Hack to fix the Giant unresizable IM window

I was really hoping that LL would listen to all the outcry about the gargantuan IM window, but they didn't. So here is a hack that allows it to be resized to a managable size. There is a side effect, when the group and friends panes are visible, their buttons can go off the edge of the window, but this causes no issue, just looks bad. Make sure you are logged out of Secondlife before doing this, and of course I take no responsibility if you screw up.

Go to the directory "C:\Program Files\SecondLife\skins\xui\en-us" Note that if your language is not english you will need to go to the directory for your language. 'es' for Spanish, 'de' for German, etc.

Make a backup copy of the file "floater_my_friends.xml".

open the 'floater_my_friends.xml" file with notepad, or wordpad, or some text editor. You will see something like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<floater can_close="false" can_minimize="true" can_drag_on_left="false" can_tear_off="false" can_resize="true" height="390" min_height="240" min_width="365" name="floater_my_friends"

Now the part we are concerned with is the 'height="390" min_height="240" ' part. the first sets the size you get when it opens by default. the second sets the minimum height you can size it to.

Change these two numbers to more reasonable sizes, I use height=150, min_height=75. That allows for a very small IM window. you could also change the minimum width if you like. Save the file, and start Secondlife. Enjoy your new window.

You are a god.

Ray, when someone asks you if you're a *God*, you say "YES"!


Sorry, couldn't help myself.

THanks for the tip, I took it one step further and rearranged all the controls on the friends window so that it was still usable at that size.

I put up my xml files if anyone wants to DL them. (Screen shot too)

http://www.seal-cove.com/chatterbox/ChatterHacks.html

This ALMOST makes it usable again. THough my poor friends list.. still way WAY too cramped.

Nice, I was too lazy to do that.

I don't know if there are any disadvantages to that ... but setting the can_close and can_tear_off values to true, allowed me to detach the friends/groups Tab from the window, giving me nearly the same functionality the old client had. You can't open the friendslist through the Communicate button anymore, but beside that I'm really happy that way

Edit: Ok, I was a bit hasty with my cheering. The detached Friendstab ist not safed when you close the client .. but even that way it's much better for me than the default behavior.

Many thanks for this hack! It's saved my SL! *grins*

For Mac users, instead of "C:\Program Files\SecondLife\skins\xui\en-us", you right click (or control-click with a 1-button mouse) on your Second Life Application and select "Show Package Contents" from the pop-up menu. In the window that opens, open the folders on this path: Contents > Resources > skins > xui > en-us (the last being the folder for the language that you use). In that folder is the floater_my_friends.xml file, which you can edit as the original poster recommended, with a text editor. Here's the settings I used (just showing the first lines, where the changes are):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<floater can_close="false" can_minimize="true" can_drag_on_left="false" can_tear_off="false" can_resize="true" height="100" min_height="72" min_width="200" name="floater_my_friends"

With a min height of 72, you can see 4 lines of text in Near Me (former Chat History) or IM windows, without tearing off or undocking anything, once you resize it as small as it will go.

Thanks for the hack.

I took the 5 modified files (the originals) and zipped them into an archive, then I replaced the 5 original files with the downloaded ones.

The "IM/Friends" tab is a bit glitchy looking, with buttons running off the bottom of the interface, but I am not back to a "reasonably sized" IM tab window.

Now, how to hack it back to put the profile/call crap down on the same line with the "send" button on the bottom of the IM tab? I'd like 5 lines of history up there instead of 3.

Just wanted to add a link to Yiff Yaffle's post, where they mention about their effort to return the UI to it's original state.

/327/24/201693/7.html#post1616184

Transcript from todays UI Triage where this was discussed. I think it sounds positive:

