Media Monkey has memory? How to force refresh on skins list?

[mdmb54]

Hi,

So, a long time ago I attempted: http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... 04#p239304 and ran into to some problems so frustrating I ended up despising MM so much that I almost went back to iTunes *gasp!*. Well I'm back now and hoped to finish the work I had started and sure enough I'm running into similar problems if i remember correctly. This time I may have found a reason for the erratic behavior though.

Basically, I was editing some Color attributes of the ListBox/Frame/Client ( the element i was working on is irrelavent but anyways ) and now media monkey is no longer accepting changes to the skin anymore. I can change the value in the theme editor and save the Theme.mskn and all but the program itself when I toggle skins, restart media monkey, and even restart the computer still shows the original color.

Now, I had the folder containing my working skin in the C/Program(x86)/MediaMonkey/Skins/ directory and at first I thought it was not getting updated due to some read/write permissions and you may be thinking this is odd because I had been editing and updating by skin toggle all along and didn't have any issue before so why now? So then I thought ok, I'll pull the folders out edit them on my unprotected drive space and then copy them back over. This is the part that is killing me. When I cut the folders out of the skins/ directory MediaMonkey is still seeing the one called DarkGlided that I had been working on even though it's not there anymore. And even weirder, the color that I had messed with some how transfered to all the other skins that aren't even unzipped. I believe this is why the color isn't changing because media monkey is reading some old cached version that isn't the true up-to-date version. It's like that color is in some memory and it's over riding the skins parameters. I actually restarted my compture a second time thinking maybe if it clears the RAM out extra good no crap could be left over and it turns after switching skins like 5 times the color finally got flushed out of the default skins in the skins/ directory but it still remains on the DarkGlided skin i had been building even though that folder isn't in the Skins/ dir.

I don't know how to recreate this error or to prove it but it's happened to me twice now. I remember it happening last time I tried this and it drove me insane. You basically no longer have control of when elements get updated into the skin mediamonkey is seeing.

The only idea i have is if there is some way to flush all cached data media monkey has. Perhaps it's stored in some temporary file, and I could delete it and the program would just recreate it on startup, similar to cookies in web pages and stuff. Other than that, I don't know how media monkey is still seeing that skin when it shouldn't be looking anywhere but the skins directory.

If you help me fix this it would be greatly appreciated. If other people are having this error and it gets fixed it could mean developing skins just got a hell of a lot easier and people would be more willing to invest time. I mean I really think I have a good looking skin and it's a shame for it to die just as it did before to a silly error like this.

I'm begging the gurus of media monkey to save me

UPDATE: even more weird behavior. I went switching the skins around again and I went from VitreousBlue back to the mysterious "DarkGlided" that I removed from the directory and some how the music player looks like part of an iTunes skin which I don't have downloaded and didn't even know existed on my computer... WTF, i'm going crazy. I thought only default skins were Glided, BlueGlass, and VitreousBlue?

"Right Click > Open in new tab" OR "Right Click > Save Image As" and view locally to see whole thing

[rovingcowboy]

you broke mediamonkey.



that is why the default, default skin showed up.

which is peke's aqua skin. last i knew it was not really fit well unless you downloaded his aqua file or mine aqua44 or nohitter151's converted version of it.

as to the color error being stuck. how are you testing the skins. did you make the folders to create the skins in and a test folder to put your skin files in that you are createing.?

to try and clean this up. do this.

get all your testing files out of the skins folder for monkey. umm? just remove all the skins files if you got any others installed from any other skinner, if you got only yours and the default skins. just get yours out and delete the default files.
now run the mediamonkey installer again it will replace the missing default files and you have new hotkeys or fixed hotkeys for the skins.

now make a new folder in that skins folder and call it test.

and just put all your testing files in to that folder.
and when you want to check your skin out just change to test in the skins box like you would any other skin.

did you also check with morten about changing his default skin?

