Hi, I am creating some Freeware apps for anyone's use.

I already have some icons for a couple of the apps (Thanks to Asher   ) but I need a few more. They need to be 256x256. I'm not too bothered about what format you make them in, as I can export them as icons later. I don't have any particularities about what the icons will be, just some vague ideas, so let your creative juices flow!

One is a webbrowser, called iSurf. The idea I had for this was a globe, no idea about what it should be like, but a globe, and then in front of the globe, tilted maybe, a surfboard. My original idea was a yellow surfboard with a red stripe, but as I say I'm not too bothered.

One is an app like paint, called SketchIt. For this perhaps a canvas with a half finished picture, and then a brush "painting"? Or anything else you come up with

One is a RSS reader so I'm not too sure about what it could be. Perhaps an RSS icon but in a "document" style wiht a pair of glasses, or a magnifying glass?

Another is an alarm app that makes an alarm for a set time, or in a set time. Perhaps an "alarm clock"? I haven't got a name for that yet, so any ideas would be welcome

There's an image editor called Image Express, I haven't got an idea for an icon there, perhaps a picture, maybe with a "cover" half over it that makes it grayscale? I dunno

And a calculator. Pretty simple, perhaps a calculator? A calculator would be cool, but any more "abstract" ideas are welcome

And the final one is a back up program that will back up files, folders, drives etc. I'm not sure what to do for this, perhaps something with a couple of drives and an arrow? Whatever comes to mind.

Oh and the other one (sorry ) is an encryption program that will allow you to encrypt files with a password, and then unencrypt them with the password. No idea what to do for that, maybe a lock? Or a file being "defragmented" and goign into a safe? Whatever you think of.

As I said I'm not too bothered about how the final icon will look, so long as their is a link of some kind to the apps name or purpose, and I know there is a lot there and it's a fair bit to ask for.

If you can make any of these for me I would be very grateful, and the ones I use will get full recognition in the app files and on the website, with any details you want (Name, Email, etc). I'll also contact you when the apps are released, though do be patient, I'm onlt one programmer

If there are more than one I will place them on the sites forums for our members to decide which they prefer, and I will happily add any details of the artists with the pictures.

Thanks in advance if anyone can help, I'll be incredibly grateful!

Note: The ones I do have icons for are a word editing app called Scribe, and an app called drop box that lets you set some folder destinations and it will move or drop files to it. If you make an icon for these I'll still consider using them. Perhaps a parchment and a quill(feather)? And maybe a box of some kind?

Also if anyone could make me a site banner that would be nice, preferably a .psd file so I can edit it accordingly, as I'm unsure of the sizes I will be using and the logo I will add to it.

I know this is a little too much for an icon, but maybe for your logo you could have someone (or just the board) surfing through the globe. Would look cool.

PS - Have you made any of these yet? For us to see? Because I'm sure if you're going to start now, we won't be able to see them for at least a few months...

Shouldn't be too long, the code is fairly simple and I have quite literally every hour of the day to put into this! Also I tend to find myself spending every hour fo the night working on these... some of them would take months, like the image processing one as I need to sort out some dlls and code to actual process the images

I do have a few test versions I made but they are small and to install them you will need to install the .Net framework which takes time...

I'll get some screenshots most definately.

And nice idea! I dunno how hard that'd be... but it'd certainly look good!

Drop Box:
This image is of one with settings changed for opacity and colour, these aren't default! Has some of my files loaded:
DropBox

Scribe:
Just some idea of the capabilities of Scribe at the moment:
Scribe In Use

And the locking capability of Scribe (Though this might be emitted):
Scribe Locked

The others as I say are tests, so they aren't much use to see One basically let's you draw with a brush, and draw squares and circles, the webbrowser so far only has the webbrowsing and some of the others haven't been started.

It's Scribe and Drop Box which are the ones to be done very quickly, rest will follow. Some are fairly simple, like the calculator (Though it is huge code) If you want any more screenshots I'd happily show them, and I'll let you know when one's are coming along and post a shot of them.

