How To Creat Your Own Skin For The Firmware 2.1

[Yod4z]

to creat your skin for the new firmware, you have to use the skinmaker software from GPH.

1 - Extract the archive where you want on your PC.
2 - Edit the file in GP2XSkinMaker\skin\GP2X. The files that need to be modified are credits.ini for the informations of the creator of this skin, system.ini to translate or modify the name of the menu titles, skin.ini to modify the colors.
3 - Select the skin in skinmaker like you 'll do on your real gp2x, going through the Setting, System menus and select it in Skin/Theme.
4 - Press F8.
5 - Creat a "skin" directory on NAND. You can use the Samba fonctionnality to achive this \\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nand on your PC when yor GP2x is connected to your PC via the USB. use sterm to put the commande mkdir /mnt/nand/skin. Or pass to stage 6 and copy from your SD card the directoyskin with your gps file using the explorer menu.
6 - Backup the gps file created in GP2XSkinMaker\skin from your PC to your mnt/nand/skin directory of your GP2x. You can use the Samba fonctionnality to achive this \\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nand\skin on your PC when yor GP2x is connected to your PC via the USB. Or you can use the Explorer menu to copy from your SD card to the Nand.
6 - Select it on your GP2x and that's it


Skinmaker control:

GP2x / PC
L / Page UP
R / Page Down
START / F10, Backspace, Home
X / ESC
Y / Z
B / Space
A / Enter

 

[joyrider]

you can also create animated buttons for the firmware skins and it's not that hard.

you can do this for 2 parts of the menu
1) the buttons on main menu (game, movie player, ebook etc)
2) the buttons in the system menu.

how do u do it ?

1) open up buttons.png from the imgmain folder as you probably can see there are 2 rows of images the 1st row is always what u see when the picture isn't selected the 2nd row is what is used if the button is selected. now in order to create animated skins u have to edit skin.ini and under the settings :
[main] and [setting]
you can add the following :
icondelay=200
icon01frame=1
icon01loop=0
icon02frame=1
icon02loop=0
icon03frame=
etc

where icondelay (i believe) specifies the animation speed
icon01frame= specifies how much frames an animation has starting from the selected picture in the buttons.png file (2nd row). so for example without animated buttons u should place 1 (and have 2 rows of pictures in buttons.png first row the unselected button second the selected button) as this value However for animated skins u can put the nr of frames the animation consists of for example 5 will say that there are 5 frames of an animation to show when the button is selected. and your buttons.png file should have 6 rows of pictures. the 1st row being the picture for a button that isn't selected and not animated the 5 following rows define the animation for the button (in one column) this is how ure buttons.png should look like:

icon 1 not selected	  icon 2 not selected	 icon 3 not selected .........
icon 1 frame 1 selected  icon 2 frame 1 selected icon 3 frame 1 selected ...........
icon 1 frame 2 selected  icon 2 frame 2 selected icon 3 frame 2 selected ..........
icon 1 frame 3 selected  icon 2 frame 3 selected icon 3 frame 3 selected ..........
icon 1 frame 4 selected  icon 2 frame 4 selected icon 3 frame 4 selected ..........
icon 1 frame 5 selected  icon 2 frame 5 selected icon 3 frame 5 selected ..........

where each individual frame is 60x80 in size so one icon's animated is defined by one column of pictures each 60x80 in size. (update: seems the size of a frame is calucalted as this:width frame = width images/8, height frame = height image / icon0?frame)


icon01loop= defines how many times the animation should play 0 for infinite times, 1 for 1 animation loop (from frame 1 to frame 5 in our example) 2 for 2 loops etc.

obviously there are 8 pictures in the settings menu and main menu so for each section u can have
icon01frame=?
icon01loop=?
up to
icon08frame=?
icon08loop=?

hope this make sense if not just ask it's pretty easy, i'm just not a good graphic artist otherwise i'd made an example on how it's done the liquido skin uses this to make the buttons seem they are jumping a bit when u select an option

 

[DaveC]

The best way I found to "skin" the interface is to install Ryo's Gmenu2X Not only can I make it look good but it is actually intuitive and much better to use

 

[Epicenter]

Why the hell is GPH wasting time adding fading menus and animating buttons when:
#1, the whole GUI is still slow, buggy and inefficient, and doesn't even use the blitter
#2, there are MUCH more pressing matters to attend to in updating the firmware, like the broken video, music and photo applications.

 

[Manwe]

Yod4z, your forgot to say:
put .gps file in the "skin" directory on NAND.
I spent a lot of time, trying to find what's wrong.

P.S. Here is Candy skin for new firmware:
http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,52,1874

 

[bacteria]

Why the hell is GPH wasting time adding fading menus and animating buttons when:
#1, the whole GUI is still slow, buggy and inefficient, and doesn't even use the blitter
#2, there are MUCH more pressing matters to attend to in updating the firmware, like the broken video, music and photo applications.

Indeed. Simple answer is eye candy. You see a product before you use it, and then buy it; once you buy it you then see its failings...

 

[joyrider]

whats broken in the video player, ebook and photo viewer ? they seem to work just fine for me

and i like having animated buttons u could create some nice skins with it. I'm still using the default menu over gmenu2x but that's perhaps cause i don't play that many games and have no need for it

 

[Parkydr]

Why the hell is GPH wasting time adding fading menus and animating buttons when:
#1, the whole GUI is still slow, buggy and inefficient, and doesn't even use the blitter
#2, there are MUCH more pressing matters to attend to in updating the firmware, like the broken video, music and photo applications.

