Using WM6.5.x Control styles in own (.NET) programs? - Windows Mobile Software Development

Hello,
since WM6.5.3 the standard Controls like Buttons, Comboboxes, TabControls, Checkboxes etc. have a new Style with gradient Backgrounds and sometimes rounded edges.
If you develop programs with the .NET CF you will get the boring old style. Is there any way to enable the new style for .NET applications?
The only thing I found was this "hack" for the TabControl:
mobileworld.appamundi.com/blogs/peterfoot/archive/2009/09/17/windows-mobile-6-5-tab-control.aspx
(sorry, seems that I'm not allowed to post outside links)
I searched a lot for this but even the documentation from Microsoft gives no hint how to do this.
There is also a new control in many system control panels which replaces the TabControl (the navigation thing at top of the form for example in sounds and notification settings). Is there any chance to use this control in my own programs?
It is really annoying that Microsoft has developed a new themeable style for their controls and nobody can use it
Thanks a lot
Markus

You can but it requires overriding the controls paint events and imo is not worth the hassle. If you want fancy looking controls then you would be better off with 3rd party controls. There's several options out there and some are free. Read about some at http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=616838
If you want to work with the native controls and spruce them up a bit check out http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/uiframework for some guidance.

Ren13B said:
You can but it requires overriding the controls paint events and imo is not orth the hassle.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks for your answer but I don't want to create custom controls or use some 3rd party controls. I want to use the standard controls but with the WM6.5.x style.
Microsoft is really stupid. They were on a good way with 6.5.x. The user interface of the standard apps is mostly consistent and finger friendly. But they forget 3rd party developers now completely. I want to be able to create apps with the system look and feel but it seems that it is not possible. So my own applications have always an inconsistent look when I use standard controls. I always get the old style but when I open a messagebox then I get buttons in the new style.
Microsoft, this is really crap!

You'll have to wait for Windows Phone 7 if you want perfect consistency. Microsoft isn't going to update the controls for 6.5.

Hey there!
Today I did some research into controls, and I found out how to enable 6.5.3 style for buttons and checkboxes. You have to:
edit2: for dialogs - open .rc file in a text editor, and find your dialog, then after a line beggining with STYLE add a line with following contents:
Code:
EXSTYLE 0x1800000
Compile it and run. You should get 6.5.3 look and feel on existing controls without changing them!
Or if you want to create controls in runtime (works good for buttons, checkboxes/radio buttons look ugly):
1) call SHInitExtraControls()
2) when creating a button/checkbox use class TTBUTTON and make sure its style is combined with 0x8000
3) Use 'em like normal buttons.
Now it's time for listboxes & others...
edit2: To mimic 6.5.3 listbox behavior you have to set item height to 64 (or 32 for (W)QVGA), for example in this way:
Code:
SendDlgItemMessage(hwndDlg, IDC_COMBO1, CB_SETITEMHEIGHT, -1, 64);
SendDlgItemMessage(hwndDlg, IDC_COMBO1, CB_SETITEMHEIGHT, 0, 64);
To expand list views, use a empty image list with a proper image height (64 or 32), for example:
Code:
HIMAGELIST il;
il = ImageList_Create(1, 64, ILC_COLOR, 0, 1);
SendDlgItemMessage(hwnd, IDC_LIST1, LVM_SETIMAGELIST, LVSIL_SMALL, (LPARAM) il);
edit: Oops, forgot you want it in .NET. Quick investigation lead me to a sad fact: .NET controls have the wrong window class. But if .NET dialogs are stored in resources there is hope. So I would be grateful if someone post here a compiled .NET application which would show a dialog with a button linked to some simple action. I might try to modify it for 6.5.3 style.

