Xion Community

I've been thinking a bit and it has come to my attention that people sometimes like using their computer as a music player and just a music player only. I've seen Winamp skins that turn the system into a nifty jukebox-like player and that is what i'm going to be working on, very soon.

Concept
A full resolution skin that turns your computer into a more media player-like system for parties or general showoff.

Requirements
What i need, is to know what kind of resolutions people use these days. Standard LCD is becoming a standard, but there are still those using 1024x768 and old CRT resolutions, and there are those who consider anything under 1600x1200 an insult to the graphical experience. There's also the matter of widescreen monitors, especially on laptops.

So, before i get started with this, give me some input! You can also submit some ideas if you like, i'm open to suggestions of all kinds ( provided they're not stupid, that is. >_> )

also check w3schools stats on monitor usage - ok its not a definitive stat but a good indication of what general sizes are used

the other thing with this is Xion has no real resize ability (yet) so your looking for a lot of work with the skin to cope with dynamically changing resolutions, sizes, positions of content

checkout cPro on our SC site, a lot of work is needed to make something like this work AND wa has resizability

I'm not saying use that but just to give you an idea of work involved, again your not going to please everyone with item positioning/placement etc...

also not trying to put you off either

I'm not making it resizable. I'll simply redo the skin for each resolution.

I'm probably looking at the basic four right now.

1024x768, 1480x1024 and their widescreen counterparts., most likely.

in a sort you are making it resizable, your making different sizes for different resolutions plus you are going to have to resize each section, component to make use of the available space for each resolution, some more x than y depending on res

doing that with a coded type player is so much easier as you can just stretch x,y parts and reposition/resize components as necessary with some simple code

also different colour schemes might play some part in this too

only help i can give is the obvious..make the buttons/VU's/whathaveyou in HUGE original sizes..maybe even more then what you would use on the biggest resolution..

probably goes without saying though

Well of course. If you're using a fullscreen player you're expecting it to be big so you can see it clearly from a bit more away. That's the idea of it afterall.

http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-DYIR.qg8 ... q=1&p=2667

That particular Winamp skin has a party mode skin. Give it a look to see what i mean to create.

if your using any gfx parts of that skin you might want to ask leechbite

Duh.

I'm not going to clone that, obviously not. It's the style i meant to show.

What I'd like to hear is what other two sizes I should include, I'll start w 1024 x 768.
Then what? 1200 x 800?
happy to hear suggestions, xonenine

The VU test skin i did, which is a 1024x768 fullscreen player, worked reportedly really well on a tablet laptop, which means touchscreen action of course.

I think you should consider the current standards as your starting points. 1024 and 1280, plus their widescreen, like i said in my first post.

According to deviantART's FAQ #813 http://help.deviantart.com/813/ the most common screen resolutions are the following:

1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200
1280x800
1440x900
1920x1200

My laptop is 1280x800 and my gaming rig is 1680x1050, but don't count my votes because I have no use for a full screen skin.

Im thinking more like making some HUDs (Game and windscreen reflection types) that would really look integral, not full screen, but I'm not overly fond of full screen skins, aside from the fact that xion makes it possible to create a dreamscape of sorts w a music player incorporated into it.
xonenine

I released a Xion skin a while back called Lucite that I designed exactly for this purpose, it's not fully fullscreen, but it really large, with large text and large buttons. Have a look, it might serve your purposes well.

I suppose most of all I'd like to do a virtual dj / technical type skin for full screen, w playlist incorporated

There's an aspect of fullscreen skinning I've stayed away from.When it comes to the really technical copies like you see in virtual dj, isn't that kind of a copyright infringement?I try to be careful about my sources so I was just wondering what the thinking/feeling is about flat-out copies of devices.(The lg xv9400 flip phone also comes to mind...)

There are some great looking dj units from denon(HS5500 and HD2500) and pioneer(svm-1000) that beg to be made the basis for skins.
xonenine