Chat window pane: Any way to make it match contact list look

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:56 am

so I use Plastik as the contact list style and appearance (skin, if you will).

One ugly thing I really find myself constantly wishing I could change is the actual chat window appearance. I know about message styles ( I use Gone Dark: Mutation) but find it odd that everything BUT the chat window frame itself cannot be altered in appearance/style.

If anyone could explain why this is so or how to achieve making the chat window itself look exactly like Plastik (or others, for that matter), I'd appreciate it.

Using 1.0.2b2 (bleeding edge, plan on using all the latest AX betas).

Thanks!

Post by **bgannin** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 12:42 pm

Changing window frames requires hacking the runtime, which is the land of APE and Shapeshifter or other resource altering applications. Using custom borderless windows and attempting to match a standard frame to enable skinability is not a feature Adium will likely support.

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 5:48 pm

You mention that the chat frame itself cannot be altered as (guessing) it's generated from some sort of static resource via OSX. How then did you get it to create the tabs and include your icons and the message style, etc. if the frame cannot be altered? I haven't seen many frames appear the way yours have so surely you must have altered them somehow.

I'm primarily curious, then, as to why the development stopped there (editing the layout of the frame) and didn't extend to the color, etc. I'm wondering if it is anything at all like Windows where you can create a container frame, set a transparent alpha layer for that frame, and then draw the "frame" the user sees within it?

Trillian is a prime example of the chat frame/window matching the style of the contact list.

Is OSX that different where it would be vastly or substantially more difficult to go the next step and alter the chat frame, much as the "frame" for the contact list has been altered?

I'm terribly happy with Adium and enjoy hearing from developers of products because I admire their position.

Thanks for your time!

Post by **Catfish_Man** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 7:27 pm

Everything in the 'content pane' of the window is easily editable. Changing the rest of the window is possible, but only by telling the system "don't bother drawing the window, we'll draw it ourselves and handle all the events and such manually", which also has some other weird side effects (I don't recall exactly what... possibly it doesn't show up in expose? I'd have to check). So, doable, but definitely not easy.

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 7:47 pm

Well, I appreciate the information!

I hope this can make it into a soon to come future version... perhaps something to work on as a pet project to bring Adium to the next level.

I really find Adium impressive but was a bit put off when I showed my younger brother the app and thought it was so cool until I opened a message window. He was like "Oh.... So it's just that part that can look like that? Meh..."

I wonder how many other users have felt "meh..." over this "lack" of how far Adium reaches to attain true customization (albeit an admittedly minor drawback)?

So we've determined it's not easy to pull off. Any ideas on whether or not it'd truly have to be done "hackish" (as in having to then bundle Shapeshifter with Adium, etc.) or with some time and such it could be done all legitimately using what is already available in OSX?

I know it's not a huge priority, as I'm sure formats and mediums are, but I truly do feel that this level of cohesion and uniformity would elevate AdiumX to the next level of "personality" and customization.

Thoughts? Timeline (if any)?

Thanks!

Post by **Catfish_Man** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 8:00 pm

Timeline: none.
Possible: Sure, check out NSBorderlessWindowMask in the Cocoa documentation, then get out the custom drawing functions and spend a long time duplicating the system event handling.

Post by **bgannin** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:34 pm

Full-scale skinning/theming has been rejected several times in the past as a form of functionality that will not be supported by Adium.

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:37 pm

Is it just too time consuming?

Post by **bgannin** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:41 pm

Knaledge wrote:Is it just too time consuming?

It's time consuming and it's functionality that 90+% of users (don't chime in I want too on this thread please) don't want. It also has the possibility of making Adium that much "uglier" in the eyes of some who view our dearth of configuration now as too much.

That said, let's look at what a basic 'fully themed' window would require:
- custom mouse tracking
- custom window dragging
- custom titlebar (or equivalent ways to work)
- custom resizer
- resource management to make sure all components are loaded from a theme
- fallbacks to prevent a theme from hosing a window (and these precautions could lead to malformed themes that mix elements [safety versus custom])

and this list is off the top of my head, barring the real implementation.

