Marts UI
 

So I have decided to finally release some of my UI components. Most of my mdos are outside of the box ideas. They are not a copy paste with a slight change. They are completely different in design and functionality. I will be adding more pieces throughout the night.

Browser Mod

Marts Browser - Browser mod with bookmarks and tabbed browsing.

Experience Bar Mod

Marts Experience Bar - Experience mod with pop-out bars.

You'll want to fix the files in your browser window download. Right now, the main file doesn't reference the bookmark file at all; rather, the default bookmark list is hard-coded within it.

-- Darryl (Milquetowst)

**Edit** Look at next post by Deathbane27 then look at my follow-up post.

Actually it doesn't reference the bookmark file; the list is built into eq2ui_mainhud_browser.xml. This obviously wasn't your intention, but that's how it ended up. Open it up in Notepad and take a look.

Some XML editors (the UIBuilder too, sometimes) like to replace <include>s with the contents of the file being included.

Thanks guess thats what UIBuilder did. I have uploaded the corrected file and tested that it works, by adding in my own bookmark (not included in the file you get).

Feedback from my initial use:

1. You should highly consider linking this thread in each of your individual pieces description. I went to the download page and almost posted there until I remembered seeing this thread the other day. It would make it easier for you if everyone posted in one spot and knew where that spot was.

2. Love the idea of tabs, as this would eliminate my need to open multiple browsers since I like having several pages of information to cross-reference. However, only the first tab uses the custom bookmarks that I created. For some reason, even though your bookmark xml file wasn't added to my ui directory, the other tabs still reference those bookmarks.

EDIT: This probably has something to do with what has been mentioned in the previous posts.

3. I have my homepage set in my eq2.ini file but the browser completely ignored this and always opened to a blank page. I used the Set Homepage button but that didn't do anything to change this.

3. Maybe consider switching the Home and Refresh buttons around. It might make more sense to have the Refresh near the Back & Forward and the Home button next to Set Homepage.

4. It would be really nice if the entire top portion could be eliminated. Somehow move the Close and Minimize buttons to the Menu (Back, Forward, etc) then have a small moveable button that could be used to maximize the browser. I like having the browser minimized sometimes but having the large bar on the screen can become annoying.

I'll continue to use this for the next week or so and see what else I can come up with. Nice work and thanks for the effort.

I am not sure whats up with the bookmarks and the homepage issue I will check into this. As far as linking this thread I don't think I will since I want suggestions and comments for each peice posted in the peice's pages. This is for letting people of each piece and putting the links together.

Thanks for the response. As far as linking this thread, I can understand that you would want comments on each piece but you might find it more and more difficult to keep track of them all once you start posting more pieces. Just ask the experienced modders around here like Zonk (Fetish) or gm9 (Profit).

I was also just going by the warning that posters get when they attempt to comment in the download section, which could end up confusing some new users:

"Please do not post a comment asking for help.
Please do not post a comment asking for features.
You are welcome to use the help forum to get help. If you want the author to add a feature please find the authors thread in the released forum.
Thank you for your consideration."

Either way though, it's obviously your decision but I just wanted to at least make the suggestion.

I am not sure why they have that up there like that. I personally want to have those type of comments left there. This thread is for discussing my UI as a whole not for each piece. Just to update you all I will hopefully be putting my collapsible experience bar up later today.

Moderators can't edit/delete comments. If someone gets abusive, Dolby has to deal with it. Similarly, comments about bugs stay there for all eternity even if the bug is fixed.

Also, authors can't subscribe to file comments or view all files with new comments the way you can with threads, so if you had 20 files, you would have to check every file manually to see if anyone's posted a bug report or feedback.



As for the bookmark issue: The <include> is there now, but bookmarks are also being duplicated within the browser.xml file. It looks like the <include> is on top of the duplicated one but it could be causing the odd behavior.

As far as the custom bookmarks are concerned, the problem is quite simple. (I fixed it myself when I corrected the hard-coding the other day, but didn't think to mention it here.) Right now, you have four separate "includes" in the main XML file, one on each tab's page. But only the first "include" actually gets processed. (That's assuming the other three bookmark lists were actually replaced with "includes" at all; I haven't looked at the revised file.) You need to move the "include" to the top-level page in the file, so that the included info (the custom bookmark list) is available to all four tab pages.

-- Darryl (Milquetowst)

It should be in the top level already and each tab page is just referencing it unless they code overwriting to be hard coded. I still havnt got a chance to check it but I have to run to work. I will check it when I am off work.

OK, I just took a quick look at your new version. (I hadn't downloaded it before, as I was just using my own fixed copy of your original version.)

What you've got is an include at the top level, as well as a duplicate include on the "Tab 1" page. But you've still got hard-coded bookmark lists on the "Tab 2," "Tab 3" and "Tab 4" pages.

-- Darryl

Yea it was hardcoded into each tab. I have made the changes and uploaded the fixed version.

Thank you for the Bookmark fix.

Any word on the Homepage issue?

EDIT: I just double checked by replacing the browser xml file with the one from the Othesus mod and the homepage came up on the first try. Setting the homepage and returning to the homepage worked. When I went back to this mod the homepage no longer worked so it seems that the issue still exists.

If there's anything I can do to help figure this out please let me know.

Added experience bar mod check first post for link and thumbnail!!

browser
 

Can not get the "set homepage" and "home" buttons to work. After going to a web site and having the address in the address bar. I press "set homepage" and nothing happens. I go to a different website and press "home" and it does nothing but stay at the website I am at instead of going to the website I pressed "set homepage" on.

Any update on the homepage issue?

I love having the tabs but it's starting to get to the point where i might prefer a homepage more. I haven't quite gotten there yet as the tabs are a beautiful thing but it would still be nice to have both features available if at all possible.

Thanks again for all of your hard work and effort.