Skin/Theme Engine...Free?

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 4:32 pm

I would say $100 would be more better

$70 sounds a bit low to me....

Anyways, is this $70 per commercial app, or per developer or per company, or .. .?

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 5:52 pm

I would say $100 would be more better

sure but then i couldnt afford it. Its like PureBasic, wich worth 100 times more as its sold for, but im happy that it is cheap, else i wouldnt even think about buying it.

besides, the quality of this skin engine is very great, and polyvector could also sell this for much more. You wont find a skin engine like this for under 100 and 100 of dollars, if you ever find it.

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 6:00 pm

Well, I agree, how about a 4 prong registration system?

1. Freeware software get to use this for free, but must provide credits where due.

2. Shareware authors pay $50 or $25 per shareware application. Must provide credit where due.

3. Commercial authors pay $100 or greater then, per commercial application. Credit can be mentioned (But not mandatory, however cannot claim engine as own.)

4. Company License, a company pay $300 to use this engine for unlimited applications/games created by that company. (But not mandatory, however cannot claim engine as own.)

If he does this, I myself would buy #4. As I now have over 4 projects I want to use this engine for.

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 6:09 pm

i cant afford number 4, and i wont buy anything unless it can be used more than once. (reffering to software, not beer

)

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 6:38 pm

Why would you not buy if its not for more then one? And since I have to assume yours is a commercial software as you have not mentioned freeware, why not shell out a small amout of cash ($300) for unlimited products since you should easily replenish that amount of cash with a few product sales?

Also, does this skinning engine work on MDI parents and children? Will it work in Linux?

PB · Post by PB » Wed Aug 11, 2004 8:54 pm

> would it only encourage piracy if there is no trial/popup-message?

I recommend you read this before you make it freeware:

http://www.hackvan.com/pub/stig/article ... eware.html

It's interesting.

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:10 pm

And since I have to assume yours is a commercial software as you have not mentioned freeware

well i dont make other apps than freeware right now

But well, i was reffering to freeware apps, and i dont like a popup in the start of my program. Its a good idea, sure, but i could not live with it, i belive. Its a great type of trial indeed.

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:29 pm

PB wrote:> would it only encourage piracy if there is no trial/popup-message?

I recommend you read this before you make it freeware:

http://www.hackvan.com/pub/stig/article ... eware.html

It's interesting.

That is a very good article. Maybe some sort of various restrictions on the engine (plus nags and popups, and watermarks) would help?

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:32 pm

there is a message, when you load the engine.:

"This software proudly uses FreeStyle from Skunksoft"
or something in that direction

its a good restriction i think.

watermarks

they would destroy every freeware users, since thats not a good thing i belive.

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:40 pm

I like that message ( a nag screen though ?), but mayhaps also a link in that nag screen to the skin's website?

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:43 pm

its not a nag, just a messagerequester. There is no link, but the http adress is there. here is a correct copy of the text:

This software proudly uses the
Skunksoft FreeStyle theme engine

For more info, visit http://www.skunksoft.com

but if it could be clickable, it would be cool. I dont know if he's going to change the nag/text, but this is good anyway.
And not to disturbing.

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:47 pm

That looks cool, kinda like a certain setup program ...

Which reminds me, well.. for myself, I was to use this for 1 freeware product and 3 commercial products, so I would need either an unlimited (or # limited) license to use this engine..

Heck, if he settles on a price and if the ETA is still a bit away, I'll be more then happy to pay the price now, just so I can get into the beta testing

thefool · Post by **thefool** » Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:52 pm

i dont know if he needs more beta testers, but thats free.
i havent paid anything, but it must be bugfree soon. But notice you wont get a registered version without nag, if u are a betatester. But if you are lucky, you can see freestyle work. And if you dont want to do anything as betatester, maybe he would be nice to send a test app for you, so you can see it in action

If i could i would. Well i can, but i hove promised not to send it to others, and im not going to do that. But ask if he needs more betatesters

PolyVector · Post by **PolyVector** » Thu Aug 12, 2004 4:22 am

That was a very interesting (and convincing) article... It would even persuade me into crippling FreeStyle, but I believe this situation is different. People may not mind a nag screen in software they use, but they will probably not want to distribute software with someone else's nag screen

I think our system is nice...

@Shannara
That's per developer...

Also, does this skinning engine work on MDI parents and children? Will it work in Linux?

It should work with MDI, I haven't tested that yet.... As for linux, that's something we'll have to decide on after we see how popular the windows version is...
I agree that we could probably charge more than what we are planning... But I would like to keep it relativly low right now... Maybe in the distant future if FreeStyle evolves into something more, we'll have two versions (standard and pro)....
Either way, I'm very happy with the way things are being organized... I'm also very thankful for all the input and support I've recieved here on the PB forums

Thanks everyone!

Shannara · Post by **Shannara** » Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:09 am

Now for some more questions...

Are there currently some "advanced" features to this engine? Such as allowing background pictures in say... listboxes, or treeviews or even the editor gadget? How about animated or gradiant or custom titlebars? Ability to have a level of transparent windows? I already have the code for that but wanted to know if it'll be a native feature to the engine..

Is it possible to extend the skin file itself? Such as I have an engine that will allow me to say, open a map file, then I can add in various data, then put in the engine's map data, and I have the option to add in some additional data before closing the map file. The same with reading the file..

Would this be possible with the skin files? That way I could make it possible not for application/game-specific skin files. If anything, if that is not possible, I could wrap the skin file into a bin or pack file, with additional info.. but it would be nice to be able to do this natively

If there will be two versions or a key version or whatever, would it be possible for you to provide a PB LIB version at an extra cost? Still including credits etc.. or if you really wanna get technical, could add in an programparameter option so whenever someone type "programname.exe /c" it'll do a messagebox with your credits in it.. Couple that into the library, and pristo.......

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Skin/Theme Engine...Free?

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