Overview
Rhino 4.0 allows developers to customize most of Rhino's interface so that the application appears to be their own. We call this a custom Skin. With a custom Skin, you can change the application icon, splash screen, the menu bar, the application title bar, the about box, and the toolbars.
Creating a custom Skin for Rhino involves creating two code modules:
- <skin name>.rhs is a regular MFC DLL that implements the skin's icon, splash screen, and, optionally, a menu. In this article, we will refer this to the Skin DLL.
- <skin name>.rhp is a Rhino utility plug-in that implements the menu handler, if necessary, and one or more custom commands. In this article, we will refer to this as the Skin Plug-in.
Create the Skin DLL
- A Skin DLL is a regular MFC DLL that implements the skin's icon, splash screen, and, optionally, a menu.
- To create the Skin DLL, launch Visual Studio .NET 2005 and run the Rhino Skin AppWizard installed by the Rhino SDK.
- The Rhino Skin AppWizard will create three classes:
- A CWinApp-derived class. This is the entry point of the DLL.
- A CRhinoSkinDLL-derived class. This class allows you to specify Rhino's icon, splash screen and menu. For more information on this class, see rhinoSdkSkinDLL.h.
- CSplashWnd. This is a basic implementation of a splash screen class. If you require something fancier, feel free to replace it with your own implementation.
- Modify the project's icon and splash screen bitmap. If your Skin is going to override Rhino's main menu, then you will need to create your menu resources as well.
- Do not forget to fill out the developer information block found at the top of your DLL's .CPP file. This block is similar to that of Rhino plug-ins.
Create the Skin Plug-in
- A Skin Plug-in is a Rhino utility plug-in that implements the menu handler, if necessary, and one or more custom commands.
- To create a Rhino utility plug-in, launch Visual Studio .NET 2005 and run the Rhino Plug-in AppWizard installed by the Rhino SDK. When picking the AppWizard to run, make sure to add the new project to the open solution instead of creating a new solution. This way, your Skin project will be origanized into a single solution.
- If the Skin DLL provides a custom menu, then copy the UUID generated by the plug-in AppWizard and found in your plug-in's CRhinoPlugIn::PlugInID() member to your Skin's CRhinoSkinDLL::SkinPlugInID() member. Important! These two methods must return the same UUID. This is a critical step as it identifies the main plug-in that Rhino will load to manage its menus and extend the Rhino command set.
- Add the following overrides to the header file of your CRhinoPlugIn-derived class:
// Skin DLL menu update handler void OnInitPlugInMenuPopups(WPARAM wparam, LPARAM lparam); // Skin DLL menu command handler BOOL OnPlugInMenuCommand(WPARAM wparam ); // Change to CRhinoPlugIn::load_plugin_at_startup plugin_load_time PlugInLoadTime();
- Add the following definition to the CPP file of your CRhinoPlugIn-derived class.
CRhinoPlugIn::plugin_load_time CSkinPlugInSamplePlugIn::PlugInLoadTime()
{
// Override to change load time to "at startup"
return CRhinoPlugIn::load_plugin_at_startup;
}
- If your Skin DLL is providing a custom menu, then add a source file named MenuHandler.cpp to the plug-in project and put the definition of OnInitPlugInMenuPopups() and OnPlugInMenuCommand() in this file. Important! Include the Skin DLL's Resource.h file in MenuHandler.cpp to provide access to the Skin DLL's menu resource identifiers. For example:
#include "stdafx.h"
#include "MySkinPlugIn.h"
#include "../MySkinDLL/Resource.h"
// Put these to overrides in a separate CPP file so they could
// include the MySkinDLL/Resource.h file without conflicting
// with this projects resource.h
void CSkinPlugInSamplePlugIn::OnInitPlugInMenuPopups(WPARAM wParam, LPARAM lParam)
{
HMENU hMenu = (HMENU)wParam;
if( NULL == hMenu )
return;
switch( GetMenuItemID(hMenu, LOWORD(lParam)) )
{
case IDM_SAMPLE_DISABLE:
::EnableMenuItem( hMenu, IDM_SAMPLE_DISABLE,
MF_BYCOMMAND|MF_DISABLED|MF_GRAYED );
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_SUB_DISABLE:
::EnableMenuItem( hMenu, IDM_SAMPLE_SUB_DISABLE,
MF_BYCOMMAND|MF_DISABLED|MF_GRAYED );
break;
// TODO...
}
}
BOOL CSkinPlugInSamplePlugIn::OnPlugInMenuCommand(WPARAM wParam)
{
ON_wString w;
switch( (UINT)wParam )
{
case IDM_SAMPLE_ONE:
w = L"Test Item One";
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_TWO:
w = L"Two";
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_DISABLE:
w = L"Disabled";
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_SUB_A:
w = L"Sub Menu A";
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_SUB_B:
w = L"Sub Menu B";
break;
case IDM_SAMPLE_SUB_DISABLE:
w = L"Sub Menu Disabled";
break;
default:
return true;
}
::RhinoMessageBox( w, L"OnMenu", MB_OK );
return true;
}
Finishing Up
- Compile the Skin Plug-in.
- Load the Skin Plug-in using Rhino's PluginManager command so it has a chance to self register.
- Compile the Skin DLL.
Installation
- To install your custom Skin, use REGEDIT.EXE to add a scheme key to your registry with a path to your Skin DLL. For example:
| Item | Value |
| Subkey | HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\McNeel\Rhinoceros\4.0\Scheme: MySkin |
| Entry name | SkinDLLPath |
| Type | REG_SZ |
| Data value | C:\Src\MySkin\MySkinDLL\Release\MySkinDLL.rhs |
- You can now test your custom Skin by creating shortcut to your Rhino executable with /scheme="<scheme name from the previous step>" as command line argument. For example:
"C:\Program Files\Rhinoceros 4.0\System\Rhino4.exe" /scheme=MySkin
Question One
If the user chooses not to run my "skinned" version of Rhino, how can I keep my skin-specific plug-in from loading?
Answer
In your plug-in's OnLoadPlugIn member, check to see if the name of the scheme that Rhino is using matches your skin's scheme name. For example:
BOOL CSkinPlugInSamplePlugIn::OnLoadPlugIn()
{
ON_wString scheme = RhinoApp().RegistrySchemeName();
if( scheme.CompareNoCase(L"Scheme: MySkin") != 0 )
return -1; // Fail silently...
return CRhinoUtilityPlugIn::OnLoadPlugIn();
}