Can I REMOVE the ICON beneath the Hot Key text?

[gamemasterbob]

Is it possible to remove the icon from beneath the text in the hot keys? This would make the text MUCH easier to read. How about adding a background fill to make the text stand out? This would be cool. The HOT keys are my GM screen. I am sure the community can relate. IF this idea has been posted forgive me. I did not see it and I searched.
Thanks in advance.

Bob

[SirMotte]

Is it possible to remove the icon from beneath the text in the hot keys? This would make the text MUCH easier to read. How about adding a background fill to make the text stand out? This would be cool. The HOT keys are my GM screen. I am sure the community can relate. IF this idea has been posted forgive me. I did not see it and I searched.
Thanks in advance.

Bob

One would have to force FG/FGU into using a different icon than the "button_link.png" in the themes settings.
Another way would be to replace it with a transparent graphic, but this would lead to empty link fields everywhere.

The dimensions of the icon are 19x19px. Messing this up would lead to misplaced buttons as they are defined by their axis placement within the UI. This would require some fiddeling around with the theme, but could be done I think. I'd rather change the underlying "hotkeybox.png" into something that highlights the text more prominently and/or change the link icon color to something else.

35576

If you tell me what theme you use, I can provide you the graphics needed.

Cheers

[gamemasterbob]

I generally use the included brown leather theme. I use FGU. The ICON in the Hot Slot is NOT needed. It never was. I feel the default should be to NOT have the ICON. The background in the hot slot should also be high contrast for the text to stand out (also above-mentioned by SirMotte). This is difficult to change? I thought UNITY was going to be a more robust platform to make these and other kinds of design changes possible.

[LordEntrails]

Unity is a more modern platform that after it is actually released will allow the developers to make more frequent feature enhancements.

What you want done can be done already in FGC or FGU, but you will have to write an extension to do it.

[Trenloe]

The icon is there to tell you what the hot key slot does. Is it a link? Is it a modifier? Is it an effect? Is it a roll? Is it something else?

I agree that depending on the colour of the hot key text, and the link icon, it can be difficult to read. This is usually theme related. But saying that an indicator of what type of hot key is not (never was) needed, maybe appropriate to how you use the hot key slots, but not for the wider FG community.

The devs are aware of the visibility issue, see the comment here: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?57859-Readability-of-modifiers-short-cut-text&p=509090&viewfull=1#post509090

In the meantime, as has been mentioned, you can look into an extension to remove or change the icons for you. Or a quick work around is to edit the text in the hot key (via the right click menu) to add spaces before, or after the text to move it left/right of the icon.

[SirMotte]

I generally use the included brown leather theme. I use FGU. The ICON in the Hot Slot is NOT needed. It never was. I feel the default should be to NOT have the ICON. The background in the hot slot should also be high contrast for the text to stand out (also above-mentioned by SirMotte). This is difficult to change? I thought UNITY was going to be a more robust platform to make these and other kinds of design changes possible.

If the button is needed or not could be open to dispute, but to claim it never was in the first place is not something I agree with.
That being said, I will take a look if I can send you a small extension that gets the visual problem sorted, stay tuned.


Edit:
Here ya go.
Version 1: Just a darkened hotbar.
35837
Version 2: Darkened hotbar and simplified link icons.
35845
Please keep in mind, that V2 changes the icon everywhere to a simple black circle (red in downstate).

In terms of readability you might want to take a look at my dark theme (see signature)

Another method you could take a look at would be to change the font color for the hotkey bar itself in the graphics_fonts.xml

<font name="hotkey">
<fgffile name="graphics/fonts/xxxxx" />
<ttf file="graphics/fonts/xxxxx" name="xxxx" size="16" />
<color value="#xxxxxx" />
</font>

[gamemasterbob]

I am truly grateful for your help SirMotte. VERY grateful. Thank you SIR.

Bob

[SirMotte]

You're welcome friend, glad you like it :).