Related

How To: Customize the Sliding Panels Homescreen

This was from the windows mobile team blog. More to follow but wanted to post it for those who don't read that.
Original link: http://blogs.msdn.com/windowsmobile/archive/2008/06/03/customizing-the-sliding-panel-homescreen.aspx
Customizing the Sliding Panel Homescreen
from Windows Mobile Team Blog by Jorge Peraza
Hi, my name is Jorge Peraza; I am a Developer on the Windows Mobile team that was responsible for the new “Sliding Panel” home screen in Windows Mobile 6.1.
When we were working on the visual style and functionality of the home screen we tried to make something that looked both professional and appealing while still showcasing all the information the user is going to need to know what’s important and requires attention. While I think the default design looks really cool, we added some customization features to enable users to make it their own.
Customizing the layout
The home screen layout can be modified using the same home.xml file from previous versions of WM, the schema of the file was extended to allow the customization of many of its elements, this includes the art assets that are used for most of the plug-ins.
When you open the SlidingPanel.home.xml file (inside \ApplicationData\Home) you will find the plug-in element that corresponds to the sliding panel home screen (its CLSID is {E9267CAB-02EE-4f37-8216-6BF6A8FF5A71}). All the child elements inside it are designed to tweak and customize the way the home screen will look.
The top level element is the plugins tag, this has one attribute called “Order” and it’s used to list the plug-ins that will be shown and the order they are going to be laid out on the screen.
The built in plug-in names are:
1)CClock – The big clock
2)CAppointments - The calendar plugin
3)CHome – The notifications plugin
4)CMyPhotos – The photos plugin
5)CMessage – The message center (this is off by default on all sliding panel built in layouts.
6)CMusic – The music plugin
7)Settings – The settings plug-in
8)Custom Plugin – Users can specify custom plug-ins with static content that can be displayed on the home screen.
For example, the XML snippet bellow moves the photos plug-in to the first position and enables the message center (which is turned off by default on both "Sliding Panel" and "Sliding Panel Media")
<plugin clsid="{E9267CAB-02EE-4f37-8216-6BF6A8FF5A71}" name="Bronze" height="266">
<Plugins Order="CMyPhotos;CClock;CMessage" />
</plugin>
There are many other ways of customizing the home screen using the plug-in settings like overriding the default images or even adding your own custom plug-ins that display static content, I'll post and updated entry latter on on how to do this in detail but for now, you can use the provided home.xml files to start experimenting with this.
The notifications plug-in and message center
In the sliding panel home screen, the notifications plug-in by default serves as a dual-purpose notifications/gateway to all you phone/message accounts where every page represents one account (so, if you have multiple notifications in one category they will be shown as one summary page).
There is however an alternative behavior where individual notifications are added as independent pages (Similar to what the T-Mobile shadow home screen does) and the plug-in only shows accounts that have new notifications in them. One cool feature of this alternate behavior is that each individual notification can be dismissed without having to leave the home screen.
You can enable this alternative behavior by setting the following registry key to a value other than 2 (The actual value indicates how many pages of each notification type will be added to the home screen before collapsing them into a summary page. We have tested 2 and 5 but feel free to experiment with other values)
[HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Chome\Chome]
PageCollapseThreshold: DWORD
Note that this prevents you from being able to access the email/phone account data if there are no notifications for it. If you still want to be able to do that you can always re-enable the message center as described in the previous section as a separate plug-in.
There is one more behavioral change you can make that allows you to “dock” the condensed view of the first plug-in to the top of the screen when it is not active, we added this for people like me that want to have the clock always visible. To enable just set the following registry key to “1”
[HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Chome]
DockOperatorBar: DWORD
Advanced layout modification
There are even more advanced things you can do to further tweak the look of the home screen but it is unsupported by Microsoft at this moment so you’ll have to experiment on your own J (Hint, look at the following files \windows\CHome_240x320.cpr and \windows\CHome_320x240.cpr).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks to djNutz for posting this information & OrganicM for his efforts.
