New theme with new icons

[Dennis]

Hi,

 

I'm working on our new theme. It won't be available for download.

I'd like to hear your thoughts on my work so far I've mostly added new icons, and only a few hundred lines of CSS code, so there's still plenty to be done.

Customized the look of 'Meters', displaying the data

 

Flat, neat icons!

 

Windows-borders are a bit transparent

 

New icons for the File Manager as well!

http://i.imgur.com/qP1Ea3C.png

 

A little styling of input fields

http://i.imgur.com/DthgJKp.png

 

Edited February 5, 2016 by DennisMidjord

[wirs]

I like everything about it with exception of the transparent windows.

 

Nice work

[marcelokruk]

Really nice icons it gives the panel a fresh look!

[Xfrag Networks]

It looks cool

 

Where did you get them icons from?

[Dennis]

I bought them from GraphicRiver, I think

 

Do other people think that the transparent windows should be replaced with 'full-colored' windows?

[marcelokruk]

I like more the full-colored windows! can you give the link to the icons?

[sigii]

i like it Nice job dude

[Coolpwner]

Really amazing theme, the best I've seen thus far!

[gijs007]

Looks really neat.

 

Could you share some (example) CSS code?

I'm interested in the code for the top bar. I've tried this my self, but couldn't get the text and icons to center in the middle.

 

I'd also like to play around with the loading bars and fonts, but I don't know the CSS code for those either.

[ECF]

Dennis has moved on to a new job position. I am pretty sure he can't share any code.

 

You can read this post here that explains: http://clientforums.tcadmin.com/showthread.php?t=12170

[Dennis]

Thanks ECF

I made an agreement with the new owner. As I'm still working for the company, he let me do what I've always done. His only demand was that I couldn't provide my help for free, and that those I help had to be billed through our billing system, and I'll get a percentage of those money.

 

The theme will be up for sale once it's finished. Icons won't be included as I do not have the rights to redistribute them :-)

 

gijs007, are you looking for TCAdmin_PageLoadingCover? ;-)

[Dennis]

Okay, there's not much CSS styling you can do regarding the Loading gif. However, it's pretty easy customizing the image:

http://i.imgur.com/2zJQW8B.gifv

[ECF]

Hey Dennis,

 

Please post the sale of this theme in the advertising section under themes.

 

I have created 2 new forums under advertising for selling/requesting configs and themes for $$$.

 

Thanks!

Edited April 15, 2016 by ECF

[gijs007]

I honestly wasn't asking for a off the shelf theme nor am I interested in one. My goal is to learn from existing templates and create something of my own. And during the learning process share some of my views and improvements so that the community can all learn from each other.

 

I know that Dennis used to share before and I really appreciate that. Unfortunately, now that he has a contract with a new owner of his business he is no longer allowed to do this.

I can understand that point of view but I think everyone in the IT industry makes use of freely available community information and it's only fair to give back to that same community (Although not required). That is the synergy that the internet has created, and hiding everything behind paywalls and other constructions isn't doing anyone any good in the long term.

 

I'm also not sure if selling configs and themes is really a good idea, what happens if someone reverse engineers a config or theme or uses parts of other people's work and creates his own and then asks money for it or even releases it for free while someone else isn't?

I'm sure this can cause a lot of (legal) trouble and flamewars and I believe this isn't something that should be encouraged.

 

Sure, you can sell support to people (on request) but selling off the shell solutions that can easily be recreated by someone else can cause lots of issues. and it would be unfair and not desirable if others are no longer allowed to create/share a config for game X because someone else is already offering one.

 

We have a similar problem with the CSS code of the theme's here, it's using existing CSS code from TCadmin created by Luis, we are all free to edit that CSS code to our own needs and adjust it (even if that means someone recreated a one on one copy of Dennis his template)

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against proprietary software by definition. But I just don't think it's a good idea to ask money in the above cases.

If you were to sell icon packs, then that is a different case because there will always be some differences in those icons and there are a million ways to create them. (and even here I see some icons are very similar between your icon pack and one created by someone else.)

 

But especially with a game config or by editing the TCadmin template you don't have anyway to determine if someone copied someone else's code, reverse engineered it or came up with it completely on his own.

Edited April 17, 2016 by gijs007

[Dennis]

I can understand that point of view but I think everyone in the IT industry makes use of freely available community information and it's only fair to give back to that same community (Although not required).

I agree, but for the next two years this will be ILLEGAL for me. It's not that it's just not allowed, it's that I will be fined more than 7500 USD, and that's a risk I won't be taking. There's no advanced CSS in the 'header', it's just about margins, centering and stuff like that :-)

 

I can't prevent people from selling my work to other people, but with the amount of people on these forums that sell configs, it won't be difficult for me to prove that someone is selling my work. When I sell configs, I keep records of the people (address, email address, name and company) that buy my work. When people want me to do a custom config for them, I give them all the rights. They can sell it and do with it as they please :-)

[gijs007]

I understand that, and I don't blame you for not sharing your work. After all, it's not an obligation for anyone and I'm not going to claim I am some sort of saint that always shares all of my work. I mean who does?

 

The point I wanted to make is that it's just not a good idea (in fact a very very bad idea probably) to sell the previously mentioned theme's and configs as of the shelf products. Because people will want to make changes to them.

 

What happens if someone else buys them under an alias or if someone sees a smart batch script in a config he/she bought from you for game A and then figures out he/she can use it (with some editing) for his/hers own config for game B and (later) sells the config for game B or shares it for free?

Or what if someone doesn't lack the expertise but finds a config for a good price and thinks it's not worth to spend the time to make a working config, but later they improve/update/innovate and adjust that config, at first for their own needs but maybe they later want to sell it or share it.

 

I think as a community we should avoid having conflicts of interest like these, it creates a lot of grey area's and will eventually cause problems. Even if you are quite relaxed and reasonable in handling this (and I believe you are) someone else might not be. For example a company can be bought by someone including the rights for those script, and maybe the buyer/stakeholders of that company wants to go very offensive with defending the works of his companies, when with the previous owners it was not a real problem.

 

I think as a community we should stick with how it's now: free theme's and config's can be posted on the forums and if someone doesn't have the expertise to make those they can hire someone who does to create a theme or config for that person.

 

The issues I'm painting out already exist between a lot of large (public) companies, take Samsung VS Apple for example. I'd hate to see that happen here, It's not good for the industry and it's not good for the customers/gaming community.