Is there a need for a skin editor? (3 Viewers)

[catavolt]

for the latest one. Will test it this weekend and report back!

 

[NoBugS]

Thanks for the feedback!

The most severe bug/missing feature with the latest version for me is that I can't even move/resize/delete imported controls (like common.videowindow.small.xml in BasicHome.xml). Besides that the latest alpha is another great step forward.

Well there is a reason to that: as you mentioned it is imported! When you use a text-editor to edit BasicHome.xml you can't move controls from common.videowindow.small.xml either, right? So I want to avoid that people move around stuff in imported files that of course affect also other files. So if you want to change imported controls you have to open that specific file. At least thats my concept so far (I think it makes sense...). So to me its not a bug, its a feature .

What do you/others think???

It would be great if you could add your 'feature-requests/ideas' (I like them....) here in SourceForge. I think you did that for other stuff in the past too. It really helps me to keep track of things.

to all for testing.

 

[DieBagger]

Makes sense

I updated the descriptions of:

MediaPortal1_Development/SkinArchitecture/slider - MediaPortal Manual Documentation
MediaPortal1_Development/SkinArchitecture/videowindow - MediaPortal Manual Documentation
MediaPortal1_Development/SkinArchitecture/imagelist - MediaPortal Manual Documentation

and a few others, hope it helps with adding further controls. I also added my suggestions to the issue tracker.

 

[NoBugS]

• Maybe you could split the "Explorer" Sidebar into Fonts/Images/Screens

Would be easy to change. Any reason for it? Do you think it would be easier to use? Or just personal preference?
I'm happy to change it, just want to avoid that everybody else wants it the way its now... What do the others think?

 

[DieBagger]

• Maybe you could split the "Explorer" Sidebar into Fonts/Images/Screens

Would be easy to change. Any reason for it? Do you think it would be easier to use? Or just personal preference?
I'm happy to change it, just want to avoid that everybody else wants it the way its now... What do the others think?

Just that the content of the sidebar can become pretty long while the sidebar itself looks kinda empty with only one tab... You could call it personal preference.

 

[DieBagger]

quick update: I also filled in the blanks for tvprogress control (MediaPortal1_Development/SkinArchitecture/tvprogress - MediaPortal Manual Documentation).

Another feature that would be quite handy is if your editor could support the skin to reload (see -> https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/skins-50/quicker-skin-development-1498/) so the developer doesn't have to close/open mediaportal on every change.

 

[NoBugS]

• Maybe you could split the "Explorer" Sidebar into Fonts/Images/Screens

Would be easy to change. Any reason for it? Do you think it would be easier to use? Or just personal preference?
I'm happy to change it, just want to avoid that everybody else wants it the way its now... What do the others think?

Just that the content of the sidebar can become pretty long while the sidebar itself looks kinda empty with only one tab... You could call it personal preference.

Makes sense to me. Will do it for next version....

Another feature that would be quite handy is if your editor could support the skin to reload (see -> https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/skins-50/quicker-skin-development-1498/) so the developer doesn't have to close/open mediaportal on every change.

Not sure what you mean. Remember reading the other thread... How does it link to me? What can I do for that? Isn't that a mediaportal feature/issue? Or maybe I just don't understand it fully.

 

[DieBagger]

I coded a little plugin for trying out the controls I added to the wiki and the way I used the skin editor was

1) MediaPortal running on left monitor, SkinEditor on the right
2) Adjust the skin file in the editor
3) Click into MediaPortal, Press E (shortcut for refreshing)

When you do a lot of small changes it gets annoying that I have to leave the skin editor all the times to see the changes. So ideally I could just define a keyboard shortcut within the editor to trigger the refresh and/or an option that everytime I save the file it also refreshes the skin.

The easiest way I can think of is to just send a user-defined key event to MediaPortal.

 

[NoBugS]

Ah ok, so you want me to control MP from the skineditor when you have both running at the same time?
And can I get the plugin? It would really help me to have something in MP to display some sample-screens to see if my WYSIWYG is working (sometimes not that easy ).

 

[DieBagger]

I used the version posted in this thread...

Unfortunately I couldn't find the source yet so I asked for it in the forum...