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Topic: «Titlebar Buttons Feature Requests , I believe it is time to rethink how Titlebar Buttons are displayed. » on forum: Feature Requests   Views: 11442
 
Jim Fraley
Registered user
 
 Posts: 32
Joined: 08/14/2007
Posted: 09/06/2018 09:07:22
 
 
 I have been a happy Actual Window Manager customer for many years. However, I believe it is time to address the issues related to how Titlebar Buttons are displayed.

As more and more applications are using custom sizes for their titlebar, for example Chrome 69, the AWM titlebar buttons are increasingly becoming a problem to see and to correctly interact with. In addition to the issues with size and placement, dark icons on a dark theme are impossible to see.

I believe AWM should have a more robust system for managing titlebar buttons.

1. Titlebar Button skins should also be available per app, not just globally. Most of my apps use the default Windows 10 light theme. The default "black" AWM titlebar button skin is easy to see. However, I use a dark them in other apps, such as Google Chrome. The "black" AWM titlebar skin is impossible to see. I would like to set app-specific titlebar button skins per app.

2. In addition to global and per-app horizontal and vertical "shifting" settings, we need a way to scale the icons. Specifically, on apps like Chrome that reduce the size of the titlebar for their own use, the default titlebar button skin is too large. I realize that scaling bitmaps can get ugly, so maybe vector versions of the buttons/glyphs would enable a smoother scaling ability?

3. It would be nice to be able to adjust the inter-button spacing for the titlebar buttons. Some applications do not allow much horizontal space, so I might want to reduce the inter-button spacing on that app.

4. Please consider adding a optional feature for adaptive titlebar icons. That is, have the glyph color change based on the applications titlebar color to ensure it is visible. At minimum, a simple XOR type of thing would ensure the glyph was visible. A bit fancier would be to allow the user to set the actual glyph color. Of course, this would be available as a global, and as per-app settings.


Although I realize a user can edit their own set of bitmaps for titlebar buttons, I do not think it is something the average user wants, needs, or should do. Adding the additional positional and color controls, and making them available globally and per-app, would satisfy the needs of most, I believe.

Example: Mozilla with default light theme on left, Chrome with dark theme on right, AWM using default titlebar button skin.
User added an image

Example: Mozilla with default light theme on left, Chrome with dark theme on right, AWM using LightGlyphs titlebar button skin.
User added an image

As you can see, one color, size, and location of titlebar buttons does not work for all apps.

(BTW, there is no "DefaultSkin" in the Actual Window Manager\Skins folder. Where can I locate a current copy to edit?)
 
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Vasiliy Ivachev
Administrator
-retired-
 
 Posts: 2073
Joined: 11/09/2010
Posted: 09/10/2018 11:48:16
 
 
 Hello Jim,

Thank you for this post.

We'll consider your requests and inform you when they will be implemented in Actual Window Manager.

Quote
(BTW, there is no "DefaultSkin" in the Actual Window Manager\Skins folder. Where can I locate a current copy to edit?)
The Default Skin is hardcoded in the main executable file and it's automatically selected depending on OS version, OS visual theme etc. Please specify what exactly you want to change in the default skin. Maybe, we will be able to provide you the necessary part of code to change the default skin settings.
 
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Jim Fraley
Registered user
 
 Posts: 32
Joined: 08/14/2007
Posted: 10/02/2018 02:43:26
 
 
 Hi Vasiliy,

Thanks for the reply. Regarding the Default Skin, I was thinking of creating a custom skin based on the default and wanted to be sure I had a copy of it with all glyphs represented. I downloaded the "Actual Window Manager skins.zip" which contains a DefaultSkin folder, but the most recent date of the files is 4/25/2006. I was hoping to get a current copy so I could make a new skin by editing the glyphs to include a white outline (or background) and see if it would work for both light and dark titlebars.
 
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Bogdan Polishchuk
Administrator
 
 Posts: 4010
Joined: 04/04/2012
Posted: 10/04/2018 04:12:45
 
 
 Jim,

Quote
I was hoping to get a current copy so I could make a new skin by editing the glyphs to include a white outline (or background) and see if it would work for both light and dark titlebars.
You can download it here.

Best regards.
 
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Jim Fraley
Registered user
 
 Posts: 32
Joined: 08/14/2007
Posted: 10/04/2018 04:16:09
 
 
 Thank you!
 
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Jim Fraley
Registered user
 
 Posts: 32
Joined: 08/14/2007
Posted: 10/04/2018 23:42:17
 
 
 A quick update that may help other users.

While trying different settings, I noticed that the AWM titlebar icons became visible on Chrome when that app was not active (not the current app with mouse and keyboard focus) because the Chrome titlebar became dark grey. I decided to adjust the AWM Chrome specific settings to simply use the "Compact view" option for Title Buttons. When you click on this button in the Chrome titlebar, an overlay is expanded which contains all of the AWM buttons, but does not interfere with the Chrome tabs underneath them. Yay! I can live with this compromise.

Next, I changed some Windows 10 Personalization options. Under Colors, "Show accent color on the following surfaces", I enabled "Title bars and window borders" and suddenly the AWM buttons were visible on Chrome when it was the active app (and still visible when Chrome was not the active app). Yay!

So, I was able to resolve my two major issues without using a custom AWM Title Button skin. Hooray!

I hope this helps anyone else having the issues I described in my initial post.
 
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