I wanted to create a post with info about what the different keys do in the CHome section of the registry. So, I'll start with a brand new one, that I bet nobody knows about....
[HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Chome\Chome]
PageCollapseThreshold: 2 or 5 (DWORD Value)
This will collapse your Notifications panel to only show active notifications. You can enable this alternative behavior by setting the following registry key to a value other than 2 (The actual value indicates how many pages of each notification type will be added to the home screen before collapsing them into a summary page. 2 and 5 were tested and work pretty well.
More to come of course....
should this change be made to the security section too, or does that matter? actually, do changes to the security section ever matter, cause they seem to apply even when you only edit the software section.
p.s.
i'm pretty sure people are gonna ask, so maybe i'll save some trouble instead of looking like an ass by answering preemptively. This DWORD value must be created with your registry editor, it's not already there, at least on ricky v24.
2 = default or normal (i assume cause it looks the same as before) and 5 = condensed.
But for the rest of us who don't have the time to be on every WM blog and forum at once here's my favorite:
To “dock” the condensed view of the first plug-in to the top of the screen when it is not active, set the following registry key to “1”
[HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Chome]
DockOperatorBar: DWORD
This is so you can have the clock always visible, no matter which panel you're on. You could also set it so that CHome Weather's compact view is always on top. Whatever plugin is first on the list.
More info from MS coming down the pipe:
We can get the day of the week on the clock plugin at the top of CHome by doing this:
Replace this portion...
<!-- Date --> <Text ID="Date" Left="180" Top="83" Width="110" Height="19" FontFamily="Segoe Condensed" FontSize="9" FontStyle="Bold" Wrap="False" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Trimming="EllipsisCharacter"></Text>
With this!
<!-- Date -->
<Text ID="Date" Left="180" Top="83" Width="110" Height="19" FontFamily="Segoe Condensed" FontSize="9" FontStyle="Bold" Wrap="False" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Trimming="EllipsisCharacter"></Text>
<Text ID="Day of Week" Left="65" Top="83" Width="110" Height="19" FontFamily="Segoe Condensed" FontSize="9" FontStyle="Bold" Wrap="False" HorizontalAlignment="Right" Trimming="EllipsisCharacter"></Text>
I will incorporate this in Chome Weather fore sure!
Here you go, the first is my Home
2nd is Scroll Down once
3rd is Scroll Down twice
4th is Scroll Down Thrice
heh
Edit: Tried Month in cpr, no luck.
will keep trying
I'm glad people are finally getting this information out. It makes customization that much easier. I'm adding the tips to the wiki as well, as they come out.
How to Reload the Homescreen
I have two questions:
1. After editing my CHome cpr file, how do I reload the homescreen without having to reboot the device?
2. How can I show any text on the clock panel? Regular text is defined by Text ID = "xxxxx", where xxxxx is something like Time, Network Name, etc. However, suppose I want to have the text "Knowledge Rules", how do I set it up in XML?
I have very little programming and Excalibur experience. So, I apologize if these questions are too naive or have been answered before.
Thanks a lot in advance.
you can use this if you dont use OrganicM Chome Weather
I don't think Microsoft has put out much documentation on the sliding panels plugin yet. Most of the CHome configurations use
Code:
TextID="text 1"
as the delimiter for static text. But that's not to say that the clock plugin will recognize that as a valid section. Could work. Could make your phone useless.
beartard said:
I don't think Microsoft has put out much documentation on the sliding panels plugin yet. Most of the CHome configurations use
Code:
TextID="text 1"
as the delimiter for static text. But that's not to say that the clock plugin will recognize that as a valid section. Could work. Could make your phone useless.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I do not understand. How do I make the phone know that:
text 1 = Knowledge Rules?
Typical syntax seems to be Text ID = "xxxx", where xxxx is a variable name, which is recognized by the device. If Text 1 is a valid variable for the device, how do I assign it a value? Am I rambling here?
No, you're not rambling. As far as the information coming from Microsoft and disseminated here on this site goes, it's a best guess right now.
