Color Keyboard Guide

[Krak4211]

Just wanted to say thanks Phatmartino for the beautiful post/tutorial! You really took the time and went out of your way to explain the WHOLE process that is Color Keyboard. Bravo!

[Phatmartino]

Hey, thanks! There was already quite a bit more information to add even before iOS 5 and the 4s, but I've been swamped. The author of CK just emailed me to today and asked if he could provide a link on the CK project site, so I'll need to step it up here shortly...

Thanks again!

[benjammin1987]

dumb question maybe, but can this be done without the Color Keyboard application from Cydia? Im assuming that the little tweak must be added before any of the above mentioned can be attempted...

[Phatmartino]

dumb question maybe, but can this be done without the Color Keyboard application from Cydia? Im assuming that the little tweak must be added before any of the above mentioned can be attempted...

Yes, the Color Keyboard tweak must be purchased and installed. Well worth the couple bucks!

[benjammin1987]

Thought so! Thanks for the reply, the app is pretty nifty... is it really that difficult to try to edit the keyboard images without the application? Possibly a 3rd party program available similar to iDesigner on Windows? Im new to the theming possibilities of the the iphone. I've jailbroke a few iphones with Redsnow and Absinthe, and have a good understanding of Cydia and SSH. I have been searching around on Google for resources but everything leads to dead ends... Its quite annoying actually haha. I would be grateful for any links you could provide.

[Phatmartino]

Thought so! Thanks for the reply, the app is pretty nifty... is it really that difficult to try to edit the keyboard images without the application? Possibly a 3rd party program available similar to iDesigner on Windows? Im new to the theming possibilities of the the iphone. I've jailbroke a few iphones with Redsnow and Absinthe, and have a good understanding of Cydia and SSH. I have been searching around on Google for resources but everything leads to dead ends... Its quite annoying actually haha. I would be grateful for any links you could provide.

Hey, I'm just about ready to start doing some major updating to the first few "Guide" posts of the thread. It will be far more organized and easier to find info about the few different methods that can be used to theme in CK.

The Background Image Method is rather involved, but I will also be adding Photoshop template .psds that I'm almost done updating for iOS5/4s. If you don't have Ps, all it really takes is getting screenshots of all of the KB layouts needed, and then using them as guides or just altering them if it needs to be simple.

They are no longer up to date for iOS5, but you can download this zip in the first post to start to get an idea of what's involved.
http://modmyi.com/attachments/forums...ethod-pack.zip

Beyond making the images, it just takes a bit of editing in the Colorkeyboard.plist file to control a few colors that are not part of the images.

Hopefully the guide will become more and more usable, and I'll always answer any and all questions!

[Coop2009]

this post should def be a sticky post without a doubt its so useful bro!

[DraxQ2]

Thank you so much for all of this information!!!

[h3kk3]

howto the the emoji keyboard with color keyboard ?? anybody knows ??

[Jus1n]

everyone can make an macbook air CK theme with siri key.i found on cydia that great theme but without the siri one so...

[Iceshade]

@Phatmartino, i could use a bit of help so i can stop busting my head to find working solution on this one. No matter how hard i trying to find solution on this one it's beyond my knowledge (even with this fantastic tutorial of yours). I have 3 keyboard installed on my i4, English, Emoji, Serbian(cyrillic). This last one is a bit of problem, it has a diferent layout 11 letters in one row.

So in basic i cant figure out is it possible to have 2 different sets of images in my theme folder and call them in one .plist.
When i switch keyboards on ''globe'' key, my first set of images stays (english qwerty in this case) and with that i cant see cyrillic letters.
I would be very grateful if you could be able to take some time and make me .plist where i can put my pictures (if that is possible) because after several days of effort i could not managed to do that.
Thanks again, great post, 'must see' for every themer out there

[Phatmartino]

@Iceshade - Hey, you bring up a great point and you're not crazy! Unfortunately I don't thinks it's going to be possible, especially with the text (and yours is sweet looking) included on the images.

There are a few compatibility issues along these lines that can be worked around by using the same images but eliminating the text from them, and then having the plist control native or Bytafont text overtop of your BG's. The biggest problem with your particular issue is that the "key" layouts on the BG images would need to change when you switch to Serbian, and there is no further separation of "states" that we can control pulling different images for than you're already seeing in your plist.

Essentially the best you can do while keeping all of the detail you put into the BG images is to have 2 different CK themes - English and Serbian, and have to arm the appropriate one when needed, which obviously defeats the purpose of the International key making it possible to switch between them "on the fly".

It's 2 steps backwards from what you currently have going on, but the only way to fully reach compatibility is to almost have a plist only theme setting colors in the plist for the Keys, Symbols, Etches, etc. and pulling images for only the "BG" you have behind the Keys and all.

1 upside to this is that you can create animation of the secondary keys (Delete, Return, Space, etc), but worth tearing your theme apart?

Is there a Bytafont you use for the rest of the device that matches the font on your images?

Either way, I'll keep thinking about it.

Let me know if you do want to look into giving up the keys and text to the plist. Can't hurt to try and see what it would look like, at least.

