How, what, where? :/

[Guest Leon1970]

Hi all,

As you can probably tell from the subject, bit of a noob here. I'm not that great, well actually, I'm really bad when it comes to xml coding and understanding plugins etc etc.

The problem that I have is when I created the following two themes:

http://smartphone.modaco.com/viewtopic.php?t=107903

http://smartphone.modaco.com/viewtopic.php?t=104989

...the home screen shows the icon plugin bar at the top. Though the moment I move to a different screen (shown in the animated gif at the above two links), the icon bar disappears.

Can anyone please tell me how I can make the icon bar remain no matter what screen I'm on?

I hope that makes sense.

Many thanks all :)

[Guest scott2eyes]

The problem is to do with the way the homescreen works...

You could put a 20 pixel high iconbar between each plugin- the problem with that is that it looks fine when scrolling down, but when scrolling up again the iconbar will flip to the bottom of the screen...

I'm afraid I don't know of any decent ways of working around this one.

:)

[Guest Leon1970]

Thanks for your reply scott2eyes.

I know the Smart XP theme by Jay-z2K has the icon bar on every page and seems to be fine which ever you scroll.

I'll guess I'll send the author and email and see if I can use his template, bit of a shortcut I know.

Still, would be nice to know which part of that template actually does that funky thing.

If anyone does happen to know, please reply :)

Many thanks.

[Guest scott2eyes]

Annoyingly, I've got an awkward firewall that blocks certain .cab and .hme files, so I can't download the Smart XP theme on my computer, and my phone won't download .hme files...

Could someone post the home.XML file so i can check out how it works?

[Guest Leon1970]

Not sure if Jay-z2K would appreciate if I pasted in his work without his permission for all to see.

I've uploaded the xml in a zip file if that helps?

Hope so.

Thanks again for looking into this for me, much appreciated :)

SmartXP.home.zip

[Guest scott2eyes]

Ah- it's simple! I really should have figured that one out for myself by now...

If you look at the plugins in the XML file, there is only one item on each page that can be selected- the SMS counter on the first page, Calendar on the second, Profile on the third and MRU on the fourth. Inbetween each page is a blank plugin that is 200 pixels high- which is the height of the screen. Because of the way the phone doesn't like displaying just a section of the plugin on the screen, this makes it scroll right past it onto the next page. And because the plugin that gets selected is always at the top of the page, it scrolls past the other plugins when you're scrolling back up again. (That's the bit I'd failed to work out for myself.)

The iconbar that looks like it's staying put at the bottom of each "page" is actually a new iconbar at the bottom of each one, creating the illusion of a single, stationary iconbar while everything else moves.

So, the basic pattern is;

-Plugin that can be selected

-Plugin(s) that can't be selected

(That much takes a whole page- ie. ~200 pixels)

-"Spacer" plugin- can't be selected, 200 pixels high

-Plugin that can be selected

-Plugin(s) that can't be selected

(Takes a whole page- ie. ~200 pixels)

-"Spacer" plugin- can't be selected, 200 pixels high

etc. etc.

As for whether Jay-z2k would mind his work being butchered- obviously I can only speak for myself, but pretty much everyone learns about homescreen XML by ripping other peoples homescreens apart, fiddling with them and seeing how they tick. If you want to use his actual code rather than just the idea behind how it works I would send him a PM or email before putting it out for the public, but I would be surprised if he would be anything less than flattered.

Hope that made some sense...

[Guest scott2eyes]

[EDIT- so good I posted it twice...]

:oops:

[Guest Leon1970]

Thank you very much!

I think I know what you mean but my head now hurts. I've printed off both my xml and Jay-z3k's xml and compared the two. I can see what you mean now :)

I'll try and work this out in my own xml but if I fail misserably, then I'll cheat and ask Jay-z2k if I can use his xml.

Thank you very very much for pointing that out to me!

:lol:

[Guest Leon1970]

hmph, spent ages yesterday to try and get the icon bar to appear at the top of each "page" but with no luck. Ended up with jumbled menu layout :lol:

I'm sure I'm doing this wrong but have run out of patience and brain cells.

I'll post up my new skin anyway with a note to see if anyone else can do it.

Again, thanks for your help in the meantime :)

[Guest scott2eyes]

You'll need the plugin at the top of each page to be one that can be selected (ie. pretty much anything except Iconbar or Clock/Carrier)- otherwise when you're scrolling upwards it will get to the one before the iconbar and then stop, leaving the iconbar sitting just above the screen. Then when you scroll up again, it will skip past the iconbar and the "spacer" and straight onto the next screen.

I don't think that there's a way to have the "unselectable" plugins at the top of every screen- only at the bottom, as far as I can figure out.

I find that the trick with XML is to figure out what you can do, then build the graphics etc. around it. Not only does that mean you're not scratching your head trying to get a layout to fit, but if you can take a screenshot of the text etc. then it makes the graphics a lot easier to put together, as you can create a new layer in photoshop (or whatever package you use), draw all over the screenshot, then just remove the layer with the screenshot. (I wasted a lot of hours before I figured that one out...)

Like the look of what you've come up with though! Just need a car to match...

[Guest Leon1970]

Thank you very much for your guidance. Sorry I didn't reply earlier. I'll have another crack at it :)