Dark Flat Skin

A skin¹ for jivelite with a different look, extra information on the Now Playing screen (rating, year, status icons, audio meta data, lyrics) and the option to rate a track directly on the Now Playing screen.

For devices running piCorePlayer, SqueezePlay and SB Touch².

Note

To check the currently installed version go to Settings > Screen > Dark Flat Skin.

⬅️ Back to the list of all plugins

Features

• display more information on the Now Playing screen(s):

  • rating, year, genre³

  • status icons

    • = is lossless
    • = has lyrics
    • = has a custom start/stop time that the CSST plugin can use
    • = is a remote track (replaced by streaming service icon if track is part of the LMS library)

  • audio meta data (content type, bitrate, sample rate/size)

  • NowPlaying screen with lyrics (SqueezePlay and piCorePlayer)
    

• rate the current track directly on the Now Playing screen (Ratings Light plugin required)

• option to replace the Shuffle and Repeat buttons with (half-star) rating buttons

• option to hide the Shuffle button and / or the Repeat button (will increase width of Play, Fwd and Rew buttons)

• easy way to install and uninstall the skin using an installer applet
  

• display the track title in a different color if the track's comments tag contains a user-specified keyword
  

• different look (flat, dark)
  

This skin comes with the usual VU meters and the default spectrum visualizer. If you're more interested in VU meters and spectrum visualizers, there are other, more suitable skins.

The settings are split between Settings > Screen > Now Playing and Settings > Screen > Dark Flat Skin.

Screenshots³

Grid skin (home menu) - piCorePlayer only

Installation

First you install the skin installer applet which you will then use to install the skin.

#1 - Get the installer

• Make sure that your LMS and your device have internet access.
  

• Go to Settings > Advanced > Applet Installer.
  

• Select and install the Dark Flat Skin Installer. Then:
  

  • piCorePlayer: restart jivelite by using the Quit button.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

#2 - Install the skin

• You should see a new menu item called Dark Flat Skin Installer at the top of the home menu.
  

• Follow the menu instructions. To complete the installation:

  • piCorePlayer: jivelite will restart automatically. Does not require a piCorePlayer reboot.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.
    

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

#3 - Enable the Dark Flat Skin

• Go to Settings > Screen > Select skin to enable the Dark Flat Skin.

• Browse the FAQ article headlines on this page.
  
  
  

Updating to a newer version

#1 - Get the update

• Go to Settings > Advanced > Applet Installer.
  

• Select and update the Dark Flat Skin Installer. Then:
  

  • piCorePlayer: restart jivelite by using the Quit button.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

#2 - Update the skin

• You should see a new menu item called Dark Flat Skin Updater at the top of the home menu.
  

• Follow the menu instructions. To complete the installation:

  • piCorePlayer: jivelite will restart automatically. Does not require a piCorePlayer reboot.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.
    

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

#3 - Enable the Dark Flat Skin

• Only if it isn't enabled already: Go to Settings > Screen > Select skin to enable the Dark Flat Skin.

Uninstalling the skin

#1 - Remove Dark Flat Skin Installer from the list of installed applets

• Go to Settings > Advanced > Applet Installer.
  

• Select and remove the Dark Flat Skin Installer. Then:
  

  • piCorePlayer: restart jivelite by using the Quit button.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

#2 - Remove the skin

• Enable a different skin.

• Go to Settings > Advanced > Uninstall Dark Flat Skin and follow the menu instructions.

  • piCorePlayer: jivelite will restart automatically. No reboot necessary.
    

  • SqueezePlay: quit and restart SqueezePlay manually.
    

  • SB Touch: your device will reboot automatically.
    
    

FAQ

»I've used the Applet Installer to install/update the Dark Flat Skin Installer but there's no menu item with this name.«

Confirm that your device has (unlimited) access to the internet. The jivelite Applet Installer (Settings > Advanced > Applet Installer) gets the list of available applets from your (local) LMS server. Your device will then (try to) download the applet directly from the source (URL).

»The Applet Installer doesn't show me the latest applet version.«

• Go to Settings -> Advanced -> Applet Installer and confirm that Recommended Applets Only is disabled.
  

