(for Sony Ericsson themes developers)

Theme packages for P990, M600 and W950 are standard zip files with the file extension .utz, containing several files. Image and sound files must match the definitions given in a XML file in the theme package.

Sony Ericsson P990, M600 and W950 theme package contains the following files:

• One (1) Theme XML definition in a file named theme.xml.This must be present in the package and specifies the theme color scheme, image files, sound files, and so on.
• Image and sound files as specified in the XML file. Files included in the package, but not referenced in the XML file, will be ignored. If the XML file refers to files not present in the .utz package the theme will not be possible to install.

It is strongly recommended to use the Sony Ericsson Themes Creator for creating theme packages to avoid errors due to wrong file references or other XML file errors.

In the P990, M600 and W950 themes XML file and in the Themes Creator interface, the basic elements defined for themes are:

• A skin represents one screen layout, for example the application background display. Each skin has one or more patches and skintext elements.
• Skintext elements define the different text styles that are used in a skin.
• Patches are graphic elements for the controls in a skin. In the themes.xml and in the Themes Creator, patches are defined by specifying image files to be displayed in the different screen areas of a skin.

Image files

The image file format used affects the total size of the theme file. In general JPEG files are smaller than GIF files with the same image size. PNG files always contain full 24-bit colour representation and do not approximate pixel areas as the JPEG format does, which in some cases leads to large files. The PNG for-mat allows semi transparency through alpha channels.

A general recommendation is to use GIF files for coloured line art graphics (“cartoon-like images”) and ani-mations, JPEG or PNG files for photographic pictures. In many cases it is worth the effort to save an image in different formats and select the smallest file for the theme. PNG must be used for images with transparent or semi-transparent areas. The recommended and simplest solution is to use PNG files for all images in the theme.

Animations are supported in the GIF format. The GIF animation format support a 1 bit alpha channel, but this will not be shown in the phone. If a GIF animation includes transparency, these areas will be filled with a color from the phone.

Image drawstyles

If an image is smaller than its associated UI control, it will be applied using one of four methods:
• Normal:
The image is applied to the upper left corner of the control, no stretching or shrinking to match the size
of the control is done (the image should already have the correct size).
• Center:
The image is applied centered in the control area.
• Stretch:
The bitmap will be stretched to match the size of the control (see below).
• Tile:
The bitmap will be tiled across the control.

Text colours and styles

Primarily there is a text colour setting for each skintext element.
For each skintext element, one of the following text styles can be selected via a dropdown list:
•Normal
•Shadow
• Outline
• ShadowOutline
Depending on which style is selected, colours can be set for shadow, outline or both.