Adium

.AdiumIcon Xtras

.AdiumIcon Xtras provide alternate dock icons for Adium. They are downloadable from adiumxtras.com, are installed by double clicking, and may be set from the Appearance preferences pane.

Creating a .AdiumIcon Xtra

The easiest thing to do is to browse into an existing .AdiumIcon (via Show Package Contents in Finder) and see the layout. The pack consists of a number of png files along with an IconPack.plist file which specifies how the png images are used.

If the Apple Developer Tools are installed, you may find it easiest to load the IconPack.plist into the Property List Editor, located in /Developer/Applications.

Alternately, viewed in a text editor, IconPack.plist is formatted in the following manner: 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
        <key>Description</key>
        <dict>
                <key>Title</key>
                <string>Your Title Here</string>
                <key>Creator</key>
                <string>Your Name Here</string>
                <key>LinkURL</key>
                <string>Link to Your Web Site Here</string>
        </dict>
        <key>State</key>
        <dict>
                <key>STATE_KEY_HERE</key>
                <dict>
                        <key>KEY_FIRST_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE</key>
                        <true/> OR </false> (This one is a true or false value)
                        <key>KEY_SECOND_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE</key>
                        <string>VALUE_SECOND_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE (this one is a string)</string>
                </dict>
                <key>ANOTHER_STATE_KEY_HERE</key>
                <dict>
                        <key>KEY_FIRST_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE</key>
                        <true/> OR </false> (This one is a true or false value)
                        <key>KEY_SECOND_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE</key>
                        <string>VALUE_SECOND_ITEM_FOR_THIS_STATE (this one is a string)</string>
                </dict>
.........
        </dict>
<dict>

You should have <key>state_key</key> and <dict>....</dict> sets for each state you wish to support. The following states are available; all but Invisible are expected to be handled by all dock icon packs, and adiumxtras.com moderators will reject submitted packs which do not support them.

  • Base
    • Shown when Adium is not connected
  • Online
    • Shown when Adium is connected
  • Alert
    • Shown when unread messages are waiting
  • Away
  • Connecting
  • Idle
  • Preview
  • Invisible
    • Optional.

Base is the state shown when Adium is not connected. Preview is generally the same as Online.

The following keys are available for use with each state:

  • <key>Image</key>
    • <string>filename.png</string> - Applicable only for a non-animating state. The image to show when in the state.
  • <key>Overlay</key>
    • <true/> if the image specified by this state is drawn on top of the Base or Online state as appropriate, or <false/>
  • <key>Animated</key>
    • <true/> if this state animates, or <false/>
  • <key>Delay</key>
    • Applicable only for an animated state. <real>time in seconds</real>, indicating the time between frames of animation
  • <key>Images</key>
    • Applicable only for an animated state. <array> <string>FirstImage.png</string> <string>SecondImage.png</string> .... </array>