text:
My recipe as seen on Maple Syrup World. where you will find an exclusive 10% Off coupon code: MORETHANBURNTTOAST, valid for 20 orders on all their products
So perhaps it is the crocuses, the slightly warmer days, the lengthening hours of light that makes April a month that dreams are made of. Why not dream of starting your day off at a sidewalk cafe in Paris and watching the day go by. In France you won't find French Toast on the menu, just order Pain Perdu.
Spring won't let me stay in this condo any longer! I must get out and breath the air deeply again. That's when I turn to quick and easy dishes like French toast to start a sun-filled relaxing Sunday off to perfection. With it's caramelized buttery exterior and a custardy interior it makes for a sinful Sunday morning treat. As we follow the natural course from winter into spring, our bodies welcome transitional recipes like this one that warm us to the core and prepare us for a fresh start now that Spring has arrived!
There are two things that I miss about living in Southern Ontario...the kaleidoscope of autumn leaves on a Sunday drive or gentle hike through the countryside... and secondly the run of maple syrup in early Spring. Growing up in Southern Ontario the one thing that was constant was our annual trip to the sugar bush. There are few smells as sweet as the aromas coming from a rustic, wood-planked sugar house, with the one possible exception being this adult-inspired French toast I sometimes prepare on Sundays.
I seem to migrate back to Ontario every 5 years to visit my family so as an ode to Ontario with its rolling hills, multitude of lakes, world class cities and multicultural diversity I decided to relish in the rebirth of Spring and have French Toast.
Start with a good baguette sliced on the bias and dipped into a mixture of egg, whole milk, Icewine and vanilla. The slices are then pan-fried in butter and drizzled with a grown-up combination of Icewine and maple syrup and finally dusted with powdered sugar. If you don't have Icewine tthere is no reason you could not use a good quality very sweet dessert wine or late harvest wine.
Now it's time to go for a hike to wear off this carb-induced coma!!!
Addendum: I had several questions asking about Ice Wine which is the valley's most celebrated offering. Eiswein or Icewine was invented in Germany in 1794. Icewine is a rare dessert wine produced in the Okanagan and Niagara Regions from the juice of naturally frozen grapes that have been picked in the middle of a cold Canadian winter. This intense, gorgeous nectar is made by leaving grapes on the vine through a frost, after which they are promptly picked and pressed. They must be picked at temperatures at least -10ºC, with the grapes frozen on the vine and hand-picked in the middle of the cold Canadian night. Once picked, the grapes are pressed immediately while still frozen. Each frozen grape creates just one drop of ice wine. One smooth, rich luxurious drop. Imagine a kaleidoscope of peaches, nectarines, apricots, and honey. Its opulent flavours are balanced by crisp acidity. Among the dozens of types of dessert wines in the world, my absolute favorite is Icewine.
The world's leading producer of Icewine is Canada, followed by Germany and then Austria. Because of the concentrated taste, ice wine is one of the most elegant and refined dessert wines. I often fill a Bernard Callebaut chocolate cup with Icewine and dessert is simple and delicious. Because the wine is so intense, a typical serving is just one ounce.You'll probably pay more than $50 for a tall, skinny bottle of ice wine, but just about every Okanagan winery makes its own signature variety. Optimal weather conditions can never be assured, so true ice wine is a real treat. The cold blast of winter arrived early last year so it was a stellar year for production.
**Vanilla-Infused Icewine Pain Perdu**
- 1 egg lightly beaten
- 2 egg whites
- 3 tbsp Icewine
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
- ½ cup whole milk
- 1 tbsp unsalted butter
- 8 thick slices baguette, cut on a diagonal
- 1 cup pure maple syrup
- ½ cup Icewine
- Garnish icing sugar for dusting


text:
The minute I saw Helene's wonderful rolls I knew I had to make them – my dad is absolutely crazy for dulce de leche!
So I invited dad, my brother and my sister to have dinner at my house. I baked the bread and left it on the dinner table, while I was making the pizzas in the kitchen. You should have seen the look on his face when he arrived and saw the rolls… He immediately asked what those were and I said they were dulce de leche rolls that I had made especially for him. The man was thrilled!
And so was my 13-year-old sister – I saw her whispering something to my father and asked what was going on. He told me that she was asking if she could get some of those for herself. :)
She told me later that she took the rolls to school and had them as a snack during class recess – but she had to share them with a friend, who asked to have some! :)
Helene, this recipe is absolutely divine: the buttery dough is very tender and soft and the filling complements it perfectly. Thank you so much for sharing!
Dulce de leche brioche rolls
80ml (1/3 cup) warm water
80ml (1/3 cup) warm milk
14g (5 teaspoons - 2 envelopes) dry yeast
525g (3 ¾ cups) all purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
3 large eggs
50g (¼ cup) sugar
340g (1 ½ cups - 3 sticks) unsalted butter, each stick cut into 4 pieces, room temperature
approx. 300g (1 cup) dulce de leche, room temperature
1 egg, beaten to blend with 1 tablespoon water
Place warm water, warm milk, and yeast in a bowl of standing heavy-duty mixer - I don't own one so I used my old and not so heavy standing mixer, with the beaters that look like springs - stir until yeast dissolves. Fit mixer with dough hook. Add flour and salt to bowl; mix on low speed just until flour is moistened, about 10 seconds. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl.
Beat in 3 eggs on low speed, then add sugar. Increase speed to medium and beat until dough comes together, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low. Add butter, 1 piece at a time, beating until each piece is almost incorporated before adding next (dough will be soft and batter-like). Increase speed to medium-high and beat until dough pulls away from sides of bowl, about 7 minutes.
Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rise at room temperature until almost doubled in volume, about 1 hour. Lift up dough around edges and allow dough to fall and deflate in bowl.
Cover bowl with plastic and chill until dough stops rising, lifting up dough around edges and allowing dough to fall and deflate in bowl every 30 minutes, about 2 hours total. Cover bowl with plastic and refrigerate an hour.
Take the dough out of the fridge and divide in half.
For the buns: roll out the dough to a 35x22cm (14x9in) rectangle. Spread the dulce de leche leaving a 2.5cm (1in) border. Roll into a log and cut into 12 pieces. Place them in a buttered 22.5cm (9in) round pan, cover and refrigerate until the next morning. The dough will rise slowly overnight.*
In the morning, bake at 175ºC/350ºF for 20-25 minutes.
You can repeat with the other half or make a brioche loaf – like Helene did.
* I halved the recipe, baked the rolls in a 25cm round pan and l let them rise for 1 hour baking them instead of refrigerating them until the next day.
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Dulce de leche brioche rolls
46 comments:
- Gattina Cheung said...
I wish you could see my face ... my whole jaw locked with drool hanging down!!! Aren't these rolls gorgeous!!!! Sticky sweet and buttery, I need to indulge myself!!!
- May 08, 2007
- Helene said...
I m thrilled you liked them and they worked out for you. I love the whole messiness of the process.
- May 08, 2007
- JB said...
These look so awesome. I want to make them, but I'm embarassed to admit I don't know what Dulce de Leche, I mean I can translate it, but I don't know what it is. JB
- May 08, 2007
- Valentina said...
Pat, I sendon Gattina. Jaw down on the floor. Awesome little rolls.
- May 08, 2007
- Tatter said...
My, my, Patricia...I LOVE dulce de leche...nice pic! Love...
- May 08, 2007
- Unknown said...
Beautiful, Patricia! They sound like heaven!
- May 08, 2007
- Anh said...
Beautiful Pat! I have been longing for some brioche for some time... I love anything buttery.
- May 08, 2007
- Susan from Food Blogga said...
Oh, Patricia, these rolls sound divine. Your sister's friend sure is lucky too!
- May 08, 2007
- Stella said...
YUM!!!!! Why couldn't I have one of these rolls on my way to work Pat?! They look soooo warm & comforting, just what I need right now!
I'm drooling right now... - May 09, 2007
- Kajal@aapplemint said...
Helen is such a inspiration to all of us.These look just perfect.I would've loved to see the look on your fathers face :)) How sweet !
- May 09, 2007
- Kirsten said...
WOW WOW WOW!! I didn't know so many wonderful things could all be in one recipe!!!
Kirsten - May 09, 2007
- Lis said...
Even raw they look amazing!! I drooled over these on Helene's blog too.. and now here.. *swoon*
I made the pasta with tuna the other night.. it was SO GOOD! Thank you again for sharing that recipe. =)
xoxo - May 09, 2007
Wow Patricia! These are just phenomenal! Gorgeous! Delicious!
- May 09, 2007
- Brilynn said...
I feel like I can almost smell those from here, they look sooooo good!
- May 09, 2007
- Sara said...
Wow, those are beautiful! Your Dad and sister are pretty lucky!
- May 09, 2007
- wheresmymind said...
I want some of those right now for a post lunch snack!
- May 09, 2007
Hi Patricia,
WOW...This looks awesome{like your blog}i must say and definitely try but i was thinking to make a loaf with it but in a breadmachine so what you suggest about it how can i made these in breadmachine and what changes has to be done,i'll really appreciate your reply.you can e-mail me at firstname.lastname@example.com.
Samreen. - May 09, 2007
- Toni said...
Pat - I love dulce de leche. And made into these rolls? Oh, Please! I think these would be the absolute perfect snack for me today!
- May 09, 2007
These look amazingly delicious, Patricia. I just recently discovered dulce de leche in the form of lowfat frozen yogurt, from Haagen-Dazs. Even that tasted criminally rich and fattening. I can only imagine how heavenly these are with, count 'em, three sticks of butter!
- May 09, 2007
These rolls look to die for. What a great recipe and a gorgeous photo.
- May 09, 2007
- Patricia Scarpin said...
Gattina, Helene's recipes are always to die for!
Helene, I was going to send you an email about the post - I'm so glad you liked it!
JB, I'm going to send you an email, sweetie.
Tina, thank you! I've been meaning to show you forever.
Tatter, so glad to see you here!!
Anita, thank you! I love it when you visit me!
Anh, this is a great dough, I can imagine it paired with so many fillings.
Susan, thank you! She's a sweet girl, indeed.
Valentina, I felt like making them again when I posted them, can you believe how greedy I am? :)
Kate, she is! Always an inspiration. And a sweet, sweet person, too.
Kirsten, dear, thanks!
Lis, I'm so glad you liked it! And I'll tell Terry about the pasta!
Gilly, they were really good. :)
Bri, the smell took over the apartment! Poor neighbors! :)
Sara, thank you! I'm lucky to have them!
