Database Info

I hate to sound like an idiot, but...

Ok, here is my stupid question of the day...
What's the difference between a "skin" and a "theme"?
It seems like they do about the same basic thing, change various aspects of the colors (colours) of things on the screen.
Although I found a "skin" for the phone dialpad and a basic "theme" for the look of the today screen, I would like to create "somthing" that will affect EVERYTHING.... including the soft keyboard, all text on all screens, the top and bottom areas as well. And I want it to be a one package installation. And... I want it to look as good in landscape as it does in portrate.
I'm using a HTC 8125 with WM5
Big Thanx!

That would be a "Skin Suite" --
Skins for top & bottom bars, phone, keyboard, other apps -- also "themed" (or matching) icons for program shortcuts to complete the look
Themes for the Today screen (.tsk files)
Take a look at the Lakeridge software forums or even the Sbsh software forums (under each program's "resources" threads) for LOTS of ideas on what you can skin and some of the skin suites that have been created.
TOTALLY AWESOME!!! I think I've downloaded just about every one of them. Of course, I like some more than others, but they're all awesome -- considering I don't have an artistic cell in my body.

WM 6.1 Homescreen weather plugin

Hey everyone!
First off I want to thank Dr. Gonzo again for the 6.1 rom. It's great and love it!
Second, I was using the HTC home screens that user tho made (found here) and I really got used to having the weather plugin on the homescreen. I really like how the homescreen is setup on this new rom, but I still want a weather plugin for it. Is there any way to add that plugin to this homescreen?
thanks.

if i was you i would try the following:
install the home plugin on your device. copy the .xml file from the plugin to your harddrive. open it and find the coresponding <plugin...> entry for the plugin. Then copy this entry to the xml-file of your skin of choice and there it should appear again... if it does not work or you have no clue what i was talking about, give me report.. i will try to do it for you,

Yea that's what I was thinking about doing. I just did not know if it would work or if it would look alright. I'm at work now so I don't really want to mess with it, but I'm going to try that when I get home.

ok. let us know if it worked when you're done

Wow this is a lot more difficult than I had thought. I can't find the weather plugin in the HTC Home screen and as the other thread may have tipped you off, the Sliding Panel home screen is very confusing to work with.
Basically what I would like to accomplish is to have Weather on my homescreen, while still using the Sliding Panel motif. So like if I could click over to the right next to where it displays the time it would show the weather. I'm going to keep working on this, but if anyone would like to jump in and help me I'd appreciate it.
Thanks.

according to the slide panel. I think all you can do is to manipulate the panels with basic configurations read out from the registry. It is not that easy to create something new, but i think a good point to start is always the manipulation of the welcome center, because this one is what most people need when they like to make "their own panels". The only way something will create a new slide is to code a plugin which is dedicated to appear in the slides. and still someone has to figure out what basic options are needed to create a new panel or to figure out what these guids are respectively.
Can you provide the htc home xml at least? it would be nice to have all extracted files in a zip file, so i do not have to install it again and pic all files out by myself.

Well that's sortof bad news that I can't create something new, however it might still be possible to edit the home panel to add that in?
I attached the xml for one of the home screens. I looked through it all and couldn't find the plugin for the weather but maybe you will have better luck than I will.

well, that is exactly what i meant. First choice, change one of the existing panels. If it works then and someone can explain those damn GUIDs I think we would manage to get it work on an own panel.
As far as it is "documented" in the XML (which is quite interesting i think for non wm6.1) this is the plugin-option for the htc home:
<plugin clsid="{B0C8AC4B-CDDC-4010-AAEB-076A2A6EB171}" name="HTCHome" height="88"></plugin>
This means to me, that cannot extract the weather-plugin for the homescreen unless you know how the home-plugin was made and the weather-plugin is a standalone, built-into htc home.
if you install the htc home, and edit your slidingpanel.xml with this tag somewhere, the home plugin should appear. I added the .xml for Frau Hottelmanns panther scheme with the htc home plugintag so you can see what i mean (not sure if the comment-tag is allowed, so just remove it before uploading to your device).
This is all I can do for you right at the moment.

Alright, Thanks a lot. I will try it when I get home.