someone at msdn blog asked the same question.
Someone at msdn blog asked the same question. Let's wait to see if we get an answer from there...
From http://blogs.msdn.com/windowsmobile...ustomizing-the-sliding-panel-homescreen.aspx:
"Jorgeba, thanks for taking the time to educate your user. I have some questions.
How do you change the text in the condense clock? The .cpr file has Text ID="Text 1". How is "Text 1" define? I would love to add the date to the condense layout.
The ActionURL and Softkey2 URL in the Appointments plug-in always open calendar in the today view. Is there a way to make one of the button opens calendar in the month view? Setting the default view for calendar does not help."
Easy as pie......
If you know what you are doing.
If you have any xml experience,then you'll know how to adjust x and y values to position things in different places. Yes, you can do that. Just change x=whatever and y=whatever to where you would like them to be. Just know this means that it will start on the left and move x pixels over and y pixels down. If you put in negative values, it will shift them in the opposite direction.
Eg. x=-whatever will move it to the left vs a + value which will move it to the right. Same for y=
Also, you can adjust the valignment and halignment to center, left, or right.
Have fun with these. They apply to everything in your cpr (That's the layout for your homescreen.It's in your \Windows directory on your phone).I mean everything, from where your network displays, right down to your pictures.
That's it. Have fun!
jaymit said:
Hi,
Sorry Im kind of a newbie :s, is it possible to edit home screen panels? I wanted to change the layout and look of the clock plugin.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does anybody know how to change font color for certain panels or certain lines of text in the panel? Is it only possible for the whole homescreen?
As far as I know even as far as old xml coding works, you can only change a font color for a selected word or unselected word. Meaning, if you have the old 6.0 your plugins that are selected could have a different color, but unselected could be another color. This applied to the entire homescreen. I have not seen different colors for different plugins, since each panel style is basically its own plugin (each has its own unique GUID), then I doubt you can change font color for each plugin. You can more than likely only change the active selected panel and inactive panel fonts. I am not sure what their titles are in the cpr, but I know that in the old 6.0, the homecolor was one of the fonts colors and the other was called something else.
Eventhough this is 6.1, it doesn't look like much has changed as far as the fonts color goes. You could, however, always try adding a "fontcolor=" command in the cpr and a hex code and try it, to see if it works.
Hope this helps.
Edit your registry or get CHome Config
Both do the same thing. You want to change the plugin order for CHome. It's located in HKLM\Security\CHome\Default Settings and in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\CHome. Edit the order you want your plugins to go. Reboot your phone and the new edits should be reflected in your homescreen layout. If you are having trouble cause this is new. Just search this thread for CHome Configurator. It's stickied at the top of this forum. Download it and it will let you select the order in a much easier way. Make sure you reboot, though, or else your changes won't show. Hope this fixes your problem. Later.
tae-xda said:
How to change the default location for where the CMyPhotos plugin
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
rollingondubs1 said:
I have that already, All my games are under a folder which i cant make it as a action url
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
try this
"ACTIONURL" = "\Windows\Start Menu\Games\xxxxx xxxx.lnk
or this
"ACTIONURL" = "\windows\fexplore.exe; \windows\start menu\games"
Yes you can
One last time, I think I've figured out how to help you.
1. Open Chome Config.
2. Scroll to MyApplication and select it with your center button.
3. Scroll to any page you want to edit. Then scroll down to where it says ActionURL. Press menu.
4. Once in the menu select the "1 Change URL" item.
5. Once you have selected that it will take you to a file explorer. Go to \Windows\Start Menu\Games. This is where your games should be. If not, then wherever you store, your games, navigate yourself to that folder and select the file you want.
I think this should cover it. Hope this solved your problem. HOLLA!!!!
rollingondubs1 said:
I have that already, All my games are under a folder which i cant make it as a action url
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How to change the location of CMyPhoto to \Storage Card\My Documents\My Picturs

