Support and General Use > Theming and Appearance Customization

Variant of existing theme

(1/2) > >>

GeorgeT93:
Hi all,

I've got  a quick question. I made a color variant of an existing theme today (basically a new background and font colors). It's otherwise the same as 2 existing themes that are already available in the themes area. Specifically it's a blue variant of lebellium Samsung-like_ABE (Advanced Battery Edition) while maintaining the 12 hour clock option from the lebellium Samsung-like theme (both by Ludovic Jakimon), for the Sansa ClipZip.

I made the changes only for my own personal use, to make it a bit more colorful, however I would like to know if it's ok for me to upload it to the themes area or not. I would ask the original author, but there's no contact information in the original files, so I want to be sure I'm not breaking any rules by uploading a properly-credited color variant of an existing theme, since I didn't write the code for the theme myself.

I *think* it should be ok, because I believe all the themes are covered under the CC BY-SA 3.0 licensing agreement, however no license is actually specified in any of the files, so I just want to be sure before posting it, that I'm not breaking any rules or anything.

Thanks,
George

[Saint]:
Hi GeorgeT93,

Thanks for your interest. Yes, you are correct, the licensing on the themes that exist on the themesite is CC BY-SA, giving you the freedom to share, adapt, and/or make commercial use of the work.


[Saint]

GeorgeT93:
Thanks for the information [Saint]. :) I just wanted to be sure I wasn't going to break any rules by making it available. I'll upload it now in case anyone else likes the theme but wants a different color scheme for it.

Thanks again,
-George

lebellium:
Hello George!

Indeed I did not put any contact information in the original theme files but since I'm a bit everywhere on the Internet under the same nickname, I thought that would not be difficult to find me for those who want to contact me...maybe I was wrong  ;D

I'm glad to hear you like my theme and I find your modification very nice too (of course you were allowed to upload it!). Cool background pic and status bar background color! I'm not as creative as you, that's why I just got stuck to a white background...lol

It's just a pity that you tried to keep the 12h clock compatibility since now the playback icon, especially the Ffwd and Rew ones, display 1px over the numeric volume and the battery indicator is 1px cut off :-[

I was to lazy to convert the white background of the FM signal strength icon to transparent color, that was not too problematic with my original white background pic but now with yours, you or I should do it. Your FM screen looks a bit strange like that.

I also noticed the 24h clock doesn't have the same position on WPS and on SBS. I don't understand why because the code (clock viewport) is the same for both files. Hum maybe I'm just too tired now, I'll have a look tomorrow.

GeorgeT93:
Hi lebellium,

First, thank you for an amazing theme, it had all the information I wanted to be able to see on the screen, and frankly looks fantastic! I kept the 12h clock (though with your existing code, it will work in 24 hour mode as well, depending on the user's clock setting in the settings screen.)

I honestly didn't notice the fast forward graphic getting cut off. :( Sorry about that, it was completely unintentional. I'm still trying to figure out the whole viewports thing, so I only moved the volume numeric display over about 2 pixels so it wouldn't crowd the clock. I'll look into seeing what I have to do to try and fix that. I definitely don't want it cut off, so I'm going to try and figure out how to move the play/ff/pause icon. I'm thinking that if I can get it moved down between where the year is displayed and the track time information, then that should free up enough space on the top bar to have the numeric volume display all the way over to the left, while maintaining the 12/24 hour clock option. I would also then have the room to move the battery display over, as I'm guessing it must be the 'empty' end of the battery that is getting cut off. I figure if I move the play indicator, I may even be able to add the LED activity light from the non-ABE version back to the title bar (as I really liked that feature)!

I did notice what you're talking about with the FM signal strength meter, but when I tried a transparent background, the green bars didn't really look right on the blue background (not enough difference in color between them with full signal strength, so it looked odd.) I was thinking of either 'boxing' in the white area to give it a more 3 dimensional appearance, or maybe changing the green to either a different color, or a different shade for more contrast against the blue background.

For the clock position, I copied and pasted the code into the WPS, FMS, and SBS files, and I just checked all 3 and the code is the same, so I'm not sure why it doesn't have the same position for you. To be honest, I'm not sure what screens use the SBS file, but I haven't been able to find which screen the clock is moved on as it appears to be in the same position on each screen I've checked. Please let me know what screen the SBS file actually is displayed on, so I can see if I can figure out what I might have messed up on! (How else will I learn?) :)

It's late here now, but tomorrow I'm going to see if I can figure out where the problem may be with the clock position, and will try my hand at moving the play indicator, and figuring out what to do with the FM signal strength indicator. If you go on the FM screen, when a stereo broadcast is playing, you'll see what I mean about the green not looking right with a transparent background on the blue backdrop.

Please, if you have any additional tips or suggestions for improving the color variant, let me know. I don't want to make this more work for you, but it is your code base, and I don't want any changes I've made to reflect poorly back on you because your stuff is fantastic, and I'm new to all this WPS stuff. :)

Thanks again for the great themes, and for letting me know what I need to look at fixing. I'll get on it first thing in the morning. :)

-George
Post Merge: October 22, 2012, 12:28:21 AMI just had another thought. Do you think it would look ok if the play/ff/pause icon was moved to the bottom of the screen to the left of the status bar? I could just make a shorter status bar graphic, then I'd just have to make it shorter in the code and move it over enough pixels for the play/ff/pause icon to show up next to it.

Just an idea, please let me know your thoughts. :)

-George


Final edit of the night, I'm really going to go to bed now! LOL!

Ok, I kept the play icon where it was, and moved the numeric volume over a tad. That should rectify the play icon from getting cut off. I'll load it onto my ClipZip in the morning for further testing. I also made a small change to the clock code, so that instead of displaying "AM/PM", it now shows just "a" or "p" if the 12 hour clock is selected. This gave me room to move the battery displays (both numeric and graphic) over a bit, so that neither should be getting cut off. I did this by adding %?cp<p|a> to the end of the 12 hour side of the code.

I also reworked the colors on the signal strength so it's brighter and now has a transparent background, so that it shows up better on the blue background, and also recolored the stereo/mono indicator as well as the red/green "tuned" indicator. Finally, I darkened the background color slightly, so that everything shows up more clearly. After I test the changes on the actual ClipZip, if everything is working correctly, I'll upload the new version tomorrow. So far, all testing has been done in the simulator.

Thanks again for all the pointers. Hopefully this version will do your theme justice. :)

-George


Good morning!

The updated version has been tested on my end, and seems 'right' now, so I've uploaded it to the theme library. Please let me know if you encounter any additional problems with it. :)

-George

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page