I am really sorry that i wrote some damn ******* before It surely is possible to create new slides!!! It is just not possible to create a slide with ANY functionality
i just had the idea, that we may figure out what the minimal options for a slide are and then go on to figure out what the others are. But if we know the minimal options we could for example copy the testuiplugin-panel and try to get it work with the entire htc home plugin in it.
just wanted to write that, so you would not be that hopeless

Ok, what i found so far is:
- The htc home plugin works on wm6.1 as usual
- It seems not to work with the bronze-plugin in the same theme
* when loading the theme, the htc home plugin is displayed but vanishes as fast as the bronze-plugin is loaded.
* i played around with the height-attribute from the bronze-plugin but it seems to have absolutely no effect
- what i discovered in one of the previous skins is, that there are at least two major plugins for the htc home plugin which can be loaded in a theme. there is the notificationbar where the calls and sms etc. are shown and there is the htchome where the weather is displayed and so on.
- I also found that the exe-file for the weather-plugin is located at /windows/weather.exe so maybe its possible to configure the "output" on a call of this file and the weatherplugin is displayed (which means that we could put it into a slide)
- I also found an old thread here on xda for the "customization" of the htc home plugin, but it seems that the way the plugin works has changed since this thread and the version gregory released
- what is missing is something like a documentation on the htc home plugin, so which parts are implemented, how are they called from the homescreen etc. maybe gregory, if he's still around here has any idea(s) ???
- i just got that the weather.exe sets the city, downloads and refreshes the local weatherdata. So the output has to be somewhere else.

sounds like you are onto something here. Since the HTC home weather plugin is causing some problems, I think I am going to take a look at some other weather plugins. They might make it a little easier. I'm specifically looking at SPB Weather and Fizz Weather.
The only problem is, once I install them I'm not really sure how to put them into the slide panel. I'm going to play around with it and I'll let you know.

A tip from my side... always start from the delivered .xml files for the theme. mostly you can see there how they are implemented in the home-screen... then you just have to copy it.
i am wondering why the htc home plug does not work with the bronze. rinkus iconbar does, and its also just another plugin implemented... It also would not make sense that microsoft put something in the code of bronze which disables other home plugins

kimamil said:
A tip from my side... always start from the delivered .xml files for the theme. mostly you can see there how they are implemented in the home-screen... then you just have to copy it.
i am wondering why the htc home plug does not work with the bronze. rinkus iconbar does, and its also just another plugin implemented... It also would not make sense that microsoft put something in the code of bronze which disables other home plugins
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You mit be better waitin until HTC release a WM6.1 Standard ROM to see if HTC customize bronze to have parts of there Home plugins integrated and extract everything from a ROM then making a cab file to install it .
Roland

this was my first thought, but as you may know, there are people out there (yes, i am one of those ) that do not like to wait and have things first and before all the others do

kimamil said:
this was my first thought, but as you may know, there are people out there (yes, i am one of those ) that do not like to wait and have things first and before all the others do
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried using Facade to use the HTC plugin with Bronze?
Roland

nope. i thought one has to BUY facade???

Customizing X7510 "Big" HTC Home

I have been looking for some tools for customizing HTC Home, which comes from Athena X7510 official ROM. You can find it in some cooked roms for X7500/x7501 as well, but this "big" version of Home plugin was first introduced in X7510, I think.
Well known HHC could be used for this, but there is no proper grafic files for this version of Home plugin. The files should be of proper size, as we are talking about VGA and biger version then the one from other phones.
I have prepared one small set of files for myself and am posting them here, so others can use them. Maybe others could do the same so we could bulild a set of graffics to be able to change our HTC HP.
The background is based on Poorlyduck's Background (thanks to Poorlyduck) and the clock is made out of Segoa Bold Gray Shaded delivered with HHC (thanks to emunutz).
I have attached my screen and grafics which can be used in HHC or copied directly to the folder where your HTC Home is installed (by default in Windows folder).
Edit:
All of you who can contribute with their work, please feel free and join here.
Edit2:
Attached Files contain HTC Dimond clock described in my post #6.

