Usability vs. Creativity

And color fun..

Published on July 24, 2006 By Frogboy In OS Customization

One of the age old questions in computer customization is what looks good?

This is a skin I've been using. Yea, it has gigantic borders and it's not nearly as usable as many other skins. But for me...It's fun. It's neat. It's different.

In the old days, a skin like this would slow my computer way down. But as software such as WindowBlinds gets better and hardware gets faster, there's really no penalty anymore. You really have the freedom to do some weird stuff with your computer.

I also wonder how many WindowBlinds users remember to take advantage of the fact that you can change the color and gamma of a skin so that even if the original author makes a skin too light or too dark or just a strange color that you can change it.

Now if only I could find a matching ObjectDock skin.

Comments

Sea Hourse

on Jul 25, 2006

Good points. I have a collection of WBs that I refuse to throw away but I never can seem to tolerate them more than a short while. My biggest objection to some skins is when the main part of the window is of a color or shade that makes it virtually impossible to read the type. Deep grey or brown just doesn't work. I know some people get sick of a white interior but at least it is useable. Someone once posted a way to change your interior color but I couldn't seem to make it work. Maybe another person knows how. One other problem I run into is where the font size radically changes in different parts of the skin. It means going through each area and trying to adjust the font size so that they all work together. Why this happens with a few skins but not the majority is one of those mysteries of the universe. Again, maybe this is a personal problem that doesn't bother others but I definitely notice it.

aufisch

on Jul 25, 2006

I for myself use the "fun"-skins for much shorter times than the "useful" skins.

The fun-skins usually reflect my current mood as well as the season and/or holidays. I keep a heap of them around and I switch dem often. For me they are a pleasure to look at whenever I boot up my computer and they often lift my spirit.

As soon as I have a lot of computer-work to do, espceially things like Excel-calculations and Databanking, I find myself going back to the sleek, and stylisch/functional skins (never ever to Windows classic though

).

But then there is the next holiday or a change in my mood....

thomassen

on Jul 25, 2006

I use the colour changing feature in WB whenever I wan't to tweak the colour of a skin. Too bad that you have to force colour every skin. Can't remember last time I found a skin that supported colour variations. And I find that odd as there's quite a few skins where the author has included four - five colour variation when he/she could have set up colour masks instead and given the full power to the user.

BoXXi

on Jul 25, 2006

Yea, it has gigantic borders

Nah.... those borders are small! I think I still hold the record for the fattest Titlebar........ "Cerulean Jewels"..... now THOSE are fat bars!! hahaha.

Bring back fat titlebars...... they rule!

Frogboy

on Jul 25, 2006

heh!

GhoS

on Jul 28, 2006

Many skins I try to use just simply fail when it comes to day to day usage. Either the fonts aren't very readible or the colors don't work for me. Some are simply because my machine simply can't handle transparencies well. So I stick to the mor functional ones than the "fun" ones.
Though I go through phases as well. I was on a blue kick for awhile, every skin I used or like was mostly of a blue shade. Now I am on a darker skin phase.
I rarely use the color changing because I haven't found with the skins I use that it works well. It creates portions of the skin that are ugly. However I agree there are skins out there that should support the color changing instead of supplying multiple skins.

I.R. Brainiac

on Jul 28, 2006

Hmmmmmmmmm...functionality vs. creativity?Heheheh,no contest.

I'm with Boxxi,nothing wrong with big.

Boxxi probably has me beat,but only because I reduced Plasmatron titlebar to 45 pixels.

Brad a good testament to how well OD progs work...I run WB5,3 widgets,CursorXP,Object Dock on a 498mhz laptop no prob.

I.R. Brainiac

on Jul 28, 2006

Oh and thats a 4mb video card.

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