Simplistique Skin Release - download and screenshots

**wishbone** · 03-01-2006, 09:23 PM

I just started using this skin and I absolutely love the look. My only comment is no volume control in the GPS screen. It would be really helpful to make sure you have voume control some how on every screen. Just because I use my car to listen to music than anything else. =)

thanks man!

**95m3hotness** · 03-01-2006, 11:00 PM

hey lloydy is there a way to change the sound increment size? and also, i noticed that the volume loads all the way up. is there a way to change that?

I dont know if its possible, it would be hot if the skin turned to nightmode by itself. Like if it went by the time and i could set it to go to night mode after 6:00pm and day mode after 6:30am.

**nkotch** · 03-01-2006, 11:02 PM

Well I don't think he has separate "day"/"night" versions of that skin.... but all you need to do is use something like Gammacontrol to automatically change brightness for day/night settings.

**xtremak** · 03-01-2006, 11:23 PM

I have a request since the skin is still in development, one of the features I would like added to the skin is the ability to control atleast the music (play/pause, next, prev) and the volume from any of the screens, one reason why this is important is that it reduces the time one has to look for buttons. Also, another thing to consider while further designing would be to keep driver usability in mind (making commands often used easily accessible). Don't get me wrong I am not *****ing as I love the skin and currently use.

**mike b** · 03-02-2006, 03:50 AM

@ LLOYDY, No it still doesnt light up orange even when on full volume!..i think ill have to have a play with the setup, but cant see anything so far that could fix this.

and yer!...i did understand what you meant about the increments of the volume bar!

Cheers,
Mike

**lloydy** · 03-02-2006, 09:32 AM

@ 95m3hotness

Unfortunately, the voume increments can't be changes at the moment. This is nothing to do with the skin - it is built into the RoadRunner application. I think many people have requested this for future releases of Road Runner so it might even already be included. This is something You'll have to take up with Guino (the main man of RoadRunner).

The night skin automatically changing idea again is a RoadRunner thing and not skin related. I think this may already be included. When my skin is fully complete I will probably make a night version of it although I find it looks fine in the dark anyway.

You should be able to find more info by searching the RoadRunner section of this forum.

@ wishbone and @ xtremak

The main reason these controls aren't on all the screens (including the GPS) is to avoid cluttering the display with too many buttons. The thing is, I have the advantage of having these "main" buttons to hand at all times anyway as I have steering wheel control buttons. I can see, however, how they would be missed without steering wheel controls. I will look into redesigning the general interface to include all these extra features.

I also think the date and time location needs standardising. This will all be ironed out in the final version of the skin.

EDIT: PS: forgot to mention, there is a secret hidden button just under the date and time on the main menu screen which skips to the next track. I put this there when I didn't have steering wheel buttons. But shhhh.... don't tell anyone!

@ mike_b

This is a strange one to me. Make sure the "volume_slider" folder is definitely in the Simplistique skin folder. This is where the volume slider images are.

Hope this clears everything up. Keep the comments, problems and suggestions coming - I'm taking them all on board. It's great to have such a good response from this skin!

LLOYDY

**wishbone** · 03-02-2006, 11:51 AM

yeah I understood that's why you did it and a reason I love your skin so much. I also am hopping to use my BMW wheel controls when my ibus adapter gets here. Simple +/- buttons I think would work without including the full slider. Anyway, thanks again for sharing this awesome skin with us.

EDIT: excuse the newbie question. How did you get your iguidance file, tool, view, to look like that to match the skin? Is that some sort of skinbedder option or is it a windows theme?

**xtremak** · 03-02-2006, 12:24 PM

I would suggest to have a top bar and a bottom bar which would be standard on all screens, the top bar could have the date and other skin specific data, the bottom bar could have the most commonly used commands (standard on all screens maybe on the right hand side or something) and screen specific commands. At the moment the design does have these it would just be a matter of changing stuff on them.

**lloydy** · 03-02-2006, 12:29 PM

@ wishbone

Actually if you just search for "RR IBUS" you will find a post with a download to the IBUSComM application already modified for RoadRunner. It simply maps the up/down arrows to skip tracks, the volume buttons for volume up/down, the "R/T" button for pause/play and the speaker button to mute. It's great. My IBUS device and the software was probably one of the few things that worked perfectly first time.

To get iGuidance looking like that I changed my Windows appearance to look like my skin - i.e. I changed the windows colours to orange and grey, and changed the toolbar font to the one used in the skin. It's in Windows Display Properties | Appearance | Advanced. The font I used is now included in the !FONTS folder. The "HandelGoth" font (or similar). I think this was discussed in more detail a bit earlier in this thread actually (there you can find the exact orange colour values etc.)

LLOYDY

**lloydy** · 03-02-2006, 12:36 PM

@ xtremak

That was my main aim, yes. However, many of the screens need extra information that would make the display look more cluttered (or smaller) so some of them get replaced (e.g. the time is smaller in the audio player to make room for the encoding details of the song). Also, screen real estate is the most essential factor when considering a GPS or TV screen so buttons and information are kept to a minimum.

I think it would be a good idea to have the track title display also be the skip buttons (e.g. pressing the left of the display would skip back, and right side would skip forward). I will look into it.

LLOYDY