Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

smeger · Nov 9, 2004, 04:26 PM

Want to? You can!

Visit this page for the basics.

The Download Tab is only for new, original themes or major updates to existing ones. No mods, no teasers, no previews.

Your entry on the Download Tab is just a simple webpage, meaning that you can use whatever you'd like to use in a webpage - CSS hover effects, javascript trickery, Flash, embedded movies, whatever. The page will be displayed in a 557x303 pixel box without margins, so you should design it accordingly. Please restrict navigation to a single page so as not to confuse users.

Unsanity will host the page, all embedded graphics, and the guiKit itself.

The link that downloads your theme should look something like this:
  <a href="guiKit://server/path/yourTheme.guiKit" title="Download MyGreatTheme!">
(we'll fill in the server and the path for you).

Links that you'd like to open in the user's web browser, such as a "more info" page or a page with extras that aren't included in the guiKit should contain target="_blank" in the anchor tag. Like this:
  <a href="http://server/path/extras.html" title="Extras for MyGreatTheme!" target="_blank">
One note regarding this: Flash links that should open in a new page won't work properly. I don't know why, I'm not very familiar with Flash.

If you'd like to check out a fairly standard example of an entry, look here. This is the actual entry for Swiz's Label O's guiKit. It contains simple rollover effects and is nice and clean. You might want to use it as a template.

You can (and should!) test your submission before sending it to us. Here's how to do so:[list=1][*]Create a folder named "testFeature" and put your submission in it. The actual HTML file inside of this folder must be named "index.html".[*]Navigate to either <your home directory>/Library/PreferencePanes or <your computer>/Library/PreferencePanes and locate ShapeShifter.prefPane.[*]Control-click it and choose Show Package Contents[*]Navigate to Contents/Resources and drag in your testFeature folder.[/list=1]

To make ShapeShifter read your content instead of the ordinary content, launch /Applications/Utilities/Terminal and enter the following command:
  defaults write com.unsanity.shapeshifter.prefpane DownloadTabTestMode -bool YES
To reset ShapeShifter to its ordinary behavior, change the trailing "YES" to "NO".

Have fun, can't wait to see your submissions!

demograph68 · Nov 9, 2004, 09:50 PM

Could we still have a way to get themes for those without shapeshifter?

justinp · Nov 9, 2004, 10:06 PM

Originally posted by demograph68:
Could we still have a way to get themes for those without shapeshifter?

You can't apply themes without ShapeShifter registered. I'm sure you can still download them.

phillryu · Nov 9, 2004, 10:08 PM

If you're talking about the guiKits, come to MacThemes.net. We report on every "tab' theme, and you can right click/save to disk our download links.

EDIT: Uh, ok, maybe you can't. But you can open that link in a page without ShapeShifter, and save that to disk. It'll take a while for larger themes though. Ideally, if you have one of those download managers, stick the link into it and download there.

wibs · Nov 9, 2004, 10:09 PM

this is all me just guessing, but I bet SS uses webkit for rendering. that means you only need to worry about making safari-compliant html/css/whatever. that's a good thing.

phillryu · Nov 9, 2004, 10:11 PM

It does use webkit. Anything that works in Safari (flash for instance) will work in SS.

TheSpaz · Nov 9, 2004, 11:27 PM

This image was not doctored. Try it yourself! Just drag a web page to the SS window.

Sage · Nov 9, 2004, 11:37 PM

Can we get resumable downloading built into SS, pleeeeaaaazzzze? Nothing's worse than being on a dialup connection, waiting 2 hours to download a theme, and near the end your connection drops and you have to start all over again. Yes, it's happened to me before, and needless to say, it's quite the PITA.

Tick · Nov 10, 2004, 02:46 AM

I'm having dns issues right now, or something. I have to enter a site in a browser twice before actually getting to the site, etc. This seems to be affecting ss too, since you are embedding webkit there. I have to go to the downloads tab, then quit system prefs, then relaunch it, and get back to the downloads tab. Hence the reason behind the following request.

I was wondering if there could be some sort of refresh functionality. Also, an imageless option for our friends on dialup, with the option to load images?

Oh, and does anyone know how to fix the problem I'm having. It's happening on my macs, but not my pc boxen...