So, Scribe and Drop Box and RSS Reader shouldn't be long, they more depend on the icon! iSurf and SketchIt will be next, along with the calculator, and then alarm, and eventually image Express I suppose it also depends upon how many features I think of for these apps, and how many I manage to stop myself from doing! After all things like locking Scribe are nice but no one will probably use them, so they just take up space.

EDIT:

Damn. I was working last night on some code, testing out some ideas, when I decided I'd do some more work on Scribe, trying to see if I could make it more efficient, lower the code count and such. However when I went into the appropriate folder, I found that it was empty except for a picture, which I suspect I dropped in there by mistake at some point.

Now this worried me greatly, and I did a search of my computer and the only remnants I have of the entire Scribe app, is just a shortcut in my appdata temp folder to a file that doesn't exist.

I then checked the rest of the folder where I keep the apps, and found bits of the website, most notably the template have also vanished, again with no remnants anywhere.  

So I panicked, sweated, panicked some more. I plugged in my usb back up, but I must have backed it up after I lost the data, because it was exactly the same.  

So I've lost a fair bit of code as well as the website, so it may well be as long as a month before we see anything of this really.  

I'm hoping to have the website done by the end of this week, hopefully with the forum.

I'm having to rewrite Scribe but since I have a few code tests left it still wont be too long.

But the main thing is that only last week when I was working in dreamweaver on a website for a friend I tried to save a page after editing, but it wouldn't allow me. When I navigated to the page, it wasn't there, it had vanished.

Anyone know why this is happening? Since it seems to be getting worse (One file then, to several folders now) and I don't want to have any major data losses or anything.

I still would like these icons, since I am still developing the apps, they have simply been put back... quite a while longer than expected  

Also the original name I was going to use: "ShadowApps" has already been taken, so any suggestions for a new name would be incredibly helpful.

EDIT:

Well Scribe is now ticking along, going really well in C#, and I've had no problems so far bar one, and that was because I'd gone and named a variable currentDoc and stupidly gone and referred to it as currentdoc - silly mistake

I have a news area and a page with development blog for every app, all I need now is a name for it, so I can create the banner and our logo, then I'll find a hoster better than the two ones I've been using, preferably free, but the important bit is add-free and then I'll post the link!

I don't know if anyone is reading this, or will bother to look since there's no new posts, but I don't like double posting for any reason but unbelievable nothingness, for an incredibly long time, or when it's appropriate (ie if I make a second post on something totally unrelated to the first, and it has been at least a day since the last post)

And another big thanks to Asher, since otherwise Scribe'd have no icon, or a rather bad one from me

*Bump* hehe..

Just a little bump...

The name was a toss up between "Shadow Bytes" and "Fluid Apps" and...

Fluid Apps won out!

So, the new name is decided, the websites template is made, so now I'm just putting all the text on the pages, and I'll need to create the forum, hopefully an installed one as opposed to one like createforum, or freeforum. So that will hopefully be done fairly soon...

As for the apps, C# is driving me mad, having trouble referencing existing forms, so I might do a reverse and drop back to VB, just to get some stable releases, or I'll have to keep going but knock out features that use seperate windows... so the Find and Replace function And that's just Scribe, no idea how bad the others could be... well we shall see...

Sorry for the bump, but this seemed enough to warrant a new post, certainly in comparison to the length of the last one, and the amounts of edits it has!

If anyone can please help, I could still do with some icons for the apps (See first post) though now I'm better at photoshop, and at creating icons, I might be able to have a better go at creating some myself... again, we shall see...

Well that's it really Over and out!

I still find it hard to believe that you're creating an ENTIRE web browser all by yourself! Do you realise you'll have to make it understand HTML, XML, DHTML, JavaScript and so many more codes???  

But the file encrypter and calculator are something a rookie would do. I made them when I'd just begun programming...

Creating a web browser in VB6:

CLICK

Theres also a video tut on the microsoft website ...

You're not really making your own browser there. You're just sort of using/inheriting pre-defined classes to make a custom browser out of IE.

To make your own browser would be a lot more difficult.