let us know what you get when you have done the above.


also you need to remember that if you change the color of the image map you added in for that section you need to also make sure you have the size's x & z set to stretch so that will fill in the area when the skin is viewed.
other wise if you have a 100 x 20 image and it is set to those sizes in the theme code section but not to stretch,
you then wont see anything only the background client of monkeys main background,
when you view it in use on a screen size that produces a larger section for that image to be seen.


and also if you are viewing the test skin by just placement of the mskn files and ini files and the few images in to the test folder then you won't see some features when viewing that way. because some things wont show up unless the are in the zipped file called .msz

and there are some features windows will allow to be changed in the theme engine only. and not in the windows os.

now one more thing that might be messing with you and that color. is the virtural tree object. morten used that in his skin and it might be causing you the error.

[mdmb54]

Hi,

I tried your steps to fix as below:

1. Backed up the theme I'm editing, it is just one folder called DarkGlided, contains extracted .mskn files, icons folder, and all images.
2. Deleted all files in the mediamonkey/skins/ directory
3. Ran MediaMonkey_3.2.0.1294 installer and it replaced the all the files in the skins folder as you said, however...

The installer launched media monkey upon completion and I went to Tools > Options > Skins and the DarkGlided it still there! Even though I had removed it from skins/ dir and deleted everything in the /dir .

Also, I had been testing my skin by just selecting a different skin and then selecting one i'm testing again. I called it "skin toggling' in previous post.

One thing that might help me understand, you said "i broke media monkey" was this just a saying or is there something i actually did in the theme that caused this behavior? I was hoping I would know how i caused it so i can refrain from doing it again

[rovingcowboy]

you broke monkey by removing the mskn file or msz file of the last used skin before you closed monkey.

that is what caused the default, default skin to show up it had no file for the skin it was listed to use, so it did what it's coded to do and used that skin.

the file you called darkguilded was replaced ? that is not by mediamonkey. that seems to be by system restore.

go to the my computer icon and right click it then to properties and then to system restore. and turn it off.

click okay, make sure you have no apps open, just normal stuff that starts up on boot up. (any others just takes longer to close down) reboot the computer and the restore files should be gone.

go in to the monkeys skin folder and remove that old skin file you don't want.

run a registry cleaner for your op system and run a junk files cleaner like ccleaner for your op system, defrag your system.
run a registry defragmenter if you can find one for your system.
run anti-virus scan
run anti-spyware program scan.

make sure your system is cleaned out good with those scans.
now after all that reboot the computer again.

there should be no old restore files in there now so go back to the my computer icon and reverse the steps and turn on the system restore.

now reboot one more time to make new clean restore files.

[rovingcowboy]

i just read your first post you linked too. sorry i did not see it back in januray but you got good help from dreadm and eyal.

just one thing i should tell you if you did not do it. is go to the wiki site and look in the developers section for skinning.

you will see my fast newbies walkthough that tells you how to set up the folders for skinning so you wont get things mixed up.

and also if you follow the steps as you read them you will be able to make a theme mskn file by the time you finish the article.

as for your not being able to change the font colors in the player title that is done by use of the player ini you change
code in the ini files for the different players,

and you picked the hardest skin to try and change. guilded was made by a programmer, who is smart and did things in it that confuse the heck out of newbies.

mediamonkey skins are easy to create they are just changing the images to the mskn files.

simplest one i can think of the change for newbies might be my tangerine monkey skin. i used very few images in there
just a couple big image maps and the few needed by the theme mskn.

you could use my latest skin Dj Coco Marantz . i just did it so the codes should be correct for you to try and change with the theme 7 engine.

but check out all the help for newbies and the how to convert mm 2 to mm 3 skins help i did plus any other walkthroughs on the wiki and you should be making skins faster then you even thought possible.

peke got me started on making the skins by telling me it was just like making a winamp classic 2 skin but faster.

