Makeover Democracy
One of the people who got in touch about Channel Guide moderation, Steven Ansell, had something very cool on his website iconicon.net. He swapped out the default icons in Democracy with some of his own work. He even rolled it up into a “Democracy Makeover kit”.
So it seemed like a good occasion to blog about how easy it is to change Democracy Player’s looks. Not only thumbnails, but also the CSS that determines almost every part of the interface. Here’s how:
On Windows, go to “C:\Program Files\Democracy Player\resources”. On Mac, ctrl-click on the Democracy .app file, “Show Package Contents”, and drill down into the Resources folder. The “css” and “images” folders are where the action is. On Mac you have to restart to see your changes, but on Windows you often don’t–just switch to another view and switch back.
And we’re totally open to suggestions, so if you make something you like, send it our way.
March 9th, 2006 at 7:26 pm
This awesome they look really good.
I’m getting this as soon as i find a way to open these .sip files
March 9th, 2006 at 8:54 pm
I’m sure this is what you mean, but I want to clarify for the mac users out there - no need to restart your computer, just democracy. Cool tip!
March 9th, 2006 at 10:57 pm
Can anybody post the files under another format for win users like zip or rar?It would be really appreciated.
March 9th, 2006 at 11:15 pm
never mind even after i was able to extract, the png files didn’t open in windows and the instructions were all for mac.What a let down.
March 10th, 2006 at 7:02 am
kruykaze,
I am sorry that the Democracy makeover kit isn’t currently available for the Windows version. I haven’t had a chance to try Democracy on a PC yet. Check back at iconicon.net in a week or so and I will add a Democracy makeover kit for Windows.
Also, If anyone finds an easy way to replace the icons on the Windows version email me at: steven at iconicon.net and I will credit you on my site.
March 10th, 2006 at 12:11 pm
Thank you for the interest and effort Steven.
March 10th, 2006 at 12:12 pm
Could you post the icons on your site I could replace them manually.thx again.
March 11th, 2006 at 12:40 pm
Hey, the picture of the makeover kit is great! THANK YOU TO STEVE!! Too bad I am PC based, but I will definitely check back for the PC version. I had already sent an email to PCF that we either should have “skins” for the player or have someone do css files. It would nice to have an archive of css files. Hey, anyone want to write a tutorial on installing css files into the player? I would/will once I get better at it for myself.
March 11th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
I installed the icons, but they wouldn’t dispay properly in Democracy. i was getting odd results, with more icon bits that should be displayed. Am I alone in having this problem?
March 12th, 2006 at 8:49 am
Matt,
I just noticed the problem you mentioned. So, I have updated the icons to work with the newest Mac version of Democracy. I alos put together a zip file with just the png files for Windows users who want to replace them manually. You can download both at iconicon.net.