This article describes how to create a simple splash screen for your WPF application.

The class we will be using is System.Windows.SplashScreen. Make sure you have the image you need added in your project.

How to do it:

SplashScreen sp = new SplashScreen(“splashscreen.jpg”);

sp.Show(false);//Displays the splash screen. The boolean value is used to instruct the splash screen whether to close automatically or not.

Thread.Sleep(3000); //Just to make sure you can get a good look at it.

sp.Close(new TimeSpan(0,0,3)); //Specify how long it will take for the splash screen to fade after the Close operation has been called.

That’s it!

This article will describe a quick and easy way to insert a splash screen into your application project.

If you already have your application project created then please feel free to skip this step. Create a new project in Visual Studio by selecting File->New->Project->Visual C#->Windows Forms Application. In the form that appeared fill in the name of your application, if you’re planning to just try this tutorial as a demo i would say a suggestive name like “SplashScreenDemo”. After this, choose the folder in which the application will be saved.

Any Windows Forms Application (Winform) starts with a form named Form1. You will need to add a second form in order to perform the splash screen action. Go to your Solution Explorer->right click on your Project Name->Add->Windows Form.. In the form that appears fill in the name for your splash screen. I would again suggest a name like “SplashScreen”. Let’s get our hands through this form’s properties. You can do this by right clicking your SplashScreen form in designer view and choosing Properties:

• BackColor: please change this color to any opaque color. I chose White;
• BackgroundImage: here you should insert the image you want to appear as a splash screen. I suggest you use a PNG since it provides support for transparency (If not, please retake the previous step and change the BackColor to the image’s background color.);
• FormBorderStyle: none;
• StartPosition: CenterScreen;
• ShowInTaskbar: False;
• TransparencyKey: Transparent.

Ok. We have the elements we need to start this short and easy demo.

First, let’s go to Form1() constructor. You can do this by going to your Form1 designer->right click->Show source. Right after the InitializeComponent() method add the following code:

Thread splashThread = new Thread(new ThreadStart(ShowSplash));

splashThread.Start();

Thread.Sleep(2000);

splashThread.Abort();

I wanted to test the Adobe Photoshop (PSD) File import feature in Expression Blend3 for a while now and it  just worked flawlessly.  So I decided to take my plan one step further and create a sample Splash screen with my illustration files. You can find the final result by clicking on the image:

In order to observe the loading experience and get a chance to test a simple animation, I included two sample video files in the project. Therefore the initial loading is incredibly slow. The animation has no complicated tricks; it only manipulates the opacity property and runs forever in autoreverse mode. Actually it runs until you are hypnotized by all the blinking!

As for the progress bar, I basically used the same idea explained in the “Splash Screen in Silverlight 3“  article by  Diptimaya Patra. I track the download progress with a “onSourceDownloadProgressChanged” Javascript function and increase the size of the colored content based on the progress percentage.

A few tips+tricks

Splash Screen – Design

Your Splashscreen Xaml will be placed in your Web project folder, which will make it  available for display while your Silverlight app is downloading (loading). But once you try to open that file in Blend to do some fixes, you will discover that you don’t have the option to display it in design mode. In fact, while playing around with the animation, I copied my Splash screen Xaml file back and forth between the Web and Silverlight project folders. Not very practial, yet it works.

File Paths

The blinking belle is made up of several illustrations. When I placed the splash screen Xaml in my Web project folder, I had to reset the images’ source info and point the file path to the Web project folder.

Browser Cache

Despite enlarging the project file to test the splash screen,  it is sometimes necessary to clear the browser cache. In fact, once the content is cached by the browser, the slow loading experience might completely disappear.

Event Triggers

When you create an animation Storyboard through the Objects and Timeline panel in Expression Blend 3, the Storyboard will be placed as a resource in your Container (Grid/Canvas etc.). Since there is no option to start the Storyboard explicitly (except with Javascript), the Storyboard has to be attached to an object  with an event trigger. In this particular example, once the Grid is loaded the event trigger starts the animation:

<Grid.Triggers>
<EventTrigger RoutedEvent="Grid.Loaded">
    <BeginStoryboard>
      <Storyboard x:Name="Storyboard1" RepeatBehavior="Forever" AutoReverse="True">
        ........
        ........
        {ANIMATION Definitions}
        .......
        ........
      </Storyboard>
    </BeginStoryboard>
</EventTrigger>
</Grid.Triggers>