Jeff, have some! :)
Samreen, thank you for the visit. I'm not familiar with bread machines, I'm sorry I can't help you with that. :(
Toni, dulce de leche rocks! :)
Terry, you should try dulce de leche - I think you're gonna love it. But you're right - it's seriously rich. And fattening, too. :)
Kristen, thank you - I think that made by your talented baker hands these would be terrific! - May 09, 2007
- Kelly-Jane said...
Wow that looks really devine! I would love them :)
- May 09, 2007
- MyKitchenInHalfCups said...
Baking for people you love and care about is just the best ever. Any thrill your dad got from the rolls I'll bet was doubled in you! The rolls look divine!
- May 09, 2007
- Anne said...
These are really lovely...I hope to try this one of these days :)
- May 09, 2007
- Peabody said...
Fantastic! Those look sooo good.
- May 10, 2007
- Warda said...
Can you hear them?? Can you hear your rolls calling my name??? Rooose! Rooose!
Eat us! Eat us ! - May 10, 2007
These do sound divine! Dulce de leche was such a big part of my childhood as both my paternal grandmother and maternal great grandmother made it. My dad loves it too! I'm am sure he will pass out with happiness if I make this! :) Thanks for passing it along :)
- May 10, 2007
- Sarah Bell said...
Give me a jar of Dulce De leche with a spoon anyday!! These look wonderful!
- May 10, 2007
- Freya said...
I love you abundant use of dulce du leche! It makes me very happy! These rolls look awesome!
- May 10, 2007
- Nora B. said...
That looks utterly perfect! I love sweet breads baked in a batch. I now won't be able to think of any other sweet berad till I try to bake this myself.
- May 10, 2007
- Karen Baking Soda said...
Sweet indulgence! I admire your dad and sister to leave them untouched at the table..
- May 10, 2007
Oh my goodness! Patricia you always make the most delicious things! Brioche and dulce de leche, combining two of my favorite things. I can't wait to try this!
- May 11, 2007
- Patricia Scarpin said...
Kelly-Jane, thank you for stopping by!
Tanna, I was really glad he liked it and even more to see my sister's reaction - which was unexpected.
Anne, you should!
Peabody, Helene's recipes are so good.
Rose, have as many as you want, sweetie!
Joey, dulce de leche is just perfection, isn't it?? :)
Your daddy is a lucky daddy!
Sarah, tks for visiting!
Freya, I splurged on dulce de leche. :)
Nora, thank you for coming to my blog! Let me know if you try it.
Karen, thank you for checking my blog out!
They were distracted by the pizzas. :)
Amy, you make me crave your food all the time, sweetie! - May 11, 2007
my mouth just water looking at those hot rolls! this is a real treat for both tummy and eyes!
- May 11, 2007
- Cookie baker Lynn said...
Your rolls are gorgeous! I can't imagine them lasting very long at all in my house. Now you've got me thinking cinnamon rolls.....
- May 11, 2007
They looked perfectly baked! Breakfast? I want them NOW, for supper (time check: 2308!!!)
- May 12, 2007
They look perfect!
Paz - May 12, 2007
- Lydia (The Perfect Pantry) said...
Seriously, these look absolutely amazing!!!!
- May 12, 2007
- Elle said...
These look almost as good unbaked. Yum!
- May 12, 2007
- Truffle said...
These look and sound heavenly! What a culinary triumph!
- May 12, 2007
- sher said...
I'm sure this is what they feed you in heaven! :):)
- May 15, 2007
- Patricia Scarpin said...
Eliza, thank you, sweetie!
Lynn, I'm glad you stopped by!
Tigerfish, they are good any time! :)
Paz, thank you!!
Lydia, seriously, you're far too kind! ;)
Elle, thank you!
Truffle, Helene's a great cook!
Sher, I hope so! - May 15, 2007
- Unknown said...
Hi Patricia, Thxs for visiting my blog. Nice blog you have here too. Love these Dulce de leche rolls. Look really yummy.
- May 16, 2007
omg, those are beyond gorgeous! wow what a presentation too. i think my husband would drop to his knees if i ever made something like this. i might just have too. i bow to thee :)
- May 17, 2007
- Madame K said...
These look irresistible. I'm putting them on my "must bake" list!
- July 06, 2007
- Jeanne said...
Oh my WORD!!! I think next to the word "decadence" in the dictionary you will find this pictutre. I think I'm in love!
- August 09, 2007

subset: commoncrawl


text:
MythUI Theme Development
This is the primary source of documentation about theming in MythTV.
MythTV supports UI theming. This theme development guide covers the steps necessary to develop your own look-and-feel for the user interface.
- 1 Overview
- 2 Terminology
- 3 Creating your first MythUI Theme File
- 4 MythUI Widget Types
- 4.1 Common Attributes
- 4.2 Font definitions
- 4.3 Animations
- 4.4 The textarea widget
- 4.5 The imagetype widget
- 4.6 The statetype widget
- 4.7 The button widget
- 4.8 The buttonlist widget
- 4.9 The buttontree widget
- 4.10 The textedit widget
- 4.11 The checkbox widget
- 4.12 The spinbox widget
- 4.13 The progressbar widget
- 4.14 The clock widget
- 4.15 The webbrowser widget
- 4.16 The scrollbar widget
- 4.17 The shape widget
- 4.18 The guidegrid widget
- 4.19 The editbar widget
- 4.20 The video widget
- 4.21 The group widget
- 5 Pending MythUI Patches
- 6 Tutorials
- 7 Required MythUI Theme Files
- 8 Optional MythUI Theme Files
- 8.1 appear-ui.xml
- 8.2 browser-ui.xml
- 8.3 categories.xml
- 8.4 config-ui.xml
- 8.5 controls-ui.xml
- 8.6 dvd-ui.xml
- 8.7 gallery-ui.xml
- 8.8 game-ui.xml
- 8.9 image-ui.xml
- 8.10 movies-ui.xml
- 8.11 music-ui.xml
- 8.12 mytharchive-ui.xml
- 8.13 mythburn-ui.xml
- 8.14 mythnative-ui.xml
- 8.15 netvision-ui.xml
- 8.16 news-ui.xml
- 8.17 notification-ui.xml
- 8.18 osd.xml
- 8.19 osd_subtitle.xml
- 8.20 recordings-ui.xml
- 8.21 schedule-ui.xml
- 8.22 settings-ui.xml
- 8.23 status-ui.xml
- 8.24 video-ui.xml
- 8.25 weather-ui.xml
- 8.26 welcome-ui.xml
- 8.27 zoneminder-ui.xml
- 9 Testing Your Theme
As of MythTV version .22, the theme engine is much more flexible and robust. This guide will serve as a comprehensive reference for developing a MythTV theme, including documentation of all available MythTV widgets and the basic XML files that must be completed to have a working theme.
Conceptually, MythTV themes are fairly simple. They are a series of XML theme files, and any associated media called by those files such as images. Within each XML theme file, individual screens in MythTV are defined as windows. Each window contains MythUI Widgets, and the widgets contain various attributes. Take this simple example of a MythUI theme file:
<mythuitheme> <window name="MyFirstWindow"> <textarea name="MyFirstTextArea"> <area>0,0,1280,720</area> basesmall <value>This is some text!</value> </textarea> </window> </mythuitheme>
Let's discuss the code we just looked at. Every tag in XML must be opened and closed, just like in HTML. If you don't match all of your tags, your theme will not work! Every MythUI theme file (with one exception to be explained later) opens with the <mythuitheme> tag and ends with </mythuitheme>. Inside of the theme, we defined a window called "MyFirstWindow." Inside of that window, we created a textarea widget with three attributes, area, font, and value. How each of these things works will be explained in a bit, but this is the most basic kind of structure found in every themed screen in MythTV.
A key component of the MythUI theme engine is the concept of inheritance. As each widget has a name, every similar widget thereafter can inherit from that name. Take, for example, this basic definition of a font:
 <size>16</size> <color>#FFFFFF</color>
Don't worry, we'll explain how all this works later. But to illustrate the concept of inheritance, let's say somewhere later in my theme you want to define another font, and you want it to be exactly the same as the one above, except for a different color. This is made incredibly simple through inheritance.
 <color>#000000</color>
The font we just defined inherits the face and size from the first one, but redefines the color! As our definitions become more and more complex, inheritance will save us tons of work!
Some widgets, including textarea and imagetype, can use the depends clause to be shown only if another widget of the given name has content. For example:
<textarea name="title" from="MyFirstTextArea" depends="coverart"> <area>100,200,300,50</area> MyFirstFontBlack </textarea>
This widget will be shown only if the 'coverart' widget is currently displaying an image. If "coverart" is changed to "!coverart", the widget will only be shown if 'coverart' is not currently displaying an image. This allows for alternative use of space depending on the existence or absence of metadata such as images or text.
At present, a widget can depend on the following widget types: textarea, imagetype, progressbar, statetype.
The dependency is a logical expression allowing the operator & (AND) and | (OR). Expression is strictly evaluated from left to right. If the "dependee" widget doesn't exist it is assumed to not be visible.
<textarea name="title" from="MyFirstTextArea" depends="!coverart&!mystateon|mystateoff"> <area>100,200,300,50</area> MyFirstFontBlack </textarea>
Warning: as the & character isn't allowed in XML, it must be escaped using & instead:
<textarea name="title" from="MyFirstTextArea" depends="!coverart&!mystateon|mystateoff">
Preassigned Names
So, you might be asking, "how do I tell MythTV which information goes into which box?" Well, in addition to being able to name your own widgets and place information wherever you like, each screen in Myth has preassigned names that it expects to find and use to display information. As an example, there will be a textarea in the "Watch Recordings" screen called title. This hook is what Myth is looking for to insert the title. Consider this example:
<textarea name="title" from="MyFirstTextArea"> <area>100,200,300,50</area> MyFirstFontBlack </textarea>
Now we're seeing several of the concepts we've discussed in action. We've created a textarea widget with a name of "title." "title" is one of the preassigned names used in several screens in MythTV including the Video browser and the Watch Recordings screen, among others. Myth will intelligently insert the title value for an object or selected item into this text area since it's on the lookout for a text area called "title." We also see the use of inheritance here with from="MyFirstTextArea". In this example, our themer has defined a basic text area elsewhere called MyFirstTextArea, and wants to use the attributes he assigned there in this text area. Rather than assigning the face, size, shadow, outline, etc. all over again, he simply uses inheritance to pull all those definitions in to this text area. Finally, we see that the themer has used the font name we created above, MyFirstFontBlack.