Yes, that's what I'm doing, I'm using the .NET framework and classes to make apps from the many controls that it has at its disposal... I think maybe I didn't make that clear? I am not making them from scratch C++, I am not any where near good enough to make anything but a console calculator!

I'm just using Visual Basic/C# and the .NET framework and the visual IDE to create these apps, I'm not making the browser and things from scratch

So I suppose it's basically building on already existing things and changing them around, very basic stuff... but like I said I am not yet good enough in C++ to make full blown apps, and I don't even know how'd start! The visual basic stuff just looked so good, especially from a start point, and would allow me to do so much really quickly while I was learning how to do more of it myself, I thought I might as well use it to learn more, and since I'd need projects to head for, like a web browser and such, I might as well let others use them while I'm at it. And then there's the tutorials I'm writing so other people who want can use it to make their own little mini applications... But my ultimate goal would be learning C++ well enough to be able to write the apps just in that on a blank document, as opposed to using inherited controls and such... But I need to learn more, and how to make windows forms with it.

I know the basics of C++, and am still learning, but I have no idea how to make anything more than console applications, I have no idea how I would go about making windows forms with it, and certainly not making it read languages like Java Script, I haven't even looked at Java Script for several years!

Any idea where I could start learning to use C++ to make actual apps, that isn't simply placing code inbetweeen existing classes as it were... I can't find anything on Uncle Google

So yea, It's not my own browser, or really my own apps, just a lot of classes with my made up code inbetween making it do more stuff... but I want to learn to use C++ to make my own and use them in apps, and then I'll be able to start making my very own apps

And yea calculator and encrypter are something a rookie could do I suspect which is why I probably wont bother unless I can make them good enough, you know, stupidly strong encryption and stuff, more difficult, like inventing my own encryption process that works based on a pasword... though I wouldn't be too sure how to go about that

*Starts attacking google and every topic on C++ and Python and Java he can find* I haven't used C++ or Java for a long time so this should be fun And I have to say that I've never even used python, though I've heard of it. Apparently it is a good programming language? I know it's very well supported on platforms...

*Contintues the attack* Need to start learning as much as possible as quickly as possible... in two weeks I get my GCSE results and then a week later I'm off to sixth form and my A-Levels... And in about half a hyear I might be int he TA, so I'm gonna run out of time pretty quick!

You can't really make Windows applications with C++ from scratch. Think about it, it took them dozens of years to make the Visual classes they have right now. You have to use the pre-existing classes, unless you have an entire lifetime to spare...

Making strong encryption is pretty simple. Here's a simple code I used for my school project:

CODEchar str[30],str2[30];
double strno[30];

cout<<"Enter string (30 letters max): \n";
gets(str);

int l = strlen(str);

for (int i=0;i<l;i++)
      str2[i] = str[l-(i+1)];    //Reverses the string

for (i=0;i<l;i++)
{
      strno[i] = str2[i];
      strno[i] *= i;
      strno[i] -= i;
}

//That's it you're done. It'll be very hard to crack that code manually. Follow the inverse of the steps in reverse order to get the decryption programme.

I haven't checked the code, so there may be minor errors.

Yea I realise that some inherited classes must be used

I'd hate to try and write something like the windows forms class from scratch, I understand almost everything has inheritance from something else

"The inverse of the steps in reverse"... oooh paradox

And thanks for that code, useful resource!

I think I'll keep making the apps with Visual Basic for now, but I'll be learning C++ and Java and Python and anything else I find along the way And hopefully start making apps from those as opposed to the VB.NET IDE.

Wow too many acronyms and I don't think I've ever seen a thread fall into code that fast

In other news, still need some icons

Hmm... too many" "'s...

But thanks for the code Uttaresh, should be very useful in time I should steal you and force you to mentor me in the world of C++ hehe...

