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Old 09-25-2013, 04:19 AM   #1
DarkStar
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Default TIP: Toolbar sub-headings and half-height buttons

I have a tall thin toolbar with three groups of Action buttons in it. I have devised a way to add 'group headings' to the toolbar.

This particular toolbar is 4 buttons wide and each button is 30x30.

Method:
  • create a .png file for the sub-heading, with dimensions 120 x 18,
  • split it into 3 sections of 40 x 18 and expand each one up to 120 x 18,
  • add 3 'no-op' actions to the toolbar,
  • assign one of the 3 images to each.
Result (with the three sectioned images shown below):



With a similar approach you can get half-height buttons too (120 x 16 in this case, with the button graphic in the first third of the image):



The only thing that has foxed me is why the button display is 40 pixels wide (maybe that is by design).
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Last edited by DarkStar; 09-25-2013 at 12:48 PM.
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Old 09-25-2013, 12:50 PM   #2
DarkStar
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To get the text on my half-height buttons to be the same as that used on button with 'text icons', I created them as 'text icon' buttons first, took a screenshot and copied the rendered text into my half-height button designs.
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Old 09-25-2013, 03:23 PM   #3
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Very Kewl Stuff DS

I've used a similar approach for custom icons of various sizes... all multiples or divisions of the standard icons.

You idea for doing a screen shot to keep the text the same is great.
Creating text at small sizes in Photoshop is always difficult.

I might only add that to have the three modes [normal, rollover and clicked] of the button change colors [if one wanted that] could be done in Photoshop pretty easily with blending effect on a layer.
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Old 09-25-2013, 05:13 PM   #4
Win Conway
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DarkStar View Post
stuff
Been using this on horizontal toolbars for years but could never get it working on vertical toolbars in any reliable repeatable way, your post set me off on a quest to remind myself why i caution against using this technique on verticals or indeed if something had changed to make it more usable.

1 The heading needs to be multiple actions/icons (A single action/icon will stop the following action/icons from being columnable as per above)

2 Your 120 width action/icon will only work with your toolbar, any sizes different to yours will have gaps between the heading action/icons or indeed put them on following rows (Easy enough to work out with a screen grab though) I know this may seem obvious but just adding it in case it isn't immediately obvious to someone.

3 If the split heading is 3x40 for 120 width a single 120 width following action/icon will make the heading revert back to 3 rows, the only way to follow with a single action/icon is for that action/icon to be exactly 2/3 the width of the heading (Any more or less than that and the heading will revert to 3 rows)

There are many more issues with this technique especially with resizing of toolbars but those three are the three that bite people first and foremost.

This is still a very unreliable technique (The exact reason i have never released my theme, i have asked for better support of this but i suspect it is very low priority) and people should step with caution understanding that it is a very hit and miss random affair.
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Last edited by Win Conway; 09-25-2013 at 06:39 PM.
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