Windows as Popups
In MythUI, any window can be a popup above the window that spawned it. This is accomplished by setting the area of the window to less than fullscreen. It can be automatically centered by using -1,-1 as the position. You cannot use -1,-1 if you specify width and height as percentages. Example:
In a 1280x720 theme:
<window name="mywindow"> <area>-1,-1,1000,600</area>
would position the window 140px from the left, 60px from the top.
Best Practices
It's important for both your sanity and code sharing to make your themes legible. The commonly used practice in Myth themes is to indent each nested tag four spaces (NOT a tab). So, the most simple example of this coding style is something like:
<textarea name="MyCodingStyleExample"> <area>0,0,100,50</area> MyFirstFontBlack <value>Wow! Look at how clean this is!</value> </textarea>
From the above example, it's simple to see what attributes "belong" to which widget. It's also best to leave a blank space between each widget in your theme file so that they are independent logical units. Here's an example:
<textarea name="title" from="basetextarea"> <area>20,10,710,80</area> baselarge </textarea> <textarea name="director" from="basetextarea"> <area>160,65,350,35</area> basesmallyellow </textarea>
If you keep these simple practices in mind when creating your theme, it will be much simpler for both you and those you share the theme with to understand how it works.
Built in Themes
There are 3 themes that are stored in MythTV main repository and installed during by default. These are set up and maintained by the MythTV developers, and are a fallback in case no download theme is available.
- MythCenter
- MythCenter-wide
- Terra
There is also a theme labeled "default" and one labeled "default-wide". These are incomplete as they do not contain the themeinfo.xml file. If new windows are added to MythTV they will be added to the default and default-wide themes. If a downloaded theme does not have a required window in its definition, then the version in default or default-wide will be used.
Drawing Order
Prior to MythUI, a draworder attribute was used to determine the order of widget rendering. This has been discarded in favor of a simpler "First Come, First Served" approach. Widgets are rendered in order of their definition in the XML file. To draw one widget over another, you simply define it after the first.
Creating your first MythUI Theme File
Let's go through the creation of the most basic of all MythTV theme files to reinforce our understanding of terminology and basic XML.
The themeinfo is the one exception to the rule about all MythUI themes opening and closing with <mythuitheme>. The themeinfo uses the following format:
<themeinfo> <name>LoremIpsumTheme</name> <aspect>16:9</aspect> <author> <name>Loren J. Ipsum</name> <email>email@example.com</email> </author> <types> <type>UI</type> </types> <baseres>1920x1080</baseres> <version> <major>1</major> <minor>1</minor> </version> <detail> <thumbnail name="preview">preview.jpg</thumbnail> <description>We're defining a basic theme. This is going to be fun!</description> <errata>Use this space for notes!</errata> </detail> </themeinfo>
Let's briefly look at what each attribute in the themeinfo.xml file does.
<name>: This is the name of your theme as will be displayed in the theme selection menu.
<aspect>: This is the aspect ratio of your theme. Myth uses this to determine whether the theme is widescreen or not. That information is then used to determine what defaults get used for omitted items in the theme. If aspect is "16:9" or "16:10" the default-wide values are used.
<author>: This contains two subattributes, <name> and <email>. they provide identifying information about the theme's author(s).
<types>: This contains one subattribute, <type>. It defines what type of theme this is. There are three eligible types, UI, OSD, and menu. UI themes are overall myth themes. OSD themes govern the on-screen display during video playback. Menu themes define the tree structure of Myth's menus. A theme can contain multiple types (UI and OSD, UI and menu, etc.) and thus there can be multiple <type> definitions.
<baseres>: This is the value that myth uses to parse all the coordinates in your theme. It is the number of coordinates you are giving yourself to work with and the resolution you are targeting with your theme. We'll talk more about this later when talking about the <area> attribute.
<version>: This contains two subattributes, <major> and <minor>. They define the Major and Minor version numbers of your theme. In the example above, the version is defined as "1.1".
<detail>: This has three subattributes, <thumbnail>, <description>, and <errata>. <thumbnail> defines an image in your theme directory to act as a preview in the Theme selection dialog. <description> describes the theme. <errata> can be used for notes and license information for your theme.
If you've been following along, congratulations, you've finished your first Myth theme element!
MythUI Widget Types
In this section, we'll explore the widgets that you can use in a MythUI theme, and explain how each of them works. You'll see an example of each widget in action, and a discussion of the possible attributes and how they work.
Common Attributes
Before discussing individual widgets, let's discuss attributes which will apply to almost all of the widgets we will use.
name | Each widget in MythUI must have a name defined in the widget's opening tag. It must be a unique name within the window. Names can be either hard-coded values (whose widget images or text will be filled dynamically by myth) or unique values assigned by the themer (whose widget images or text are statically assigned by the themer). |
area |
The most commonly used attribute of any widget is <area>. As the name implies, it sets the location and size of a widget. <area> takes four arguments. They are:
Myth coordinates are calculated from the upper left corner of the screen (position 0,0). In our themeinfo.xml file, we defined the <baseres> attribute, which defines the screen space we intend to work with. This does not mean that it will only work on this resolution! It simply tells MythTV how to reckon the coordinates. On a 1280x720 theme, 128 pixels is 10% of the screen. If one were to use the theme on a 1920x1080 screen, Myth is intelligent enough to still place the item 10% across the screen. In short, baseres establishes the relative coordinate system that you intend to use in your theme, not a fixed resolution at which it will operate. So, to create a widget 500 pixels right of the top left, 200 pixels down, and with a size of 300x100, we would use:
In cases where area is defined for a sub-attribute, e.g. for an image within a button, the area is reckoned from the top-left of the parent attribute rather than the top-left of the screen. Area can also take percentage values, such as:
The above example would place a 300x100 item 10% across and 20% down the screen. Percentage may also be used to size an item, relative to its parent item (which can be the entire screen, the container size of a button, etc.). When using a percentage in the width and height, the percentage is calculated based on the amount of space left, not on the total space available. This is rather counter-intuitive. For example if you have a screen 1280x720 this command will create a widget at the top left hand side that is 128x72 as you would expect:
You would expect this to create an identical widget at the bottom right hand side, but in fact it will create a much smaller widget that is 13x7 at a position 10% away from the bottom right hand side:
An another example, if you have a column of widgets each taking the same percentage in the height, they will actually get smaller and smaller the closer to the bottom of the screen they get. If you specify 100% in the height or width it will always extend exactly to the end of the screen. You can also use offsets:
Would create an area that has a 20 pixel margin on the left and right, and a 10 pixel margin on the top and bottom. Negative numbers in the width / height fields indicate that a right / bottom margin of that size, is desired. Percentages and offset can be combined:
Would create an area that starts 40 pixels from the right edge, and 20 pixels down from the middle. The size would go to the right edge horizontally, while leaving a 10 pixel margin from the bottom. Note that 100%-10 and -10 in width or height have the same result. Also a negative percentage is not allowed, also percentages have to be whole numbers. Area tags defined in the default or default-wide themes may have an extra value, for example: <area>24,4,250,33,800x600</area> This tells MythTV that this area assumes a screen size of 800x600. It will be resized to the appropriate size of the theme where it is actually used. |
position |
<position> is a lot like <area>, except it does not scale the widget. It looks like this:
Position might be used in a few circumstances. If you want to place an image on the screen, but leave it at native resolution, or if you want to place a widget on the screen, but use the size of the definition it inherits from, you might use position. Here's an example of the position tag placing a widget or image at location 650x400:
Percentage values can also be used with position. You can also combine offsets with percentages:
alpha |
<alpha> is a very exciting effect that affects the transparency/opacity of a widget or image. It uses the following format:
<alpha> sets the transparency from 0 (totally transparent) to 255 (totally solid). This allows for great and subtle see-through effects. If you don't set an alpha value, the widget or image will be 100% opaque. Here's an example of an item set to 50% opacity:
alphapulse |
<alphapulse> is another exciting transparency/opacity effect that allows text or images to cycle through various levels of opacity. It uses the following format:
You'll notice that alphapulse has a slightly different format than other XML or HTML-style tags. Since alphapulse takes multiple arguments, they're all built into the one tag, which indicates it has no paired tag by closing with "/>". Min is the minimum transparency value in the cycle. Max is the maximum transparency value in the cycle. Change sets the speed at which the cycling occurs. It is best to keep this value in single digits, or the pulse may become indistinguishable. Here is an example of a widget or image pulsing between half and full opacity with a slow, steady speed of change:
minsize | Applies only to textarea, shape, and imagetype, when used with the variable sizing of buttonlists. Minimum size the item is allowed to shrink to. Takes two arguments: horizontal and vertical size. Percentages are allowed. In the case of <textarea>, the actual size of the text is determined, and the size of the textarea is shrunk if possible. Any <shape> or <imagetype> siblings to the <textarea> are then shrunk by the same amount.
As of 0.25-pre, three optional attributes are support: initiator, shrink and vanish. The initiator attribute can be used to indicate whether this area should be used to influence the minimum size of siblings and parents. By default <textarea> elements are initiators. The shrink attribute indicates which direction the textarea should be shrunk: narrow or short. Narrow is the default. The vanish attribute indicates that if the textarea is empty, that it and all of it's siblings should just vanish, and not be drawn at all -- regardless of the minsize values. Unpolished minsize example xml (Example only works >= 0.25-pre)
helptext | Applies to focusable widgets only. Specifies text to be shown in an accompanying textarea called helptext when this widget is focused. This can be used to help a user to understand the function of a widget and guide them around the screen. |
focusorder | Applies to focusable widgets only. Normally widgets accept focus in the order they appear in the XML, this offers a simple and easily understood mechanism. In more complicated layouts the order of widgets might not match the logical flow between them and this attribute allows a fixed order to be defined instead. It accepts a numerical value where '0' is the first widget, '1' would be the second etc. It is not necessary for all focusable widgets to have a defined focusorder, the default value applied to each is zero so if the intent is to ensure another widget is considered last then it only needs a value greater than zero. Two widgets can share the same value and if that should be the case then they are evaluated in the order they appear in the xml. |
Note: Many MythUI attributes can take boolean arguments, which are represented here as "yes" or "no" for simplicity, but all boolean attributes can also take arguments of 0 and 1, or true and false or yes or no.