Does this mean if I copy and paste the files you provided I could make it look exactly as the screen shot? To which folder exactly? Is it as easy as selecting it off the today screen settings?
How did you show the time and Main Memory at the top bar together?
What is HHC?
Is there a way to change the color to all black?
How come you also have TABS on the top part? Is that part of the files you provided? How can I have those TABS?
Are you using Real VGA? If YES, will your files work with Real VGA at 96 dpi or do we have to use it at 196 dpi?
Sorry for the numerous questions...

cktlcmd said:
Does this mean if I copy and paste the files you provided I could make it look exactly as the screen shot? To which folder exactly? Is it as easy as selecting it off the today screen settings?
How did you show the time and Main Memory at the top bar together?
What is HHC?
Is there a way to change the color to all black?
How come you also have TABS on the top part? Is that part of the files you provided? How can I have those TABS?
Are you using Real VGA? If YES, will your files work with Real VGA at 96 dpi or do we have to use it at 196 dpi?
Sorry for the numerous questions...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My screen is build with some special soft which I use in all my phones.
On top bar i use WKTask, gprs connection monitor and pBar.
The last one is showing time and memory in right top corner. It's main perpouse is more or les the same as WKTask but I like them both. WKTask is bestin closing apps but pBar gives you some other things like showing time and memory.
HTC Home is standard Today plugin. It does not give you those upper tabs. I use UltimateLounch (UL) for it. You can build tabs with normal icons/links to apps on your Athena, but also you can use Today plugins as tabs or combunation of Today plugins and sections with normal icons. The best is that you can use gestures to change from one tab to the other and it can show you a cube efect switching to the oter tab.
Hope this helps.
Edit:
All of this should work in realvga. I did not test it in this Athena, but the same config have used in my old x7500 with realvga 128dpi and it was fine. Now have decided that I prefer finger touch then density, so did not install realvga on my new x7510.
HHC is HTC Home Customizer by emunutz.

Thank you for clarifying everything. I'm going to check out Ultimate Launcher.
I also found pBar 1.5. Is this the version you are using?

cktlcmd said:
Thank you for clarifying everything. I'm going to check out Ultimate Launcher.
I also found pBar 1.5. Is this the version you are using?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's it.

HTC Dimond style clock
I have resized HTC Dimond clock made originaly by Ipaso.
It looks nice on HTC (black) them and Poorlyduck's backround. HTC theme was moded a little. As always I use UL as main organizer of my screen.
All files are for portrait and landscape.
Edit:
I have updated my attached file in my post #1. HTC Dimond by Ipaso is now fixed to solve the problem of small "0" in landscape and 12 hours type clock. Bug found by robjhellis (thanks).

where can i get the new home screen? i dont want to flash to spl 3.5 im still on 1.2 can anyone post the cab of the new htc home screen?

cjmedina said:
where can i get the new home screen? i dont want to flash to spl 3.5 im still on 1.2 can anyone post the cab of the new htc home screen?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can google for emunutz web page of his HTC Home Customizer. I think he provides installers of HTC Home plugin.

Color Icons for BIG HTC Home
I have been running AP4 since it was released and am very pleased with the great work done by the AP team. However, I was looking to add a bit of color to the HTC home and I have created a set of icons to do so.
If you like....please enjoy.

looks very good!
many compliments
and...thank you

Customizing "Big" HTC Home
Some time ago, I have opened a thread for customizing "Big" HTC Home plugin for Athena. The thread is here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=2506158&postcount=1.
It would be nice if people could have all efforts for this subject in one place.
BTW, nice done.

can you make the clock look like diamond's, thanks

Tadeusz said:
Some time ago, I have opened a thread for customizing "Big" HTC Home plugin for Athena. The thread is here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=2506158&postcount=1.
It would be nice if people could have all efforts for this subject in one place.
BTW, nice done.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Done Thanks for the suggestion

Tadeusz said:
I have resized HTC Dimond clock made originaly by Ipaso.
It looks nice on HTC (black) them and Poorlyduck's backround. HTC theme was moded a little. As always I use UL as main organizer of my screen.
All files are for portrait and landscape.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Tadeuz, I've copied your Diamond Diamond Clock on to my 7510 and in landscape the first digit is about half ther siz of the other three. In portrait they are all tye same size. Any thoughts on why this might have happened?
Also, any chance to give us a run down on the settings for Ultimate Launcher to get the top selection bar. Just cannot work it out.
Very many thanks.

