Xion Community

Hi, everyone!

I was searching for a lightweight combination of winamp and foobar2000 today, and look what I found! Xion proved to be everything I asked for, and I immediately investigating the skinning possibilities (..wow!).

After a few hours of photoshopping I was getting close to what I desired - with one single problem. I couldn't get the playlist background completely transparent. I tried various settings with layer opacity and colors, but I wasn't satisfied (either the list was too hard to read, or the background was too easy to spot) That was about 2 hours ago.

Since then I've basically trashed my .psd due to trial and error, and searched the web - including these forums - for some clue how to make the background invisible while leaving the text at full opacity.

You're my last hope, guys! Is it possible to have the playlist background at zero opacity and only have the text visible? Have I missed something obvious in my frenetic searches?

I'm happy for any help or answers you can provide.

Use a white (or black) rectangle and set it to 1% opacity... should be essentially invisible to you

g0lv Wrote:Hi, everyone!

I was searching for a lightweight combination of winamp and foobar2000 today, and look what I found! Xion proved to be everything I asked for, and I immediately investigating the skinning possibilities (..wow!).

Hey g0lv and Welcome to the Xion Community!

Glad you're enjoying using Xion!

g0lv Wrote:After a few hours of photoshopping I was getting close to what I desired - with one single problem. I couldn't get the playlist background completely transparent. I tried various settings with layer opacity and colors, but I wasn't satisfied (either the list was too hard to read, or the background was too easy to spot) That was about 2 hours ago.

Since then I've basically trashed my .psd due to trial and error, and searched the web - including these forums - for some clue how to make the background invisible while leaving the text at full opacity.

I know exactly what you're attempting to do, unfortunately in the current implementation you won't get the desired result. Xion is the only media player with a resizeable window that supports complete alpha transparency with soft edges, that renders using the common windows controls. In order to do this, I had to do some tricky things. Due to the way I've done this, it causes the issue you're experiencing.

I will need to spend some time in the future to see if I can fix this. Unfortunately for now, you won't be able to get it exactly as you like as the text will just fade out when you make it more transparent.

You can do it easily with the main window, but unfortunately the playlist window is of a slightly different breed, due to the resizing and common window control rendering ability.

You can see an early screenshot when I first got this feature working that is similar to what you want (however, more opaque) ->



Cliff

Cliff Cawley Wrote:I know exactly what you're attempting to do, unfortunately in the current implementation you won't get the desired result. Xion is the only media player with a resizeable window that supports complete alpha transparency with soft edges, that renders using the common windows controls. In order to do this, I had to do some tricky things. Due to the way I've done this, it causes the issue you're experiencing.

Many thanks for clearing that up! Now I won't have to ponder this issue anymore. Xion has already let me do much more than any other audio player out there. This was simply a cherry on the top.

Cliff Cawley Wrote:I will need to spend some time in the future to see if I can fix this. Unfortunately for now, you won't be able to get it exactly as you like as the text will just fade out when you make it more transparent.

If it would be possible to have the background and foreground opacity separated in future releases, then the possibilities it opens are endless. Imagine having a playlist on your desktop in plain text, similar to conky, but interactive. Again, many thanks for the answer and this amazing piece of software! I'll definitely keep an eye out for future releases.