Digital Clock Docklet for Object Dock

[Ghostwalker]

will those icons change with the skin or do you need something as a default?

[Smaky]

will those icons change with the skin or do you need something as a default?

Sorry, they will not change with the skin... it's just I could not create anything that looked fine for it. Those icons will not change with the skin. I need three icons... an alarm clock, and "On" icon and an "Off" icon.

It would be great if you would help me out with these too!

[Ghostwalker]

Sorry, they will not change with the skin... it's just I could not create anything that looked fine for it. Those icons will not change with the skin. I need three icons... an alarm clock, and "On" icon and an "Off" icon.

It would be great if you would help me out with these too!

What about these?

Icons

[Smaky]

Way better than mine... there are two ways I could add state information to a list view, by adding a second icon to the item (as it is now), where the green/red icon will be shown next to the gray one. or by overlaying an icon to the current one... in this case a single icon will be shown but overlaying the state incon on top of the original one.

If you think the later is better, then I think the red/green icons should be something smaller that complement the first one. What do you think?

[Ghostwalker]

Right now all three icons are 32x32 and 24x24, do you want me to make the gray one 32x32 only and the red/green 24x24 or 16x16?

[Smaky]

Not exactly, what I mean that in order to test the "overlay" state effect I think I need a couple of simpler icons that will be overlaid over the gray one... maybe even only one like a tach that goes over it.

Edit:

On second thought... maybe a 16x16 red and green icon will do it too.

Edited May 10, 2009 by Smaky

[Ghostwalker]

16x16

[Smaky]

Thanks... I am still working on the alarms mode for the digital docklet... still a lot of stuff to do, but a little teaser.... almost there.

Ok, an (almost) functional version is ready, the alarms settings dialog is working now (exept for the Backup/restore buttons), alarms mode is working now. The only small-tiny-little thing that is still not ready is the actual alarm firing , but I would like your feedback & ideas before implementing that.

Edit: While waiting for your feed-back on the alarms mode, I have started development of the world-clocks mode. The updated download does include a partially functional world clock mode and the configuration dialog lets you configure clocks for different locations. Currently you have to manually capture the UTC offset for each configured location. I will add support for contacting weather.com so you may capture your city or zip code (for US locations) and it will retrieve the time offset for you (similar to the included weather docklet).

Edit 2: World clock configuration dialog is almost done, you can add a new world clock configuration, capture the zip code/city name and press "Search" at the weather.com logo to look for that city... then choose the desired city from the combo and the UTC offset/name will be retrieved for you.

BTW: A 32x32 World clock icon would be much appreciated... right now I just recycled the alarms icons. Only a single icon is needed.

While Ghostwalker is working on the icons for the config dialogs I have googled around for some icons that would work for now. Maybe they'll give Ghostwalker some ideas.

Edit 05/18/2009: Updated the alpha release:

- World Clock mode is fully working now, You may press "Search" during world clock configuration to retrieve the UTC offset for the location from weather.com.

- Added Date label to World clock to show the date at the configured location.

- Merged "Docklet Font" & "Layout" tab in the configuration dialog for easier skin configuration.

- Added font configuration per clock mode. Now the Font Face/Color/Size could be configured independently for each clock mode (To solve the problem reported where the font for world clock should be black, whereas in clock mode it should be white). By simply selecting any clock element for a given mode, the font controls will affect that mode's settings.

Note: this download will be retired as soon as a stable "beta release" is ready, so I will not be adding it to the first post now.

Latest Alpha Release v.0.2.0.4i

I have moved the Alpha download to the first post.

Edited May 23, 2009 by Smaky

[MetalArend]

I was looking into this new update... I LOVE it! Really... Nice... Work... :impressed:

But as it is for now still a work in progress, now is the time to ask some thing, to change stuff and so on...

Some thinking about the fonts & skin...

1. Maybe merge those two together?

- When you add a skin, the font could be in the same package, 'cause a beautiful skin with a bad font would not be a nice thing Maybe make it possible to add some fonts to the skin, so you don't have to put a font-file in the skin-package, but the skin-maker can provide the user with his preferred fonts to use with this skin.

- As you would do so, it all is one big "layout" thingy, so the preview from the font wouldn't matter anymore.

- On the stopwatch part, the word "stopwatch" could be a text-area, so it would be colored too...

Same goes for the Alarms and World Clock, basicly make a Stopwatch-title, Alarms-title, World Clock-title area...