Modern disease - triumph of image over substance. A lot of people care more about looks than functionality (e.g PSP, iPod ). It will probably help GP2X sales - as would more games like Payback - I just tried the demo.

Personally, I find the application goods enough, I just like having a relatively cheap portable computer.

 

[Yod4z]

Yod4z at your forgot to say:
put .gps file in the "skin" directory on NAND.
I spent a lot of time, trying to find what's wrong.

P.S. Here is Candy skin for new firmware:
http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,52,1874

5 - Backup the gps file created in GP2XSkinMaker\skin to your nand/skin directory. You can use the Samba fonctionnality to achive this wink.gif \\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nand on your PC when yor GP2x is connected to your PC via the USB.

I think is writen but not clear for all of user

 

[joyrider]

5 - Backup the gps file created in GP2XSkinMaker\skin to your nand/skin directory. You can use the Samba fonctionnality to achive this wink.gif \\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nand on your PC when yor GP2x is connected to your PC via the USB.

actually it's\\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nandskin where u need to place them not \\gp2x\gp2x\mnt\nand

 

[krosfyah]

It strikes me that it would've made a lot more sense if GPH had the firmware update create the skin directory. At least that way users could just copy over the gps files from the SD card instead of having to mess around with Samba first.

 

[joyrider]

It strikes me that it would've made a lot more sense if GPH had the firmware update create the skin directory. At least that way users could just copy over the gps files from the SD card instead of having to mess around with Samba first.

another way would be to place a skin directory on the sd card with the gps file(s) in it and use the explorer program in the menu to copy it over to the nand that way u don't need to mess with samba

 

[krosfyah]

It strikes me that it would've made a lot more sense if GPH had the firmware update create the skin directory. At least that way users could just copy over the gps files from the SD card instead of having to mess around with Samba first.

another way would be to place a skin directory on the sd card with the gps file(s) in it and use the explorer program in the menu to copy it over to the nand that way u don't need to mess with samba

Oh yeah, lol.. I totally forgot you can copy folders too.

 

[Vimacs]

copyskin.gpu
mkdir /mnt/nand/skin
copy /mnt/sd/blub.gps /mnt/nand/skin/blub.gps

 

[DaveC]

I'm still using the default menu over gmenu2x but that's perhaps cause i don't play that many games and have no need for it

It really doesn't matter if you play alot of games or not. Gmenu2x is basically easier to use for everything. You don't have to mess with all of the game setup stuff if you don't want. I still use an older version of Gmenu because it is smaller and loads quicker. It makes getting to what you want much faster. You just select a section and pick an icon. It is much easier than navigating through a directory tree with only 4 items per screen then scrolling through a list one at a time to get to what you want. That is just a HORRIBLE design, I don't know why anyone is still using the default menu.

 

[jmetal88]

I'm still using the default menu over gmenu2x but that's perhaps cause i don't play that many games and have no need for it

It really doesn't matter if you play alot of games or not. Gmenu2x is basically easier to use for everything. You don't have to mess with all of the game setup stuff if you don't want. I still use an older version of Gmenu because it is smaller and loads quicker. It makes getting to what you want much faster. You just select a section and pick an icon. It is much easier than navigating through a directory tree with only 4 items per screen then scrolling through a list one at a time to get to what you want. That is just a HORRIBLE design, I don't know why anyone is still using the default menu.

Not everyone minds, DaveC.

 

[Epicenter]

DaveC : GMenu2X :: DaveC : DrMDx
It really is a great program, though. The firmware's menu is one of the most horrific things I've ever seen. The fact that GPH hasn't nuked it to the ground and started over is appalling beyond words.

Modern disease - triumph of image over substance. A lot of people care more about looks than functionality (e.g PSP, iPod ). It will probably help GP2X sales - as would more games like Payback - I just tried the demo.

If someone buys the GP2X because its ugly menus fade between each other, that is deeply disturbing, and I pray they never come to this forum.

 

[Parkydr]

DaveC : GMenu2X :: DaveC : DrMDx
It really is a great program, though. The firmware's menu is one of the most horrific things I've ever seen. The fact that GPH hasn't nuked it to the ground and started over is appalling beyond words.

If someone buys the GP2X because its ugly menus fade between each other, that is deeply disturbing, and I pray they never come to this forum.

GMenu is good, but I find the standard menu adequate for my needs.
I don't give a toss what it looks like - I can't be bothered with skins, the menu is just a method of getting to the applications.

The only way they could improve it for me is to add a keyboard and boot straight into a bash shell

 

[Epicenter]

It's not just a matter of looks. It's poorly laid out and thus slower to get at what you want, and inefficient and slow, so doing the simplest tasks involves a lengthy wait.

 

[joyrider]

well i'm sorry byt gmenu2x is slower in my situation :

i use the gp2x for almost deving only. and i use the samba client (not server) to mount a windows share in /mnt/ext that way i can access my windows drive and all my projects using the default menu using ext. using gmenu2x i'd have to create a shortcut for each project i have and for each new project i start and i just can't be arsed to do that i like the explorer style of going through maps and folders it's almost the same as on windows. only thing i don't like is that they only show 4 maps at the same time for utils and games.

and sometimes i just don't use any menu at all and just use telnet or i kill the default menu and restart it so that i have stdout /err output in the console.