This is howto add "transparent" background to WRT widgets

[oxidative]

As discussed in this thread, there is currently no API available that would allow to let WRT widgets use the currently set skin and wallpaper.

There is however a way to perfectly fake this. The idea is to create two static images (one for landscape and one for portrait mode). These two images are then used in the widget as background images (defined via CSS). Note that those images will not be transparent, instead they look as if they were .



I've used this technique in my ComingNext HS widget. Here is a sample:



Now the difficult part is to create those two images. There is no WRT API to get the current wallpaper, neither is there a way to access the current skin graphics. However, this quite easy using a native C++ API. So I've created an application that will do just that: create two images using the current skin and wallpaper. You can give it a try here: ComingNext Skin Fetcher v1.0. The sourcecode is also available under the GPLv3 here.

Now to put this to the next level, an integration into ApiBridge would be awesome, so that we could use the functionality from within WRT widgets without the need for a separate application. Are there any information available on how to write ECOM plugins for use with ApiBridge? Anyone interested in helping developing on this?

[DeathBaba]

It would be nice to extend HS widgets api with background support. I think it's possible as symbian is already open source, so just check sources and propose good API solution (compatible with previous versions of course).
And note, that we have different background under each widget, so API should somehow take into account, where widget is placed and which rect it occupies.

[oxidative]

Added an official api for this is a good idea. However, this will not help the developers out there who need to work with the existing api for devices that exist today.

[oxidative]

For the record:

The new APIBridge package which contains the Plug-in creation package has now been released.

Get it from here.

We now also have a landing page:

http://www.forum.nokia.com/Tools_Doc...ons/APIBridge/

So it should now be possible to write a plugin for this functionallity.