- You could add buttons to start an empty skin in the properties, so you basicly can make a new skin, based on an empty template or another good skin... Making this would make it easy for everyone to make a new skin...

- Repositioning the buttons, as in screenshot, could be used uniform in Alarms & World Clocks design (yeah, too much information )

- I left out the "colorize digits"; if you make it an option to use a font globally or not (as the color you choose is for everything, or just text), it is the same as... let's see... You choose an element, and the font-part gets updated with the font that that element has to have. So every element could have a font, or could have the font-part greyed out, as it happens to be image only! Instead of "colorize digits", you could add a setting to have the font be global or not?

- Colorize AM/PM, and other stuff like that? Or make it font-able? See also previous paragraph.

2. Colorize digits - typo

*edit*

3. Could you add sth to simply quick change the preview for the different tabs? You basicly have an outline for four parts (clock, stopwatch, alarm, world clock), just a quick changer for those global parts of the skin? Maybe make it more hierarchical: "Skin>Tab>Element>Font" (hope someone understands what I'm trying to say here )

Edited May 17, 2009 by MetalArend

[Ghostwalker]

Some thinking about the fonts & skin...

The fonts used are images that are in the skin directory the only place the system fonts are used is the docklet label and the city names in the world clock(as far as I know)

@Smacky

I just downloaded this and when I click on the alarm view or the world clock view it crashes the dock. Also with this skin the city names should be black while the clock fonts are white so you might add an option to set the color for the city names. I will work on the icons for you and yes they gave me some good ideas.

Edited May 17, 2009 by Ghostwalker

[Smaky]

Thanks for your feedback... and yes, this is the time to ask for stuff.

Sorry for the double post... moderator, please combine this post with the previous one (I know I have did this in the past... maybe too many times. my apologies).

@MetalArend:

Thanks for such great feedback... this is what I mean by comunity-driven development!

1. Maybe merge those two together?

I have been thinking about that too... your layout for the configuration dialog looks good.

- When you add a skin, the font could be in the same package, 'cause a beautiful skin with a bad font would not be a nice thing Maybe make it possible to add some fonts to the skin,

so you don't have to put a font-file in the skin-package, but the skin-maker can provide the user with his preferred fonts to use with this skin.

I'd like that too... but I see two problems:

1. In order for windows to use a font, it should be installed at the FONTS directory, having the .ttf file is not enough (or at least I have not found a way for an app to use a font without installing it first).

2. Most of the fonts that look good are not copyrighted, so I would not be able to distribute them without written permission. I am not a skinner, so I would left that to the skinner guys. But I would not like to violate any legal disposition by incorporating fonts that I have not created (and I believe I will never do create a font).

- As you would do so, it all is one big "layout" thingy, so the preview from the font wouldn't matter anymore.

Quite right!

- On the stopwatch part, the word "stopwatch" could be a text-area, so it would be colored too...

Same goes for the Alarms and World Clock, basicly make a Stopwatch-title, Alarms-title, World Clock-title area...

This is something Ghostwalker and I discussed previously, so for the sake of simpliciy, we decided to take the stopwatch and all other "titles" out of the docklet and include them as part of the docklet background. Additionally, there is very limited "effects" that could be added to the text when drawn manually (as text areas) inclyding them in the docklet background gives the skinner complete control on how those will look.

- You could add buttons to start an empty skin in the properties, so you basicly can make a new skin, based on an empty template or another good skin... Making this would make it easy for everyone to make a new skin...

Sorry, but I did not quite got this one

- Repositioning the buttons, as in screenshot, could be used uniform in Alarms & World Clocks design (yeah, too much information )

This means you would better have the command buttons to the left of the list view controls in the "Alarms" & "World clocks" tabs? That was my original design, but I believe it takes way too much real-state out of the dialog for the well... important stuff, the list of alarms & clocks. This is more evident when selecting the "Details" view mode.

- I left out the "colorize digits"; if you make it an option to use a font globally or not (as the color you choose is for everything, or just text), it is the same as... let's see... You choose an element, and the font-part gets updated with the font that that element has to have. So every element could have a font, or could have the font-part greyed out, as it happens to be image only! Instead of "colorize digits", you could add a setting to have the font be global or not?

Colorize works on everuthing but the docklet background. It works by substituing white areas with whatever color you choose for the font. This is why digits should be white if you want them to be colorized.

On the other hand, having a separate font face/color configuration for each "text" element would require more memory for the docklet to work. I know it's not that too much of it, but nevertheless more. It seems that I will need to have, at least a font face/color configuration for each clock mode, but for each element seems to me a bit overkill, let's see what the skinner has to say about it.

