Working with Skins

With QCD, you can change the way the player appears on your desktop. When you first open QCD, what you see (the player) is actually the default base QCD skin . To understand more about how skins work, it helps to understand some of the basics:

Skin Modes:

A skin is a file that changes the appearance of your QCD player. If you want, you can group multiple skins together ù when you group skins together, you end up with a skin family .

In turn, you can apply a skin family to QCD. Once you've applied the skin family to QCD, each skin kid (or skin family member) acts as a mode for the skin family. A skin mode is the skin you actually see ù it's a reflection of the currently selected skin. This feature allows you to group skins that are commonly used or have a common theme, and switch between them quickly and seamlessly.

You can switch the skin mode size at any time. Each family can have up to 9 different modes, and you can name the modes any way you like! For example, a skin may have a mode named "Kong" for full display, a mode named "Retro" for a display that is somewhat smaller, and a mode named "Runt" that takes up the least amount of space on your desktop.

Skin Layouts:

A skin layout is a saved configuration of a skin mode's window sizes and positions. You can save and manage as many skin modes as you like for each skin mode.

Skin Browser:

You can also preview and download new skins. When you preview skins, you view a sample screenshot of the skin, and if you like it, all you have to do is click Install. After installing the skin, it can be found back in the 'skin browser' section under the 'All Skins' tab (or the Family or Kids tab, depending on the type of skin you downloaded).

To work with skins, you use the Skin Browser area of the QCD Preferences window.

There are several ways to open the Skin Browser:

Here are some things you can do with skins:

To:

Do this:

Change between skin modes

  • Type Alt-S.  This is a convenient shortcut. Especially if don't see the mode buttons on the currently loaded skin.

Change between skin layouts

  1. On the base skin, click the Skin Menu button.  (#11 on the base skin.)

  2. Select Skin Layouts, choose your Layout.

 

Save a skin layout

  1. Set current mode's window sizes and positions the way you want saved.

  2. On the base skin, click the Skin Menu button.  (#11 on the base skin.)

  3. Select Skin Layouts > Save Current Layout.

Download and install new skins

  1. Open the Skin Browser as described above.

  2. Go to the Download Skins page.

  3. Click Update Skin List to download the latest list of available skins from the QCD web site.

    Tip    : At the bottom of the window, QCD will tell you how many new skins have been made available (if any) since the last time you looked.

  4. Choose the skin family or individual skin (kid) you want from the list.

    Tip    : Use the Preview button to preview skins before downloading them.

  5. Click Install to download the skin and install it in the Skin browser.

Tip: You can better manage the list of available skins by unlisting skins you already have, or don't like. Any unlisted skins that get updated will automatically be relisted so you won't miss out.

Load a skin

  1. Open the Skin Browser as described above.

  2. Go to the Skins page. This shows all the skins and skin families you currently have installed.

  3. Click on the skin or skin family you want. This loads it into QCD.

  4. (Optional) Click the Current Modes > button to cycle through to the mode you want.

Refresh a skin

  • Anywhere on the skin, press F5.

Group skins into families

  1. Open the Skin Browser as described above.

  2. Click the Make Custom button.

  3. Switch to a skin and mode of your choice and set it as a mode in the custom skin family by clicking Set mode on the Create a Skin Group window.

  4. Enter a name and description for your custom skin and then click Create.

This custom skin will appear under the Custom tab in the skin browser.

This lets you use several skins as different modes of the same skin family (so you can switch between them by typing Alt-S).

Delete a skin

  1. Open the Skin Browser as described above.

  2. Go to the Installed Skins page.

  3. Click on the skin you want to delete. This will load it into QCD.

  4. Click Delete to delete the skin.

  5. Select another skin.

Note: You cannot delete the default QCD skin.

Have QCD load skins randomly

  1. Open the Skin Browser.

  2. Go to the Skin > Settings page.

  3. Check the box labeled Random skin on startup to have QCD load a different skin each time you launch it.

  4. Check the box labeled Random skin per track to have QCD change skins each track.

  5. Check the box labeled Select random mode from the current family only if you only want QCD to switch between modes in the current skin family.

Change the font used with skins (for international support)

  1. Go to the Settings > Language & Fonts page.

  2. Check the Enable Font Selection option.

  3. Select the character set and font name to use.

  4. Click the Set current for this skin button (or alternatively, you can set the font for all skins by clicking Set current as default)

Note: This is useful if you listen to CDs or tracks that have artists or tiles with Japanese, Chinese, or other non-western characters. Skins contain built-in character sets that may not be able to display these names.