Topic: OT - Taskbar toolbar icons (Read 9360 times)

Marko · « **on:** August 23, 2003, 01:34:51 am »

I currently use player control icons previously shared via interact (ashamed to admit it, but I forget who they are from

)

I added a few other controls from the mcc command file (pay attention, here comes the begging bit) ......
and was wondering if someone considerably more talented than myself could find the time to knock up some icons for me?
I genuinely have tried myself, both by trying to create from scratch, and using google, but both with really poor results.

Here's my current toolbar. It's always this height, and more often that not, some shade of grey...

The first and last icons on the top row are "Start" and "Exit" commands, and "play" is actually "play/pause"
On the bottom row, we have...
"Copy listening to.." and "rate currently playing" 1 to 5

Please?

NoCodeUK · « **Reply #1 on:** August 23, 2003, 02:35:36 am »

I think the icons you have are Phil Lees based on my original ones for my MC Toolbar idea. I could probably knock you up some quick icons. How about the MC logo with numbers instead of a play symbol for the ratings??
Copy Listening to I will need to think about!!

Adam

gkerber · « **Reply #2 on:** August 23, 2003, 08:56:03 am »

How do you do "Copy Listening To" from a toolbar button?

I don't know of any mjextman commands for that.

Marko · « **Reply #3 on:** August 23, 2003, 11:12:42 am »

Quote

How do you do "Copy Listening To" from a toolbar button?

I don't know of any mjextman commands for that.

Code: [Select]

%windir%\System32\mjextman.exe /MCC 25015, 0
does the job

Listening to: 'In My Place' from 'Splendour in the Grass 2003' by 'Coldplay' on Media Center 9.1

Marko · « **Reply #4 on:** August 23, 2003, 11:20:25 am »

Quote

I think the icons you have are Phil Lees based on my original ones for my MC Toolbar idea. I could probably knock you up some quick icons. How about the MC logo with numbers instead of a play symbol for the ratings??
Copy Listening to I will need to think about!!

Adam

Adam, that would be really neat, and muchly appreciated. "Ratings" idea sounds cool. I did try adding a yellow question mark to a copy of the windows xp volume icon that sits in the system tray, but the results were laughable

See, my imagination is as limited as my graphics editing!!!

Doof · « **Reply #5 on:** August 23, 2003, 12:44:53 pm »

How about just copying the graphic image from the already existing MC toolbar for the copy Listening to?

Marko · « **Reply #6 on:** August 24, 2003, 11:54:37 am »

Quote

How about just copying the graphic image from the already existing MC toolbar for the copy Listening to?

That was my first "cop-out" option, but for the life of me, I couldn't find the image anywhere. I looked inside mjextman and media jukebox.exe's but couldn't see them.

Not standing still on this either....

The red & green things are all my own work, the ratings holes are someone elses, I just added the numbers, and the copy listening to.. is from shell32.dll.
I don't like it. Looks a bit unbalanced to me somehow.

Listening to: 'Sailing To Philadelphia (Live At Toronto)' from 'The Ragpicker's Dream (Ltd Ed Cd 2)' by 'Mark Knopfler' on Media Center 9.1

nila · « **Reply #7 on:** August 25, 2003, 03:22:03 am »

Marko - Could I get those numbers off of you?
I've also got the task bar set up to rate my songs - it's revolutionised tagging for me but your icons look a LOT better than mine

Could I get them?

jleerigby · « **Reply #8 on:** August 25, 2003, 04:26:22 am »

Quote

I've also got the task bar set up to rate my songs - it's revolutionised tagging for me but your icons look a LOT better than mine

What do you mean Nila? Can you send me a screenshot and tell me how to set this up? Sounds great.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #9 on:** August 25, 2003, 05:05:54 am »

I recently asked Adam about this as I saw his on a screenshot he posted.
I have tried to make something similar myself, but the results are poor yet usable. Aside form the icons not looking good, I was also having difficulty getting a nice layout on the toolbar.
I would suggest this be set up and packaged to be used as a form of mini-me skin. I know the paths may need editin for it to work on some systems, but I think this is a great way to run MC in the background.
Pretty-please

sraymond · « **Reply #10 on:** August 25, 2003, 05:55:27 am »

Quote

I recently asked Adam about this as I saw his on a screenshot he posted.
I have tried to make something similar myself, but the results are poor yet usable. Aside form the icons not looking good, I was also having difficulty getting a nice layout on the toolbar.
I would suggest this be set up and packaged to be used as a form of mini-me skin. I know the paths may need editin for it to work on some systems, but I think this is a great way to run MC in the background.
Pretty-please

Lisa,

I agree with you about the packaging. Take a look at my post http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=MediaCenter;action=display;num=1051504451;start=9#9. Don't you agree this would be a much nicer solution?