- Colorize AM/PM, and other stuff like that? Or make it font-able? See also previous paragraph.

It's already there, just make the text white and it will be "colorized"

2. Colorize digits - typo

How should it be? Sorry, but I'm not a native english speaker.

3. Could you add sth to simply quick change the preview for the different tabs? You basicly have an outline for four parts (clock, stopwatch, alarm, world clock), just a quick changer for those global parts of the skin? Maybe make it more hierarchical: "Skin>Tab>Element>Font" (hope someone understands what I'm trying to say here )

So you would like to see a combo for maybe: Clock Mode "Clock" and then the "Element Combo" listing the available items under that element? Seems plausible, but I would like to hear from skinners (sorry, I did not asked before... are you planning on creating skins for the docklet?), from my personal standpoint, I believe it's not such a big problem to have such a long list of items... I event thought about that too, but... I'm lazy, I wanted to get this this going as soon as possible.

Edit: Alpha release updated, it now include some of the features requested. For the latest alpha release updates look at post 58

Edited May 19, 2009 by Smaky

[MetalArend]

Thanks for your feedback... and yes, this is the time to ask for stuff.

I have been thinking about that too... your layout for the configuration dialog looks good.

So we agree

I'd like that too... but I see two problems:

1. In order for windows to use a font, it should be installed at the FONTS directory, having the .ttf file is not enough (or at least I have not found a way for an app to use a font without installing it first).

2. Most of the fonts that look good are not copyrighted, so I would not be able to distribute them without written permission. I am not a skinner, so I would left that to the skinner guys. But I would not like to violate any legal disposition by incorporating fonts that I have not created (and I believe I will never do create a font).

Whick means actually that having a font part actually isn't a good idea, and it would maybe be better to do it all with images, where you only can choosse the size and the color? That actually makes the problem with the am/pm not being text obsolete, because the text parts from the design would be "hard-coded", not depending on the system, and looking the same way on every computer where you would use the skin with those settings backed up from your first install.

Or it could mean that you're still going to use some text parts, and then it would be still a good idea to give the skin-builder the option to add to the skin a font he prefers, where the docklet can look for that font first, before going back to the default font? (While I'm writing this two paragraphs, I'm actually leaning towards the first solution, the hard-coded part, leaving the text to the skinner, not completely to the end-user... (Actually, I'm thinking on it while I'm writing this) *edit* Reading through this post will solve this problem eventually, by attributes for every element.

This is something Ghostwalker and I discussed previously, so for the sake of simpliciy, we decided to take the stopwatch and all other "titles" out of the docklet and include them as part of the docklet background. Additionally, there is very limited "effects" that could be added to the text when drawn manually (as text areas) inclyding them in the docklet background gives the skinner complete control on how those will look.

The only thing then would be that the text-parts in the other tabs would be images, and the first tab would be real text? The longer I think about it, it would maybe just a good idea to delete the font option completely, using images for every letter maybe, just leaving the option to maybe sizing and coloring the images, so the top text on the four tabs would be same scaled, same colored, same "font", unless you would one by one "fonting" them differently...

Sorry, but I did not quite got this one

Let's say it otherwise then...

In the world clock and the alarm part, you can add a new clock or an alarm. Copying those buttons to the skin-tab, for the sake of overal design, you would have a button to "create a skin". Actually, it isn't that bad as idea, to let a default skin come with the docklet, making it possible for users to not really get into everything "howto skin the docklet", but just making them work on a skinversion with just another name (new skin ), and add this one to the list of skins to choose from...

This means you would better have the command buttons to the left of the list view controls in the "Alarms" & "World clocks" tabs? That was my original design, but I believe it takes way too much real-state out of the dialog for the well... important stuff, the list of alarms & clocks. This is more evident when selecting the "Details" view mode.

I see that. Actually, I really do prefer those buttons under the preview, or the lists, for exactly the same reason. The only reason that I put it aside from the clock-preview, and not under it, was to leave the preview the size it is, and the window too, so it would not be too difficult to make those changes in the layout from the skin-tab, 'cause I think that it isn't that easy to resize the preview part Just wanted to make it not too hard to make those changes.

Colorize works on everuthing but the docklet background. It works by substituing white areas with whatever color you choose for the font. This is why digits should be white if you want them to be colorized.