robjhellis said:
Tadeuz, I've copied your Diamond Diamond Clock on to my 7510 and in landscape the first digit is about half ther siz of the other three. In portrait they are all tye same size. Any thoughts on why this might have happened?
Also, any chance to give us a run down on the settings for Ultimate Launcher to get the top selection bar. Just cannot work it out.
Very many thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have no idea, what happened. You mean all digits on first place are smaller then the other 3 places, no matter what the actuall digit is at the momment?
If so then it means there is some problem with HTC Home Plugin. Are you sure, you are using the same version of Home Plugin as mine. Are you on X7510 or the older Advantage? If so then you could have some older "small" version of Home plugin.
Try to compare your screen with mine. In landscape you should have the clock on left side and messages infro on right side, not under the clock, as it is in other versions of Home plugin.
Talking about UL, there is good source of info at this place: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=2134341&postcount=1
I could give you mine setup file but I use a lot of specific icons and links, as well as some today plugins, which you could not have on your device. I have noticed that UL could hang up if you load a setup file with links to non-existing apps or today plugins. This would mean a hard reset if you do not have some special recovery software on your device and some additional knowledge, how to get out of such situation.
before you start to fiedle with UL config make a backup of working config (UltimateLounch.ini file). In case you get stucked, you can go into recovery state and return to this working config. Of cource backed-up file should by on your device, not on your PC.
Generaly, before you start to add a today plugin to UL config, you have to deactivate it in Today setup, so it is inactive. Then you can add it to some tab in UL setup.
In may case, my Today screen have only two active plugins, UL and callendar (as this is not working in UL). The rest plugins I have on particular tabs in UL. You also can set one tab as a default one, so it is always shown when the system starts.
You can use icons taken from the app, or you can prepare or use special icons for each app link (when preparing tab for app links).
Hope this helps.

Tadeusz you have given me a lot to digest. Much of it will need to wait until the weekend as the week is going to be busy at work. Thank you for your input.
Re the 1st digit. I can now report that it is only the zero that is the small size. When the 1st digit changes to a one then everything is of uniform size. I am running in 12 hour mode whereas I see your image is showing a 24 hour version. I'm, therefore, seeing the zero more often than you would see. Of course I never see a two in 1st place using the 12 hour clock. Other than that the clock and message set up is the same as yours. My device is the x7510 and I have applied auswims' color icons (post #9). Thanks for any further thoughts you may have.
I've attached a screenprint showing the small zero.

robjhellis said:
Tadeusz you have given me a lot to digest. Much of it will need to wait until the weekend as the week is going to be busy at work. Thank you for your input.
Re the 1st digit. I can now report that it is only the zero that is the small size. When the 1st digit changes to a one then everything is of uniform size. I am running in 12 hour mode whereas I see your image is showing a 24 hour version. I'm, therefore, seeing the zero more often than you would see. Of course I never see a two in 1st place using the 12 hour clock. Other than that the clock and message set up is the same as yours. My device is the x7510 and I have applied auswims' color icons (post #9). Thanks for any further thoughts you may have.
I've attached a screenprint showing the small zero.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So here we are. I've found it, thanks to your report. Tomorow evning I'll upload fixed package. My computer needs some work now, so can't do anything before I'll fix it.

Looking forward to that. Have a great day!

robjhellis said:
Looking forward to that. Have a great day!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It should be fixed now.

Applied the fix - now looking good. Thanks a bunch

classic look

Hi everyone
I have my HD2 and i have to say it is superb.
I have looked everywhere and i cannot see any mods to give the HD2 a classic look on the homescreen. i.e remove the program shorcuts from beneath the clock and enable the old program tab along the bottom.
The large screen is so superb and it is a bit too busy and hides the magnificence of a great wallpaper.
also it would be nice if everyone put in one thread all the personalisation mods that work for them from the HD as well as new ones.
I have tried several of them that used to work on my cooked HD roms but now do not on my HD2.
Thinks like tranparent clocks and i would love to have a transparent top taskbar leaving just the icons floating and bottom bar where the menu and phone shorcuts are with out having to install complete theme chager which tweak too many things.
If anyone can help that would be great

go to settings click menu click more than there is a option home screen
there u can ad your classic stuf and dissable htc sence or enable new WM 6.5 home screen. i hope u can find it
grz.

