Old skins worked into current versions

[bond304]

I started playing planeshift nearly 2 years ago. I quit, then came back. I have noticed a lot of changes from then, but the one that bugs me the most is the gui. I love the old one and the new one looks too modern with the chatbox and other things. I really think you should take the old themes from previous versions and modify them to work with current versions so people can choose how things look. It really makes my sick and want to cry, not being able to use the old gui, i am really sentimental about these kinds of things.

p.s. I imagine it would be relatively easy to take old themes and make them work, and it would make me soo much happier.

p.s.s. Don't flame me for my stupidity if i overlooked something.

[Akkaido Kivikar]

You can always DIY (do it yourself)... especially easy with GIMP or Photoshop. Possibly even MSPaint if you work hard enough.

[bond304]

Hmmm, well i'm sure there are some images that don't have a corresponding image in the current one, and also i know nothing about xml and how to define what images go where. (yes, i looked in the file, but i barely know what's going on)

I consider DIY a last resort, but i guess since probably nobody else likes the old theme and everyones hungry for change i guess i'm alone in this so ill start diy'ing it tomorrow then, and i will see how far i get.

[Lanarel]

The changes made to the GUI are in how they are defined. It is now much easier for others to modify them or create new ones, as much less is defined in code (as it was before). The art team did not have time to create more than one functional skin though. But since it is now so much simpler to create one yourself, we hope there well be enough choice when players create their own.
If you need help in figuring out what to do, there are often people who would like to explain things in IRC (#planeshift or #planeshift-build).

[-stf-]

Can be changed the appearance of chat window so tabs are on top as in Steel Blue instead of left side as it is now in Arcane Crysalis with skin? My screen is only 760 pixels in width (edit: sorry, should be height) and the smallest possible chat window with all tabs is taking about 40% of the screen while the horizontal tabs took only 20%. It causes problem with targeting the items with mouse and needs switching chat window on/off, while the old window was fine for this. The same for mini inventory, the horizontal takes too much of horizontal space to have multiple windows displayed, the vertical was better for this (maybe it can have visible 4x6 slots).
Is there any guide for skin creation and possibly tab or window parts positioning in skins?

[Idoru]

The framework that skins now work on is largely new. The release has not been around long enough for someone to have written a guide to creating skins I would guess.

On the positive side, the GUI is -extremely- flexible so should allow you to change most things. Just poke around in the XML files in the GUI directory (I strongly suggest you backup the entire GUI directory before you go poking around), check out chat.xml, seems a logical place to start for you -stf-

[-stf-]

I will see what I can do and if I will find how to change it, maybe I will produce new skin. I liked the old default Steel blue skin (not the elves or stone, and sorry, I don't remember the name of the third I used).

[bond304]

Which version had the wooden themed toolbar? http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/9816/shot18.jpg

[-stf-]

Which version had the wooden themed toolbar? http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/9816/shot18.jpg

Seems to be elven theme for 0.4. Hmm, maybe older

[bond304]

Wow i didn't know that! This is the one i am looking for
If you want to try and make a theme from the old files, here are the theme zips for various versions of various themes:
http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=d1b361d818ef3ea3ab1eab3e9fa335ca2d66aca84b79080b

In a minute i will also upload the elves from ps v4.03

Edit: One problem, the way the new skin are done, the edge of windows is defined with samples, so every window has the same border, making it impossible to make the stats window not have a leafy border and making the chat window have a leaf border. Back in the day it was done by defining the specific entire window and things are filled in but now each part of a window is defined, like vertical border, horizontal border, background for a window. Idk how it could be done without modifying how the game does gui as a hole.

[weltall]

which is proper gui designing for a windowing system like it's paws differently than the mess which was there before...
actually it's still possible to force a pic but it's untested and unsupported and might need some hardcoding in src/client/gui/

[bond304]

Yes, i know, but it does present a challenge when trying to port an older theme to the latest version, soo far i have only gotten the toolbar and mouse changed back, everything else seems complicated.

[weltall]

yes you need some knownledge of tools like photoshop or gimp. you need to put all the elements of your gui in a big image and then take the cut cordinates (most graphic editors show your current cordinates by putting the mouse over) then just add for the right element the cordinates in the skin.xml iirc. teorically it's also possible to split it but it's not suggested (will take more ram and vram). you can also just edit the things in the skin already if you think the space it has are right

[Akkaido Kivikar]

As I stated earlier, it's really easy if you know how to use Photoshop, I assume Gimp is similar (but free)... you can edit and re-zip the images up and then test quickly in 0.5 and then make necessary changes.

Have played with it a bit myself for my own skin, piece of cake. Really, just DIY it, upload the new skin.zip to the internet and share away.

[Lanarel]

Pawseditor is probably hopelessly out of date, but hopefully in the future someone will find time to update that and make it much easier to create (or change) a skin.