• Confirm that your server and device both have internet access.
  

• If it's a caching problem, try this:
  

  • reload the LMS Settings -> Manage Plugins page so the server has the latest list of available applets
    

  • if you enter the Settings -> Advanced -> Applet Installer menu and it doesn't show the latest update, exit the menu and wait a couple of minutes before calling it again.

»I can't open the Screen > NowPlaying > NowPlaying Views menu.«

This is a jivelite quirk that's not tied to any skin in particular. Just enter the NowPlaying screen using the top right note icon. Then go back and try again. That usually solves it. If not, make sure that you have selected a player and that this player is connected.

»How do I switch to next NowPlaying screen from the lyrics NowPlaying screen?«

You need to click/touch the track title in the title bar. The lyrics (text) cannot be used for that because you can scroll up or down in the song lyrics using click-hold/touch-hold.

»I have changed some skin settings. When I go to the Now Playing screen immediately afterwards, the Now Playing screen does not display the changes, the screen layout is wrong or the buttons don't work as they should.«

Sometimes you need to switch to another Now Playing view before the changes take effect.

»Clicking/touching the stars on the NowPlaying screen does not change the rating. Why?«
»How Do I unrate a track on the NowPlaying screen?«
»How do I change the track rating by half a star on the NowPlaying screen?«

To rate a track directly on the Now Playing screen, the track must be part of the LMS library (applies to local and remote/online tracks). And you need the Ratings Light plugin. Make sure the Now Playing screen setting Rate tracks directly on screen is enabled.

To unrate a track click/touch the space to the left or right of the rating stars. Since the space to the left of the rating stars is quite small on Now Playing views with artwork, it's probably better to click/touch the space to the right (about 40px wide).

Alternatively or additionally, you can replace the Shuffle and Repeat buttons on Now Playing views that display track ratings with rating buttons that will increase or decrease the track rating by half a star. This setting is not enabled by default and can be change here: Settings > Screen > Dark Flat Skin.

»I've selected a different VU meter design but it still displays the old one.«

Please note: on piCorePlayer, the VU meter you select for the Dark Flat Skin is also used by the Dark Flat Grid Skin. You can't set a different VU meter for the Grid skin.

For guaranteed success:

• SqueezePlay: restart SqueezePlay.
  On Windows (and possibly Linux) selecting a different VU meter requires admin privileges. Please read the corresponding FAQ article below
  

• piCorePlayer: use the Quit button to restart jivelite.
  

• SB Touch: reboot your device.
  
  

Works sometimes:

• Go to Settings > Screen > NowPlaying > NowPlaying views.
  

• Deselect the analog VU meter view.

• Exit the menu.

• Then reenter the menu and select the analog VU meter view again.

»SQUEEZEPLAY on WINDOWS and LINUX«

WINDOWS:
Installing and uninstalling the skin and changing the VU meter design require admin privileges on Windows, i.e. you need to `run SqueezePlay as admin` to install, uninstall or change the VU meter design.

The installer has to rename files in and copy files to the NowPlaying and Clock applet folders in the protected jive applet folder. And on Windows, creating symbolic links (to change the VU meter design) seems to require admin privileges too.

LINUX:
It probably depends on where you've installed SqueezePlay. The installer requires write permissions (755) to rename files in and copy files to the NowPlaying and Clock applet folders in the jive applet folder.
If you install the skin using sudo, it will install the userpath skin files in the root user's home folder. And nobody wants to run SqueezePlay as root all the time.
So either the installer can write to the jive applet folder or you install the applet (files) manually.

»SB Touch: after a reboot the device seems to fall back to the WQVGAsmallSkin skin. Selecting the Dark Flat Skin doesn't stick.«

The SB Touch knows 3 different skins settings: Touch Skin, Remote Skin, and just ”Skin”. The GUI menus will let you change the Touch and the Remote skin type but not the type “Skin“ which resets to WQVGAsmallSkin after every reboot.
However, it's easy to fix:

• go to Settings > Screen > Select skin > Touch Skin
  

• select WQVGAsmallSkin
  

• and then select Dark Flat Skin again.
  