Windows Mobile 6.1 - Skinning of All UI Components - possible?

Hey All!
Have used search many many times, and tried searching Google, but can't find any result!!!
I have tried many Shell UI programs like ThrottleLauncher, Wisbar Advance, PointUI and SPB MobileShell. Of all these, SPB seems the most polished.
Whilst these apps manage to hide the ancientness that is WindowsMobile 6.1, it doesn't allow you to skin the scrollbars, buttons or dropdown menus. Can anyone think of a way to do this? Maybe something that does the same job as PalmRevolt does on Palm OS?
Surely it'd be a case of finding a program that can replace some icons / settings in the Windows Directory...
I'm keeping SPB Mobileshell too.. Its just that I'm resigning to the fact that I'll be stuck with WinMo6.1 on my Palm Treo Pro for quite some time!
Thanks all!
I'm still going to use SPB, but thought this woud
dr3wster said:
Hey All!
Have used search many many times, and tried searching Google, but can't find any result!!!
I have tried many Shell UI programs like ThrottleLauncher, Wisbar Advance, PointUI and SPB MobileShell. Of all these, SPB seems the most polished.
Whilst these apps manage to hide the ancientness that is WindowsMobile 6.1, it doesn't allow you to skin the scrollbars, buttons or dropdown menus. Can anyone think of a way to do this? Maybe something that does the same job as PalmRevolt does on Palm OS?
Surely it'd be a case of finding a program that can replace some icons / settings in the Windows Directory...
I'm keeping SPB Mobileshell too.. Its just that I'm resigning to the fact that I'll be stuck with WinMo6.1 on my Palm Treo Pro for quite some time!
Thanks all!
I'm still going to use SPB, but thought this woud
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Using a resource editor, it is possible to skin almost everything. It's just a bunch of dlls, exes and registry entries. I use PE Explorer and it's great and very powerful, but it does cost quite a bit of money..
dwizzy130
No unfortunately its not possible. At most you can alter themes, as I am sure you already know. The only other thing you can do is change the size of the scroll bars in the registry, and if you set their width to 0, they disappear... A setting like 2, makes them thin enough that they indicate where you are, but can't really be used.
Apart from that, you already have the right idea with SPB, Point UI, etc. You may want to know that PointUI hides more of the oem interface with the pay version and will be adding a dialer among other things in the next update. You did not mention Manilla... I don't use it b/c I just don't have the time to deal with new ROM bugs, but nonetheless it does the best the best job at hiding winmo, and has the most skinned elements...
EDIT: Just read the above post... I guess it is possible.
OK, decided to add some addtional stuff
Altering WM menu system and Dialogs
Try this program
FingerSuite
or
Try the extracted HTC Menu app
or
Edit the Menu Font size registry key for a less pretty effect, but it means one less program to install.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\system\gwe\menu\popfnt
and change the value for the "Ht" entry to "1000" decimal (from 1200).
play around with 800, 900, and 1000 and see which suits your personal preference
Modifying Scroll Bars
Change the thickness of scrollbars
To change the thickness of the scrollbars at the right/bottom of documents larger than the screen, adjust...
For the horizontal (bottom) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cyHScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
For the vertical (right) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cxVScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
The default thickness is 13. You can set the value to anything you may like
Change the length of scrollbar arrow buttons
To go with changing the thickness of the scrollbars, you may wish to change the length of the scrollbar arrow buttons...
For the horizontal (bottom) scrollbar arrows:
HKLM\System\GWE\cyVScr = 0 (DWORD decimal)
For the vertical (right) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cxHScr = 0 (DWORD decimal)
The default length is 13. You can set the value to pretty much anything you like
Found another useful app for handling scroll bar color, background colors ect.
UITweaker
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=411197
Further down in that thread someone gives this link which seems usefulhttp://mobile-sg.com/software/?platform=ppc
Hmm, real pity nothing can be done to skin those ugly looking scrollbars, eventhough SPB or any other software will beautify the look as well as experience of using the device, the scrollbars will still leave a signature stating "I am the ugly looking WM 6.1"
I just recently flashed SNN Diamond on my Wizard and I'm loving it so far but I do have one caveat. When I put a customized background on my today/home, the drop-down start menu adopts the same image as its background. I don't want my drop-down start menu to have a background image, I'd prefer it to be a plain color. How do I change it? You would think that this is a simple thing to do but I have been at it for a day, still no luck. Any ideas guys?

Help with UI elements

Hello,
I've been programming for quite some time on Windows/linux, and I just started developing for WinMo. I must say, when it comes to UI, there really isn't much out there.
What I am trying to do - and if anyone out there knows of any good tutorials or example code, that would be excellent - is make a figure friendly Multi-Level ListView Control for .net CF 2.0 (I need to support WinMo 5.0-6.5) The multi-level part is that when an item is selected, the current ListView slides to the left and a new ListView slides in from the right (I know it's a bad example, but like how the iPhone Multi-Level menus work)
I have been searching the internet and have not found any information on how to do this. My idea for how to create a control like this would be something like this:
MenuControl:
Array of ListItem Controls
Panel that expands in height according to the number of ListItem Controls
ListItem Contro:
Graphic on the left side
Text describing the item
Optional MainControl object for when item is selected
OnSelect Event handeler
When the Even is fired, the local MainControl is loaded
Once MainControl is loaded, using a 15 milsec timer, decrease x position of both controls for 800
Is this a good way of doing the UI? Any help would be excellent
Hi!
have a look at my SliderList. It does exactly what you described...

[REQUEST] A real Startmenu replacement ( WM startmenu is RAM hungry!!!)

