SKS 6 Help for newbie!

By RobJK Posted April 12, 2008 19:59:20

I am having no problem with most things in sks6. It is mostly a Breeze. I am however having problems with font colors. AHH. Its enough to make someone run away! LOL anyways, here are the problems I am Haveing.....

The font color for button text in system defined colors changes LOTs of places in windows vista. Not just buttons. So the problem is this.. I have black buttons and the places tool is black on my skin, so I change this font to white, only to find out it also includes the font color in other places like gimp tool windows and that makes your font on those windows invinsible. The only thing that I can come up with is to change it to a green or something else that will match my skin but that looks ugly. I only like black and white font for most places. anyway around this besided changeing the colors of my buttons and places bar?

The second font color problem I am having is for menus. All white font because the menus are black. The mouseover lime green. The white text doesnt show up against the background sooo... I could change the color of mousover or is there a way to change the text color of mouseover menu items?

Third What is a USI2 Frame? I kind of know but is it an alternate option to perpixle window frames? Can I just skin perpixle frames and leave USI2 frames alone.

Any help with any of these would be greatly appreciated. Thank Brainy for the heads up and thanks everyone else for your time.

+2 Karma 11 Replies 4 Referrals

You do not need to change system font colors to change the button text color.

1. Go to the button menu and click on the text tab.
2. There is a dropdown box for the different states the button has. You can change the font color for each state.
3. This is where you can change the color of the font.

It is basicaly the same for the font color in the menus.

The reason you would skin a per pixel frame is if you wanted it to have shadow or transparency. I have not done that yet, so can't advise you on that. The UIS2 frames are regular frames that dont have shadow and transparency. Thats what I skinned on my first blind.

Hope this helps a bit.

Third What is a USI2 Frame? I kind of know but is it an alternate option to perpixle window frames? Can I just skin perpixle frames and leave USI2 frames alone.

Generally UIS2 frames are pre XP and inner program windows... such as an image in the photoshop work area. Also, if a skin does not have the perpixel frames (at all) the UIS2 frame becomes the default.

thanks Xiandi but that doesnt take care of all buttons. there are buttons that the system sets the text to be black. Buttons in internet sites and lots of other. I found it and changed it to white. But that system color also chagned text in other places sooo... I solved it by changeing the color of my buttons. But thanks anyways. I didnt even know that you could do it through there for each state so cool! Thanks for that.

SKoriginals so that means that i can just add perpixle frames and leave the USI2 alone? It is a vista only skin so...

I have a huger problem though........ guys and I have tried and tried to fix it and nothing is working?

It has something to do with the extra setting for the start menu? I think how do i make shorter? I have the height and width set to zero for both vista and non vista so that it should be useing os default? Not fun! So annoying. Please help me with this first! I am sorry i was messing around with the intergers and it turned out to be a mess and when I set it back to default this is the result! AHHH lol thanks!

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If you make perpixel frames,you must have normal bitmapped frames also...they are used by some apps for interior windows and by people on pc's whose graphics cards do not support perpixel.

Font colors are fun huh...you are now entering the twilight zone of skinning.WB does not have complete control over fonts or font colors...learning where you can and cannot do something(or where you must compromise)can take years...have fun.

This is why most skins are monotone or at most 2 color...and almost never darker than mid grey...its not worth the headache.

startmenu: each part of the startmenu has an 'extra setting' where you get to put in the exact width and height of each part... a startmenu will stretch and go larger for a few reasons, i know of two.

1. large icons are being used
2. you have increased the number of programs on your startmenu.

if these are none of the reasons, it will then be because perhaps you made yr userpane too high and or your proglist, placies list too high ect........

you can scale it down no probs.

I've found that making your system buttons black is more trouble that it's worth. I only did that on my very first skin

It looks like you are getting the hang of things and discovering the quirkyness of skinning a WB.

Remember, if you need anyone to test out your skin before you upload, I'm always willing

I think how do i make shorter?

I also found out that if the content margins on the text are too big, it will do that too. If you're using a large text, and/or have those margins fairly large , it tend to mess up things.

good point xian........forgot that one!

If anyone stops b here can someone tell me how to adjust the verticall alignment for lock and hybernate buttons in the start menu as well as the search box in vista.