On the other hand, having a separate font face/color configuration for each "text" element would require more memory for the docklet to work. I know it's not that too much of it, but nevertheless more. It seems that I will need to have, at least a font face/color configuration for each clock mode, but for each element seems to me a bit overkill, let's see what the skinner has to say about it.

So you would like to see a combo for maybe: Clock Mode "Clock" and then the "Element Combo" listing the available items under that element? Seems plausible, but I would like to hear from skinners (sorry, I did not asked before... are you planning on creating skins for the docklet?), from my personal standpoint, I believe it's not such a big problem to have such a long list of items... I event thought about that too, but... I'm lazy, I wanted to get this this going as soon as possible.

Maybe ask the skinners how difficult it would be to make the text image-hard-coded? (well, I'm not good with designing. I'm such a guy too, trying to code some things, making things, and then not having the skills to design them well enough - it's annoying, really! But right now, I'm just annoyed by all the difficult to find well-built docklets, 'cause they almost always have sth that isn't... You know... Just seeing that you're opening you're development up every time in this forum way, just trying to think about things, and giving visions (some bad, some maybe good))

I was just thinking about a hierarchy... You have a skin, which means the overal layout; you have the tabs, like clock, alarm, and such; then in the tabs you have the different elements; then you have the font and size and position attributes for every element.

This means that you can choose to quick preview not by choosing an element, 'cause that's too low in the hierarchy, but by choosing which tab you would like to preview (*edit* this was the main issue, just having a preview from the other tabs, it's possible, but in a strange/unlogical way: I choose another element, but the complete preview just changed ).

By having not only the position and size from the element, but also a color and a font, would that be such a big difference for the memory? By writing this out, I'm just stating that when you would "font" the text-areas, it just is the same thing as giving a size to a different element, so it means that you could actually make it a lot easier... Give every element a color-attribute, a background/image-attribute, a width and height-attribute and a text-attribute... So a simple image element doesn't have a text or color, a text-element does not have an image, but a text with a color, or maybe a text with an image behind it... Maybe the image part could have the option to not specify an image, but a simple color too, and so on...

This means (example): the skin defines the border ("iTime" part), the tab defines which part is inside this border (the clock, the alarm), the element defines the element ("am", "16:15", the background), and the attributes gives the possibility to place them, size them, colorize them, each individually, or globally for the whole skin by choosing "global setting" or so...

It's already there, just make the text white and it will be "colorized"

Ah, I see. Sorry! It just were the only parts that kinda-like are text-parts, and then didn't colorize. It's just strange to have all the rest pink, and then those two text-thingies not pink, but flashy white.

How should it be? Sorry, but I'm not a native english speaker.

The way I wrote it in the previous post "Colorize digits", nothing wrong with the way it is said, just a real typo

*edit* gonna take a look at the update, sorry, probably half of the text I just wrote doesn't matter anymore... Sorry for wasting the time to read it, you would better had it used to work on this beautiful docklet

*edit again* I took a look, damn, quick change!

1. Just wondering, when I click "colorize digits", will it also change parts of the skin that the skinner wanted really "white-white"? So the per-element-colorizing wouldn't be that strange as solution?

2. Nice, the preview still that big, the buttons under it, the font on the same screen, just made the screen heigher. Why didn't I think of that!

3. When I choose "24 hour", should the am/pm not vanish?

Edited May 19, 2009 by MetalArend

[Smaky]

@MetalArend,

I will read your post carefully... it was indeed a long post, but I appreciate your feedback.

For your last three questions...

1. Just wondering, when I click "colorize digits", will it also change parts of the skin that the skinner wanted really "white-white"? So the per-element-colorizing wouldn't be that strange as solution?

2. Nice, the preview still that big, the buttons under it, the font on the same screen, just made the screen heigher. Why didn't I think of that!

3. When I choose "24 hour", should the am/pm not vanish?

1. This was really a side effect... found while learning a bit of GDI+, you define a transformation matrix and it gets applied to all bits with the defined color... I don't know if this is more a problem than a solution, but it seemed to me that it would bake easier skinning.

2. As a matter of fact, it does, but in the end, this is actually a skinner's decision. If you take a look at the "background_ck.png" file you'll see the AM/PM thing there, so when you select "Show 12 hour format" the "AM"/"PM" elements are not being drawn anymore, but the background is. As I mentioned, the background is not "colorized", I could easily do if needed... that's why the "white" regions that came from the background images still look white instead of whatever color you select.

Let's say it otherwise then...