For further information on Silverlight Splash Screen scenarios and displaying animations, check out the Splash screen articles in the MSDN library.

credit to Zoel

Membuat splash screen, welcome page, intro, cover website, halaman muka, atau apapun istilahnya yang lain relatif mudah, tetapi karena menjadi tampilan pertama ketika pengunjung melihat website atau blog kita, splash screen menjadi sulit karena harus memenuhi syarat informatif dan eksklusif, baik dari segi konten, tampilan (desain layout) dan isi yang terkandung di dalamnya. Umumnya splash screen dibuat untuk mempromosikan produk terbaru, headline berita, event-event penting, dan hal-hal menarik lainnya.

Tampilan splash screen website resmi Manchester United

Splash screen pun bisa ditampilkan bagi blogger yang menggunakan WordPress sebagai CMS-nya, tentu dengan blog hosting sendiri, bukan di WP.com

Tampilan splash website Ongisnade.net (versi lama)

Berikut langkah-langkah membuat splash screen atau welcome page pada blog WordPress, cara ini saya gunakan pada website Ongisnade.net versi lama.

Langkah 1
Buat halaman splash terlebih dulu. Konsep desain, layout, link, hingga CSS atau PHP-nya anda atur sendiri sesuai kebutuhan. Simpan sebagai file home.php (atau home.html)

Langkah 2
Upload ke root direktori www anda

Langkah 3
Edit .htaccess yang terdapat pada root direktori

DirectoryIndex home.php index.php
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>

Selesai…

Sekarang, coba akses atau enter alamat URL anda, misal www.namaanda.com, dan lihat perubahannya. Mudah bukan? Website anda pun menjadi seperti website Manchester United atau Ongisnade.

Die CD-Cover von (K)Ubuntu 9.10 sind da:

Ubuntu 9.10

Altro indubbio elemento di fastidio (se pur lieve) nell’utilizzare Avira AntiVir come antivirus è sicuramente quello dello splash-screen all’avvio, vale a dire la comparsa ad ogni accensione del PC della finestrella con il logo del programma.

Come facilmente prevedibile, anche qui c’è un modo molto semplice per aggirare l’ostacolo:

> Andare in start > esegui…

> Digitare regedit e premere il tasto Invio

> Andare in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

> Fare doppio click sulla chiave avgnt

> Aggiungere /nosplash al termine del percorso pre-esistente  (ottenendo quindi una stringa simile a “C:\Program Files\Avira\AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic\avgnt.exe” /min /nosplash).

> Chiudere regedit

via Come rendere meno stressante AntiVir 8 – Geekissimo.

Introduction

In this article we will discuss about the Splash Screen in Silverlight 3.

If a Silverlight application is small, it will be downloaded quickly and appear in the browser. If a Silverlight application is large, it may take a few seconds to download. As long as your application takes longer than 500 milliseconds to download, Silverlight will show an animated splash screen.

Splash Screens can be used for the following purposes:

1. To show the Progress of downloading the xap file. (By Default)
2. Copyright Information
3. Custom Animation.

Crating Silverlight Project

Fire up Visual Studio 2008 and create a Silverlight Application. Name it as SplashScreenInSL3.

The built in Splash Screen is not that exciting. It simply displays a ring of blinking circles and the percentage of the application that’s been downloaded so far.

If you don’t like the stock splash screen, you can easily create your own. Essentially, a custom splash screen is a XAML file with the graphical content you want to display, and a dash of JavaScript code that updates the splash screen as the application is downloaded.

Add a new XAML file to your ASP.NET website (not the Silverlight project).

Choose the Silverlight JScript page template, enter a name, and click Add. This XAML file will hold the markup for your splash screen.

Add the following xaml code into it.