Font definitions
While not specifically a widget, font definitions share much in common with widget definitions, and are thus included here. Here's a complete font definition:
   <fontdef name="normal" face="Arial"> <pixelsize>26</pixelsize> <color>#ffffff</color> <shadowcolor>#000000</shadowcolor> <shadowoffset>2,2</shadowoffset> <shadowalpha>64</shadowalpha> <outlinecolor>#888888</outlinecolor> <outlinesize>2</outlinesize> <outlinealpha>64</outlinealpha> <italics>yes</italics> <weight>bold</weight> <letterspacing>3</letterspacing> <wordspacing>5</wordspacing> <decoration>underline</decoration>    </fontdef>
face | The font face is the plain English name of a font installed system-wide or whose TrueType font (.ttf), OpenType font (.otf), or TrueType font collection (.ttc) file is provided within the theme's directory structure. If the font license allows, distributing the font with your theme will ensure other users (even those without the font installed on their systems) use the proper font, so text size is correct and text items fit within the areas you've specified. And, it means users will not have to manually install fonts to their systems. To get more debugging info about which font files and faces are found within your theme directory run "mythfrontend -v gui,file" (on 0.24: mythfrontend -v "gui,file,extra", on trunk: mythfrontend -loglevel debug -v "gui,file"), and use the same name specified in the log output as the face name in your theme. |
pixelsize | Size is the font size used in pixels. Use pixelsize or size, not both. Pixelsize has some advantages: Themes are laid out using pixels to a fixed base size so it is easier to tell whether text is going to fit in the given area. Pixels are a finer unit of measure and allow for better fine tuning. When internally rescaling the units for a higher or lower resolution, less is lost to rounding, so text is less likely to be cut off. To convert from size to pixelsize use: (size / 72) * 100. For example:
<fontdef name="myfont" face="Verdana"> <size>14</size> </fontdef> Would become: <fontdef name="myfont" face="Verdana"> <pixelsize>19</pixelsize> </fontdef> by using (14 / 72) * 100 = 19.4 Pixelsize can only use whole number, so round up or down. |
size | Size is the font size used in points. Use pixelsize or size, not both. (pixelsize is preferred) |
color | Color is the hexadecimal value for the color of the font. |
shadowcolor | Shadowcolor is the hexadecimal color value used for the drop shadow behind the text. |
shadowoffset | Shadowoffset is the coordinate offset for the drop shadow. In our example, the drop shadow would be two pixels to the right, and two pixels down from the text. |
shadowalpha | Shadowalpha sets the opacity of the drop shadow, with a value from 0-255 |
outlinecolor | Outlinecolor is a hexadecimal color value for an outline around the text. |
outlinesize | Outlinesize is the pixel radius of a text outline. |
outlinealpha | Outlinealpha sets the opacity of the text outline. |
italics | italics takes boolean values of yes or no and change the text in the expected fashion. |
weight | Weight changes the "press" of the pen when rendering fonts. Values can be numeric or textual, from 1-7 or ultralight, light, normal, demibold, bold, black, and ultrablack. Rounds to the nearest weights offered by the font family and there may be less than 7 available. |
stretch | Stretch changes the horizontal stretch of fonts. Values can be numeric or textual, from 1-9 or ultracondensed, extracondensed, condensed, semicondensed, unstretched, semiexpanded, expanded, extraexpanded and ultraexpanded. |
decoration | Decoration of the text. Values are underline, overline, and strikeout. |
letterspacing | Number in pixels to add to the spacing between letters. Completely optional, only for use when attempting to expand the space words take up. |
wordspacing | Number in pixels to add to the spacing between words. Completely optional, only for use when attempting to expand the space text areas take up. |
Note: Fonts must be installed on the system. If you include a non-standard font with your theme, your users will need to install it systemwide for it to be used in your theme. Myth will fall back to installed fonts if the font is not installed systemwide.
Note: This is available from version 0.25 and only when using the OpenGL painter.
Another way of creating animations is by using the imagetype widget
<window name="MythConfirmationDialog"> <area>-1,-1,706,298</area> <animation trigger="AboutToShow">
 <alpha start="0" end="255" easingcurve="OutQuart"/> <zoom start="1000" end="100" easingcurve="OutQuart"/>
 </animation> ... </window>
animation |
Starting tag for a group of animations with a common trigger. It can take one attribute, trigger, which dictates when the animation(s) should be started. Values are AboutToShow, and AboutToHide, which respectively occur when windows are shown and hidden. Default is AboutToShow. |
section |
It can take two attributes, duration, and centre. duration controls the length of the contained animations in milliseconds. Default is 500. centre specifies the centre used for rotation and zooming. Values are topleft, top, topright, left, middle, right, bottomleft, bottom, and right. Default is middle. Possible children are alpha, angle, position, zoom, horizontalzoom, and verticalzoom.
duration |
Specifies the duration of the animation in milliseconds. This will override any value specified in the section tag. |
start |
Specifies the start value of the animation. Default is 0 (or equivalent). |
end |
Specifies the end value of the animation. Default is 0 (or equivalent). |
easingcurve |
Specifies how the speed of the animation from start to end should be. Values are Linear, InQuad, OutQuad, InOutQuad, OutInQuad, InCubic, OutCubic, InOutCubic, OutInCubic, InQuart, OutQuart, InOutQuart, OutInQuart, InQuint, OutQuint, InOutQuint, OutInQuint, InSine, OutSine, InOutSine, OutInSine, InExpo, OutExpo, InOutExpo, OutInExpo, InCirc, OutCirc, InOutCirc, OutInCirc, InElastic, OutElastic, InOutElastic, OutInElastic, InBack, OutBack, InOutBack, OutInBack, InBounce, OutBounce, InOutBounce, OutInBounce, InCurve, OutCurve, SineCurve, CosineCurve. Default is Linear. See QEasingCurve::Type for an overview of what each value means. |
reversible |
Boolean attribute that specifies if the animation should repeatedly go back and forth between the start and end values. Default is false. |
looped |
Boolean attribute that specifies if the animation should start again from the beginning once it has reached the end value. Default is false. |
alpha |
Controls the alpha value of the widget. It uses the following format:
angle |
Controls the rotation (in degrees) of the widget. It uses the following format:
position |
Controls the position of the widget. It uses the following format:
Specifying -1 for a coordinate will use the corresponding value from the widget's position. The following will for example move the widget from 100,100 to 400,400:
zoom |
Controls the zoom attribute (in percent) of the widget. It uses the following format:
horizontalzoom |
Like zoom but only applies a horizontal zoom. It can be combined with verticalzoom. It uses the following format:
verticalzoom |
Like zoom but only applies a vertical zoom. It can be combined with horizontalzoom. It uses the following format:
The textarea widget
The textarea widget is the simplest widget in MythUI. It will place a text area on the screen which can either be filled by the themer or (by using the name= tag) dynamically filled by MythTV. For purposes of simplicity, let's look at all the attributes which can be used in a textarea widget and then discuss each one.
<textarea name="MyFirstTextArea"> <area>x,y,w,h</area> <case>upper</case> MyFirstFontBlack <cutdown>yes</cutdown> <scroll direction="left" /> <multiline>yes</multiline> <align>left,top</align> <colorcycle start="#000000" end="#ffffff" steps="255"/> <value>I've created my first widget!</value> OR <template>I have created my own %1!</template> OR <template>I have created %n widget(s)</template> </textarea>
MythUI widgets are always opened with their widget type as the tag. So, we start our textarea widget and give it a name with <textarea name="MyFirstTextArea">. Let's look at each attribute.
area | As explained above, this attribute sets the location and size of our text area. You could also use <position> if inheriting from another text area (by adding from="name ofothertextarea" to the textarea tag). |
case | This sets the capitalization of our text area. If not set, the text area will follow normal capitalization. Valid values are normal, upper,lower, capitaliseall (capitalize first letter of each word) and capitalisefirst (capitalize first letter of each sentence). |
font | A font name as defined earlier in the same UI file or in base.xml. In our example, we are using MyFirstFontBlack which we discussed defining earlier. |
cutdown | If the textarea runs over the defined area, the cutdown attribute will truncate it with ellipsis, "...". If you are concerned that a value inserted by myth will be too long for the text area you have assigned, you may want to set cutdown to "yes". Default behavior is to not cut down text. In pre-0.25, cutdown can optionally take "left", "middle" and "right" as options, which indicate where the ellipsis should be applied. "yes" is equivalent to "right". If multiline is true, any cutdown will always be on the right. |
multiline | The multiline attribute wraps text onto a new line if it runs out of space. |
align | Aligns the text in both horizontal and vertical directions. Valid values are: left, right, top, bottom, hcenter, vcenter, center, justify and allcenter. justify is full justification. |
colorcycle | An attribute very like alphapulse, except the cycle is between colors instead of opacities. Colors in MythTV are always in hexadecimal format. The above example will cycle between white and black, with 255 steps in between. The cycling occurs at approximately 30 steps per second. Thus, our example will complete in just under eight seconds. |
scroll | If the "text" is to large for the specified area, starting with 0.25, it can be set to scroll within the area.
<scroll direction="left" /> <scroll direction="right" /> <scroll direction="up" /> <scroll direction="down" /> <scroll direction="horizontal" /> <scroll direction="vertical" /> The "horizontal" and "vertical" options will cause the text to bounce back and forth within the area. Starting with 0.27, attributes are available to control the scroll rate and the delay before scrolling starts: <scroll direction="vertical" rate="15" returnrate="35" startdelay="4" returndelay="4" /> The 'rate' is in pixels per second, with a default of 70. The 'delay' is in seconds, with a default of 3. returnrate and returndelay are only applicable to direction="vertical" and direction="horizontal". |
value | Value is the attribute which sets the text to appear in the textarea. It is optional. In a text area which Myth is not filling in, it can be any text you wish to set. In a Myth-filled box, it will be the "fallback" value. If myth has no text to insert, the user will see this value instead. In a few instances, various variables can be inserted for the value to allow for compound text areas which include multiple pieces of information in a format of the themer's choosing, like %TITLE%, %SUBTITLE%, %DATE%, %STARS%, etc. |
template | Template is preferable to using the <value> element when displaying variables. When a screen is loaded, the value element is displayed first, then replaced with template when the variable data is available. This can be values which exist in a map (such as most Program Info like %TITLE%, %SUBTITLE%, etc) but it can also be any named text area where you wish to put the inserted value in a textual context, such as prefacing the value with a label. Example:
<template>Title: %1</template> When text is being inserted %1 should be used as the placeholder. Any numerical insertion should use %n to take advantage of number/plural translation capabilities in Myth. <template>%n item(s)</template> Would display (1 item, or 3 items) when translated. |
The imagetype widget
The imagetype widget is another very simple widget. It takes a filename as input, applies masks, crops, and other manipulations, and displays it on the screen. Just as with the textarea widget, certain hardcoded name values on certain screens can be dynamically filled by MythTV.
