Date: 01.16.2003 Posted by: Views: 825 | Rate: 0.00

Part 2
Desktop icons.

The main difference between Windows Explorer and the Aston Shell is the way icons are displayed. Windows Explorer uses square icons of fixed sizes, whereas the Aston Shell can have icons sized up to 256x256 pixels of any shape. Although the image still has four sides it will include a colour that will not be shown by the Aston Desktop. This is known as the "transparent colour". The "transparent" colour for bitmap files is: red=255, green=0, blue=255 ( or "#FF00FF"). Using the "transparent colour" as a background to your image, it is possible to make icons of any shape. Each desktop icon can have three states: normal, mouse-over and mouse-down ( or as it says in the help file "common, highlighted and pressed state" same thing.) This is how desktop icons look a bit like a web page when you mouse-over an icon.

To see how this is done have a look at the 3 images below.



These are the 3 icons used to make the Homepage icon in the AstonDesktop You can see the author of this theme has called the file "B" for Background, "homepage" and then "1, 2 and 3". 1 is the normal state, 2 is the mouse-over and 3 is the mouse down. If you right click on any desktop icon and select "settings" you will call up the "elements editing" page. This is one of the most important pages within the Aston Shell. See below:



(there must be "application or document" instead "internet". Smanic)

The three images that make up the desktop icon for the homepage are shown at the top and are called from First icon, Second icon and Third icon further down the page.

Element's editing
Let's look at each part of this page.
1. The three boxes at the top show the 1st, 2nd and 3rd icons.
2. Underneath each there is a control panel, some files contain icons, *.exe and *.dll files for instance. You can therefore use the same file, but specify a different number for a different icon. For example the Aston Master program file amaster.exe conatins a number of icons:



3. Hint:, sometimes this will automatically take the name of the program or application you are using. Basically put in here what you want to appear on screen.
4. Application: this has a browse button for you to select the program or application you want to run. It can be left blank if you specify the object type, see 6 below.
5. Working directory: this ids the directory that will open first from your applications, for example C:mydocs
6. Object Type: This is the most powerful and important box. From here you can specify what you want to run from the desktop icon. There are many choices:



and when scrolled down:



The best way to learn how they work is to play about with them. Most are self explanatory.

7. Window: This allows you to open the item in the normal state or default, or minimise or restore state.
8. First icon: allows you to browse for your first icon
9. Second icon: allows you to browse for your second icon
10. Third icon: allows you to browse for your third icon
11. Hotkey: allows you to assign a hotkey top the item
12. X & Y are the coordinates of the desktop icon
13. Themes element: check this box and the desktop icon will only appear of youe current theme. Uncheck it and it will appear of every theme.
14. Lock: check this box and the icon cannot be moved. Uncheck it and it can be moved and positioned anywhere you want.


But that is not all… You can have a animated gif file that will begin the animation once the user mousse-over it. More on that later.


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written by Almark
(other great tutorials by Almark:
link)