AIR Custom Chrome v.03
It’s been a while since I released a new version of my AIR Custom Chrome, so I thought I would update it with a couple new features. I won’t get into the theory behind these enhancements just yet. But I wanted to release this to the public and get your thoughts. Keep in mind that I am not an engineer, just a designer that loves to tinker. So you may find some glitches (other features). Special thanks goes out to Daniel Wabyick who first introduced me to this approach.
- OS specific windowing controls - Detects the operating system and places the windowing controls in the appropriate location.
- Light & dark themes - Right click to “View Source” to view the project source files.
- Synchronization - Click on the status icon/Led to change the state of the connection icon. You can spawn the synchronization preferences HUD by clicking on the general area.
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*The “Source” is available by right-clicking and selecting ‘view-source’ in the application.**This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.
September 16th, 2008 at 1:03 am
Wow… sweet skin. Inspires me to build some random app just so I can use it
September 16th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
Thanks John.
September 17th, 2008 at 12:38 am
Very nice going to use this for a current project
will have to modify colors slightly for my style but you’ve made that easy enough to do 
September 17th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Thanks Wael. Feel free to expand upon these examples. Consider these a starting point to get you up and running with relative ease. Shoot me a link if to your project when it’s appropriate. Take care.
September 18th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
i installed the air apps and i can not find the source of it , how i can use this apps?
September 18th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Hi, Saeed:
You will have to “Right-Cick” and select “View Source”. This will then spawn the source view of the applications. At which time you then “Download Source”
** One thing to note. It seems as though the full source is available in the “Dark” theme.
September 26th, 2008 at 12:24 am
ypeError: Error #1009: Cannot access a property or method of a null object reference.
at com.xd.components.chrome::AppControlBar_light/detectOS()[D:\E_AIR\A_CustomChrome\src\com\xd\components\chrome\AppControlBar_light.mxml:19]
repair to ===>
private function detectOS():void {
if(Capabilities.os.search(”Mac”) >= 0){
trace(”I am on a Mac”);
whichControls.selectedIndex = 0;
macWindowControls.visible = true;
} else {
if(winWindowControls){ //
September 26th, 2008 at 5:40 am
I have installed the dark version but there is error there is an error when i try to download the source. Page error and cant find the download. Any ideas?
September 29th, 2008 at 8:54 am
HI, Bobo & Lib:
Lib - Thanks for the code suggestion, I will look into this when I come up for air
Bobo - Not sure why you are having this issue. I will troubleshoot and see if I can recreate this error. If you could provide me with a bit more info on your OS, version of AIR, etc.. I will try and recreate this error and make the necessary adjustments.
Thanks everyone!
November 25th, 2008 at 6:30 am
@lib with your code correction the winWindowControls never shows up.
I did this:
private function detectOS():void {
if(Capabilities.os.search(”Mac”) >= 0){
trace(”I am on a Mac”);
whichControls.selectedIndex = 0;
macWindowControls.visible = true;
} else {
var winWindowControls:AppWindowControls = new AppWindowControls();
winApplicationBar.addChild(winWindowControls);
trace(”I am on a PC”);
whichControls.selectedIndex = 1;
winWindowControls.visible = true;
}
}
and commented out
and it works fine.
thanks Brett
November 30th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
Thanks for feedback and code snippets. I will make sure to adjust this in my project. Thanks again everyone!
February 18th, 2009 at 2:39 pm
thank you for the excellent example! Can you tell me how this would work in a multi-window application? I want to try adding “heads-up display” type tool palettes which would have a width below the minimum allowed OS width (they need to be 20px or so). I know I can do that with a transparent window, but is there a way using your elegant method to give it “chrome” consistent with the main window?
February 24th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
Great apps! I tried downloading the Source from both versions and got an error. It was looking for the source files as if they were on my C drive instead of from a URL.
July 16th, 2009 at 7:35 am
Amazing Chromes !! I am a designer myself and have made my own chrome, but don’t know how to implement it perfectly, so I will be going through your code
And Nice blog, love it!