Mac Guru · Nov 10, 2004, 11:18 AM

Same thing is happening to me, you type in a URL, and get an error saying it doesn't exist, but on a second attempt it works... Odd.

Mac Guru

Tick · Nov 10, 2004, 12:50 PM

Originally posted by Mac Guru:
Same thing is happening to me, you type in a URL, and get an error saying it doesn't exist, but on a second attempt it works... Odd.

Mac Guru

I'm updating router firmware this weekend, to see if that's the cause.

boy8cookie · 03:32 PM

Same thing is happening to me, you type in a URL, and get an error saying it doesn't exist, but on a second attempt it works... Odd.

me too, and I though I was the only one. It was happening prior to the 10.3.6 update, and I was hopefull for a fix which I did not get :/ Other network related things, like diablo 2 for instance, has troube logging on as well. What's the problem and more importantly, whats the fix?

Tick · Nov 10, 2004, 01:22 PM

What routers are you guys using?

digitaljames · Nov 10, 2004, 02:47 PM

There is a known issue with the dns servers for a number of ISP's. It's not your hardware.

Tick · Nov 10, 2004, 02:59 PM

Originally posted by digitaljames:
There is a known issue with the dns servers for a number of ISP's. It's not your hardware.

That'd work for me, except it's not affecting any of my windows boxes..

digitaljames · Nov 10, 2004, 03:09 PM

Originally posted by Tick:
That'd work for me, except it's not affecting any of my windows boxes..

hmmm.....I got the info from broadband reports (windows users)...maybe it's an occassional or sporadic thing. Mine was great for a week the bammo, it started again last night (after RR said they had resolved the issue)?? Who knows....

cube3 · Nov 10, 2004, 03:12 PM

same here, and only affecting mac with latest update.

slava · Nov 10, 2004, 03:30 PM

Originally posted by Tick:
That'd work for me, except it's not affecting any of my windows boxes..

Possibly the DNS timeout in the system libraries is shorter than on the Windows boxes. In my experience, resolve takes merely half a second more than the timeout is. =)

Tick · Nov 10, 2004, 03:41 PM

Originally posted by slava:
Possibly the DNS timeout in the system libraries is shorter than on the Windows boxes. In my experience, resolve takes merely half a second more than the timeout is. =)

haha, ya

I didn't want to play with my resolv.conf till later. I need to update the firmware anyhow, heh

nanovivid · Nov 10, 2004, 03:44 PM

Codepoetry had an entry about the DNS issues a little bit ago. I've tried the suggestions and it seemed to help before 10.3.6 but doesn't so much seem to help anymore.

jerseyfreeze · Nov 10, 2004, 03:47 PM

Originally posted by Mac Guru:
Same thing is happening to me, you type in a URL, and get an error saying it doesn't exist, but on a second attempt it works... Odd.

Mac Guru

I get the same thing.

I'm on Time Warner Cable in Greensboro, N.C.

Tick · Nov 12, 2004, 02:56 AM

Originally posted by nanovivid:
Codepoetry had an entry about the DNS issues a little bit ago. I've tried the suggestions and it seemed to help before 10.3.6 but doesn't so much seem to help anymore.

This fixed me on 10.3.5, now I don't want to upgrade because of the problem, heh.

nanovivid · Nov 12, 2004, 10:44 AM

Originally posted by Tick:
This fixed me on 10.3.5, now I don't want to upgrade because of the problem, heh.

Actually, I realized yesterday that somehow IPv6 had gotten turned back on in my network prefs, but I hadn't noticed it. After turning it off, it seems to be sticking and DNS lookups are once again much better.

So you might be able to upgrade OK.

MacMan4000 · Nov 12, 2004, 01:03 PM

Back on topic...
I just thought I'd share some knowledge that I went crazy trying to figure out. When you make a guikit:// link you need to make sure the theme.guiKit at the end has a capital "K". If its lowercase then SS will reject it. Took me forever to figure that out.

just thought I should share.

Link · Nov 14, 2004, 03:29 AM

Reply made in shapeshifter, lol.

*adds to list of stuff to get* Damn it's changed since the first time I used it.