Hi everyone, I am a cooker ( doing great things, but mainly a noob one compared to some masters out there ) .
Cooking on the Omnia I900 & Acer S200 ( french rom only), these devices have low memory.
For example the acer S200 only has 256mb of ram, but mainly the same hardware than the powerful HD2(except ram....:-( )
Arto ( great cooker of the Acer S200 scene ) has found that removing the start menu completely gains 15mb Ram on our devices ( by fooling the system with empty .cpr grid, icons caches aren't generated.)
This can help people make really light roms!!! The main problem now is the we don't have here a real startmenu alternative, a eye candy one than keep the spirit of our devices... Quickmenu is functionnal but not too beautiful.
After many searches over xda, the only thing I found was Quickmenu and the sense Startmenu replacement ( I modded the kenia1234 startmenu replacement to give it 5 columns, here is the work : 5 columns start sense2.5 menu replacement )
I don't know why developper aren't interested in making a real , fast and beautiful startmenu replacement ( with full fonctionnality, at least control panel wikth .cpl files abilty, and even more folder architecture, fullscreen, lightweight ),
but here is the request or that, If others than me are interested, please reply and tell your needs, to help developpers...
Something like Panoramic Launchpad would be great!
Last week I started creating a startmenu alternative. It's very underdeveloped, and I have no idea when it's finished, but to give you an idea I attached two screenshots.
It still lacks a couple of features (if someone can point me in the right direction, please do so ):
- no control panel items yet
- no icon transparency (I got that working, but it was horribly slow)
- no background (because of the lack of transparency)
- no hook on the hardware windows key (like quickmenu)
- no hook on the software start button (like ameba does on winmo 6.5.x)
- if there's no png file attached to a link, no icon is displayed
But the other basics are working:
- starting programs by clicking (yes I know, very basic )
- flipping pages by swyping your finger (left->right, right->left, up->down, down->up)
- opening folders, and going back up one level with the left soft button (just like the usual start menu)
I actually started this because I'm not a fan of the hexagon grid styled start menu, not because of memory issues. I did take a look at the current memory usage of my start menu, and currently it is 1.41MB. But that will grow with more icons and transparency I guess.
If you're interested I can continue developing this startmenu.
The most important thing to me is ram usage, the lower it is the best it is,
the png file limitation to display an icon should be reconsidered, the ability to display native icon is much more important, or, much easily to program, you can make your app request the "HKLM\Security\StartInfo\Start\myprog.lnk" key to read the icon you should display, if nothing is entered, lets just start the native icon.
This is important to make your startmenu replacement user friendly. nobody likes assigning manually an icon to an app, having the ability to do it is good, but the most important for the users is that your program automaticaly displays the native icon like the start menu does.
To use cpl, you just have to use a ctlpnl.exe command line, like this :
ctpnl.exe mycpl.cpl
if cpl has multiple tab, ctpnl.exe mycpl.cpl,1 ( where the number is the tab you want to be open)
for cpl files, I thinks its the big part of the job :-(
What I meant with:
- if there's no png file attached to a link, no icon is displayed
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My program uses the icons set in HKLM\Security\Shell\StartInfo\Start, but if it's an older program, there might not be a high resolution icon, and in that case I won't display any icon. That's something I will fix ofcourse.
I'll have a look at the cpl files, and I guess google will help me there as well.
Also looking for a way to show my startmenu instead of the winmo startmenu, but no luck so far. If anybody knows how to catch when the winmo startmenu is activated in c#, please let me know.
Hi guys
Have you ever heard of iPhoneToday http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=633618 ? It's so light and configurable
XTask has a good looking, light start menu replacement.
If you leave out the start_icon.png's, then the native icons are used. The 6.5 start menu also slows down boot time dramatically. Just delete all the shortcuts, soft reset, and check the millisecondtoidlethread in hkcu/performance. Boot time may be 20-30 seconds faster.
vinvv said:
Last week I started creating a startmenu alternative. It's very underdeveloped, and I have no idea when it's finished, but to give you an idea I attached two screenshots.
...
If you're interested I can continue developing this startmenu.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This certainly looks very interesting! Please continue, I also hate the honeycomb (as many people around).
I like this
vinvv said:
What I meant with:
My program uses the icons set in HKLM\Security\Shell\StartInfo\Start, but if it's an older program, there might not be a high resolution icon, and in that case I won't display any icon. That's something I will fix ofcourse.
I'll have a look at the cpl files, and I guess google will help me there as well.
Also looking for a way to show my startmenu instead of the winmo startmenu, but no luck so far. If anybody knows how to catch when the winmo startmenu is activated in c#, please let me know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi m8
I also hate the startmenu but this is cose it eats arround 30mb of ram...
There is a way to disable the default startmenu ....
Look this post its working fine on Blackstone NRG roms.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=7911317&postcount=16270
I just dont like the replacement menu or the quickmenu
Your app can be assigned to startmenu button with ameba
If can i help with your project on this just let know
Also keep in mind that many shells (Throttle Launcher, Mobile Shell etc) read the data to load program shortcuts from the start menu, so that the replacement has to take care of that too.
what do you think about wisbar 4? would this be an alternative to quick menu? i was using this prog. a year ago and i was totaly impressed. now i use it again together with the new energy rom from august 28. after the replacement from the start menu i have real nice and fast blackstone