In the world clock and the alarm part, you can add a new clock or an alarm. Copying those buttons to the skin-tab, for the sake of overal design, you would have a button to "create a skin". Actually, it isn't that bad as idea, to let a default skin come with the docklet, making it possible for users to not really get into everything "howto skin the docklet", but just making them work on a skinversion with just another name (new skin ), and add this one to the list of skins to choose from...

The problem with this is that for a skin to be created it is needed that a subfolder be created under the docklet's folder. This is where Vista/Windows 7 UAC get's into an breaks things. Because docklets are saved under "Program Files" an UAC's protected folder, there is no way toi create and save files there (actually there is, it would either require to run ObjectDock as an administrator, elevate the user's process at run time, or having ObjectDock installed somewhere else).

Since I believe that skinning is something the "regular" docklet user will not do, I believe it is not such a problem. Creating a new skin is as easy as copying whatever skin you like the most (to work as a template) to a new subfolder and select it from the combo, from there it't just a matter of "adjusting" it to suit your taste, replacing images, etc.

[Ghostwalker]

- On the stopwatch part, the word "stopwatch" could be a text-area, so it would be colored too...

Same goes for the Alarms and World Clock, basically make a Stopwatch-title, Alarms-title, World Clock-title area...

The main reason I wanted the titles to be images is the fact someone may want to leave these elements out of the skin and not display the words "Stopwatch". "WorldClock" and so on. With a text area you get it displayed no matter what. Also the font I used to create this skin is copyrighted and cannot be distributed(legally). Also you cannot do this with a text area...

There will be three skins that come default with the docklet iTime(which will be completed first) Scale Me(second, preview in a previous post) and this one (far from completed) Southwest a little something for our friends south of the border.

The colorized text I really don't take into account as the skin gives every color needed, maybe I should but not sure why. With these skins I will give permission to use any element in a new skin so new skinners will not have to make digits and so forth if they do not need to. As of right now it crashes the dock on xp so I cannot go any further until Smacky has time to debug it.

By the way the digits are supposed to represent cactus in case my graphics are not good enough to tell.

2. As a matter of fact, it does, but in the end, this is actually a skinner's decision. If you take a look at the "background_ck.png" file you'll see the AM/PM thing there, so when you select "Show 12 hour format" the "AM"/"PM" elements are not being drawn anymore, but the background is. As I mentioned, the background is not "colorized", I could easily do if needed... that's why the "white" regions that came from the background images still look white instead of whatever color you select.

I use 12 hour format so I did not notice this, I think I can get around this just have to make new am/pm images and remove these from the background_ck.

I have to go mow some of my yard right now but will update the skin later today(got 10 acres to take care of)

Edited May 19, 2009 by Ghostwalker

[Smaky]

Ghotswalker,

What can I say, I love it, it's a funny sking... and they do resemble cactus, I'd just make the background a bit brownier and less saturated, like old wood.

I'll take a look at XP today... stay tunned. Ok, done. Actually there were a few problems that should had arisen before... who knows . Please download latest alfa (post #58), it worked for me under XP SP3, Vista SP2 & Windows 7.

BTW, as you can see, I decided to add an "Alarm Title" element to show the... well... alarm title on the docklet. It seems to me easier to unserstand what the alarm is for this way whem there are multiple alarms configured. Problem is that the alarm highlight includes an "Alarm" title that gets messed with the actual alarm title. Would you mind to fix this image taking the "Alarm" title out of it?

Edited May 19, 2009 by Smaky

[MetalArend]

The main reason I wanted the titles to be images is the fact someone may want to leave these elements out of the skin and not display the words "Stopwatch". "WorldClock" and so on. With a text area you get it displayed no matter what. Also the font I used to create this skin is copyrighted and cannot be distributed(legally). Also you cannot do this with a text area...

Nice skin!

1. @ Ghostwalker: You can't do sth like that indeed. But then my only concern was that of you use an image on every tab, but not on the digital clock tab, isn't that a bit strange? With the new download this seems fixed, nicely done! I'm only annoying you with trying to think about the difference between text-parts, and image-text, 'cause they aren't really that different...

1b. Also the am/pm thingy is fixed! Woohoo! *EDIT* Still thinking that the am/pm part has more to do with the time than with the skin itself, so I think it should be white, with some partly greyed out parts for shadow, but not by using an opaque factor, but maybe using pixelating the color (one pixel grey, the one beside it white, so that colorizing it still would have a shadow)...

