Quote
You going to tell us about the chicon="" attributes then Dr Blo?
This must be something new with the E200 cos it dont work on the SPV1 I've got.
What else have you found out?
Well ... :twisted: what else have I found out indeed samjam!! :wink:
Let me break it down like this!
First of all - I will be shortly releasing a version of this theme FOR the SPV & e100, so fear not, DrBlow will help you!! (if I can ever find the files since I got my e200!)
But of course you are right in saying that the chicon="" attributes do not work on those phones! However, replacing the icons DOES work! chicon is the attribute that allows icons to be "swapped" when selected on the e200.
Here's the science ...
The Orange shortcut is radically different on the E200 to the SPV, E100 and MPX. In an attempt to minimise confusion for support of attributes I will refer to them as
<shortcut> 02 when referencing SPV, E100 and MPX and
<shortcut> 03 when referencing the E200 plugin.
<shortcut> icon, chicon, imagesource and half-highlight attribute
support
<shortcut> 02
The icon and imagesource attributes are both supported in this version of
the Orange plugin. They allow homescreen designers to load customised icons that are either 16x16 or 32x32. These attributes allow designers to supply there own icon in place of the "?" which can be an issue for the 16x16 sized shortcuts, and the smaller icons included by Orange are not always applicable - & lets face it, they were crap anyway!! :wink:
icon="integer value"
the integer value is the resource id for the icon within a given dll or exe
imagesource="string : system path to the file containing the
resource"
examples
imagesource="/IPSM/Application Data/home/myicons.exe"
imagesource="/IPSM/Application Data/home/Themeicons.dll"
[instructions for creating these files is contained in the zip]
you can also experiment and point the imagesource at the application you
used as the "action" and see if there is an appropriate icon by trying to
guess the resource number for the icon (start at 101) - tricky, but worth a try if thats what you want!
If your favourite website uses a "favicon.ico" and so display a different
image in IE, then you could add these add these to a dll or exe and display them when using the <shortcut> to launch a URL, favicon.ico icons are generally 32x32 so you may want to resize them to 16x16 first. (bearing in mind copyright issues etc :wink: ).
For this theme, I just created some icons in fireworks, & converted them to icons - then added them to the exe file. Easy!
The
bgimage attribute is also supported in <shortcut> 02. Bitmaps
seems to be the only supported image format.
RIGHT :-
<plugin clsid="{A1536C57-6AC2-4c31-9542-B144B0E9D076}" name="myicons1"
height="20">
<background b-border-width="0">
<format state="selected" bgcolor="transparent" bgimage="IPSMApplication
DataHomemyBackgroundImage.bmp"/>
</background>
<shortcut icon="123" imagesource="pathtomyexedll" width="50%"
action="http://mobile.msn.com/hm/folder.aspx"><text> </text></shortcut>
</plugin>
it is important that the format tags are wrapped within the background tags otherwise the shortcut will not detect the image. The CODE BELOW will FAIL because of a prematurely ended background tag - GET IT??!! :twisted:
WRONG :-
<plugin clsid="{A1536C57-6AC2-4c31-9542-B144B0E9D076}" name="myicons1"
height="20">
<background b-border-width="0"/>
<format state="selected" bgcolor="transparent" bgimage="IPSMApplication
DataHomemyBackgroundImage.bmp"/>
<shortcut icon="123" imagesource="pathtomyexedll" width="50%"
action="http://mobile.msn.com/hm/folder.aspx"><text></text></shortcut>
</plugin>
<shortcut> 03
icon, imagesource and bgimage support is backwardly compatable, see above for details.
The new Orange shortcut 03 also have seceral other new attributes (or not
otherwise widely publicised ones)
chicon is the attribute refering to the "selected icon", icon is the
attribute refering to the un-selected icon (or default) . The addition of
chicon allows a different icon to be displayed when that shortcut is
selected, versus being unselected, if shortcuts are grouped it can also
retain a selected state whilst moving in the same group. This allows transparency to be used instead of a background colour, so the only thing changing is the icons! As demonstrated in the screenshots above! :wink:
half-higlight is another attribute that acts on the selected
shortcuts background, this allows the background colour of the selected
grouped shortcut to alter when its column is in focus. Orange use that awful grey as the half-highlight for the shortcut on the E200 default homescreen. (where do they get their graphic designers?? :wink: )
The E200 shortcut has another attribute of great interest to homescreen
designers. :shock:
keys is this attribute that allows a shortcut plugin to run a given
application and then to send simulated virtual key presses to that
particular window.
The Orange "make a new appointment" plugin uses these features, I have
included "remove programs", "sign in to messenger" and "change homescreen" as further examples of how this attribute may be manipulated!
keys="!<window name>;~50;-TSOFT1"
means run the window called window name, sleep 50 ticks, send left soft key.
The appropriate window name can be discerend via the use of remote spy++ on Embedded Visual Tools 3.0, for instance the windows name of the "seetings" executable is Dialog and this is used in both remove programs and change homescreen.
Key Mapping
T0 0
T1 1
T2 2
T3 2
T4 4
T5 5
T6 6
T7 7
T8 8
T9 9
TSTAR *
TPOUND #
TSOFT1 Soft left
TSOFT2 soft right
TBACK back key
THOME home key
TACTION action key
A full lookup table can be found in the E200 registry under
HKLMSoftwareOrangeVirtualKeycodes
There are plenty of other attributes and features to the plugin, such as
args which allows exe to take command line parameters not to mention
group and
handlekeys - but lets not get too carried away here! Its way past my bedtime!
This is by no means exhaustive or complete, this is a work in progress, and it only looks at the shortcut, O also seem to provide the ringtone plugin, an Orange alarm, the spacer, and there also seems to be a new messaging and calendar plugin! Lots more to look at!!
The long & short of it is that, difficult as it is for me to say (!) - the new Orange plugins are really quite good ( :oops: ) & have got alot of potential for homescreen development - & adding icons was imperative to allow it to fit into themes. The default orange icons were, em ... well, **** (not very good)!! I was forever trying to change icons on the SPV/e100 (because every single orange default icon was SO bad!), so of course, as soon as we discovered this little beauty - we had to share the info with the smartphone community ASAP!
The new plugins have the potential to allow access to pretty much anything from the homescreen & loads of plugins on one screen, so the scope is huge!! :wink: It is a constant source of amazement to me that Orange can be responsible for so many sins, & yet you can see that actually some of their programmers are trying (& succeeding) to do something innovative like this! :shock: If only some of those guys could get "promoted" to the customer help desk - we'd be laughing!!
Like I said, it's still a work in progress & I personally require help from several fully trained professionals to understand it (remember, Drs rarely work alone, or without a support network in place!
), but we wanted to get the idea out to other developers so that homescreen design can make full use of these new plugins, & be able to use icons that fit with the theme - so there will be more to come!!
Hope that all helps a bit :wink: , & if you need any more help there samjam - don't hesitate to ask!
News + Articles
Sign In
Create Account
0
Back to top