[win32] API - New Sense interface Look 'n Feel V1.6.4 (01/28/11)

I have created a win32 API for C++ that mimics HTC's Sense UI Look 'n Feel... More informations on my website: charlie-soft.com
DOCUMENTATION : http://charlie-soft.com/Software/Manila_SDK/html/
This SDK is designed for speed: .NET applications are usually very slow to load and not fluid. I use some tricks to improve speed, like drawing only area having changes, scrolling without backbuffer or creating textures for text (GDI text drawing was slower…).
What’s in the box:
PNG resources for VGA/WVGA. They can be easily modified. SDK will resize automatically the resources if your device has a smaller (or higher) resolution!
Design your app for VGA, the SDK will adjust the layout for other resolutions!
Full Finger Control.
Source files (.cpp and .h) of library.
Source files of example.
Class:
MyEditControl: Edit box with different width. Easy get and set text. SIP detection: scroll Edit area.
MyItem: Button (3 types), checkboxes and switch (TripleState!). Event on click, visibility and state can be changed/get easily.
MyPanel : This element is not visible but is used to bring together elements. This element can have a title and dotted separator between each element.
ChildSection : Contains a subsection which is displayed with a sliding effect.
MyLabel: Print text with different font and color.
MyPictureBox: To print image (png, jpg, bmp, gif…)
MySelector: Like the HTML select. Scroll screen if list is out of screen (see video below).
Section: A section is a panel which can be scrolled up/down. It contains the different elements.
MessageBoxSense: Four type of messagebox: info, Ok/Cancel, Abort/Retry and Yes/No.
MySlider: A simple slider of any size... The min and max values can be changed easily, as the cursor position.
Change log
V1.6.4
Added the possibility of multilines in edit control
V1.6.3
Added possibility to add picture to slider of ChildSection...[bug solved]
Explorer bug solved
V1.6.2
Added an event when user click on screen...
V1.6.1
Memory usage improved
V1.6
Loading of image is now safe (use video memory by default but if problems use device memory)
File Explorer
Icons
Speed and memory improvement
V1.5
just add possibility to change color of text for hover and selected...
Minor bug changes:
items out of screen no longer try to redraw
text of items recompute their size when changing
background color is correctly changed
The SDK is now multi thread safe!
Add the possibility to right clicks (long press)
Add the possibility to hook windows message (WM_ACTIVATE for example)
Add the possibility to have a bottom bar.
Add the possibility to have a background image (landscape and portrait).
If the app is allready started, close the new instance and show the previous one.
MySelector can be scrolled if the list is too long.
Text is now printed with alpha transparency.
Compatible with any character (hebrew, vietnamese...).
MyPictureBox can now be stretched.
Memory usage reduced.
V1.4
Minor bugs fixed
Add the possibility to show MessageBox without a main application.
V1.3
Background can be transparent ! (see this app for demo)
Native drawing (DirectDraw was too slow in landscape)
Slider can have a force feedback (see this app for demo)
V1.2
MySlider added
drawing process rewrited: less redraw->less computation->less CPU utilization -> battery consumption reduced
Loading optimisation
The layout is now independent of screen resolution!
top taskbar is occassionally cleared [fixed]
White screen, touching the panel brings it back [fixed]
landscape items position incorrect [fixed]
V1.1
landscape compatible
Abort/Retry added to MessageBoxSense
TripleState Checkboxes and OnOffItems added
FAQ
is QVGA resolution supported?
Yes, SDK will find the correct resolution and select the appropriate resource resolution. The SDK will delete the other resources...
have you planned to extend MessageBox types to Abort/Retry?
Yes, to create one:
MessageBoxSense::show(L"Hello",L"Try again ?", MESSAGE_ABORTRETRY);
is this landscape compatible?
Yes but having refresh rate issue. Seems to be a DirectDraw problem (S2U2 was subject to the same issue...)
If someone know how to solve this problem, send me a message !
Back button too slow.
You can change the speed anim using this function: changeSpeed(double nbMilisecond)
why aren't you including some TripleState Checkboxes and OnOffItems ?
Both are now included:
new MyItem(1,5,15,ITEM_IS_CHECKBOX,ITEM_THIRD_STATE,L"My third checkbox (Third state)");
Other apps
Wake on Wan is a new app which use this SDK. Sources are available!
Quick shutdown is a software which use this SDK too. It can turn off, restart or set the phone in sleep mode. Sources are also available!
"
Sense SDK win32 C++
For informations about SDK (installation, use compile...), see here: http://charlie-soft.com/Software/Manila_SDK/html/
Good work ! thanks for sharing hope devs will use it.
