Change the menu theme

STEP 1: REPLACING OLD IMAGES

1. Startup BREW Resource Editor and then goto File > Open or press ctrl+o and then locate guide.mainmenu.bar and click ok

2. Double click Objects and it will then list all of entries in the .bar which are essentially each individual image.

3. Single click Hex 5001 IDI_OBJECT_5001 and you will notice the right window change to load that entries information. You will see Source     Hex located below Attributes

4. Double click Hex which will activate a drop down menu and then select File. Below Source there should be Data

5. All set? Click Apply in the bottom right, or the changes you just made will not take effect.

6. Single click the empty white box to the right of Data, below File. It will then turn into an text input box with a [...] icon to the right of it.

7. Single click [...] and it will open a window where you need to select the image that you would like to replace the current image with.

Tip: If you need to locate the image by actually seeing it, like a preview, right mouse click inside the window and then goto View > Thumbnails

8. Locate and select the image that you will be replacing the old image with and then click open. You will notice in the bottom right hand corner that Object Preview is now displaying your new image.

9. All set? Click Apply in the bottom right, or the changes you just made will not take effect.

PAUSE Now repeat the same process for all the other images that you will be replacing to compile your own custom skin.

After changing all images for guide.mainmenu.bar you need to repeat this process on guide.bgtitle.bar which are the backgrounds behind the title of each menu tab.

After completing this process for all the images, return here for the next step: compilation.

STEP 2: COMPILING YOUR CUSTOM SKIN

Tip: Make sure that you have replaced all the images by making sure that under Data it has a path to your image. If it is blank, no image has been specified.

1. Goto File > Save As because now we need to save this .bar file as a .brx file so that BREW Resource Editor will allow us to compile the skin.

2. Select a location and then name your .brx something like mainmenu_yourskin.brx Although its not mandatory, it'll just be better for organizing and sharing your skin with the world.

3. Now that you've saved your new .bar as a .brx, BREW will allow you to compile your skin.

Goto Build > Compile Resource Script or Press F5

4. If all goes as well, it will say Successfully built specified resource script file. Your new mainmenu_yourskin.bar file has been created at the same location that you saved the .brx file to.

PAUSE Now repeat the same entire process (steps 1 and 2) for all other .bar that you will be customizing (such as yourskin_bgtitle.bar). After completing all the customizations to the .bar files, come back here to continue onto step 3: uploading.

STEP 3: UPLOADING YOUR CUSTOM SKIN TO YOUR PHONE

1. Connect your phone with the mini USB cable. Keep your phone closed, as we will be replacing the main menu's of the phone. If you are browsing for instance Get It Now, there could potentially be a problem during this process while uploading the new skin.

2. Install BitPim and then launch BitPim
In the top menu, goto View and then click View Filesystem

3. On the left hand side, Filesystem should appear below the Play List. Click on it. Now you'll see a folder with a plus and slash symbol in the center window. Kind of looks like +[ ]/    double click it or click the plus sign

4. This should load your phones filesystem. If you receive an error that it cant connect to your phone, simply unplug your phone and plug it back in, then click the plus sign again. Also for future notice, once you have the filesystem loaded and you experience this same error -- simply unplugging and plugging back in lets you continue what you were doing (useful for some of the following steps)



5. After successfully loading your filesystem:        o double click the brew folder        o double click the mod folder        o single click the app_mainmenu folder


6. In the right window, you should now see all the mainmenu_theme files. We're going to be replacing mainmenu_blue.bar -- we recommend that you save the original mainmenu_blue.bar to your computer by right mouse clicking it and selecting save. It will then download the file and ask you where you want to save it to. Select somewhere you will remember just in case you want to change it back to your original blue theme in the future.

7. Right mouse click mainmenu_blue.bar and select overwrite... now you need to locate the custom main menu .bar file that you would like to upload to your phone. It will now start to upload 1/2 of the skin to your phone.

If you receive and error that says the files are locked or access is denied, you need to restart your phone by turning it off and then back on OR right mouse clicking in the right window pane of bitpim and selecting reboot phone.

8. Now that you've uploaded that file, its time to upload the other 1/2 of the skin. We need to change directories, so its easiest to just click the [minus] - sign to the left of the mod folder to minimize that entire folder.

9. now single click on the sys folder. you should be at /brew/sys/ with 8 or 9 file in the right window pane.

10. locate blue_bgtitle.bar and backup the original blue_bgtitle.bar as described above (right mouse click > save > select location)

11. Now that you've backed up your original file its time to upload that second 1/2 of the skin. For some reason the phone seems to lock the system files after uploading the first 1/2 of the skin. So what you need to do is right mouse click the right window pane and select reboot phone

After your phone restarts and regains a connection (you will hear 2 usb chimes, both different sounds seperated by a few seconds) you're ready to go.

12. Right mouse click blue_bgtitle.bar and select overwrite... and then locate the custom bgtitle .bar file that you would like to upload to your phone.

13. Now open your phone, navigate to: Menu > Settings & Tools > Display > Display Themes > Blue -- then press the CLR button to go back to the menu.

14. SUCCESS! look at that sexyness! You've officially installed your own custom skin.
Feels good, dont it?

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