Scott-

Doof · « **Reply #11 on:** August 25, 2003, 05:59:19 am »

The toolbar button images are in C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\Data\Default Art\toolbar.bmp

knickelfarz · « **Reply #12 on:** August 25, 2003, 07:24:30 am »

Maybe you would like to use these:

Download TaskbarIcons.zip

knickelfarz · « **Reply #13 on:** August 25, 2003, 08:37:44 am »

And here some icons for the REAL rating lovers

Download HeartIcons.zip

LisaRCT · « **Reply #14 on:** August 25, 2003, 08:57:55 am »

Thanks Knickelfarz, nice!

Now I have a question . . . I used *.bat files to call the commands, it works but there is quite a lag-time.
Is there a better method? (I do not know any programming other than batch files from the old MSDos days).

jleerigby · « **Reply #15 on:** August 25, 2003, 08:59:58 am »

Wow - They are nice. Can I easily slot them in to an existing skin or do I need the assistance of an expert skinner?

gkerber · « **Reply #16 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:10:20 am »

Quote

Thanks Knickelfarz, nice!

Now I have a question . . . I used *.bat files to call the commands, it works but there is quite a lag-time.
Is there a better method? (I do not know any programming other than batch files from the old MSDos days).

If you right click on the icon and select properties, you can add the mjextman commands right there, instead of calling a batch file.

gkerber · « **Reply #17 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:11:48 am »

I see some of you have "rating" buttons on the toolbar.

What do these buttons do? Only show the selected rating or do they set th rating for the current track?

Either way, what is the mjextman command for these buttons?

Thanks.

Marko · « **Reply #18 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:41:43 am »

Nila, for sure. You, and anyone else who would like them, can download from HERE

knickelfarz, nice one. I d'loaded them, thnx. Not sure about that "listening to" button though. The toolbar would look more balanced if it were round too, what do you think?

Everyone.....
I was wondering how many of us were actually using this control method? If there a fair few, perhaps we could get together and sort out uniform addresses/names for the icons and common commands, then we could easily share icon sets. The only hurdle I can see is getting the icon cache to refresh quickly.
Any thoughts?

knickelfarz · « **Reply #19 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:44:23 am »

I posted this some time ago...here it's again

Maybe another useful extension for the taskbar:
"ButtonBar 2.95", a little tool that can be used to create a small toolbar with your own buttons (and much more...). It can be configured in a way that it is unvisible and "flips out" only when you touch the upper right corner of your desktop. Together with the buttons Phil Lee once postet it can look like this, for example:

"ButtonBar 2.95" is freeware until you don't use it to display more than 10 buttons...it can be downloaded here: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/bbar_e.html

knickelfarz · « **Reply #20 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:51:03 am »

Quote

Not sure about that "listening to" button though. The toolbar would look more balanced if it were round too, what do you think?

I did that to avoid confusion, maybe others use a different order of the icons... but the look/form can be improved, of course (for all buttons...)

I'm even not sure about the symbol of that button... "Copy listening to.." - What happens exactly when you do that?

knickelfarz · « **Reply #21 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:02:53 am »

Quote

Can I easily slot them in to an existing skin or do I need the assistance of an expert skinner?

Because Photoshop can not open .ICO files, you can just make a screenshot of the icons and paste that into Photoshop... You can then cut them out and use them for whatever you want.
Note: The five rating buttons of MC look the same, they only have three states (selected, unselected, mouse over). So you can not get the "1-2-3-4-5" look inside MC...

Doof · « **Reply #22 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:05:50 am »

It copies the currently playing track's name to the clipboard. It's what people are using when you see:

Listening to: 'Push Th' Little Daisies' by 'Ween' on Media Center 9.1

Personally, if I were doing this, I'd use the same toolbar buttons from the toolbar.bmp file. Just for the sake of using an image I'm already familiar with. Toolbar buttons are often times hard enough to learn the first time. I don't need to be figuring out multiple images for the same action.

Marko · « **Reply #23 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:16:07 am »

gkerber, the ratings buttons set the rating for the currently playing track when clicked. I've put the commands I use into a zip for you.
Commands.zip. You will need to fix the associated icons yourself.

Taskbar Toolbar Info for LisaCRT et al

It is possible to control MC by passing commands to mjextman.exe, which is sitting in all our "/%windir%/System32/" folders. so....