  

It's a trade-off: Dark Flat Skin is a stand-alone/separate applet that's easy to install/uninstall. But that causes quirks like this one. It only happens after a reboot. So decide for yourself if you think it's worth it.

»piCorePlayer & SB Touch: My device is stuck in a jivelite reboot loop.«

If the installation / update didn't complete successfully or if you manually deleted skin files or folders, jivelite will still try to load the (missing or damaged) Dark Flat Skin. Instead of doing a factory reset, you can try to log in to your device and repair this:

• enable remote (SSH) access to your Touch (Settings > Advanced) or piCorePlayer (pCP Web UI > Main > Security) and log in to your device.
  

• change to the the user settings folder:
  

  • on the Touch: cd /etc/squeezeplay/userpath/settings
    

  • on piCorePlayer: cd /home/tc/.jivelite/userpath/settings
    

• open the settings file called SelectSkin.lua with your default editor (vi or nano) (on piCorePlayer you need to use sudo).

• change the selected skin in that file to the default skin:
  - Touch: skin="WQVGAsmallSkin"
  - piCorePlayer: skin="JogglerSkin"
  

• save your changes to that file
  

• piCorePlayer only: do a backup using pcp bu
  

• reboot your device.

»If I can't use the DFS uninstaller (Settings > Advanced), how do I manually clean up the files added or modified by the DFS installer on my device?«

SqueezePlay: locate the user applets folder with the DarkFlatSkin folders, the path ends with `/userpath/applets/`. Delete all folders whose names start with `DarkFlatSkin`. Then delete and reinstall the SqueezePlay app.

The steps below only apply to piCorePlayer and Touch:

• enable remote (SSH) access to your Touch (Settings > Advanced) or piCorePlayer (pCP Web UI > Main > Security) and log in to your device.
  

• you need these applet folder path(s):
  

  • Touch: all applets are installed to the same folder: /usr/share/jive/applets/
    

  • piCorePlayer: you only need the user applets folder: /home/tc/.jivelite/userpath/applets/
    

• delete all folders starting with DarkFlatSkin
  

• piCorePlayer only: delete the NowPlaying and Clock folders in the user applets folder as well.

• Touch only: have a look at the NowPlaying and the Clock folders.
  

  • in the NowPlaying applet folder:
    if you have a file called NowPlayingApplet.lua_ORG in this folder, delete the file NowPlayingApplet.lua and then rename NowPlayingApplet.lua_ORG to NowPlayingApplet.lua.
    Do the same with NowPlayingMeta.lua_ORG and strings.txt_ORG.
    

  • in the Clock applet folder:
    if you have ClockApplet.lua_ORG in the this folder, delete ClockApplet.lua and then rename ClockApplet.lua_ORG to ClockApplet.lua.

• piCorePlayer only: if there's a file called /opt/bootlocal.sh.orig in the /opt folder, delete the file called bootlocal.sh in that folder and rename /opt/bootlocal.sh.orig to /opt/bootlocal.sh.
  You can also delete this file: /home/tc/darkflatskin_bootscript.sh.
  

• piCorePlayer only: do a backup using pcp bu
  

• reboot your device.

»piCorePlayer: I've enabled the analog VU meter and spectrum visualizer NowPlaying views but when I toggle through the NowPlaying views, these two are missing.«

The VU meter and spectrum visualizer are only displayed if the device running jivelite is also a local player (e.g. if you have SqueezeLite running on your piCorePlayer device).

Reporting a new issue

If you want to report a new issue, please fill out this issue report template.

If you'd like me to make small changes to the skin, please test the new changes on your device/OS first and then create a pull request with the changes here.

If you use this applet and like it, perhaps you could give it a ⭐ so that other users can discover it (in their News Feed). Thank you.

Footnotes

1. Based on JogglerSkin (piCorePlayer, SqueezePlay) and WQVGAsmallSkin (SB Touch). ↩

2. I don't own a SB Touch device. So I can't troubleshoot issues of the SB Touch version beyond UI issues. For known issues on SB Touch devices, please see the FAQ. ↩

3. Genre is only displayed on piCorePayer and SqueezePlay. Not enough screen space on SB Touch. ↩ ↩²