Skinning Resources - Background Selector & Skinner Panel

I thought I'd re-introduce a couple of things I've developed over the past year which may be useful for anyone making skins.

1. User selectable backgrounds

This allows you to package a number of backgrounds along with your skin and lets the user select which one they want to use from within game preferences. See below:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v307/radestock/rsx1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v307/radestock/rsx2.jpg

As you can see it uses a nice tidy subtle_popup within the settings menu. Users can select from 6 backgrounds. The Default background is for when background changes are enabled, the other 5 are files the skinner adds to their backgrounds folder.

This comes in the form of a full skin to show how it works.

I've produced this with a view for people using it within their skins. Should skinners wish to see at how it works, "global panels.xml" in the 'panels' folder and "preferences.xml" in the 'screens' folder are where they need to look. Everything is commented and easy to follow and should just slot into most skins. Feel free to use it however you wish.

No permission needed to use - a credit somewhere would be nice though.

Mediafire Download link (updated 18/7/09)

2. The Skinner Panel

Fairly basic this one but really really useful when developing skins. It creates a small moveable panel with a single button on it. Click the button twice and it will automatically reload your skin without having to navigate yourself to preferences then click confirm. A time saver to see your changes but also a life saver if you're working on a skin and mess things up, leaving you with no side menu.

To use:

1. Find the global panels.xml file of the skin you wish to use the tool with and open it with a text editor.

2. Scroll to the very bottom of the file and find </panel> right at the end of the file.

3. Copy the code below and paste it JUST ABOVE </panel>.

4. Make sure in FM preferences you have 'Always reload skin on confirm' ticked and 'use skin cache' un-ticked.

<!-- RADESTOCK'S SKINNER PANEL -->

<container class="titled_box" title="Skinner Panel V1.1" width="160" height="50" appearance="boxes/hints" colour="black" size="8" alignment="centre">

<layout class="stick_to_sides_attachment" alignment="bottom, right" inset="100"/>
<attachment class="moveable_attachment"/>

<widget class="action_button" text="Reload Skin" auto_size="vertical" appearance="button/button" width="148">
	<attachment class="test_global_attachment" get_property="scid" value="23" mode="0" set_property="hidn" skip_if_null="false" skip_if_resetting="false" priority="1"/>
	<event id="click_event" event_id="sPRF" event_target="scrn"/>
	<layout class="stick_to_sides_attachment" alignment="bottom" inset="5"/>
	<layout class="centre_in_parent_attachment" alignment="horizontal" offset="0"/>
</widget>

<widget class="action_button" text="Confirm" auto_size="vertical" appearance="button/button" width="148">
	<attachment class="test_global_attachment" get_property="scid" value="23" mode="1" set_property="hidn" skip_if_null="false" skip_if_resetting="false" priority="1"/>
	<event id="click_event" event_id="conf" event_target="scrn"/>
	<layout class="stick_to_sides_attachment" alignment="bottom" inset="5"/>
	<layout class="centre_in_parent_attachment" alignment="horizontal" offset="0"/>
</widget>

</container>

<!-- END OF SKINNER PANEL -->

Hope people find both of these things useful and they help create some great skins.

radestock dude would your skinner panel idea work with sitv's, ie the ability to change the sitv graphic at will.

The skinner panel just reloads the skin, it doesn't change anything.

Quick question, didnt want to start a new thread because I dont know if it should go in here lol.

Anyway, Do skinners play the game much? Do they have much time to play the game when making graphics and skins lol

I don't, but I know a lot of others do. I didn't play FM08 for longer than 3 months game time.

I do want to actually play FM09 properly though and see if it's any good.

Hey radestock. I'm having a bit of trouble with your ' User selectable backgrounds' fix.

If I place the skin in this directory:

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\My Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 2009\skins\rs_bgs

Then it doesn't appear as a selectable skin in FM09. I took a look at the 'rs_bgs.xml' file and changed (line 28):

<string id="required_version" value="8.0.0" />

to

<string id="required_version" value="9.0.0" />

This enables me to select RS X: Background Selector Demo from the list of skins on FM09 and I can confirm it. However, if I do so I get the following problem:

If I add the RS X: Background Selector Fix to an existing skin, it appears to work fine. I can apply it to the skin and select it in FM09 but then I can't confirm my preference change (this is using the existing .xml file, not rs_bgs.xml). I'm not sure why, just nothing happens when I click on it. When I apply it to a skin and use the rs_bgs.xml file in place of the existing .xml file, I get the same original problem, it doesn't appear as a selectable skin. If I change the required version to "9.0.0", I get the same problem as shown in the screenshot, except that I get the default background for my skin in place of the default FM08 one.

As far as I'm aware this is a tool for skinners not end users. If you are making a skin you need to look at what radestock has changed within the xml files and copy them into the revelant files for your skin.

The preferences issue will be because FM08 didn't have the resolution coding, FM09 requires the coding for the preferences screen to work, so you are best of going back to the default file and copying the changes radestock made.