[Manko10]

Hi,

currently I'm struggling with Adobe Fireworks bugs to create a new feather for Nightingale. :-)
I'm not finished with it yet, but I will in the next few days. Attached the sketch from which I'm currently developing a computer generated prototype (bad quality, I know, the photo has been shot with my Desire S and I must not upload more than 500kB here - but you know: it's just a sneak peek).

The feather will be very different from Songbird's and more native (but not quite). I'm trying to satisfy the desire for a nice looking, precious and interesting, not boring interface as well as the desire for an application that doesn't look like an alien on most desktops.

Stay tuned.

[stevo]

that looks pretty good for a draft, here are some things i would like to keep in mind when developing this feather:
1. We need to maintain a consistancy with the UI, simular to what firefox does.
2. We must have a gnome window frame.
3. Try to use as much of the gtk theme as possible.

The reason I say this is because we want the user to see this application as part of their desktop, and if they change themes our application should follow along as best it can. That being said, how we arrange our interface and any special controls (like the faceplate) are ours to do with as we need.

Thanks,
Stevo.

(04-15-2011, 06:03 AM)Manko10 Wrote: Hi,

currently I'm struggling with Adobe Fireworks bugs to create a new feather for Nightingale. :-)
I'm not finished with it yet, but I will in the next few days. Attached the sketch from which I'm currently developing a computer generated prototype (bad quality, I know, the photo has been shot with my Desire S and I must not upload more than 500kB here - but you know: it's just a sneak peek).

The feather will be very different from Songbird's and more native (but not quite). I'm trying to satisfy the desire for a nice looking, precious and interesting, not boring interface as well as the desire for an application that doesn't look like an alien on most desktops.

Stay tuned.

[Manko10]

As I wrote, the feather will be much more native as Songbird's. It will, however, still use custom elements to make it a bit more visually appealing and not as boring as Rhythmnbox for instance.
The window frame in the draft (and my prototype here) is a KDE window frame, as I use KDE, but it will also work well with any GTK frame as it's definitely a native frame. Also the menu bar will be native. I would also say that all dialogs such as notifications, alerts, the settings window etc. will be completely native.
The main UI, however, will have custom elements. I would say, we'd rather discuss how far we go there, when my prototype is ready for the public. :-)
I'm also one of those folks who wanted to have a more native as well a consistent skin.

By the way, this forum is not very optimized for phone screens, is it?

[stevo]

Yes that makes sense, unfortunatly xulrunner is not very gtk friendly so the menus would still be xul. Until we migrate up to xulrunner-2.0+ etc.

Anyways, great job and I love your approach.

(04-15-2011, 06:43 PM)Manko10 Wrote: As I wrote, the feather will be much more native as Songbird's. It will, however, still use custom elements to make it a bit more visually appealing and not as boring as Rhythmnbox for instance.
The window frame in the draft (and my prototype here) is a KDE window frame, as I use KDE, but it will also work well with any GTK frame as it's definitely a native frame. Also the menu bar will be native. I would also say that all dialogs such as notifications, alerts, the settings window etc. will be completely native.
The main UI, however, will have custom elements. I would say, we'd rather discuss how far we go there, when my prototype is ready for the public. :-)
I'm also one of those folks who wanted to have a more native as well a consistent skin.

By the way, this forum is not very optimized for phone screens, is it?

[Ezekiel000]

(04-16-2011, 06:44 AM)stevo Wrote: Yes that makes sense, unfortunatly xulrunner is not very gtk friendly so the menus would still be xul. Until we migrate up to xulrunner-2.0+ etc.

Anyways, great job and I love your approach.

How does Firefox integrate so well? I'm just wondering because it runs on xulrunner but it looks just like every other gtk application.

[Manko10]

It just looks native by default although it isn't. ;-)
But each new version of Xulrunner has made great progress in this respect (just compare Firefox 1 to Firefox 4). However, Firefox 3.x looks more native on Windows XP (or Vista/7 with Classic Theme) than Firefox 4 but I guess that's because of a shift in focus (support for Aero). On Linux Firefox 4 looks pretty native though.

[GeekShadow]

I hope we are moving to a native feather for Linux platform, there are severals feathers that enable native user interface hosted on addons songbird website you might check those...

[FalconBird]

Great job Manko10 ! Personally I enjoy the Cover Flow (on user's songs or albums, I presume). I am looking forwrd to seeing it with colors.

And if I have understood, XUL and GTK are only cousins, aren't they ?

(04-17-2011, 09:24 AM)GeekShadow Wrote: I hope we are moving to a native feather for Linux platform, there are severals feathers that enable native user interface hosted on addons songbird website you might check those...

But these add-ons are out of date. I have got one which has not worked since Songbird 1.7.2 NOFX on my Songbird.

[Manko10]

Quote:Personally I enjoy the Cover Flow (on user's songs or albums, I presume).

So do I and therefore I would suggest implementing it natively, not as an add-on. And pleeease... don't make that foolish mistake Songbird's coverflow add-on developers made. They have squished the reflection on the ground. That's physically incorrect and it looks damn daft. :-)

Quote:And if I have understood, XUL and GTK+ are only cousins, aren't they ?

Er... yes and no. Both are libraries for graphical user interfaces, but Xulrunner is a complete rendering engine whereas GTK+ is a library for native applications. On Linux Xulrunner uses GTK+ for the interface.

[Manko10]

Et voilà, here you find the finished prototype (it's too large to upload here): http://dl.dropbox.com/u/23091379/Nightin...export.png
and here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/23091379/Nightin...t_blue.png

It's a custom theme built on a native window frame. I think it's a good compromise between both kinds of style: native application and custom feather.
The main UI consist of three frames in which the proprietary UI elements are. The first draft adapts the main color of the coppery logo, the second uses the system's native selection color (which is mostly blue). I think the first is more vibrant but it might remind some people of the media library of German ZDF.

A few specs for the theme: both vertical frame borders are freely draggable, both side panels are collapsible (by clicking the icon in the header). Also the smaller horizontal double bars are draggable (you find them between the coverflow and filter pane, between the filter pane and library pane, between the library pane and the bottom part there and above the album art in the left panel).
The "Playing album" cover art in the left pane is also collapsible by either double clicking the double bar or the little arrow. Each navigation part above can also be collapsed. Also the bottom part of the middle pane is collapsible in the same way to provide space for a fourth panel if needed.
There is no menu strip by default but you can right click anywhere in the top part to get the main menu in form of a context menu. By pressing F10 you can also enable the normal menu strip temporarily. By checking View->Main menu you can also enable the menu strip permanently. It's placed above the play controls.
The dark bar above the cover flow is semi-transparent (60% opacity) and turns fully opaque on hover or focus (the light gray is actually white).

The icons in the left panel are currently those of Songbird but we might replace them (I was too lazy to create new ones).

The album art used in the prototype is just example material from lorempixum.com.