<imagetype name="MyFirstImage"> <filename>imagefile.png</filename> <area>300,200,210,70> <alpha>150</alpha> <preserveaspect>true</preserveaspect> <crop>x,y,w,h</crop> <mask>mymaskfile.png</mask> <reflection axis="horizontal" shear="24" scale="85" length="35" spacing="0" /> <grayscale>true</grayscale>  <filepattern low="0" high="30" cycle="reverse">imagefile%1.png</filepattern> <delay>500</delay> </imagetype>
An imagetype widget must have (one of) a filename or filepattern. All the other attributes are optional. An imagetype will also take all global attributes such as area, position, alpha, and alphapulse.
filename | The filename attribute sets a filename for the image relative to the root of the theme directory. You can place an image in a subdirectory and include it in the filename value, like:
As with the textarea widget, if the imagetype is dynamically filled by MythTV and there is a filename set, the file will be the "fallback" when Myth has no value to insert. The filename attribute can *also* be a directory name (which must end in "/"). This will select and display a random image from the directory. The directory can be relative to the theme directory or absolute path. |
preserveaspect | preserveaspect will scale the image to the size specified, but will retain the original aspect ratio by leaving empty space within the defined area. This option is excellent for posters with variable sizes and aspects, or places where both a screenshot or fixed image might appear. |
crop | A crop, as evidenced by the name, crops the image to the specified x/y value, width, and height. This is useful for preview images which might have closed-captioning garbage. |
mask | mask allows a second image to be set to alpha-mask the original. This is a black and transparent image of identical size to the imagetype area, where black is visible and transparent will be masked. This allows for smooth edges and exotic shapes to your image. Masks cannot be resized or scaled. NOTE: If the filename of the image is used elsewhere in unmasked form (or possibly with a different mask), the mask may be ignored. |
reflection | reflection is an attribute which casts a reflection of the imagetype along either the horizontal or vertical axis. Valid values for axis are horizontal and vertical. Shear is the angle of the reflection as a percentage value, from 0-100. Scale is the severity ("squishedness") of the reflection as a percentage value, from 0-100. Length is the size of the draw reflection compared to the size of the original image as a percentage value, from 0-100. Spacing is the distance of the reflection from the axis of the reflection, which can be used to give the impression that the object is above the surface upon which the object is reflected. |
grayscale | grayscale determines whether a colour image should be displayed as grayscale instead. |
filepattern | filepattern allows for simple flipbook animations. The low and high values define the first and last image numbers in a the series, and the "%1" in the filename is the place where the number variable is inserted. So, for a flipbook animation that cycles from myfile1.png to myfile99.png, the filepattern would look like:
Animations typically restart from the beginning when they've reached the end. An animation may also be cycled forward, then reversed when it reaches the end by adding cycle="reverse" to the attributes. e.g. 1-2-3-2-1 This may reduces the overall number of frames required and save memory. |
delay | delay is the time interval in milliseconds between cels in your flipbook animation. It is an integer value and defines the speed at which the animation is cycled. |
The statetype widget
The statetype widget is a special widget used for an image, button, or other element that behaves or looks differently according to its status. An example of a statetype would be a button item which can be either selected or unselected. Statetypes are also used in menu watermark images (discussed in the menu-ui.xml article). The most important new attribute introduced in the statetype is a state. Each state represents how a statetype behaves under a given condition.
<statetype name="blah"> <area>10,10,100,100</area> <showempty>yes</showempty> <state name="selected"> <position>20,15</position> <imagetype name="selectimage"> <filename>selectimage.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="normal"> <imagetype name="normalimage"> <filename>normalimage.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype>
state | The state attribute defines the behavior of a single state in the statetype (which is a collection of states). Instead of name, some states use the type attribute. The names are unique depending on the context of the statetype. Commonly used state names are selected, unselected, active, and inactive. Type will always be on, off, half, or full. Which types are used depends on the context of the statetype. In the example, if the item were selected, the "selectimage.png" image would be displayed. If it were unselected, the "normalimage.png" image would be displayed. This is the simplest example of a statetype, but each state can have its own position, images, text, and virtually anything you can imagine! |
showempty | The showempty attribute specifies that any empty state should still be displayed (as empty). |
The button widget
The button widget is the definition of an individual button item.
<button name="MyFirstButton"> <position>0,0</position> <statetype name="buttonstate"> <state name="active"> <imagetype name="background"> <area>0,0,150,35</area> <filename>buttonbackground.png</filename> </imagetype> <textarea name="text"> <area>5,5,140,30</area> <align>allcenter</align> basemedium basemedium basemediumgrey </textarea> </state> <state name="selected" from="active"> <imagetype name="background"> <area>0,0,150,35</area> <filename>buttonbackground_selected.png</filename> <alphapulse min="200" max="255" change="1"/> </imagetype> </state> <state name="disabled" from="active" /> <state name="pushed" from="active"> <imagetype name="background"> <area>0,0,150,35</area> <filename>buttonbackground.png</filename> <alpha>255</alpha> </imagetype> <textarea name="text"> <position>8,8</position> </textarea> </state> </statetype> </button>
After all of that text, there is absolutely nothing new about a button! No special attributes, no new material. The button widget contains a single statetype, buttonstate. The statetype contains four states, active, selected, disabled, and pushed. active is a unselected, active button. selected is a selected, active button. disabled is an unselected or a "greyed out" button. pushed is the "down/pushed in" state of a button (mid-push). Each state must contain (or inherit) the textarea text.
You may notice above the use of inheritance and the use of states in a font declaration. These font states carry over into the following state attributes and change the fonts of each type accordingly.
button statetypes
Statetype Name | Included States | Optional named attributes: |
buttonstate | active | textarea - text |
selected | textarea - text | |
disabled | textarea - text | |
pushed | textarea - text |
The buttonlist widget
The buttonlist widget is a series of dynamically-filled buttons. It is one of the most commonly used of all widgets, and is primarily built out of other widgets.
<buttonlist name="MyFirstButtonlist"> <area>0,0,349,250</area> <layout>vertical</layout> <spacing>3</spacing> <arrange>stack</arrange> <align>center</align> <scrollstyle>free</scrollstyle> <wrapstyle>items</wrapstyle> <buttonarea>0,0,100%,97%</buttonarea> <statetype name="buttonitem"> <state name="selectedinactive"> <area>0,0,100%,30</area> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>buttonbackground.png</filename> </imagetype> <textarea name="buttontext"> <area>5,10,85%,30</area> basesmall <cutdown>yes</cutdown> <align>left,vcenter</align> </textarea> <statetype name="buttoncheck"> <position>91%,5</position> <state type="off"> <imagetype name="checkoff"> <filename>lb-check-empty.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state type="half"> <imagetype name="checkhalf"> <filename>lb-check-half.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="checkfull"> <filename>lb-check-full.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> <imagetype name="buttonarrow"> <position>92%,11</position> <filename>rightarrow.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="selectedactive" from="selectedinactive"> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>buttonbackground_selected.png</filename> <alphapulse min="200" max="255" change="1"/> </imagetype> </state> <state name="inactive" from="selectedactive"> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>buttonbackground_selected.png</filename> <alpha>127</alpha> </imagetype> <textarea name="buttontext"> basesmallgrey </textarea> </state> <state name="active" from="inactive"> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>buttonbackground_selected.png</filename> <alpha>200</alpha> </imagetype> <textarea name="buttontext"> basesmall </textarea> </state> </statetype> <statetype name="upscrollarrow"> <position>10,97%</position> <state type="off"> <imagetype name="upon"> <filename>uparrow.png</filename> <alpha>90</alpha> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="upoff"> <filename>uparrow.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> <statetype name="downscrollarrow"> <position>40,97%</position> <state type="off"> <imagetype name="dnon"> <filename>downarrow.png</filename> <alpha>90</alpha> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="dnoff"> <filename>downarrow.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> </buttonlist>
A buttonlist is an extremely commonly used widget. It is a series of buttons which are dynamically filled depending on their context. It is also one of the most complicated widget structures in MythUI. A buttonlist widget contains the following structure, which is largely self-explanatory. The checkoff, checkhalf, and checkfull states pertain to those buttons which contain checkboxes (like in the MythMusic playlist).
layout | Valid values for layout in a buttonlist are horizontal, vertical, and grid. The default is horizontal. | ||||
spacing | Spacing is an attribute to set a pixel value to reserve between each button in a button list. | ||||
scrollstyle | Sets the scrolling behavior of the buttonlist. Valid options are:
| ||||
wrapstyle | Wrapstyle sets the wrapping behavior of the buttonlist. Valid options are items (The list itself wraps at the ends), selection (the selector reaches the end of the list and "jumps" to the beginning), captive (same as none but prevent the buttonlist losing focus when attempting to move beyond the edge), flowing (the selector will wrap from one line to the next in a grid layout), and none (no wrap). The default is none. | ||||
buttonarea | Exactly the same arguments as a normal <area> tag, the buttonarea allows one to specify the portion of the buttonlist which is taken up by the buttons themselves, allowing one to make room for the up/down arrows as necessary. | ||||
drawfrombottom | Place the buttons at the bottom of the buttonarea instead of the top. Accepts normal boolean values. | ||||
arrange | Button arrangement type.
| ||||
align | Aligns buttons in both horizontal and vertical directions. Valid values are: left, right, top, bottom, hcenter, vcenter, center and allcenter. Center is an alias for allcenter. Only valid with <arrange>Stack, Fill or Spread</arrange>. | ||||
searchposition | Sets the position of the popup search dialog when shown for the button list. You can use this to position the popup so it doesn't obscure the button list. eg <searchposition>-1,430</searchposition> will position the popup horizontally centered and 430 down. NEW in 0.25-pre |
buttonlist statetypes
Statetype Name | Included States | Sub-statetype (if any) | Included States |
buttonitem | selectedactive | buttoncheck | checkoff |
checkhalf | |||
checkfull | |||
selectedinactive | buttoncheck | checkoff | |
checkhalf | |||
checkfull | |||
active | buttoncheck | checkoff | |
checkhalf | |||
checkfull | |||
inactive | buttoncheck | checkoff | |
checkhalf | |||
checkfull | |||
downscrollarrow | full | ||
off | |||
upscrollarrow | full | ||
off |
Additionally, each state in buttonitem can take a textarea named buttontext for the button's text and an imagetype called buttonarrow to indicate the button contains a submenu.
The buttontree widget
The buttontree widget is essentially a wrapper widget to contains a pre-set number of buttonlists. It is used in various places, notably the MythVideo List View.