[mdmb54]

I don’t quite understand how System restore is getting involved in this. I might try some of those steps to see if I can fix it but I still feel like it is media monkey holding the information, not Windows forcing it back into the directory. I can look in the skins folder and see that it is not there in windows explorer but mediamonkey still lists DarkGlided in the available skins.

Also, I have read both Wiki’s and I don’t quite understand how a particular skin can restrict me from edit it vs others who you say are easier. I understand there is scripting /code involved but if I all I’m doing is changing the images and colors why would any of that matter?

Did he [Morten?] code in some safeguards against modding or something?

Would I have better luck with VitreousBlue? Meaning is that skin script free and more able to be edited?

Also, why do you keep saying "default, default". There is only one Default.mskn in the Skins folder and it doesn't seem to contain anything.

[DreadM]

Greetings

@mdmb54:
I don't understand really what you talking about ,to many words!
I can just tell you , that i got many open skin folders (37 at the moment),and sometimes i see also peke's aqua player , but just when i forgot to delete a second skin folder in the open one.(sometimes there is a second second skin folder insde the un zip'ed Skin file)
So be sure that is no second folder inside your opend Skin folder,or that you use the same name like a existent Skin.msz .
And peke's player is somehow an Emergency player if something going wrong.

[mdmb54]

Let me be more clear...

I followed the wiki steps which involved takin an existing skin ( I happened to choose Glided.mskn ), renamed to name of skin i'm creating ( DarkGlided ), changed extention to .zip and extracted said DarkGlided folder inside the skins/ folder. I then deleted the .zip file and began editing the skin with the theme editer. After 2 days of work I must have done something wrong and media monkey no longer was showing the updates I had saved using the theme editor. I REMOVED the DarkGlided folder from the skins/ folder but MediaMonkey still shows DarkGlided if you go to Tools > Options > Skins and look at the available skins such as Glided, BlueGlass, VitreousBlue, etc. I have opened the skins folder and verified that the DarkGlided is not in there. Perhaps in other words. I've removed the skin from mediamonkeys 'vision' and it still 'sees' it.

Are you saying that perhaps I have clicked Save As in the theme editor and have duplicate information in this DarkGlided folder I am working on in which case Mediamonkey can no longer read it correctly and defaults to Aqua?

Also, where to you store your 37 uncompressed skins as you edit them? I had mine inside the mediamonkey/skins/ directory. Is there a better place?

[DreadM]

well the only place for skin files is the skin folder from MM ,and all my fils are stored in this folder.(open ones and msz files)
I Think you make something wrong when you say

I then deleted the .zip file and began editing the skin

Simply unzip the Glided.msz with zip program ( i use 7zip) to MM's skin folder ,now it's no longer a zip file just a pure Folder,rename it to Dark glided and now you can edit the files inside,and you can select the new open skin file from Options > Skins.

[mdmb54]

Well it was taken right from rovingcowboys instructions:
http://www.mediamonkey.com/wiki/index.p ... h_for_MM_3

"3. Unzip / Extract the files from the .zip file, into your new folder then delete the ".zip" file. (It is no longer needed and will just confuse you.)."
I changed Glided.msz, to Glided.zip, unzipped Glided.mskn, extracted to my folder name DarkGlided, and deleted the left over zip just as he said. After this i have an uncrompessed skin inside the DarkGlided folder that the theme editor can modify.

I appreciate the effort to help but I don't think you understand problem. I was editing the skin for two days. I understand the extracting process and editing the files using the theme editor as an uncompressed skin with the mskn files, images, etc. The problem is that no matter what I do media monkey is still refering to some version of the DarkGlided folder that contained the files i was editing even though I have removed that folder from the skins directory. Like you said and I thought, that is the only place where they should be other wise media monkey would not see it and you wouldn't be able to test it.

I guess this is harder to explain than I thought. To me it seems obvious cause I can see it on my computer but to you guys I don't know how else to say it.