2. @ Smaky: Forget about the add button It was just sth that happens to happen by trying to make the mockup. It isn't important, and you're right on the fact that "regular" users won't ever use it, and skinners will manage on their own to add a new skin folder...

3. The hierarchy-thingie (let's call it that) would really make things easier, I thought. I think it's the only thing I would really love to see added to a new release... Doing this right, would make previewing different tabs much easier, and making text-areas or drawn digits much more logical. So when there would be one thing I would appreciate to think about by reading my last post, it would be all the parts about the hierarchy

4. The colorizing is a nice "side-effect" tough! Using it with care, as putting a flag for every element being colorized or not, it is a really nice feature with lots of potential! Nothing wrong with it, just giving some thoughts on it

5. I've been reading a lot of things about digital clock widgets, docklets and so on, and I don't remember if it was with this docklet, but it's sth that would be really nice: can I add this docklet twice, and make it so that I see the hours on the first, and the minutes on the second, so they make one big digital clock? Actually, the most should be done by making a new skin, but in the preferences, there then should also be an option added to show minutes or hours (there already is the option to show seconds). Maybe a good idea to implement this with a text-area in the preferences, where the user can add "HH:MM:ss" or so, making much more possible, without cluttering the preferences up with a lot of option-buttons (on the other side, it would demand to get into those things, but then again, we're talking about doing a clock, wouldn't be strange if you already looked into that, Smaky?).

6. Some things I was running into by trying this docklet, wherefrom I'm not sure it has to do sth with my installation:

6a. I can't click on the different fields to see on the actual dock the stopwatch tab. This is probably because I'm running RocketDock and RKLauncher, not Object Dock (you may shoot me for that!), so I didn't dare to add it before to my list.

6b. Is it supposed to show no background image when first added? (This is new to the last version, before it did start with the clock and so too) Again, on RocketDock, it shows the default "unknown"-icon as a background, showing only the date, but no time or anything from the skin. Actually, in the preferences it seems as the skin is not yet selected. When I select "icons" as skin, everything runs smoothly, so this could be an enhancement or a bug, just bringing it to your attention. If this is supposed to be this way, maybe adding the same "set up this docklet first" or so would be nice (the way it happens on the network monitor and the wifi info).

Should give you this: never seen this quick acting on sth I said, wow, I could get used to this

*EDIT*

7. I'm adding not a mockup this time, but a screenshot. As I said in 6b, I didn't have a background when I added the docklet to my dock. I went to the preferences, choosing "icons" as the skin did solve it. But now I saw that I'm seeing the clock on the stopwatch background... Worth looking into it?

8. @ Ghostwalker: what could be done to use one big png for the complete skin (or just a collection for all the numbers in one image, the images for am/pm in one image)? Using the position that shows up, like it is being used in the "animated shortcut" docklet? Just an idea...

Edited May 20, 2009 by MetalArend

[Ghostwalker]

First off with every update I'm impressed more and more with your docklets. To me there are many shortcut programs out there but docklets make the dock for me so I don't know how many times I can thank you for making docklets that provide relevant information.

Problem is that the alarm highlight includes an "Alarm" title that gets messed with the actual alarm title. Would you mind to fix this image taking the "Alarm" title out of it?

@Smaky, will do

*EDIT*

7. I'm adding not a mockup this time, but a screenshot. As I said in 6b, I didn't have a background when I added the docklet to my dock. I went to the preferences, choosing "icons" as the skin did solve it. But now I saw that I'm seeing the clock on the stopwatch background... Worth looking into it?

@MetalArend, I have noticed this also in Objectdock occasionally.

8. @ Ghostwalker: what could be done to use one big png for the complete skin (or just a collection for all the numbers in one image, the images for am/pm in one image)? Using the position that shows up, like it is being used in the "animated shortcut" docklet? Just an idea...

@MetalArend,I will be combining am/pm images today.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The skin has been updated the changes...

1. removed alarm title from alarm highlight

2. merged the am/pm and removed it from the background_ck

3. removed gloss from buttons, the buttons and the gloss png were merged and I just caught that today so now the gloss will not be as thick.

Of course don't forget to use the new ini file. Open prefs and click restore go to the skin directory and load icons.ini

Download

Edited May 20, 2009 by Ghostwalker

[Ghostwalker]

Smacky does this allow for daylight savings time here in the states?

Also there seems to be a bug in the alarm on/off hotspot after I position it to the first button and save, the first button in the alarm view is not clickable the next is clickable below the button and the next one is even farther below the button. Now this is with the skin I'm working on now the iTime skin is clickable on the first button but after that it is the same below the button.

