Homegate ideas...

[MichaelCarey]

Hi Everybody,
I was wondering if someone can give me some ideas on how to make Homegate "look nice"?
I have NO artistic bone in my body at all but I want to make my pages look like I do ;)
At the moment I have three pages, each look the same and while they are quite functional, they look VERY boring.
I realise that this is a very personal thing, but I'm open to any suggestions.
Regards,
Michael.

[Frank Mc Alinden]

Hi Michael
Might be way off the mark here but there was talk of Charmed Quark Software creating a cbus plugin and what i have seen of Charm Quark Software it looks nice....

Have a look a look at the link.....
http://www.integrate-oz.net/forum/showthread.php?p=451#post451

HTH
Frank

[Darren]

There is a little bit of info in the help file under the topic "good design practices".

The hard part is to decide what "look" you want. Once that is done, implementing it is usually straight forward (but can still be time consuming).

For inspiration for some nice looks, see some of the "skins" for products like :
- Windows Media Player
- Win Amp
- Pronto remote control

Also have a look at some of the sample projects which came with HomeGate.

The next version of HomeGate will make it easier to make nice looking projects quickly.

[MichaelCarey]

Next version? I only just upgraded to V2, at a price mind you! I'm sure glad Clipsal don't charge for every software/firmware upgrade! ;)
No problem, thanks for the info Darren.
Regards,
Michael.


The next version of HomeGate will make it easier to make nice looking projects quickly.

[Darren]

The Beta release of HomeGate V2.5 is available for download from :

http://www.cbusforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=454

It supports themes, which can be used to generate attractive projects very quickly.

[Rolecgroup]

Hi Everybody,
I was wondering if someone can give me some ideas on how to make Homegate "look nice"?
I have NO artistic bone in my body at all but I want to make my pages look like I do ;)
At the moment I have three pages, each look the same and while they are quite functional, they look VERY boring.
I realise that this is a very personal thing, but I'm open to any suggestions.
Regards,
Michael.

Michael

We just created whole screen images in photoshop, import them into Homegate then place transparent buttons over the background, we're quite happy with the overall look, we did two version for PDA, and touchscreen

http://www.rolec.net/main.jpg

http://www.rolec.net/bedroom.jpg

http://www.rolec.net/lounge.jpg

http://www.rolec.net/pda1.jpg

http://www.rolec.net/pda2.jpg

http://www.rolec.net/pda4.jpg

Hope this gives you some inspiration :)


Dean.

[Dave Byron]

Dean

looks great - would it be nice if homegate could use hmtl as well.
there is lots of stuff out there that could create real good looking screens then.




dave

[Rolecgroup]

Dean

looks great - would it be nice if homegate could use hmtl as well.
there is lots of stuff out there that could create real good looking screens then.




dave

HTML progs like Dreamweaver still rely on good images, from photoshop etc. to make nice pages. I dont think there would be any advantage to using WYSWIG type editor programs. You could do a nice background, and then use custom images for all the buttons. Obviously Homegate can do mouse click image swaps etc., so you can certainly create very Web like pages.

The sliders in the one


http://www.rolec.net/lounge.jpg

are dynamic Homegate standard internal sliders, make transparent except for the middles that were coloured to match the background. Removing the pointer etc. just gives a nice looking bar to run up and down with your finger.



Dean.

[coppo]

I must say,

tally ho chaps!

those people at rolec can certainly make some good backgrounds.

You also have the right idea of making the most with what you have,
some programmers/installers will need to work on their graphic skills, no matter how many sample templates CIS provides with the released software, you will still probably want to make your own alterations to suit your customers needs.

One of the most useful suggestions i have heard for graphics is to be able to draw out your own shapes for a component ( dreamweaver users call it hotspots ) rather than just using a lot of smaller squares and putting them near each other with identical linking properties.

Darren has advised this one is on the list but is time consuming to implement