<buttontree name="MyFirstButtontree"> <area>20,347,1240,266</area> <numlists>3</numlists> <spacing>6</spacing> <buttonlist name="listtemplate" from="basebuttonlist" /> </buttontree>
- The buttontree contains a buttonlist item named listtemplate.
numlist | The numlist attribute sets the number of buttonlists to be laid out horizontally. |
spacing | The spacing attribute sets a number of buffer pixels between each buttonlist. |
The textedit widget
We've discussed how to display text, but how do we accomplish text entry? The answer is through use of the textedit widget.
<textedit name="MyFirstTextEdit"> <area>0,0,287,28</area> <statetype name="background"> <state name="active"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>textedit_background.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="selected"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>textedit_background_selected.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="inactive"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>textedit_background.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> <imagetype name="cursor"> <filename>cursor.png</filename> </imagetype> <textarea name="text"> <area>3,5,281,22</area> basesmallblack </textarea> </textedit>
Again we see that complicated widgets are actually just collections of simple widgets. The textedit widget includes a statetype named background. The statetype contains three states named active, selected, and inactive. active is a functional but not highlighted textedit widget. selected is an active, highlighted textedit widget. inactive is a "greyed out" or unusable textedit widget.
We complete the widget by defining an imagetype for the cursor in the textarea called cursor, and a textarea called text for where the actual text will be entered.
textedit statetypes
Statetype Name | Included States |
background | active |
selected | |
inactive |
The checkbox widget
The checkbox widget is the definition of a checkbox.
<checkbox name="MyFirstCheckBox"> <area>0,0,30,30</area> <statetype name="background"> <state name="active"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>unchecked.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="selected"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>checkbox_background_selected.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="disabled" /> </statetype> <statetype name="checkstate"> <area>0,0,30,30</area> <state type="off" /> <state type="half"> <imagetype name="background"> <filename>checked_selected.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="mark"> <filename>checked.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> </checkbox>
Yet another widget built out of less complicated widgets. The checkbox widget starts by defining a statetype called background. background contains three states, active, selected and disabled. Active is a functional checkbox which is not highlighted. Selected is a functional, highlighted checkbox. Disabled is a non-functional "greyed out" checkbox.
checkbox contains a second statetype called checkstate. This is a set of three states to indicate the fill status of the checkbox. The states are off, half and full. Off is a completely unfilled checkbox. Half is a half-checked box. Full is a fully checked checkbox. Note that the background statetype uses "name" states and the checkstate statetype uses "type" states as discussed above in statetype.
checkbox statetypes
Statetype Name | Included States |
background | active |
selected | |
disabled | |
checkstate | off |
half | |
full |
The spinbox widget
The spinbox widget is the definition of a spinbox. A spinbox is a selection box containing multiple values which can be scrolled through (e.g. priority in the recording schedule editor -99 to 99). A spinbox is just a special type of buttonlist with helper functions to fill it with dynamic values.
<spinbox name="MyFirstSpinBox"> <area>0,0,90,40</area> <layout>horizontal</layout> <statetype name="buttonitem"> <state name="active"> <area>0,0,70,40</area> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>spinbox_background.png</filename> </imagetype> <textarea name="buttontext"> <area>5,5,55,30</area> basesmall <cutdown>yes</cutdown> <align>right,vcenter</align> </textarea> </state> <state name="selected" from="active"> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>spinbox_background_selected.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state name="inactive" from="active"> <imagetype name="buttonbackground"> <filename>spinbox_background_inactive.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> <statetype name="downscrollarrow"> <position>75,2</position> <state type="off"> <imagetype name="dnon"> <filename>lb-rtarrow-reg.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="dnoff"> <filename>lb-rtarrow-sel.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> <statetype name="upscrollarrow"> <position>75,21</position> <state type="off"> <imagetype name="upon"> <filename>lb-ltarrow-reg.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> <state type="full"> <imagetype name="upoff"> <filename>lb-ltarrow-sel.png</filename> </imagetype> </state> </statetype> </spinbox>
No new elements in the spinbox. It can have a <layout> of horizontal (right and left keys scroll through values) or vertical (up and down keys scroll through values). The spinbox contains three statetypes named buttonitem (the button itself), downscrollarrow (the down arrow) and upscrollarrow (the up arrow). buttonitem contains three states, active (available but not highlighted), selected (available and highlighted) and inactive (unavailable, unhighlighted). Each state in buttonitem should contain (or inherit) a buttontext textarea. upscrollarrow and downscrollarrow each contain two states (using the type= attribute), full and off.
spinbox statetypes
Statetype Name | Included States | State must contain: |
buttonitem | active | textarea - buttontext |
selected | textarea - buttontext | |
inactive | textarea - buttontext | |
upscrollarrow | full | |
off | ||
downscrollarrow | full | |
off |
The progressbar widget
The progressbar widget defines exactly what it sounds like, a progress bar when loading screens, for the web browser, et cetera.
<progressbar name="MyFirstProgressbar"> <area>0,0,10,10</area> <layout>horizontal</layout>  <imagetype name="background"> <filename>progressbar_background.png</filename> </imagetype> <imagetype name="progressimage"> <filename>progressbar_fill.png</filename> </imagetype> </progressbar>
layout | A progressbar can be laid out as horizontal and vertical. |
style | The style attribute sets the type of progressbar. The options are reveal and slide. Reveal places the progressimage imagetype or shape onscreen, but invisible, and reveals it as the item loads. Slide puts slides the progressimage imagetype or shape into the area as the item loads. |
The progressimage imagetype or shape must be defined.
The clock widget
The clock widget allows you to put a clock showing the system time in your theme. It takes all of the global attributes, font definitions, and behaves otherwise like a normal textarea, except it allows the themer to set the time format.
<clock name="clock"> <area>565,700,158,25</area> clock <template>%DATE%, %TIME%</template> <align>center</align> <alpha>255</alpha> </clock>
template | The template element, already seen in the textarea, allows the themer to define the time format. Placeholders are %TIME%, %DATE%, and %SHORTDATE%, these represent the time or date formats chosen by the user. To override the user-chosen defaults you can use the format described by QT Date/Time Format. |
The webbrowser widget
<webbrowser name="MyFirstWebBrowser"> <area>20,20,1240,500</area> <browserarea>0,0,100%-16,100%-16</browserarea> <url>http://www.google.com/</url> <zoom>1.0</zoom> <scrollduration>500</scrollduration> <scrollbar name="vertscrollbar" from="basevertscrollbar"> <area>100%-14,0,14,100%-14</area> </scrollbar> <scrollbar name="horizscrollbar" from="basehorizscrollbar"> <area>0,100%-14,100%-14,14</area> </scrollbar> </webbrowser>
browserarea | The browserarea attribute specifies the area to use for the webpage which may be different than the area if scrollbars are present. |
url | The url attribute specifies the web address to open in the widget. |
zoom | The zoom attribute magnifies the page in the widget. 1.0 is the default, non-zoomed value. |
scrollduration | The scrollduration attribute sets the amount of time the web page will take to scroll to the new position (smooth scroll). 0 turns smooth scroll off. |
background | The background attribute sets the background color for any page without one explicitly set. It takes a hexadecimal color for "color" and an integer value from 0-255 for "alpha." |
updateinterval | The interval at which the widget is repainted, in thousandths of a second. |
The scrollbar widgets are optional and must be called "vertscrollbar" and "horizscrollbar". If not present web browser will show the normal Qt scrollbars.
The scrollbar widget
This is a regular scrollbar widget that can be added to both the webbrowser and the buttonlist widgets.
<scrollbar name="basevertscrollbar"> <area>1114,0,14,970</area> <layout>vertical</layout> <hidedelay>0</hidedelay> <shape name="background"> <area>0,0,100%,100%</area> <type>roundbox</type> <line color="#aaaaaa" alpha="255" width="1" /> <fill style="gradient"> <gradient direction="diagonal"> <stop position="0" color="#999999" alpha="255" /> <stop position="100" color="#999999" alpha="120" /> </gradient> </fill> <cornerradius>12</cornerradius> </shape> <shape name="slider"> <area>0,0,14,40</area> <type>roundbox</type> <line color="#0895f8" alpha="255" width="1" /> <fill style="gradient"> <gradient direction="diagonal"> <stop position="0" color="#0767AB" alpha="255" /> <stop position="100" color="#0767AB" alpha="120" /> </gradient> </fill> <cornerradius>12</cornerradius> </shape> </scrollbar>
layout | The layout attribute specifies the orientation of the scroll bar either vertical or horizontal. |
hidedelay | The hidedelay specifies a delay after which the scroll bar will hide itself after the webbrowser or buttonlist has been scrolled. A value of 0 means the scrollbar will never hide. |
A shape or imagetype called slider must be defined.
The shape widget
The shape widget is a widget for drawing basic shape primitives in MythTV. It is primarily used in the Program Guide (EPG), but can be used elsewhere at the themer's discretion.
<shape name="MyFirstShape"> <area>25,105,530,30</area> <type>roundbox</type> <cornerradius>10</cornerradius> <line color="#FFFFFF" alpha="255" width="1" />  <fill color="#000000" alpha="30" />  <fill style="gradient"> <gradient start="#FF0000" end="#0000FF" alpha="255" direction="diagonal" /> </fill>  <fill style="gradient"> <gradient direction="diagonal" alpha="255"> <stop position="0" color="#FF0000" /> <stop position="50" color="#00FF00" alpha="40" /> <stop position="100" color="#0000FF" /> </gradient> </fill> </shape>
type | The shape primitive you wish to draw. Eligible types are box, ellipse, and roundbox. |
fill | The fill attributes for the shape. Color is expressed as a hexadecimal value, and alpha as a numerical value between 0 and 255. May also takes a style attribute. Valid styles are gradient and solid. When using the gradient style, the subattribute gradient should be used. |
gradient | The gradient attribute takes a direction value. Valid values are vertical, horizontal, and diagonal. Gradients have stops defining endpoints for color and alpha. Each stop takes a position from 0-100, a color, and optionally, alpha. |
line | The line attributes for the shape. Color is expressed as a hexadecimal value, alpha as a numerical value between 0 and 255 and width as number of pixels. |
cornerradius | The corner radius of a rounded box. |
The guidegrid widget
The guidegrid widget is a widget for producing an EPG (Electronic Programming Guide). It is used in both the liveTV and Guide scheduling screens.
