Skinning gripes... cannot find one to suit and not sure how to edit these things...

[iamneallyons]

OK - So i have barely played this game this year due to not being able to find a skin im happy with (as silly as it sounds its true). 

My gripes with the standard skins are...

in the base skin with the green backround, the inbox/news section is really glarey/white - on the players attributes section - when you highlight key position because of the green backround you cant really see whats highlighted properly which annoys me - compared to say the FM dark skin which you can clearly see which attributes are highlighted. Other than the attribute screen i really like the green backround across all other panels. 

I want the club overview screen to have the stadium in the centre of the screen not in the bottom left, but i dont know how to do get the picture there. 

So is there anybody prepared to help me get a skin how i want it?

I would like to keep the base skin but change... 

The colours on the attribute part that highlight the desired attributes for the position as they appear to be a light blue and then light green on the green backround and it just doesnt work for me, is there someway to alter this to say an orange colour which will contrast?

Get the club overview panel to show the stadium in the centre of the screen rather than bottom left. 

Change the inbox/news feed backround from the white/light blue backround to a darker grey or even the same green backround thats on the rest of the panels and is also on part of the inbox backround now. 

Change the hideous square boxes on the tactics screen to kits or even round circles. 

If any of you can help me out with this id much appreciate it. 

[iamneallyons]

31 minutes ago, D_LO_ said:

• I created a thread specifically detailing how to change the tactics screen, step by step, everything you need is in there, please search.
• The club overview also basically has it's own thread. @wkdsoul even provided a download with the stadium (I believe) Might require some manoeuvring to get the stadium into the centre but that shouldn't be too difficult, the thread will give you a starting point and possibly principles to achieve everything you want anyway...I remember having several convos advising re. this page myself, some may be contained within this thread too with the principles I allude to... A more extensive search will bring up a lot of guidance on this.
• The attribute highlight can be changed a couple of ways, I always prefer to go straight to the graphics which are found: skins\fm-widgets\graphics\tables\custom\attributes (you will need to use resource archiver to acquire all the files for all these issues, sticky guide at top if unfamiliar with) Once you've obtained the files place them: C:\Users\YOUR NAME\Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 2017\skins\SKIN NAME\graphics\tables\custom\attributes , i.e. the equivalent position you obtained them from. There will be two folders, preferred and required. Each will have row.xmls change the red_replacement values to the colour of your choice. You can alternatively change the value stated in the settings.xml, i.e. search for preferred & required attribute and change the RGB values to your preference (if you aren't familiar with colour coding google RGB colour values and play with the colour palette, you should soon see how it works) 
• Re. inbox, the background colouring again can be effected via several methods, to avoid finding each panel though you can just go to the settings.xml and search (ctrl+F for 'inbox') that should bring up several results and test the effects of altering the results, i.e. inbox_content_background and inbox_sidebar are likely to be two of the most prominent here. Again the settings.xml in question here will need to be extracted using the archiver, it's found: skins\fm-widgets\settings and your amended copy should go: C:\Users\YOUR NAME\Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 2017\skins\SKIN NAME\settings

 

If any folder is missing in your base skin download (see below) just create it ensuring your directory is the same as those I've detailed. The base skins are usually quite 'empty' so don't be surprised by this. 

 

As ever you will also need a copy of the base skin as a working folder for changes to take effect which goes into your skin folder in your documents, you can then insert the necessary, amended files mentioned which you have extracted. If all of this sounds alien to you, I strongly recommend you read the guides at the top as they go into this in far more detail, there's also links to the base skin downloads you'll definitely need. 

I dont mean to be rude mate and i appreciate your reply, but your asking me to do a lot of what i have no idea how to do - i tried finding the attributes on the settings.xml but then you have to alter the numbers for the colours etc and its made zero difference. 

[iamneallyons]

9 minutes ago, D_LO_ said:

Well I even gave an alternative to changing the highlighting, i.e. going straight to the graphic, which I gave the directory for, and changing the colour in the row.xml. I'm not sure what else you expect, short of doing the changes for you.. is that your expectation here? 

 

of course not - but there might also be panels out there i can make use of without having to alter all the said items which im not great with. 

i dont have that directory to change any of the files in there, you said something about a resource archiver - im lost with that. 

[michaeltmurrayuk]

You can recolour the inbox by editing these values found in the settings file:

    <!-- Inbox -->
    <colour name="inbox_sidebar_background" value="blue grey 100"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_content_background" value="blue grey 50"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_button_box_background" value="blue grey 100"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_attachment_background" value="teal 700"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_new_attachment_accent" value="teal 400"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_icons" value="blue grey 900"/>
    <colour name="inbox_text" value="blue grey 900"/>
    <colour name="news_item_text" value="white"/>

(Teal is the default green, so if you want that change the blue grey values to teal).