[10:40] Iridium Linden: Moving onto https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-1917.
[10:40] You: i thought this would address some of the issues people have with the new communicator
[10:40] Wyn Galbraith: USB button attachment with all the keys preprogrammed and programmable
[10:41] Farallon Greyskin: Well I can say that atleast the people I hang out with this is a huge issue
[10:41] MystiTool HUD 1.0.21: Entering chat range: Eelke Forder (6m)
[10:41] Aric Linden: I completely endorse this Matthew
[10:41] Benjamin Linden: thanks for working on this Matthew
[10:41] McCabe Maxsted: I think having the ability to separate the flist/group window altogether would be a better solution for most people
[10:41] Aric Linden: the back and forth is really painful
[10:42] Farallon Greyskin: In fact it stands as the ONE thing that may truly split off a popular O.S. client
[10:42] Squirrel Wood: yep. people tend to not like the communicate combined window
[10:42] Farallon Greyskin: There are already several people working on this very thing.
[10:42] Benjamin Linden: we have already decided internally to make the contacts list removeable from the chatterbox
[10:42] McCabe Maxsted: from the communicate window i mean
[10:42] Aric Linden: /applauds
[10:42] You: I tried that
[10:42] McCabe Maxsted: thank god, haha
[10:42] Kitty Barnett: yay!
[10:42] Eric Reuters: thumbs up :0
[10:42] Eric Reuters:
[10:42] You: but the window looks very empty when you've detached everything from it!
[10:42] Wyn Galbraith tears off the chathistory right away.
[10:42] Iridium Linden: kk, so we can move on?
[10:42] Benjamin Linden: there were some window management issues we needed to address
[10:42] Benjamin Linden: like what happens with an empty chatterbox window, for example
[10:42] Farallon Greyskin: If it is tearoffable wiill ther be a button back for it on the lower button bar?
[10:43] Farallon Greyskin: I did notice thant an empty chatterbox window cause other... problems in the code
[10:43] You: you can make if tearoff my editing the xml but that doesn't work well - since you can get an empty box!
[10:43] Farallon Greyskin: Yeah and then if you hide it it dosn;t come back!
[10:43] Torley Linden: Oh thanks Matthew for filing this.
[10:44] Benjamin Linden: Farallon, I'm not convinced we should put a button back on the toolbar. these are all advanced user scenarios (undocking, etc). I think we need to see how new users react to the new UI
[10:44] You: I think having shortcuts to open the windows in a seperated form is important
[10:44] MystiTool HUD 1.0.21: Entering chat range: Linri Jewell (6m)
[10:44] Benjamin Linden: yes, we have retained all the shortcuts
[10:44] You: CTRL-SHIFT-F does friends
[10:44] McCabe Maxsted: I think users will want something that they don't have to redo each time they login. Does it remain torn off after logins?
[10:44] You: and I thought adding CTRL-SHIFT-G for groups?
[10:44] Farallon Greyskin: Well just from my personal use, the friends list is almost always closed, I pop it open using the tool bar then close it at intervals. Mainly becuase I have to have it large to see everyone. SO I don;t want it on screen all the time
[10:45] Benjamin Linden: it is supposed to remember it's position between sessions
[10:45] McCabe Maxsted nods
[10:45] Benjamin Linden: this last tweak will allow people to set up their UI the way it used to be, for the most part
[10:45] Benjamin Linden: by last, I mean "most recent" -- we are still evolving the design
[10:46] You: ok, i was going to tidy up the patch but if it is being solve in house i'll hold off
[10:46] Wyn Galbraith: Ah legacy settings.
[10:46] Benjamin Linden: I believe this is already being worked on Matthew, so why don't you hold off for now.
[10:46] Matthew Dowd nods
[10:47] Benjamin Linden: thanks for your help with this, however
[10:47] Torley Linden: =)
[10:47] Benjamin Linden: and for including screenshots in your bug!
[10:47] McCabe Maxsted: matthew didn't you have a patch to move the friends/groups selector to the top?
[10:47] Torley Linden: Yup thanks lots Matthew!
[10:47] You: oh, if the window is torn off, having the tab on the left can be an issue if you make it tall and thin!
[10:47] Benjamin Linden: yes, we're probably going to change that too
[10:47] You: group/friends tab that is
[10:48] You: k
[10:48] Torley Linden: One of my longtime personal gripes is not having vertical tab strip for active IMs... I'd prefer that.
[10:48] Iridium Linden: kk, we only have 10 minutes left, so shall we move on?
[10:48] Farallon Greyskin: Yeah if it's torn off, auto switching the tabs to the top might be desirable.
[10:48] Torley Linden: (E.g., in Firefox, I often have many tabs open, and multi-row horizontal lines look confusing, so I have like, 50 or so going down the left side.)
[10:48] Benjamin Linden: I agree, Farallon
[10:48] Iridium Linden: We're importing 1917, right?
[10:48] Daedalus Young: I have tabs in my browser on the left side too, Torley
[10:48] Torley Linden: Daedalus: Cool beans.
[10:49] Torley Linden: Import 1917 and ping Voice Team?
[10:49] Benjamin Linden: Iridium, let me find out which Jira Richard is working on to separate the contacts list, and we can link it to that
[10:49] Torley Linden: Ahh okay cool..
[10:49] Iridium Linden: kk
[10:49] Benjamin Linden: thanks
[10:49] Torley Linden: Next up!




Matthew

nice. I hope something worthwhile materializes.

and yet now that it is mandatory it still sucks

Indeed. But we have Nicholaz Beresford coming to the rescue. Go to his site and get his latest voice client that sits on top of the Release Candidate version.

http://nicholaz-beresford.blogspot.com/

Returns the UI to a useable state.