Settings> Today> Items - remove hooks with "HTC Sense"

I think he's asking for a more TouchFLO look, rather than a Sense UI.
I think you're gonna have to wait a while mate. A lot of the customisations that we thought of as normal on the HD simply aren't available yet on the HD2.
I was the same - my HD was modded like mad, but the HD2 is more like it was out of the box. It took a while, but I'm now very used to the Sense UI, and would feel lost without the functionality that I've gained from that extra clutter.
Have a look at the Sense tweaks and mods thread. That has some good stuff in it, but not as much as you're looking for, yet.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=584415

Thanks guys for taking the time to reply to me.
Xinyo i couldnt quite follow your instructions
and Soverign 35 that dosent work either.
However JohnC your are exactly right. It is the classic touch flo look that i am looking for. i would love to have the option to remove the program shorcuts from the homescreen and have the program tab back along the bottom and practically everthing transparent on the home screen.
Maybe htc could give us the option of the classic touchflo look or the htc sense look. in the next rom update. in the mean time all tweaks would be welcome

Just want the classic look on the HD2 too
I have two problems that stop me getting what I want which I ran on my TyTn II perfectly well. HTC in their infinite wisdom have removed the SMS entries from messaging and thus from the messaging today screen plugin. Secondly as they have also removed the task bar options I cannot set either get it in the top right hand corner of the screen or set the X button to close apps rather than just minimise them. Any ideas how I can re-enable these please?
I am more than happy to disable the cluttered SenseUI nonsense. Having SenseUI as an option is one thing, having it forced on you as a result of not being able to do things in the standard interface because HTC have removed them is another. The whole point of Windows Mobile is it's customisability and HTC have managed to break this!

HD2 home screen personalisation

hye,
everywhere on xda I see nice homescreens, how can I get them myself?
I would like to change the background in every tap and maybe set anothe clock... etc.
thanx

Clocks are readily available all over this section of the forum, just search clock and you'll have 100's of options.
Install cookies home tab or max manilla to gve yourself more options...
Different bg's for each tab.............. I've seen a cab somewhere that will display your today screen bg behind all the other tabs but I cant remember where... its in here somewhere though......
Happy searching...............

You have a lot for work to do:
1. Install Co0kie's Home Tab + CHT Editor - MUST haves
2. Install clocks (there are tons, you MUST do a search)
3. If you like to have the same background in all tabs not just home screen, install HDWallS (wallpaper browser) and the correct HDWalls patch. There are a lot of pre-made cabs already but you can always make your own if you install the PC version of HDWalls on your comp. Just search for HDWalls and detailed instructions are there.
4. Check out the LEO TODAY thread so you can see what other people have done and a lot of cabs are there too.
5. With everything else that you feel like doing on and to your phone, I cannot stress enough the you MUST SEARCH first and post a new thread last.

okee cookie home tab v1.8 is realy nice, everything I want

The possibilities for personalization are endless!
If I can give you a good tip, look around everywhere here!
And don't forget to take a look here!
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=582619
This thread is make by one of us compatriot!! (belg)
their are a lot of people who post their home screens!
you can find a lot of explications and examples!! the possibilities are endless!!
Ps; welkom landgenoot!

First, I will give you the MOST important advice. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE find a program like SPB Backup (it one is not free, but its restored my phone back to the latest settings i liked)... make a backup of your device and save it on your SD card. You don't want to make a mistake, delete a manila file while modding your phone, then try to remove the mod cuz you don't like it. not all the mods are perfect. Having to HARD RESET, will delete everything and restore you back to STOCK SETTINGS. I've personally done this countless times and spend 3 hours reinstalling apps and setting up my cookie HT icons and email, wifi. its a real pain in the butt. Even SK tools has a backup feature. it takes 4 minutes and it saves your tale! If you're forced to do a Hard reset, just restore your backup. also do another backup when you like the particular setup with mods on your device
You may want to do a little research on HDWalls with Cookies HT 1.8, this gives your device transparent bars top and bottom or simply places the wallpaper behind the whole screen removing the top and bottom black bars. its a very clean look. however you do lose the ability to give every screen its own wallpaper except the start menu.
DINIK's Slider, Keyboard, Phone Dialer, and CHT Clock are highly recommended!!! He also makes all black and white icons come to life with color!
look into transparent mods... there's a ton! i have at least 40 installed. Use BSB tweaks and Touch tweaks.