For the Attributes Highlight in the same file locate these lines:

  <colour name="preferred attribute" red="125" green="168" blue="187" />
  <colour name="required attribute" red="25" green="98" blue="169" />

To change the colours you need to change either the colour value in the first bit of code or the RGB values in the bottom bit (you can change them to use either method depending on what you prefer by just changing the colour code to match), if you don't know how to change the colours then have a read of this thread: https://community.sigames.com/topic/351795-football-manager-2015-skinning-guide-part-3-changing-the-text-colours/Whilst if you want to work with the default colours values (such as those declared in the inbox colours) then you can grab a list of the default colours from this website and it is just a case of replacing the colour name and number with the colour and shade you want: https://www.materialui.co/colors

 

[iamneallyons]

On 15/08/2017 at 17:09, michaeltmurrayuk said:

You can recolour the inbox by editing these values found in the settings file:

    <!-- Inbox -->
    <colour name="inbox_sidebar_background" value="blue grey 100"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_content_background" value="blue grey 50"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_button_box_background" value="blue grey 100"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_attachment_background" value="teal 700"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_new_attachment_accent" value="teal 400"/> <!-- Box background colour - red_replacement -->
    <colour name="inbox_icons" value="blue grey 900"/>
    <colour name="inbox_text" value="blue grey 900"/>
    <colour name="news_item_text" value="white"/>

(Teal is the default green, so if you want that change the blue grey values to teal).

For the Attributes Highlight in the same file locate these lines:

  <colour name="preferred attribute" red="125" green="168" blue="187" />
  <colour name="required attribute" red="25" green="98" blue="169" />

To change the colours you need to change either the colour value in the first bit of code or the RGB values in the bottom bit (you can change them to use either method depending on what you prefer by just changing the colour code to match), if you don't know how to change the colours then have a read of this thread: https://community.sigames.com/topic/351795-football-manager-2015-skinning-guide-part-3-changing-the-text-colours/Whilst if you want to work with the default colours values (such as those declared in the inbox colours) then you can grab a list of the default colours from this website and it is just a case of replacing the colour name and number with the colour and shade you want: https://www.materialui.co/colors

 

im attempting to alter these in the settings file, reloading the skin and clearing the cache but im seeing no changes in the backround colour of the message on show. 

[iamneallyons]

so iv attached a screenshot so we are on the same page to make sure im changing the right part, on this page where you can see the white backround and then the light grey/blue on the inbox bar - they are the sections i want to change - iv altered the inbox part like told to above, cleared cache and reloaded skin but its not changing anything. 

[iamneallyons]

So iv just tried doing exactly what you said, i just changed the first part to "red" as you said and this is the error iv had up when iv tried to reload the skin in the game, any ideas?

[iamneallyons]

right look likes scratch this - IGNORE the above, iv found a skin im quite happy using almost now, i just need to change the highlighted attributes part and il be happy - so its the tempo skin... when im looking in the skin folder, there is no "settings.xml" file for this skin, iv attached whats in the folder - iv opened the "skin_config" file but that has no real code in there to alter, certainly not the attribute colour part as iv searched for it, any ideas where i will need to alter this???

[iamneallyons]

Iv cracked on and used the provided info guys, much appreciated - iv managed to get it looking how i want it now. 

Edited the backround so its teal/green, edited the attributes part so its white highlight and orange for the minor requirements. 

I had to create a settings folder and then an XML file and copied over the standard XML settings and edited that to get it to work. 

Thanks for helping me out. 

[iamneallyons]

4 minutes ago, D_LO_ said:

Glad you've found a resolution.

This is just FYI really, going forward but the above means you've made an error in closing the code/deleted something. Usually it's something minor like a ". Can be difficult to spot what's missing with the naked eye. In such circumstances I'd recommend the undo function (ctrl+Z) or if it's too late it can sometimes just be easier to re-download the file again if you experience something similar in future. 

 

EDIT - see you sorted attribute highlighting. 

Honestly the only thing i changed was between the "" in the code, i havent altered any other part of the code - thats why i couldnt get my head around it, there was nothing else to "undo" if that makes sense?

[iamneallyons]

20 minutes ago, D_LO_ said:

I've had a debate about this kind of thing with someone else not so long ago... all I can say is was the error message coming up before you edited it? Presumably not if the skin was working. If it only appeared after then it's fairly safe to say it was probably caused by your changes. It's so easily done and even easier to miss.  I say this from vast experience, having caused similar error messages myself, probably several hundred times. Part and parcel of skinning, no big deal, I'd just say keep the program you edit panels in open until everything is 100% so you at least have the option to undo, worth bearing in mind for future if nothing else.  

yeah - at least im on the right track now and i can strip and use bits from what i like etc for the future!