[Smaky]

Ok, let's see, two great feedback post, thank you both. This time I will not qoute each item independenlty since there's a lot to say.

First, I did upload a faulty alpha release yesterday, the default skin is going to be "iTime" and the folder was left named as "icons". Simply rename it to "iTime" and the clock should show fine when adding the docklet, mo more ugly icons. (I have updated the alfa download to solve this).

I have been updating the docklet even twice a day, so please double check if you are testing with the latest release. I will add the current version number to post 58 so you can check.

I was thinking on adding a "visible" property to each of the skin elements, this way you could decide not to show a particular element on a docklet instance. By adding this and a few text area titles to the elements list the skinner could decide to either show a regular text tile to each clock mode or to hide them and include such titles as part of the docklet background. On the other hand, having such a feature, would let you create a setup such as the one MetalArend described, one docklet showing only hours, another one showing minutes and the like. So four docklet showing the complete hour... sounds good, isn't it? This will be a Priority #2 feature... I will do it as soon as I finish all basic funtionallity of the docklet (all clock modes, major bugs, etc.)

In regard to the hierarchy thing I tend to comply with MetalArend. I will add a "Clock Mode" Combo listing each clock mode that will filter out the elements corresponding to that mode on the "Elements" combo. Having said that, this will be a Priority #2 feature too.

@MetalArend, sorry but I did not understood 6a completely.

I have not got the time to test it out on other docks besides ObjectDock/ObjectDock+. When we reach a beta release I will do that. Having to test it out on 3 different OS is taking me some time, add two more docklet environments, do the math... I do not want to spend so much time testing, I would like to have the docklet "complete" first.

Problem 6b should be solved by renaming the folder to iTime or redownloading the latest alfa release.

AM/PM images should be left separated, I think there will be scenarios where AM will be positioned separately from each other. I think the issue here is maybe not to have the AM/PM image integrated to the background so, when using 24 hour desings, no residual image of AM/PM will be left, then again this is a decission the skinner should make. On my previous docklet version I included them as part of the background in a "Dimmed" state, when 12 clock is used the "active" image simply got overlaid over the dimmed one (leaving the other one dimmed).

I do not think that combinig all elements into a single image would be better, doing so would impose restrictions on the dimensions of each element, right now, there are no such restrictions (albeit that you are working on a 256x256 pixel area). I know most skinners do a single image and then slice it out (I did that with my early skins). Call me lazy if you want, for now I think I will let this as is, having the skinner to do the "hard" work

I know the code to "retrieve" the time zone is pretty lame, I just could not find any other publicy available web service that would lend us the "time zone" and "UTC offset" for a given location... as a matter of fact, weather.com is a wheater service, but I found it had the UTC so I used it. So, I did not found a web service which will do that, there are several web site like www.timeanddate.com

which do provide complete time zone information, problem is that I could not find such service as a "web service" that could be called without HTML scrapping (which I really do hate). If you know of such service please inform me so I can test it out.

I can confirm there's a bug in the hot-spot code, right now it only works when the docklet is set to 256 px (when maximized on a zoomer) I need to further debug it. Solved, next release will include this fix.

Finally, I have just started implementing the Alarm reminder... so I think it will take a few days to get this done (in it's first inception), so I will post an update only if I manage to get something that would not crash.Basic alarm reminder is now working, it just shows a dialog with the title & message set for the alarm and plays the configured wav file. Only "Dismiss" works for now. Snooze is not yet implemented and it only supports wav files... mp3 is still on the to-do list.

Edited May 21, 2009 by Smaky

[MetalArend]

Problem is that the alarm highlight includes an "Alarm" title that gets messed with the actual alarm title. Would you mind to fix this image taking the "Alarm" title out of it?

1. Same thingie as before: on one tab the title is a background, on the other a text-area... *slaps himself and whispers in his own ear "stop complaining"* But then again, it will be quite easy to add or remove the one or the other, so it's up to the skinner to make things the same allover the tabs.

I do not think that combinig all elements into a single image would be better, doing so would impose restrictions on the dimensions of each element, right now, there are no such restrictions (albeit that you are working on a 256x256 pixel area). I know most skinners do a single image and then slice it out (I did that with my early skins). Call me lazy if you want, for now I think I will let this as is, having the skinner to do the "hard" work tongue.gif

2. Allright, put it on the some time in the future list maybe . What I ment with the shadow-part in that paragraph, was just that you can make a greyed-out-part in an image by combining white pixels with grey or black pixels, where those white pixels could be colorized by that neat feature, so you could have an image completely colorized, with gloss, shadow and so on still nice looking.