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:44 pm

Perhaps this will be featured in an upcoming "Get a Mac" commercial.

It's disappointing to see such creative aspects of the community limited by the foundation upon which you build, as I am sure the limitation doesn't rest on your (Adium) shoulders, but those of OSX itself.

Shame. Thanks anyhow.

Post by **bgannin** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:06 am

It's a tough row to hoe sometimes being a Mac user, but 99.999% I'm happy

(the logic behind the 'limiting' nature of the platform is the age old 80/20 rule, and it's relentless application by Apple's teams, and those who emulate them.) That rule being, "what's the solution that works best for 80% of people 100% of the time instead of the feature that 20% of people desire that 80% won't even use or realize they need."

Knaledge · Post by **Knaledge** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:21 am

I hear you there. And much less sassy than I had expected from an experienced Mac user, which I presume you are.

I can live without the feature I just really felt it would have been a nice touch. It's still very nice work with the message styling, to say the least.

I wonder though - are there any major things planned for Adium when Leopard debuts? Does the above become somewhat alleviated?

This sort of "put it in the hands of the developers" approach seems to be catching on with the Apple side of the fence (more like a gate, these days) in terms of giving you, the dev, a fleshier, fuller suite of extensibility than in previous iterations.

Curiously, though, I still can't set a desktop background via Photo Drawer (Preview)- I must enter an entirely separate portion of the OS. And oddly, rather than being prompted to delete something when simply tapping the "Delete" key, I _must_ instead hold "Command" and then press "Delete".

Where Windows gives me the option, OSX gives me an explanation. =/

It's interesting to note the differences between two platforms, say... Windows and OSX. Where one seems so foolishly backward (security), the other seems arbitrarily hard-headed (user friendliness... in so much as the "no-brainer" stuff mentioned above).

While there are arguments for both (the ever elusive "Secure Windows" vs the "You can do anything you want as long as you do it this way and this way only" OSX),
I find sometimes that what is one man's junk is another man's "Why _would_ 'Cut' be present on the right-click context menu? Just Drag n' Drop!"

Here's hoping the future holds wider arches on those Aqua doors and Leopard print floors!

Post by **bgannin** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:34 am

Leopard is the software equivalent of "Fight Club" now - those who are in can't discuss it, even if they did acknowledge it. That said, every major OS version provides new opportunities, but Adium has a support policy of current OS - 1 (we support 10.4 and 10.3, thus for Leopard, 10.5 and 10.4, with Tiger as our baseline)

Post by **bgannin** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:38 am

Knaledge wrote:Curiously, though, I still can't set a desktop background via Photo Drawer (Preview)- I must enter an entirely separate portion of the OS. And oddly, rather than being prompted to delete something when simply tapping the "Delete" key, I _must_ instead hold "Command" and then press "Delete".

That's by design, and good design in my opinion (see the 80/20 rule.) Preview is just that - a viewer. Changing backgrounds is an entirely different task and has its own location for that, as should be expected for discrete functionality. They interoperate via drag & drop (drag image to well or file icon from titlebar) and you're set. Some dedicated apps have seen fit to add this (Safari, iPhoto) but it's not necessarily something everyone needs to buy into.

And Cmmd+Delete is also a feature, not a bug. It prevents accidental occurrences from starting a potentially dangerous process.

Post by **Catfish_Man** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 1:06 am

Knaledge wrote: I wonder though - are there any major things planned for Adium when Leopard debuts? Does the above become somewhat alleviated?

Once we can use Leopard features (see bgannin's point above about supporting 10.4 for a while), there are some things that have definitely caught my eye. CoreAnimation obviously has potential (highly abusable potential...), WebKit's SVG support could be amazing for message styles, plus a bunch of stuff I can't talk about of course