Hello my friend !
Great work !
( C'était exactement ce que je cherchais en c++ pour mes MFC smart device !!! )
Great Work, Thx for the source!!
Really great work!
but I have two questions:
- is QVGA resolution supported?
- have you planned to extend MessageBox types to Abort/Retry?
thank you
regards
NIce work
Altough i don't really know what todo with it... i instalt the example.cab and it was really smooth!
Only one thing if i go to other controls and i want to change the value then the onscreen keyboard should show up right? But it doesn't.... So i slide my qwerty keyboard open, and in landscape i get an error message: DDERR_SURFACELOST(back buffer)
I dont know what it means... is this landscape compatible?
Good job man !
Nice works !
I just have a feedback, I find too slow the animation when you click on the "back" button, is there is a way to speed it up ? (or disable simply the animation)
SDK Manila
Hello all !
I will try to answer all your questions. So :
- is QVGA resolution supported?
No but easy to implement... Just resize resources to correct resolution. I will post resources shortly.
- have you planned to extend MessageBox types to Abort/Retry?
If it's something wanted, I will do it.
- is this landscape compatible?
No, not yet. But will be in next release!
-Back button too slow.
I will add a method to set the speed of animation... in the next release
-Bug with hardware keyboard
The onscreen keyboard don't show up and I don't know why... I will look around for a fix.
If a developer wants to translate .NET applications into C++, feel free to post I will try to help you!
There is still lot of work, but I will try to do this quickly!
petititi said:
- have you planned to extend MessageBox types to Abort/Retry?
If it's something wanted, I will do it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thank you for quick reply. I need this extension for my app "htc menu loader" (link in signature) to migrate from .net to c++
again, really great work. You are making something that HTC should have done months ago.
Great project !
I don't know if you notice but I disabled the bottom taskbar... Do you think that I should add the possibility to enabled it? I saw that your application needed one...
I hope you will find my SDK easy to use !
Hey, this looks awesome.
Question though: I'm just shy of clueless when it comes to making an actual working app. Is there any place I can go to read/learn the coding I will need to actually use this?
Application win32 c++
You can use the example application included into the SDK to learn basic stuff or you can download this application: WakeOnWan. It’s based on my SDK (here are the sources).
You need some basic knowledge about Object-oriented programming and C language. I try to explain how to use the SDK in the example using comments or on my webpage.
I will also post a short tuto in second post...
Very, very nice! The demo runs very smoothly on my stock Touch Pro 2.
petititi said:
You can use the example application included into the SDK to learn basic stuff or you can download this application: WakeOnWan. It’s based on my SDK (here are the sources).
You need some basic knowledge about Object-oriented programming and C language. I try to explain how to use the SDK in the example using comments or on my webpage.
I will also post a short tuto in second post...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome thanks!
What's sad, is when I was young, I used to be able to code in C. Made my first video game when I was 6 on a Commodore 64 (ok i dated myself here) Now, can't remember very much
C++ ? It's just like riding a bike!
Hatefly said:
Awesome thanks!
What's sad, is when I was young, I used to be able to code in C. Made my first video game when I was 6 on a Commodore 64 (ok i dated myself here) Now, can't remember very much
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sure you can!
It's just like riding a bike - you never really forget how. And we are here to help you to refresh your memory.
petititi said:
I'm sure you can!
It's just like riding a bike - you never really forget how. And we are here to help you to refresh your memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sweet thanks! Just downloaded an ebook on c programing.
Sounds (and looks) great, although there are still to many glitches (like not working in landscape etc.) which are preventing me from using this package.
But I have one question, why aren't you (all) including some TripleState Checkboxes and OnOffItems ?
I need them often but you cant find such controls online - not to speak of sense.
TripleState Checkboxes ?
Hello,
the TripleState Checkboxes is a simple feature I can add. To be sure, TripleState Checkboxes will looks like:
And tripleState On/Off:
I will include them in the next release... Be patient, the next release is coming soon and adds support for portrait and fixes a few bugs...

Categories

Resources