Thread: Plugin Development Contest (Plugin devs from all FEs welcome)

just tried this.


When I copied a built dll across, it did not appear in the list for the buttons (sample1 did fine).

So I copied the new openmobile.framework.dll to the openmobile folder and now openmobile crashes as soon as it starts.

just wanted to say, good idea for getting developers to contribute.

works better than berating them......

Originally Posted by Enforcer

just tried this.

When I copied a built dll across, it did not appear in the list for the buttons (sample1 did fine).

So I copied the new openmobile.framework.dll to the openmobile folder and now openmobile crashes as soon as it starts.

signing the framework was supposed to make it easier but it seems to be too picky so heres everything unsigned. This should all work together just make sure to use the framework dll in this zip for compiling. Future changes should work just by swapping out the one dll.

Originally Posted by SFiorito

just wanted to say, good idea for getting developers to contribute.

works better than berating them......

Well hopefully it goes both ways... they get a better development experience (except for poor enforcer being the first to take the plunge) and a platform they know will last...and we get their help

I'll give that a go tonight.

OK, got that example working.

I now have a question/observation.

From what I can see at the moment the size and position of the controls seems to be determined by the plugin developer, is it planned to have this determined by the skin designer, otherwise the only difference between skins is going to be the colours and design of the buttons not the placement.

Originally Posted by Enforcer

OK, got that example working.

I now have a question/observation.

From what I can see at the moment the size and position of the controls seems to be determined by the plugin developer, is it planned to have this determined by the skin designer, otherwise the only difference between skins is going to be the colours and design of the buttons not the placement.

Well yes and no.
One of the biggest differences is that we separate plugins from skins. A skin (aka high level plugin) should really only be displaying data, where as the real work is being done by the various "low level plugins". For example, you could have one skin to display weather data and data provider plugins for france, england, the US, etc. That way you pick what features you want (like data, music player, etc) and then the look you want (since the skin is completely independent from the plugins).
Of course there is also support for serialized controls which means you can read in an xml file containing all the controls and their properties. The xml file can be done automatically in the skin designer or by hand. The reason we try to avoid this is that it slows things down (same reason we discourage use of ini files for settings).

So if I am not using ini or txt files for my data, where does it get stored?


*edit

BTW when I press the exit button (probably any buttons on the menu screen) the animation only does something in the top left corner of the buttons, looks weird.

See below

Originally Posted by Enforcer

So if I am not using ini or txt files for my data, where does it get stored?

OpenMobile.Data.* (http://openmobile.sourceforge.net/wi...x.php/Database)
It's a shared thread safe database. If you want to start by using an ini or txt file and then once thats working start using the database that works too but the database will be far easier then trying to figure out why your plugins don't work right on linux or on multiple screens.

Originally Posted by Enforcer

BTW when I press the exit button (probably any buttons on the menu screen) the animation only does something in the top left corner of the buttons, looks weird.

See below

Edit-found it. It happens when full screen. Fixed as issue#10.

Originally Posted by justchat_1

OpenMobile.Data.* (http://openmobile.sourceforge.net/wi...x.php/Database)
It's a shared thread safe database. If you want to start by using an ini or txt file and then once thats working start using the database that works too but the database will be far easier then trying to figure out why your plugins don't work right on linux or on multiple screens.

See, that is another thing that should be added to your plugin examples


Will have a play.


I assume I have to add openmobile.data to my imports.

*edit, yes I did. Cool got it to work I think.