I do not think that combinig all elements into a single image would be better, doing so would impose restrictions on the dimensions of each element, right now, there are no such restrictions (albeit that you are working on a 256x256 pixel area). I know most skinners do a single image and then slice it out (I did that with my early skins). Call me lazy if you want, for now I think I will let this as is, having the skinner to do the "hard" work tongue.gif

3. I was just thinking that all your digits have the same size already, so just putting them in one picture (first row 1 till 9, second row 1 till 9 smaller, and so on) would make the folder with pictures not that "full". I don't think it would limit the size of the digits, it only would need another way of showing them, as it means that you not only have to show the image, but also have to position it right.

This could then be done: one picture with O-9 (normal version, shadowversion and c-version), and so on for the am, pm, and backgrounds... But it isn't that necessary

While we're at it: am/pm icons are positioned strangely, but I'm sure it's just temporary

6a. This is solved already, as it is working in the new version! Woohoow... Adding the clock also works like a charm! You're my personal hero!

*EDIT* Can you put some space between the day and the date?

Edited May 21, 2009 by MetalArend

[Smaky]

@MetalArend

Ok, now I understand the "combining AM/PM" stuff... I believe that Ghostwalker already took care of that. And yes, I think that combining the Digits in a single image would be useful. Not too much problem to solve and it saves a lot of images from the skin directory.

@Ghostwalker, on the same issue... if you could please combine the images... mhmm never mind... I can do that myself.

Now I will go back and add the Visible property to the skin elements.

[Ghostwalker]

1. Same thingie as before: on one tab the title is a background, on the other a text-area... *slaps himself and whispers in his own ear "stop complaining"* tongue.gif But then again, it will be quite easy to add or remove the one or the other, so it's up to the skinner to make things the same allover the tabs.

I don't understand what you are talking about,iTime,Stopwatch,Alarm,Worldclock are all images? what ever is there that is text is because I cannot remove text to replace with an image or I probably would and not have any text.

[MetalArend]

This is an example. As you can see, there's also a border, just to make sure that when you don't set the height and width right, you'll see it for sure in any preview!

*edit* It's just a way of using images. When you only read this image once in memory, and then use it from there, it will make a big difference. But I don't know for sure if this will be usefull for the docklet, that something you have to test

*edit* Answering Ghostwalker: it's actually up to Smaky to make the docklet as such that it is possible for the skinner to choose this. He already told us before that he is doing this, but I was only concerned that while he was implementing this easy way to make a skin, he would forget to actually make his first skin everyone will see coherent on this issue.

I was thinking on adding a "visible" property to each of the skin elements, this way you could decide not to show a particular element on a docklet instance. By adding this and a few text area titles to the elements list the skinner could decide to either show a regular text tile to each clock mode or to hide them and include such titles as part of the docklet background. On the other hand, having such a feature, would let you create a setup such as the one MetalArend described, one docklet showing only hours, another one showing minutes and the like. So four docklet showing the complete hour... sounds good, isn't it? This will be a Priority #2 feature... I will do it as soon as I finish all basic funtionallity of the docklet (all clock modes, major bugs, etc.)

iTime.zip

Edited May 21, 2009 by MetalArend

[Ghostwalker]

I see what you mean less images less ram more work on the skinner though. I don't think the reset buttons should be combined with the button_sw though but hey it is not mine do whatever works. But that skin is not done yet so let me know what everyone decides so I can try to finish it. I learned my graphics from doing Yahoo! Widgets not windows applications that tend to merge their graphics like this.

Edited May 21, 2009 by Ghostwalker

[Smaky]

Ok, I have added the "Visible" property... it's still a long way from finished, I will polish it a bit before reaching beta stage. The latest alfa update is at post 58. It seems as if I did not do a lot... but internally elements structures changed completely... anticipating changes to come (like the "hierarchy" stuff).

@MetalAremd, I don't think I will go all the way up to combining all images as you suggest. But i think that I will definetively combine some of them. Maybe a single image for each digits set and a single image for the backgrounds. But I would rather have all other elements on sepparate files. so they are easier to be freely "accomodated" on the docklet. Besides I do not want so much code just to "slice & dice" skin images.

BTW, did you test the alarm remider? Are they working for you?