Make SageMC look like VMC?

[osburnfamily]

Has anyone made a skin to make SageMC look like the Vista Media Center GUI?

[jaminben]

111 views and no replys, the answer is no. However I think by the amout of views and going by the post title some people would proberly like one including myself.

[osburnfamily]

You'd think so. Thanks for the reply!
To tell you the truth, it's not that I don't like what I can do with SageMC. In fact, I can pretty much arrange it exactly like I want.

What I find 'better' about the VMC GUI that I'd like to see in SageMC has more to do with how the GUI is rendered (I think). Now, I'm not an expert in the technical terms of GUI rendering; but, it just "feels" like the VMC GUI is different. Not so much in the layout, but in the back-end of the GUI (if that makes any sense).
Now, if there's a VMC-like skin that'll do it--great! But, that's what I'm looking for.

[mikejaner]

There is talk about this in the SageTV Studio thread. It has to do with moving backgrounds and if SageTV can or cannot do it. I personally could care less about the moving background stuff, but I used to want it also. Over the years my opinion has changed as a result of realizing I want functionality over asthetics. Both Tivo and MCE have moving backgrounds, but they lack a lot of features which I want, so it's a no go for me.

[stuckless]

I tend to agree with Mike, I'll take features over flash any day.... but his post reminded me of a commercial I remember seeing several years ago. These programmers are huddled around thier computer and their boss comes by asking how the project is going (or something like that), and they show him the "Flaming Logo", and he's really impressed by it. Of course he completely misses the fact that product doesn't have any features

[jaminben]

Agree 100% and thats why I chose Sage over MP, VMC etc. However that doesnt mean to say you can't have the bells and whistles as well.

[Brent]

I think we can have both. Solid featureset and ease of use and add in some nice look & feel icing as well.

With SageMC you can customize your UI to work somewhat like VMC's interface does with the vertical menu and such, but you don't get the animated background or the slight animations on the focused selection (eg. hit select and the menu item "expands" a little to show that the menu item was selected.

Animated backgrounds are possible in SageTV, but it requires someone to do use studio to make that happen. currently there isn't an STV that supports it.

I think it would be nice to have a bunch of "skins" or UI's that look and work similarly to VMC and some of the other products. Doesn't mean we need to give up any functionality and it certainly isn't something that is required to make it successful, but it would be nice.

[osburnfamily]

Originally Posted by mikejaner

There is talk about this in the SageTV Studio thread. It has to do with moving backgrounds and if SageTV can or cannot do it. I personally could care less about the moving background stuff, but I used to want it also. Over the years my opinion has changed as a result of realizing I want functionality over asthetics. Both Tivo and MCE have moving backgrounds, but they lack a lot of features which I want, so it's a no go for me.

Actually, I also could care less on the moving background features. The first thing I do in any HTPC setup is disable the sound/animation. What I'm really referring to is the rendering of the GUI itself. I don't know how else to say it. It's like the differents between a Windows GUI and an Xorg/Linux GUI. The Windows GUI, while being much less tweakable, to me is also "lighter" than that of a Linux GUI.

Same with VMC vs Sage (IMHO).

So, is that simply a skin that can change that, or--is that a result of a rendering engine.?

[flashbacck]

I know everyone here prefers function over form, but why does everyone always act like we can only have one or the other? Sure, we can prefer function, but we should have both damnit.