How to Create a Windows Media Player Skin

binary code

Writing a skin for Windows Media Player is very much like coding a Web page in HTML. It is not easy, but with a little practice you'll begin to see how the code comes together and what you can do to modify it to your chosen design or style. Media Player skin files are called "Windows media skin," or .wms files, which you can code in Windows Notepad.

Instructions

1. Open Notepad.

2. Paste the code below into your file. This is the start of your skin file:

   <THEME title="Skin Title" author="Me" copyright="©whatever" id="skin" >

   <VIEW id="main" titleBar="false" resizable="false" backgroundImage="background.bmp" clippingcolor="#00FF00" >

   </VIEW>

   </THEME>

3. Change or personalize the "title," "author" and "copyright" field to whatever you'd like.

4. Change the "background image" to whatever image file you'd like and the "clipping color" to your preferred color, using hex code.

5. Insert the below code in Notepad under the Step 2 code:

   <VIEW><buttongroup mappingimage="map.bmp" hoverimage="hover.bmp" >

   <PLAYELEMENT mappingColor="#00FF00" />

   <STOPELEMENT mappingColor="#FF0000" />

   <NEXTELEMENT mappingColor="#00FFFF" />

   <PREVELEMENT mappingColor="#FF00FF" />

   <PAUSEELEMENT mappingcolor="#FFFF00" />

   </buttongroup></VIEW>

6. Save the file with any name you'd like with the extension .wms to "C:\Program Files\Windows Media Player\Skins\." It will be available the next time you open Windows Media Player.

References

• Customize: How To Create Windows Media Player Skins