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Aim 7.0: Process of Making Skins
Step 3: Adding your theme to Aim 7
We’re at the final stretch. Let’s take a look at themes.xml and explain whats going on in each line.
<theme name="Wood" color="#FF501B06" texture="wood_pattern.png" swatch="wood_swatch.png" guid="96fe3ce5-9b56-4857-8208-ff3a3454ba12" />
Theme name is the name of your theme. Please add the name within quotation marks. In this example the name is called wood.
Color is the background color of your theme. You can be creative by matching the background color of your background image. The background color uses html color codes.
The FF at the beginning of the color code is the opacity of the background. It’s best to leave it at FF so that the background color can update when you change your skin.
Texture is the background image.
Swatch is the icon that shows up for your theme when you click the theme switcher.
GUID is a mystery. At first I thought it was a way for AOL developers to stop the skinning of AIM 7. After some testing, I realized that this Guid code needs to be tacked onto every custom skin. So the easiest way to do this would be to copy the last line of code in your skin and just edit the file names. We’ll get to that further ahead.
templateType calls a specific theme file. This template file is similar to Aim 6 template.box files. You can change a large amount of specific colors here. One day we will append a page onto this tutorial that will cover the templateType system. For now, templateType’s sole purpose is to change the color of the text to black, because certain themes have light backgrounds.
If you look to the far right,
the acronym theme blends in with the background color!
How To Use Custom Images
You can use your own custom background images by adding the following:
<theme name="MY THEME" color="#FF501B06" texture="box://imApp/theme/mybackgroundimage.png" swatch="box://imApp/theme/mybackgroundimage.png" guid="96fe3ce5-9b56-4857-8208-ff3a3454ba12"/>
Highlighted in purple, this code will retrieve your background image stored on your computer under a folder called theme.
In Windows Explorer head to the folder:
C:\program files\aim7\services\imApp\ver7####\
Create a new folder called theme inside that folder.
Inside that folder insert the background image you are using in step 1. Please pay particular attention to your background image’s file name including the file extension. AIM for the most part uses PNG or JPG files. I recommend using PNG files because they allow for transparency.
Additional Points
Please remember the following points!
- You must fully close AIM then re-open it and switch themes for your custom theme to show up.
- Don’t forget tilemode=”none” to stop tiling your background.
- You can add as many theme lines as you want as long as it is before </theme>
Congratulations you are done!
26 Comments to “Aim 7.0: Process of Making Skins”
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Is there any way to make it transparent like the aero glass theme?
I think it’s possible this time but I don’t have Vista so I can’t test it out.
C:\program files\aim7\services\imApp\ver7_0_5_38\resources\en-US\themeTemplate.box
Open this file in notepad. Might have something to do with copying and pasting WIN__ around.
I think WIN__ is the default windows colors.
tried it and it doesnt work. i eventually changed everything and it turned to a default color of black or white.
Yeah, this doesn’t work for me. The only thing that changes is the color, there is no design.
Oh well, guess it isn’t possible then.
I have one question only.
I have everything fine, except for the step where i add the link to where the photo is, nothing work’s. I have AIM 7.0.13.4
Is this still supposed to work with this version? i get everything fine except for the image that wont show.
I’m trying to load it from C:
into the folder u suggested, but nothing, i do change “box” with the drive lettter correct and apply all the root forlers that lead up to the file correct, please help me.
Thank You in Advanced.
My mistake, The folder is within your AIM version number. I’ll correct this in the blog post. I haven’t tested it with Aim 7.1 though
C:\program files\aim7\services\imApp\ver7_0_13_4\theme\picture.jpg
So place the theme folder underneath your AIM version folder number, and this will allow your skin to show up.
What’s the exact size the design should be?
One last question, when i dig into the XML file; How do i Place the address if it’s in that folder?
i have it in the C: drive in the folder u said.
Could i start it with C:// or just place the”filename.jpg”
everything i get except for that.
OH! and i have windows 7, so the Program folder has a (x 86) in front of it for Program’s that aren’t x64 so the Drive address would look like this…
C:/ProgramFiles (x86)/AIM/services/imApp/ver7_1_3_4/Theme/Phatstyle.png
(btw that’s the image i set as the swatch, the other’s a jpg)
How exactly do I save it? Like, i’m finished editing the txt doc. And now do i save it over the old one?
Ok, nevermind, my question was retarded. But it’s not working? I have a folder located in Program files -> AIM -> services -> imApp -> ver7_0_13_4 — named theme that contains a png file of the image i want as my theme.
is what I have as my complete theme. Is anything wrong with this? And wood_swatch.png is my swatch because i wasn’t too sure what to do or make for that, so if that’s screwing it up, can you explain how to fix it?
Thanks.
Ok, I won’t spam anymore haha. I figured out my issue, and now my only problem is it’s not showing my clear png image. Like, it’s literally a square of photoshopped aero glass. It’s simply taking the color and thats it.
By taking the color, i mean the color that I enter in the color spot.
@Manny In the instructions it says to use box://imApp/theme/mybackgroundimage.png, there is no c:\\. AIM will automatically find the JPG or PNG file as long as you place it within the theme folder and the name is exactly the same. In your case:
texture=”box://imApp/Theme/Phatstyle.png”
I see you have Aim 7.1 and I have not tested skins with Aim 7.1
@Dallas, That folder directory is fine, as long as the
box://imApp/theme/mybackgroundimage.png
points directly to your image. Remember to completely close aim then restart it for the theme to show up.
If you want you can send me a link to your photoshop picture and I’ll send back the xml file for proper placement.
@Magic, there is no file dimension it has to be. I have even tiled the mobile icon included in the program as a background for a theme.
http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/4918/windowsaeroglass.png
I can get the theme to show up, like, it’s a little square that says Glass, which is what I named it. But i’m pretty sure its taking on the Color:#2343242342342348973(That isn’t the color, that was a keyboard smash to be used as an example) that is there, rather than the image.
?
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!
It work’s with my Version. Dude you the Mother F**king man!!
I figured it out, you just cannot use spaces when naming your png or jpg file, or at least that seemed to solve it when i changed the name of the picture. However, my glass just looked greyish blue, which was ugly, so i just too a windows 7 startup screenshot, healingbrushed all of the crap so it’s just a nice blue background, it looks great!
Thankyou vurrry much sire (:
im having alot of trouble here :\ im on Win7 64bit
heres the code
“”
but when i load it it only shows the green color and not the pattern, the pic is 380X380
please help D=
by the way, you screwed up the guid which is probably your problem ideceased.
guid=”96fe3ce5-9b56-4857-8208-ff3a3454ba12 />
is what she has
guid=”96fe3ce5-9b56-4857-8208-ff3a3454ba12″/>
is how it is suppose to be, it fixed mine.
By the way, there is a new version, updated for windows 7, so the icon is on your bigger bar, rather than the mini bar on the right, which this method still works, therefore, it looks like its a permanent way to theme!
Oh, and one last side note, with the latest update, the color you have in your theme, also pops up when you have aim minimized and someone signs on, or messages you. So you may actually want to find a nice color and copypaste over the ugly brown color
http://www.2createawebsite.com/build/hex-colors.html
may help
A hint that might be helpful to people who couldn’t save at first, like me, is to edit the permissions you have on the theme file. Right click, click properties, go to security, and edit the permissions so that you can modify the file.
Hope this helped!
http://bumped.org/tek/2010/01/14/aim-7-skins-sonar-series/
Four Aim 7 Skins coming soon!
So it appears it isn’t working with the latest update of AIM?
Haven’t tested it with Aim 7.2 GM but it was working in AIM 7.2 Beta