<Grid
xmlns=“http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007“

xmlns:x=“http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml“>

<StackPanel
VerticalAlignment=“Center“>

<Grid>

<Rectangle
x:Name=“progressBarBackground“
Fill=“White“
Stroke=“Black“
StrokeThickness=“1“
Height=“30“
Width=“200“></Rectangle>

<Rectangle
x:Name=“progressBar“
Fill=“Yellow“
Height=“28“
Width=“0“></Rectangle>

</Grid>

<TextBlock
x:Name=“progressText“
HorizontalAlignment=“Center“
Text=“0% downloaded …“></TextBlock>

</StackPanel>

</Grid>

Next, you need to add a JavaScript function to your ASPX entry page or ASP.NET test page. (If you plan on using both, place the JavaScript function in a separate file and then link to it in both files using the source attribute of the script block.) The JavaScript code can look up named elements on the page using the sender.findName() method, and manipulate their properties. It can also determine the current progress using the eventArgs.progress property. In this example, the event handling code simply updates the text and widens the progress bar based on the current progress percentage:

<script
type=”text/javascript”>

function onSourceDownloadProgressChanged(sender, eventArgs) {

sender.findName(“progressText”).Text = Math.round((eventArgs.progress * 100)) + “% downloaded …”;

sender.findName(“progressBar”).Width = eventArgs.progress * sender.findName(“progressBarBackground”).Width;

}

</script>

To use this splash screen, you need to add the splashscreensource parameter to identify your XAML splash screen and the onsourcedownloadprogresschanged parameter to hook up your JavaScript event handler. If you want to react when the download is finished, you can hook up a different JavaScript event handler using the onsourcedownloadcomplete parameter.

<object
data=”data:application/x-silverlight-2,” type=”application/x-silverlight-2″ width=”100%” height=”100%”>

<param
name=”source” value=”ClientBin/SplashScreenInSL3.xap”/>

     <param
name=”onError” value=”onSilverlightError”
/>

     <param
name=”background” value=”white”
/>

     <param
name=”minRuntimeVersion” value=”3.0.40624.0″
/>

     <param
name=”autoUpgrade” value=”true”
/>

     <param
name=”splashscreensource” value=”MySplashScreen.xaml”
/>

     <param
name=”onsourcedownloadprogresschanged” value=”onSourceDownloadProgressChanged”
/>

<a
href=”http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=149156&v=3.0.40624.0″ style=”text-decoration:none”>

<img
src=”http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=108181″ alt=”Get Microsoft Silverlight” style=”border-style:none”/>

</a>

</object>

That’s it run your application to test your Splash Screen. If you still don’t see your Splash Screen that is because your page is loading in 500 milli seconds. To see the splash screen build your sample application and this time you will be able to see it.

Remember this is a sample Splash Screen. You can make your own Splash Screen.

Enjoy Coding.

Este es un sencillo tip para cambiar tu pantalla de inicio de Openoffice a algo como ésto:

Para lograrlo sólo sigue los siguientes pasos:

• Descarga tu pantalla de inicio de Openoffice.org. Te recomiendo ésta
• Inicia Nautilus con privilegios de administrador. Para hacerlo abre una terminal y escribe sudo nautilus
• Dirígete a la carpeta donde descargaste el tema y cópialo. Ahora pégalo sin salir de Nautilus como administrador en /usr/lib/openoffice/program/. Reemplaza el archivo llamado openintro_ubuntu_sun.bmp por el archivo que descargaste
• ¡Y listo!

Membuat splash screen, welcome page, intro, cover website, halaman muka, atau apapun istilahnya yang lain relatif mudah, tetapi karena menjadi tampilan pertama ketika pengunjung melihat website atau blog kita, splash screen menjadi sulit karena harus memenuhi syarat informatif dan eksklusif, baik dari segi konten, tampilan (desain layout) dan isi yang terkandung di dalamnya. Umumnya splash screen dibuat untuk mempromosikan produk terbaru, headline berita, event-event penting, dan hal-hal menarik lainnya.

Splash screen pun bisa ditampilkan bagi blogger yang menggunakan WordPress sebagai CMS-nya, tentu dengan blog hosting sendiri, bukan di WP.com

Berikut langkah-langkah membuat splash screen atau welcome page pada blog WordPress, cara ini saya gunakan pada website Ongisnade.net versi lama.

Langkah 1
Buat halaman splash terlebih dulu. Konsep desain, layout, link, hingga CSS atau PHP-nya anda atur sendiri sesuai kebutuhan. Simpan sebagai file home.php (atau home.html)

Langkah 2
Upload ke root direktori www anda

Langkah 3
Edit .htaccess yang terdapat pada root direktori

Working on Java Swing is sometimes not the easiest! Today I came across a problem with the Java6 Splash-Screen feature where you can define the splash screen in the manifest file. I wanted to see when the splash screen gets shown and when it gets disposed. The screen really gets shown when the JVM starts, so its good to use it for showing feedback while initialization. And the screen gets disposed as soon as the first window, may it be a frame or dialog, gets shown.