Step 1. Make a directory out of the way somewhere, "C:\toolbar\Media Center" for example, then enter it.

Step 2. Create shortcuts to mjextman in this directory. Each one will point to "C:\WINDOWS\system32\mjextman.exe /command, parameter" (or download the above zip file and extract the files to this directory)

Step 3. You will notice that all these shortcuts take the mjextman icon. Make another folder to contain your custom icons, "C:\toolbar\icons" perhaps, and place the icons inside.

Step 4. Go back to "C:\toolbar\Media Center" and rightclick on one of the shortcuts and select properties. Click the "change icon" button, then the "browse" button, and navigate to "C:\toolbar\icons" and select the icon you want for the selected command. Do this for each shortcut.

Step 5. Right click a blank area of the taskbar, hover over "Toolbars" and click on "new toolbar" browse to "C:\toolbar\media center" and click OK. You should now see the taskbar toolbar.

Step 6. Windows sorts the icons by name by default. Drag them into the order you prefer, windows will remember your order. If you have your taskbar locked, unlock it, then rightclick a blank area of the media center toolbar and remove text labels etc., drag to a position you are comfortable with, lock the taskbar again.

Job Done.

Note, sounds long-winded reading it huh, but it could be done half a dozen times over in the time it's taken to read through. If your XP system tray is autohiding icons, you might consider placing your media center toolbar next to the start button to avoid it getting messed about by the changing system tray.

re. Step 2: If you download the commands.zip file, these are "good to go" if your OS is installed to C:\windows. Just choose the ones you want to use, then update their icon properties. If the command you are looking for isn't there, have a look at the mcc_commands text file for the full list available.

Helpful?

jleerigby · « **Reply #24 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:41:33 am »

Quote

Step 2. Create shortcuts to mjextman in this directory. Each one will point to "C:\WINDOWS\system32\mjextman.exe /command, parameter" (or download the above zip file and extract the files to this directory)

Thanks Marko. I've followed all the steps Ok and it's looking good. All I need to understand now is what the /command, parameter refers to? I've currently got five sexy looking icons all pointing to mjextman.

Help!

gkerber · « **Reply #25 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:43:33 am »

Quote

gkerber, the ratings buttons set the rating for the currently playing track when clicked. I've put the commands I use into a zip for you.

Thanks, I'll extract them from properties and set up my own icons.

Is running mjextman like this documented? I have the page for the basic commands, but these commands go way beyond what I'm aware of.

jleerigby · « **Reply #26 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:50:09 am »

Quote

Thanks Marko. I've followed all the steps Ok and it's looking good. All I need to understand now is what the /command, parameter refers to? I've currently got five sexy looking icons all pointing to mjextman.

Help!

Gotcha - Sorry didn't read properly.

knickelfarz · « **Reply #27 on:** August 25, 2003, 10:52:38 am »

Quote

It copies the currently playing track's name to the clipboard. It's what people are using when you see:

Listening to: 'Push Th' Little Daisies' by 'Ween' on Media Center 9.1

Ah, I see...

Quote

Personally, if I were doing this, I'd use the same toolbar buttons from the toolbar.bmp file. Just for the sake of using an image I'm already familiar with. Toolbar buttons are often times hard enough to learn the first time. I don't need to be figuring out multiple images for the same action.

Well, that little guy and his speaker will get too small for icons like above... Anyhow, here are both

Download CopyIcons.zip

jleerigby · « **Reply #28 on:** August 25, 2003, 12:06:39 pm »

Groovy. So now I have a nice looking toolbar that rates the currently playing track. How do I go one step further and use my remote (IRMAN) to do this. Does this mean I have to get into Girder?

LisaRCT · « **Reply #29 on:** August 25, 2003, 12:57:48 pm »

Quote

Taskbar Toolbar Info for LisaCRT et al

Helpful?

AWESOME

Thank you sooo much

And everyone else too . . the icons, instructions, zipped command file . . . all were wonderfully helpful.
And in the process I learned somethng. In retrospect, I should have seen it

But . . . .

Thanks ALL!

jleerigby · « **Reply #30 on:** August 25, 2003, 01:45:12 pm »

Yeh - thanks guys. Armed with this info and the commands listed in the CCF file bundled with MC I realise I can set up a toolbar button to make MC do virtually anything I want. Pitty really that we can set up all these toolbar buttons in the MC GUI itself!