[Iceshade]

Yeah, i thought that you'd say that this is not possible, anyhow, i made two sets of BG images for both SRB and EN keyboards and since EN is in every day use i will keep that as primary and rearm Cyrillic in CK if necessary. Did you sometimes had the feeling that one almost completely unimportant little thing spoil all the pleasure that you feel ??? What I meant to say is that i lost almost whole day to make 8 pictures in PhotoShop, every single peace of image is layer including all letters with custom PS styles and gradiants, so inability to change the language directly on the keyboard is like complete fail to whole this thing (call me crazy, that's me).
Once again thank you for the original post and effort that you made to make this tutorial for the rest of us.
In the meantime, for all of you who are happy with a "simple" look of your keyboard check this:

http://simple-web-app.com/color-keyboard-theme-maker/

[zYxMa]

Hey,

can I leave "active" buttons untouched, for example in this case, the Send button should be Blue as it is in native iOS. I'd like to keep that.

Is it possible to make these kind of buttons back to Blue?

[Phatmartino]

Hey,

can I leave "active" buttons untouched, for example in this case, the Send button should be Blue as it is in native iOS. I'd like to keep that.

Is it possible to make these kind of buttons back to Blue?

Hey, the key you're talking about is referred to by Color Keyboard as "Return". I'm guessing that what you want is for the Return key (the text changes between "return", "Search", "Go", etc.) to be themed like the rest of your keys until it's "active", and then turn native blue?

Unfortunately, about the only way to have the Return key change to the native blue in those instances is to remove control of that key in the plist.

Here's a quick list of the separated states that we CAN control in the plist:

1 = "pressed"
2 = "disabled"
3 = " normal"

The change that happens natively when the key turns blue takes place within the 3 = "normal" ControlState. To be able to theme the key normally, and then have it change when active, there would need to be a separate ControlState for "active" (which there unfortunately isn't).

You can at least theme only the "disabled" state of the return key to match the rest of your keys, so that in an instance like on the Spotlight page, before entering any text the search key would match your black/red keys until you start to type, and then change to the "active" blue, but this will leave far more instances where the return key is just native gray, because there is no "active/inactive" change to be made.

Let me know if I'm misunderstanding and/or if you do want to remove the Return key and need help editing your plist. Happy to if need be.

[zYxMa]

Hey, the key you're talking about is referred to by Color Keyboard as "Return". I'm guessing that what you want is for the Return key (the text changes between "return", "Search", "Go", etc.) to be themed like the rest of your keys until it's "active", and then turn native blue?

Unfortunately, about the only way to have the Return key change to the native blue in those instances is to remove control of that key in the plist.

Here's a quick list of the separated states that we CAN control in the plist:

1 = "pressed"
2 = "disabled"
3 = " normal"

The change that happens natively when the key turns blue takes place within the 3 = "normal" ControlState. To be able to theme the key normally, and then have it change when active, there would need to be a separate ControlState for "active" (which there unfortunately isn't).

You can at least theme only the "disabled" state of the return key to match the rest of your keys, so that in an instance like on the Spotlight page, before entering any text the search key would match your black/red keys until you start to type, and then change to the "active" blue, but this will leave far more instances where the return key is just native gray, because there is no "active/inactive" change to be made.

Let me know if I'm misunderstanding and/or if you do want to remove the Return key and need help editing your plist. Happy to if need be.

Good stuff, thanks for explanation and I, in the meantime, did some reading too and I figured that as well. Yes we may need to speak to the Color Keyboard creator to possibly implement this feature in future, or perhaps to separate all the "return" keys so all those keys can be themed ;-)

For now this is what I created (notice the blue highlight color above return button):

[roman3001]

hello,i want to change only the letters and numbers in the popups ...which line to change them i must touch???
THX

[Phatmartino]

hello,i want to change only the letters and numbers in the popups ...which line to change them i must touch???
THX

Hey, happy to help.

It can be tricky, though, trying to explain what to look for as it can vary depending on how the plist is set up.

Any chance you can post a copy of your plist?

Or if preferred for any reason you can email a copy to me at:

[email protected]

I should be able to easily explain if I can see what you're looking at.

[roman3001]

Hello, here is my plist, i need the letters little bit brighter, now they are black, the best is grey for me... Only the popped up letters... I use a wallpaper CK theme... THX
http://db.tt/kkBa3FW3

[Phatmartino]

Hello, here is my plist, i need the letters little bit brighter, now they are black, the best is grey for me... Only the popped up letters... I use a wallpaper CK theme... THX
http://db.tt/kkBa3FW3

Hey, I took a look and made a few quick changes. I set the Popup Text to be controlled by these first two Custom Color <strings>:


<key>CustomColor</key>
<array>
<array>
<string>PopSymbol</string>
<string>C5C5C5[FF]</string> <-- Change this (C5C5C5) for the Symbols
</array>
<array>
<string>PopEtch</string>
<string>000000[00]</string> <-- If you want to use an Etch, change [00] to [FF] (these set Opacity)
</array>


roman3001.zip

Try it out, and let me know if anything needs more tweaking.