But nothing comes for free, a problem occured as I added class-path entries to the manifest.  The splash screen was not shown! So I played around with a dozen of combinations in the manifest file. The outcome is that if the Splashscreen-Image entry is after the Class-Path entry no splash screen will be shown! So always keep you entry for the splash screen at the top of the manifest file.

The following is a quick tutorial on how to create a single executable for a java application using WinRun4J. We will also give it a splash screen.

To start download WinRun4J.

Now unzip it into any folder, create a new directory called winrun4j and copy:

• WinRun4J.exe
• WinRun4J.jar
• WinRun4JTest.jar
• WinRun4J.ini
• SplashScreen.gif
• RCEDIT.exe

You should now have a folder that looks like this:

Now create a console window and change directory to your winrun4j folder:

Now its time to use RCEDIT to embed the files into the WinRun4J executable. If you run RCEDIT you should see the following output:

F:\winrun4j>RCEDIT.exe
WinRun4J Resource Editor v1.0 (winrun4j.sf.net)

Edits resources in executables (EXE) and dynamic link-libraries (DLL).

RCEDIT   [resource]

  filename      Specifies the filename of the EXE/DLL.
  resource      Specifies the name of the resource to add to the EXE/DLL.
  /I            Set the icon as the default icon for the executable.
  /A            Adds an icon to the EXE/DLL.
  /N            Sets the INI file.
  /J            Adds a JAR file.
  /E            Extracts a JAR file from the EXE/DLL.
  /S            Sets the splash image.
  /H            Adds an HTML file the EXE/DLL.
  /C            Clears all resources from the EXE/DLL.
  /L            Lists the resources in the EXE/DLL.
  /P            Outputs the contents of the INI file in the EXE.

F:\winrun4j>

So to embed the JAR files we need to run the following command:

F:\winrun4j>RCEDIT.exe /J WinRun4J.exe WinRun4J.jar

And:

F:\winrun4j>RCEDIT.exe /J WinRun4J.exe WinRun4JTest.jar

Now we need to edit the WinRun4J.ini file to contain the necessary instructions (or in this case remove the unnecessary ones). After editing it should look like this:

main.class=org.boris.winrun4j.test.WinRunTest

Now we are ready to embed this file into the executable:

F:\winrun4j>RCEDIT.exe /N WinRun4J.exe WinRun4J.ini

The last thing we want to do is embed the splash screen:

F:\winrun4j>RCEDIT.exe /S WinRun4J.exe SplashScreen.gif

You should see that the WinRun4J.exe file has increased in size:

You should now be able to double click on the WinRun4J.exe and launch the java application:

To check that there are no magic tricks you can delete the other files (i.e. WinRun4J.jar, WinRun4J.ini, SplashScreen.gif, WinRun4JTest.jar and RCEDIT.exe). You only need the executable.

That’s all folks.

A new version of WinRun4J is now available (v0.3.0). The changes and new features are:

• Added log.overwrite option for log files
• Fixed log file logging
• Added process.priority option to set process priority on startup
• Fixed shutdown bug on service mode
• Added ability to write text to splash screen
• Fixes for splash screen loading in 64 bit mode
• Improved window attributes on splash screen
• Further improvements to diagnostics

Download at the WinRun4J Sourceforge Site.

Because the countdown is running for the next Blender release – the last one before the big step of 2.50 – there also is a splash screen contest started by Ton. The winner-entry will appear in the 2.49 release of Blender, presumably containing the following changes:

• bugfixes
  
• etch a ton
  
• texture nodes
  
• video textures in the game engine
  
• projection painting
  
• JPEG 2000 support
  
• further improvements of the game engine (update for Bullet Physics, …)
  

The deadline for the entries is Sunday the 19th at 14:00 UTC – probably directly before the release of release candidate 1. Find more information about it and the rules (and post your entries) at the official thread on Blender Artists Forums.

I hope many people will participate – and I hope I will be among them. I try to make an entry – although the time is a bit short to create something totally new, it is no problem to modify some older project to fit in the template.

Wilber will be surly missed.

GIMP is a versatile graphics manipulation package. This page should help you get a taste of what GIMP is capable of. You can also have a look at our introduction page or browse through the tutorials.http://www.gimp.org/