[nohitter151]

Did you try to just delete (or at least temporarily remove) the whole skins folder?

[mdmb54]

Yes. This time I just deleted the whole folder and DarkGlided it still in the skins list. See screenshots

Skins folder is gone....


Media Monkey Listing Dark Glided:


When I first launched MediaMonkey it did the "default, default" ( as rovingcowboy said) and loaded up Aqua but now that I've selected DarkGlided an it is the only visible skin I can't go back. At the moment I'm just running in non-skinned mode for music but as you can see, no skins folder, mediamonkey shouldn't have anything in the list, yet DarkGlided is still there.

I did a search on the entire C: drive for this mysterious "DarkGlided" and as you can see below, the first entry is a copy of the skin in some AppData/VirtualStore/ bullshit:


The last two entries are short cuts to the real DarkGlided on my other drive so those don't matter. I guess this is a step in the right direction. I at least know where the DarkGlided had been hiding but now it broke media monkey even further so I'm a little worried.

I deleted this and re-ran the latest media monkey installer and I have gotten the DarkGlided to finally go away and the three default skins are back however now I can't get any of the skins to load. It's as if the program is locked in non-skin mode even though I clicked on the regular .exe .

UPDATE: after full uninstall, restart, and install mediamonkey appears to be operating normally. No more DarkGlided and default themes are working. I think I'm going to enjoy this moment for an hour before I start trying to skin stuff, and break it again .

[rovingcowboy]

your last post above of how you found and fixed things, tells me windows 7 sticks a copy of the user's current skin in the documents and settings folder.

that is nice info to know

sorry for you being the guninne pig to find it.


you also say you had the trouble of not being able to reuse the skinning exe
until after a few reboots. that sounds like there was a hotkey refusing to be changed until a reboot.
this is normal windows action, they say no more reboots needed after installs but since they said that with windowsMe, the need for reboots shows up in every os they make.

if you find you can't load the skins exe again just delete the none skinned exe and it should work it did here.


yes i said default default skin because it is as dreadm said a skin in the code to use when there is no skin msz file or the one that was in use is missing. the mediamonkey still needs a skin so that one was hard coded in just for those broken skin local urls.

the default skin as every one referes to when saying one default, is the guilded skin.

i believe nohitter151's skin will be more complete to use for all the added features because he made it about 2 years after morten made his guilded skin.

yes you can delete the zip file as i said in the walk through.

you can put your creating folders in any location you want just don't put the files in the main skin folder of monkey or you will change some of the default skin files.

i make a speical folder for my files i use to make skins with and it is nowhere near the mediamonkey folders.
i only make that one folder in the skins folder and call it " Test " that way i can just move all the uncompressed files
for the skin in to that folder and don't have to worry about looking for the different names of the skins as i test them. they are all called test because of the folder.

morten i think took shortcuts only a programmer can do in his skin. which is why i say its better to use another skin either one of the newest versions on the wiki from the others or one of mine as the all will have the most up to date code
features used by the skinning engine, or features used in skins by the author of the skin. like in my jade monkey skin and my trucking monkey skin i use images to cover the text area so you don't type on the normal gray background. but on the image i put there.
so in those there is code for that which is not going to be in mortens skin.

its just what features do you like to use in the skins that should be used in your skin. the reason so many skins are made is just for that colors and features for our options. but we all try to put all the controls on the player we can.

can't hardly wait to see what you make on your own for a skin you should be on your own skin in about a week if all you do is sit in the chair 18 hours a day and make or learn how to make this skin.

hardest part is the learning of the use of the theme engine and the different mskn files. once you got that down your well on your way to making 20 or more skins look at eyal he made one skin it took him a long time on his first 2 skins.
each time after that he got faster and faster, i my self have made a skin in 4 hours. and made one with all the minor tweaks to it in 72 hours.
so it is just how picky you are or how much you want to change in way of the skin your overlaying your own images too.