<guidegrid name="guidegrid"> <area>220,295,1032,390</area> <layout>horizontal</layout> <channels>5</channels> <timeslots>4</timeslots> <solidcolor>#003256</solidcolor> <selector type="roundbox" linecolor="#ffff33" ></selector> <showcategories>yes</showcategories> <showcategorycolors>yes</showcategorycolors> <categoryalpha>60</categoryalpha> <recordingcolor>#00aa00</recordingcolor> <conflictingcolor>#ff6600</conflictingcolor> <cutdown>no</cutdown> <multiline>yes</multiline> <textoffset>9,6</textoffset> <recordstatus type="SingleRecord" image="gg-rs-single.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="TimeslotRecord" image="gg-rs-timeslot.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="ChannelRecord" image="gg-rs-channel.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="AllRecord" image="gg-rs-all.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="WeekslotRecord" image="gg-rs-weekslot.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="FindOneRecord" image="gg-rs-findone.png"></recordstatus> <recordstatus type="OverrideRecord" image="gg-rs-override.png"></recordstatus> <arrow direction="left" image="gg-arrow-left.png"></arrow> <arrow direction="right" image="gg-arrow-right.png"></arrow> basesmall </guidegrid>
channels | Number of channels to appear at a time in the guidegrid. Valid values are 1-12. |
timeslots | Number of 30 minute timeslots to appear in the guide at a time. Valid values are 1-8. |
solidcolor | The color for a guide box (when category colors are not used) expressed in hex. |
selector | The attributes of the selected item. Takes type (valid values are highlight, roundbox, and box), linecolor (color expressed in hex) and fillcolor (color expressed in hex) arguments. |
showcategories | Specifies whether to show genre text (not available for all grabbers). Defaults to yes. |
showcategorycolors | Specifies whether to show genre color coding (not available for all grabbers). Defaults to yes. |
categoryalpha | The alpha value of the guide grid items. Valid values are numbers from 0-255. |
recordingcolor | The color of an in-progress recording, expressed in hex. |
conflictingcolor | The color of an conflicting recording, expressed in hex. |
cutdown | Whether to cut down titles in the guide. Valid values are yes and no. |
multiline | Whether to allow multiple line guide entries. Valid values are yes and no. |
textoffset | Offset value from the top left of the guide grid item. Expressed as x,y values. |
recordstatus | Icon to display to indicate an item's recording status. Analogous to a state in other widgets. Takes a type (Valid values are SingleRecord, TimeslotRecord, ChannelRecord, AllRecord, WeekslotRecord, FindOneRecord, and OverrideRecord) and an image (path to a valid image file). |
arrow | An arrow icon which indicates the recording continues backwards or forwards. Takes arguments of direction (valid values are left and right) and and image (path to a valid image file). |
font | The font to be used in the entire grid. Valid values are any pre-defined font name. |
The editbar widget
The editbar widget is a widget used in the OSD (and in the future, in other places) to perform editing of media.
<editbar name="MyFirstEditBar"> <area>0,0,900,37</area> <imagetype name="cut"> <area>0,2,900,33</area> <filename>progressbarbg.png</filename> </imagetype> <imagetype name="keep"> <area>0,2,900,33</area> <filename>progressbarfill.png</filename> </imagetype> <shape name="cuttoright"> <area>0,0,4,100%</area> <fill color="#0000FF" alpha="255" /> </shape> <shape name="cuttoleft"> <area>0,0,4,100%</area> <fill color="#0000FF" alpha="255" /> </shape> <shape name="keeptoright"> <area>0,0,4,100%</area> <fill color="#0099FF" alpha="255" /> </shape> <shape name="keeptoleft"> <area>0,0,4,100%</area> <fill color="#0099FF" alpha="255" /> </shape> <shape name="position"> <area>0,0,4,100%</area> <fill color="#FFFFFF" alpha="255" /> </shape> </editbar>
cut | A shape or imagetype to represent the "cut" portions of the media. |
keep | A shape or imagetype to represent the "kept" portions of the media. |
cuttoleft | A shape or imagetype to represent that the material to the left will be cut. |
cuttoright | A shape or imagetype to represent that the material to the right will be cut. |
keeptoleft | A shape or imagetype to represent that the material to the left will be kept. |
keeptoright | A shape or imagetype to represent that the material to the right will be kept. |
position | A shape or imagetype to represent the current position within the timeline. |
The video widget
The video widget is used in MythMusic to display the visualisers (and in the future will be able to display video and more). This widget currently doesn't introduce any new elements. NEW in 0.25-pre.
<video name="MyFirstVideo"> <area>0,0,100,100</area> </video>
The group widget
The group widget allows other widgets to be grouped together. The widgets become the children of the group so hiding a group will hide all children also moving a group will move all the children as well. Another use of the group widget is to allow a group of widgets to be shared among several screens for example you can create a group that contains the MythMusic playback controls which can then be added to any of the music screens which both saves time and helps to maintain a consistent look and feel. Groups can be nested so a group can itself contain other groups. This widget doesn't introduce any new elements. NEW in 0.25-pre.
<group name="basemusiccontrols"> <area>650,650,200,50</area> <button name="prev" from="baseprevbutton"> <position>0,0</position> </button> <button name="rew" from="baserewbutton"> <position>60,0</position> </button> <button name="pause" from="basepausebutton"> <position>120,0</position> </button> <button name="play" from="baseplaybutton"> <position>160,0</position> </button> <button name="stop" from="basestopbutton"> <position>205,0</position> </button> <button name="ff" from="baseffbutton"> <position>255,0</position> </button> <button name="next" from="basenextbutton"> <position>315,0</position> </button> </group>
Pending MythUI Patches
Various MythUI Tickets have not yet been applied to Myth's Code. They will be documented temporarily on this page until they enter Myth's code, when they will be moved to the current page.
Once you have read the above, you may want to attempt the Theming MythNews tutorial, which guides you through most of the basics of defining widgets, inheritance, and laying them out on a page. Once you have completed this tutorial, you should have a better understanding of how all the MythUI parts fit together, and will be ready to attempt a theme of your own.
Required MythUI Theme Files
You can click any of the file titles to view a reference of the required windows and named widgets.
The themeinfo.xml file sets forth the aspect ratio, base resolution, preview image, and various other pieces of information critical to a fuctioning theme.
The base.xml file is the first file loaded by your theme. The base.xml file is the core definitions for each widget in your theme. Here you will define popup menus, font names, progress bars, dropdown menus, and all the other basic widgets used in the Myth UI. The base.xml file is a fantastic place to put all the definitions you intend to use later, which you can then call by name.
Within base.xml, there are certain hardcoded window types which represent search dialogs, popup menus, progress bars, and other generic windows that are used throughout the UI. These must be defined.
The menu-ui.xml file is the file which determines the layout of Myth's core (non-popup) menus. It can be as simple as a single buttonlist, or can be enhanced with clocks, widgets, and other eye candy.
Optional MythUI Theme Files
The following are "optional" in that if they do not exist, the theme will fall back to those files stored in the default and default-wide directories. To finish a complete theme, however, they should all be themed.
The appear-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the Screen Size Adjustment Wizard.
The browser-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythBrowser Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The categories.xml is a unique file that maps program guide colors to genres in various languages.
The config-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of various settings screens in mythfrontend and mythtv-setup.
The controls-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the Key Binding window and popup.
In versions 0.23 and below, the dvd-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the DVD Ripper. It is not used in versions 0.24 and above.
The gallery-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythGallery Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The game-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythGame Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The image-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the Image gallery screens (0.28 or higher only).
The movies-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythMovies Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The music-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythMusic Plugin and its associated settings screens. MythMusic's MythUI port is in progress, and the linked page shows only those windows which have been ported.
The mytharchive-ui.xml governs the layout and behavior of the save recordings an videos to a native archive plugin.
The mythburn-ui.xml governs the layout and behavior of the save recordings and videos to video DVD plugin.
The mythnative-ui.xml governs the layout and behavior of the import recordings from a native archive plugin.
The netvision-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythNetvision Internet Video Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The news-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythNews Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The notification-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the notification center cards (0.27 or higher only)
The osd.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the On Screen Display (OSD). (Note: .24 or higher only)
The osd_subtitle.xml file governs the formatting (text and background) of text-based captions and subtitles. (Note: .26 or higher only)
The recordings-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the "Watch Recordings" screen.
The schedule-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the EPG (Program Guide) and all recording scheduling screens.
The settings-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the Theme Chooser window and the System Event Handler Editor.
The status-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the System Info Screen.
The video-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythVideo Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The weather-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythWeather Plugin and its associated settings screens.
The welcome-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythWelcome program.
The zoneminder-ui.xml file governs the layout and behavior of the MythZoneminder Plugin and its associated settings screens.
Testing Your Theme
During development it's helpful to make iterative changes and observe the results without having to exit and restart the frontend each time. You can trigger a theme reload by sending the USR1 signal to a mythfrontend process. On Linux this is as easy as:
kill -USR1 $(pidof mythfrontend)
Alternatively, you may bind a key to the RELOADTHEME jump point using the Edit Keys menu.
From 0.24 both a DTD and XSD (XML Schema Definition) are available for themes and they can be used to ensure that your theme conforms to the latest version of the xml and find a range of mistakes. The XSD is recommended over the DTD as it can be used to check conformity and formatting of values and not just markup.
To validate your theme a number of tools might be used, but xmllint is available from xmlsoft and runs from the command line:
xmllint --noout --schema http://www.mythtv.org/schema/mythuitheme.xsd path/to/your/theme/*.xml


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Although biting is fairly common in young children, it is often worrisome to adults. A family member, playmate, or classmate at daycare or preschool may be the one bitten. Biting can be painful and frightening when it happens. It upsets other children and often angers teachers and other adults.
Biting is usually caused by 1 of 4 different factors:
Experimental biting. Experimental biting is done by infants and toddlers as they explore their world. They put everything in their mouths and sometimes bite in the process. You can help decrease biting by telling them, "No—biting hurts!" and being firm. Offer them things that they can safely bite on, such as teething rings.
Frustration biting. Frustration biting happens when young children become frustrated and unable to cope with a situation. Until they learn how to play cooperatively, they may respond to the demands of other children by hitting or biting. Some helpful guidelines for decreasing this type of biting include:
Keep playtimes short and groups small.
Supervise young children's play closely.
If biting happens, say, "No, don't bite. Biting hurts," and remove your child from the situation right away. Stay with your child and help him or her to calm down. Explore other, better ways to handle the situation with your child, so he or she learns to handle emotions differently next time.
Powerless biting. Powerless biting happens when a child is in need of feeling powerful. Sometimes, the youngest child in the family uses biting to gain power. To help prevent this type of biting:
Make sure your child feels protected and is not always being "picked on" by others.
