[http://sourceforge.net/p/ufoai/feature-requests/378 Item 378] imported from sourceforge.net tracker on 2013-01-28 20:18:20

suggestion : there should be a way to create greyscale versions of disabled gui elements on the fly.

if a control needs a specifically designed disabled icon, this icon is defined and used. if no such icon is used, game automatically in runtime creates greyscale image and uses this image.

such a method allows to easily have 'disabled' controls everywhere, while still allowing flexibility with different disabled icons where needed.
===== Comments Ported from Sourceforge =====

====== bayo-fr (2008-11-29 15:14:55) ======

Hello. I will not spend my time for it.

Its very easy to create a grey scale icon and to put it in a texture, every body can copy-paste an image and apply a grayscale filter (less than 1 minute). I do it very fast for the little blue arrow (button_pack1.psd). Autogenerating "disabled" part of a normalized image like button_pack1 using grayscale from the "normal" part can also be done with a script (30 seconds to do a script like that with Photoshop).

We use a method to skin button with a generic and simple way. I dont think its very interesting to compexify that, adding a code in a lot of nodes or haching texture loading... for finally something we can do in a simple way.

Imo, we can do it :
* (only if it is possible with OpenGL and the current architecture) with the "pic node" (to allow graphist to play dynamically with the hue of an image...) But a pic is not a button, a pic is not a checkbox, a pic is not a radiobutton...
* for new nodes create specially for it, but its not "everywhere".
====== bayo-fr (2008-12-23 09:35:35) ======

But few days ago i create "icons". We can view it in m_icon.c and ufo\icons.ufo. In this case, the draw code is simple and shared. If there is a way with opengl to autogray/autohilight a normal icon, it can be a usefull thing. We can add on icon script everything it need without memory problem.
====== bayo-fr (2009-11-25 00:15:18) ======

I create icon object a long time ago, and now we can blend them. It is not a grayscale feature, but we can use it to create grayscale from a white icon.