris64:
Hi Ivek,

Though I swore not to touch the skins again, I made some minor changes and fixes :-)

... and I guess you'll have to update them now from the attachment, so TIA ... ;-)

Lots of fun
Chris


Changelog v1.0.2.6.101:
-------------------------------
movie skin:
- Buggy entry in "<linkcolor_memo>" [DDDDFFF->DDDDFF] fixed
- some cleanups

persons skin:
- column containing the photo is changed in width [160->190]
  (now the buttons menu is allowed to be seen WITH the DELETE button in edit mode ... hopefully)
- Buggy entry in "<linkcolor_memo>" [DDDDFFF->DDDDFF] fixed
- "Translated name" color changed [FFFFFF->DDDD00]
- "Alternative names" color changed [FFFFFF->DDDDDD]
- "Birthday" color changed [FFFFFF->00FF55]
- "Date of death" color changed [FFFFFF->FFD00BB]
- "<linkcolor_combo>" changed [FFFFFF->DDDDDD]


EDIT:
Ivek, FYI, I added my minor version (-v101) number to the XML files to make testing easier for me with different
versions in the PVD\Skins subdirectories. They should work without this extension, because the "skinname" has not,
and the "version" has changed in the XML files.

If you prefer some other (consistent) naming for the distribution, let me know ...

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