*Dissapears into the mad lab of google-induced-web-pages-mass-code-absorption*

Oooh.. installing Ubuntu now, onto a virtual machine so I can run windows and Ubuntu, and in the meantime I'm going to learn Ubuntu programming (GNOME Desktop programming in Python I believe) and make some fun apps for that. I think I may have just killed this app thing... and since there are so many amazingly cool open-source things out there already... why should I make my own, when I can point people to those! Hmm... I'll still be making them for fun though, programmings a good hobby

Well I'm going to keep making these anyway, simply for personal use - I could do with a rtf editor that's as powerful as Works but with only the things I need, and much faster in loading - will make my life easier

And a spare browser will be nice to use when Opera refuses to load hotmail... And the paint app just for fun

But I no longer need any of these icons, so request closed.

programmings never something I really thought of doing/trying but I think I could give it a go... what i need to do lol... and how where would you write it and how would you save it?

Ah some simple questions... if only the answer were likewise

Well it depends what language you want to learn. There are many. There is C++ (Most widely used, but difficult to learn, especiallu if you've never programmed before) VB (Very simple, you can download the express edition of microsoft visual basic, which is free and very good), there are others like C (C++ but not OO), C# (Another version of C), Pearl, Python, Ruby, Java (Used mostly for internet code, like Runescape) php, html, AJAX (More web languages) there are tons...

If you want to look at web applications, and web programming, you should look at learning java, and for that you can just download the Java things from Sun Microsystems Site (Google "Java", should get it) and also html and php (Web pages, and script).

Or you could learn more programming for applications, in which case it is OS dependent in some cases... for example you can make VB apps with Visual Basic Express (Free) to run on windows, or you could learn to make apps with C++ (Difficult to learn, and use) for which you would need a C++ compiler, like DevC++ (Google it). Or you could do C (DevC++ again will do C compiling) or you could learn Python (You can download the oython engine for any platform, and it is a good language for begginers I feel http://diveintopython.org/), or Pearl or Ruby (Google).

There are a lot of languages.

A little lesson: You write code in a language, you can write the code anywhere (Notepad say) but you have to Compile that code. Compilers like dev C++ will do this, or visual basic express has a compiler built in, for vb. And then these compiled files are the code files you run, or execute. In Python you can just save the file as a .py file and then run it, you don't have to run it through a compiler as such (The way Python "compiles" isn't important in a way, just know it compiles the code when you import the .py file). (Importing files is a way of including them in other files. So my main code for a calculator might import (or use) a file that does the calculations, and thenI can use that file and access it because I have imported it).

Anyway, I would suggest if you are looking at web development, look into learning some basic html, and perhaps php, the code you would use to make webpages. Then look into learning java (There is a huge, and good, tutorial on the official site, many on google). If you aren't dead by then... keep going!

If you want to do windows development (Making applications for Windows, or Linux) then look into vb express for a nice simple way to make windows applications, or look into python or pearl or ruby. (I suggest python ) If you want to go mad, look into C++ but good luck, that is no place for a begginer to start programming. For linux applications I am unsure, I only know Ubuntu uses the GNOME desktop, so the GNOME programming things work there. When you first start programming applications, then you will probably just be looking at ones that run in the command line (Black box on windows, the terminal in linux) and you wont get further than "Hello, I am a program." "What is your name?" "Hello <NAME>". Unless you go with VB, then you will be making windows applications very very quickly. For the mac I would say use xCode, it is the VB express of the mac world, but better really.

Um.. if you have any more questions, which you will, post here. I suggest you post here, as I'm sure Uttaresh will notice, and he's better at programming than I am, so he can help you more with learning, and how to learn.

In fact he will probably (hopefully) post his own reply to you, that will probably be simper and less daunting than this one

Programming is a fairly big thing, it's good to start small and work up. I tried jumping into C++ but I didn't get past a calculator before I gave up There was a thread in software aid and support where someone else asked this but I cant find it.

But dont be daunted by all these languages! There are simple ones, and billions of tutorials on the web. And once you get started, and make even just some code that says "Hello world" I promise you'll feel good about it It's a great feeling to see something do anything, knowing that you managed to make it do it

 
 
Well if you create your own browser settings, change the properties, and everything it is kind of like creating your own browser only a ton easier I tried making a skinnable calculator from scratch and it was harder than doing it on VB because they let you import buttons, but I still created all the VB text :] VB isn't a terrible program for starters like me, but I still like the thrill of writting and editing pictures and VB code.