Explain the situation to bigger or older children and get their help to make things more equal.
If biting happens, tell your child that he or she is not to bite and remove him or her from the situation right away. Stay with your child and help him or her to calm down. Explore other, better ways to handle the situation with your child, so he or she learns to handle emotions differently next time.
Stressful biting. Stressful biting is done when a child is under a lot of emotional stress. Biting may be a sign of distress or pain when the child is upset or angry. If this happens:
Try to find out what is bothering your child. Watch for what happens right before the biting happens.
Help your child to find other ways to express his or her feelings. Let him or her know that biting is wrong and remove him or her from the situation right away.
If your child bites, respond firmly, but calmly, to the biting. Let your child know that you disapprove and remove him or her from the situation. Help your child learn new ways to handle things. If your child bites repeatedly, be sure to talk with your child's healthcare provider about the problem.


text: shaun jayBy Olivia Garrison Posted November 15, 2016 In shaun jay2016-11-152016-11-15/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/blue-01-103.pngCreative Click Media/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/blue-01-103.png200px200px 0Olivia GarrisonOlivia is the Director of Communications at Creative Click Media and a lifelong lover of words, syntax and grammar. Recent PostsDigital Marketing AI: Should You Work With An Agency That Uses Artificial Intelligence?Taylor Swift's Marketing Playbook: 13 Chart-Topping Tactics for Your SMBHow to Choose an SEO Agency: Finding the Ideal Partner for Your BusinessThe Ultimate 2024 Social Media Graphic Sizes GuideLeave a Comment Cancel replySave my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Δ


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Franklin T Ball Bats
T-Ball Bat Buying Guide
June 08, 2023
With so many baseball bat brands, types and styles on the market, it can be overwhelming to try and find the best baseball bat for 7 year old ballplayers.
April 19, 2022
When it comes to Little League, it is often questioned what kind of bats you are allowed to use at certain levels. Since 2018, it is required that all divisions
January 01, 2024
Purchasing a new bat can be very overwhelming at times due to the huge volume of bats available on the market. Durability, performance, and comfort at the plate
January 05, 2024
When it comes to the best baseball helmets, you have plenty of brands and styles to choose from. So how do you know what to get? In order to help you find the best
January 08, 2024
Finding the perfect pair of batting gloves for you can be difficult. We have put together a list of the best batting gloves for adults, softball players, and youth
Other Great Choices
- @Recommendation.Title by @email@example.com@Recommendation.MSRP


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Tits and ass are incredibly prevalent in modern society. Sex is used to sell products in advertising, actors are shamefully primped into digitally crafted sex symbols and TV shows like Toddlers in Tiaras, stretch the definition of acceptable television viewing. Sex is everywhere, but oddly, not in our games.
With the recent pulling of No Reply Games' sex focused, interactive story 'game' "Seduce Me" from Valve's Greenlight service due to breaking of the terms and conditions – for being an "offensive" title – sex is back in the headlines of gaming websites the world over, all of them asking the question, "does sex belong in video games?"
It could be argued that games purely focused around sex are pornographic in nature and therefore warrant some sort of segmentation perhaps, in the way it is with websites and traditionally with stores that cater specifically to it.
But what about games that just feature sex as a feature or component of the overall experience?
Every time a popular title attempts to put anything sex like in its games that goes beyond a fade to black and some grunts, there's a problem. Look at GTA: San Andreas' Hot Coffee mod, or the blue side boob that appeared for a brief second in Mass Effect 2. It all gets blown out of proportion, people that haven't even played the game or seen footage of the event start screaming "save the children," and to some it seems as if the world is going to end.
Of course it never does and children are as corrupted as their parents allow them to be. These games have age ratings for a reason and if parents choose to ignore them it's their responsibility to set it right, or at least explain things to their kids so they understand and learn about the adult activity in a constructive way.
But should it be there in the first place? Well the obvious answer would be yes, for a variety of reasons.
1: Taking into consideration the age ratings I mentioned earlier, the average gamer is in their 30s at this point. Not only have they had sex, they've been living with internet pornography for over 15 years. Believe me, unless you're doing a game adaptation of The Serbian Film, this is nothing we haven't seen before.
2: Unless it's Manhunt, where ritualistic killing was censored because... it's the game the lobby groups decided to go after, murder barely raises an eyebrow from anyone. Killing is rampant in games. Just look at the fast Paragon leveller in Diablo III. He's killed almost two million monsters alone. If he can commit mass murder, why can't a game have a sex scene in it?
3: Sex is a part of life. For anyone that doesn't know, it's how babies are made. Shocking I know, but we all began our life at a moment of parental coitus and society is slowly beginning to lose the taboo. It's still there – and enjoyed by many – but the simple fact is that sex shouldn't be considered a naughty thing any more. It's in films, in advertising, television and there is absolutely no reason it shouldn't be in our games.
However, despite these very obvious reasons that sex should be included in games and accepted by the public as a simple part of the artistic medium, the blame isn't entirely on the shoulders of complainers. Game developers could also help the cause out.
Despite the criticism for its leud content, Mass Effect actually has an incredibly impressive and deeply emotional erotic part to it but it is a rarity. More often than not, we get adventurers fucking hookers, or silly quick time sex games or button mashing to fuck harder. This isn't the type of thing that detractors of sexual content in gaming are going to agree with, probably ever.
No I'm not saying that because lobbyists and complainers have stale sex lives that games should be the same, but there isn't a reason that sex can't be used as an emotional connector between characters either.
Games focused around getting the clothes off of a digital woman should be just as allowed to exist in our gaming spheres as the latest AAA blockbuster, but they don't further the cause of sex in video games as much as they could.
Not only do I believe that sex deserves to be a part of gaming, I think it deserves to have more credit as a part of the emotional story within a game. It doesn't need to be your character just getting his rocks off, or a nudge-nudge-wink-wink from the developers saying "we know what you gamers want, digital titties," but a real way for players to connect with a character.
We talked a few weeks about about how Lara Croft's surviving of an attempted rape could be used to delve into all sorts of new character emotions within a game. How about include a sex scene in that game not long after the rape and make it optional. Have it so that players can decide. If she goes along with it, perhaps Lara is emotionally distracted and merely trying to forget a horrific experience, thereby not building a relationship with the male counterpart. Perhaps if she says no, players can learn something about his character.
Sex is a massive motivator in human life and it should be used in games as well, not just as a treat or a laughable aside, but a real part of the gameplay. It can be part of the story and part of the world the developers create.
It doesn't always have to be, just as not every single racing game has to be a sim like experience, but just now and again I'd like to see some real effort put into sex.
That last line could have been phrased better.


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Male Marines listed being falsely accused of sexual harassment or assault as a top concern in a survey about moving women into combat jobs, and thousands indicated the change could prompt them to leave the service altogether.
The anonymous online questionnaire by the Marine Corps surveyed 53,000 troops last summer, with the results provided to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta before he opened thousands of combat positions to women last week.
The Marine Corps released the results to The Associated Press on Friday.
Among the other top concerns listed by male Marines were possible fraternization and preferential treatment of some Marines.
Respondents also worried that women would be limited because of pregnancy or personal issues that could affect a unit before it's sent to the battlefield.
Military experts said the results were not surprising because the Marines have the highest percentage of males among the branches of the armed forces.
Former Marine infantry officer Greg Jacob of the Service Women's Action Network said the Pentagon's estimate that 86 percent of assault victims opt against filing complaints "suggests that there's hardly an overabundance of reports, false or otherwise."
Some, however, said the survey shows the need for sensitivity training and guidance from leadership so the change goes smoothly, as occurred when the military ended its policy that barred openly gay troops.
"I think there is this sense among what I would imagine is a very small minority of Marines that this male bastion is under siege and this is one more example of political correctness," said David J. R. Frakt, a military law expert and lieutenant colonel in the Air Force reserves.
Just as the Marine Corps adjusted to the end of "don't ask, don't tell," despite being the most resistant among the military branches, troops will likely fall in line again with this latest historical milestone, said Frakt, a visiting professor at the University of Pittsburgh.
Marine Corps officials did not respond to a request for comment on the survey results.
About 17 percent of male Marine respondents and 4 percent of female respondents who planned to stay in the service or were undecided said they would likely leave if women move into combat positions. That number jumped to 22 percent for male Marines and 17 percent for female Marines if women are assigned involuntarily to those jobs, according to the survey.
Both sexes mentioned intimate relationships between Marines and feeling obligated to protect female Marines among their top five concerns about the change.
Female Marines also said they worried about being targeted by enemies as POWs, the risk of sexual harassment or assault, and hygiene facilities, according to the survey, which did not give specifics.
The women surveyed also expressed concern about acceptance and physical abilities if given a ground combat job.
About 31 percent of female respondents — or 1,558 women Marines — say they would be interested in a lateral move to a combat position as their primary job, and 34 percent — or 1,636 — said they would volunteer for a ground combat unit assignment.
Elaine Donnelly of the conservative Center for Military Readiness and a vocal critic of the change said the survey asked the wrong questions and should have been asking if troops favor it and whether it will make a more effective force.
The questionnaire also relied on the "mistaken belief" that training standards will remain the same, which Donnelly said is not realistic given the differing physical abilities between the genders.
She said the Pentagon is bent on imposing gender-based quotas that will drive down standards. Defense leaders say standards will not be lowered.
"The results that are being put out there are designed to manage public perception," she said. "There is a lot about this that still needs to be discussed and it's really not fair to the women who serve out there."
The infantry side is skeptical about how women will perform in their units, and some positions may end up closed again if too few females meet the physically demanding standards of combat, said Gen. James Amos, head of the Marine Corps, who spoke to reporters Thursday at a defense conference in San Diego.
"I think from the infantry side of the house, you know they're more skeptical," Amos said. "It's been an all-male organization throughout the history of the U.S. Marine Corps so I don't think that should be any surprise."
Most Marines support the policy change, Amos said.
It will be up to the military service chiefs to recommend and defend whether women should be excluded from any of those more demanding and deadly positions, such as Navy commandos or the Army's Delta Force.
Over the past decade, many male service members already have been fighting alongside women in Iraq and Afghanistan. Women who serve in supply units, as clerks and with military police have ended up on the unmarked front lines of modern warfare.
More than 150 women have been killed in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while serving in support roles.
About 7 percent of Marines are female compared to about 14 percent overall for the armed forces.
Both sexes surveyed said getting women closer to the action will improve their career opportunities.
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