LisaRCT · « **Reply #31 on:** August 25, 2003, 02:26:16 pm »

Quote

Armed with this info and the commands listed in the CCF file bundled with MC I realise I can set up a toolbar button to make MC do virtually anything I want.

Uno momenta por favor!
Arret messeur!
HUH? Yo wussup?

. . . I viewed the Girder ccf file to find something unintelligible, I found some commands on the Developer's Board, but where is this nice juicy list I can use?
For instance I'd like: Restore to instantly pop up the MegaMe interface for quick tag changes, etc. I guessed at these but with no luck.
I know, I am a pain in the shoes . . . LOL

jleerigby · « **Reply #32 on:** August 25, 2003, 11:40:45 pm »

I think it was the Girder CCF file that I used (in the extras folder). I tried a few of the commands in there and they worked fine.

nila · « **Reply #33 on:** August 26, 2003, 12:44:45 am »

wahey - thanks for the icons guys!!

Any chance of a blank one or one with a ? too so I can use that as well? I have a taskbar icon for unsetting the rating as well (I just call it 0)

If not no big deal.

thanks for the icons work great!

knickelfarz · « **Reply #34 on:** August 26, 2003, 08:00:33 am »

Download Variations.zip

sraymond · « **Reply #35 on:** August 26, 2003, 08:05:04 am »

These are some nice icons... any chance of JRiver packaging them in their "Extras" folder? Or perhaps someone is willing to donate some "central repository" space?

Scott-

Phil Lee · « **Reply #36 on:** August 28, 2003, 03:38:41 pm »

I just noticed this thread and am pleased to see a lot of you were using the icons I knocked together. I decided to try the new ones from this thread and noticed that I'm having problems with the toolbar now. Everytime I click on a button it is actioned but I get an error dialog as well. I'm using the 241 build BTW. Does anyone else get this?

Marko · « **Reply #37 on:** August 28, 2003, 03:52:55 pm »

Yeah, Phil, I'm getting the errors too (with build 241) and immediately decided to drop back to 240. Trouble is, when 240's setup gets to the skin selection page, it bombs out. No error, nothing, just poof, and it's gone.

Gonna reboot, if that doesn't fix it, I'll uninstall, if that doesn't fix it, lord only knows what I'm gonna do

knickelfarz · « **Reply #38 on:** August 28, 2003, 04:10:17 pm »

Same here with build 241... There seems to be a new version of "mjextman.exe" with this build... maybe a bug?

LisaRCT · « **Reply #39 on:** August 29, 2003, 06:37:41 am »

Must be a bug . . same thing happening here.

Marko · « **Reply #40 on:** September 11, 2003, 11:25:59 pm »

The errors were just a passing blip. They're all gone now and all's well in taskbar toolbar land

If anyone's interested, DJ_Hazelwood has produced a set of buttons to complement his "NightLife" skin package. Very nice they are too. Check out the thread here for more details.

-marko

Listening to: 'God Moving Over The Face Of The Waters' from 'Songs 1993-1998' by 'Moby' on Media Center 9.1

Marko · « **Reply #41 on:** September 11, 2003, 11:36:08 pm »

Tip

I set a directory for my toolbar icons called default. I then put each icon set into their own directories and gave named them all the same (all the "play" icons are called play.ico etc.), then, to change them, I just copy the icons into the default folder, overwriting the existing ones. This removes the hassle of changing the properties for each shortcut. Either wait for the icon cache to update (usually after a reboot) or use a tool like Tweakui to rebuild the cache.

Surfer_Fox · « **Reply #42 on:** November 21, 2003, 02:32:50 pm »

Quote from: sraymond on August 26, 2003, 08:05:04 am

These are some nice icons... any chance of JRiver packaging them in their "Extras" folder? Or perhaps someone is willing to donate some "central repository" space?

Scott-

I'm with you Scott - it's difficult following the thread from scratch and doing each task in turn. Can all this be put into a plug-in easily, or am I asking a lot (Im no coder and dont want to offend - a lot of people have obviously put in a lot of work here)?
TF

Sauzee · « **Reply #43 on:** July 09, 2004, 06:44:49 pm »

I just discovered this thread thanks to a link from Marko. Fantastic

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: OT - Taskbar toolbar icons (Read 9360 times)

Marko

gkerber

Marko

Marko

Marko

nila

jleerigby

LisaRCT

sraymond

LisaRCT

jleerigby

gkerber

gkerber

Marko

Marko

jleerigby

gkerber

jleerigby

jleerigby

LisaRCT

jleerigby

LisaRCT

jleerigby

nila

sraymond

Marko

LisaRCT

Marko

Marko