@Yincognito & dvo
Thanks for the feedback, I appreciate your thoughts.
Hover versus Click
As stated earlier, the video window and skin window are completely separate Windows objects. Neither one knows about the other and there is no interaction between them using this method of viewing and control.
In order to have button controls that do not require clicking the FFPlay window first to give it focus, I use an add-on to send key codes without changing focus away from the FFPlay window. The buttons send these key codes to the active window (FFPlay) to achieve the desired action:
ACTION | 'KEY'
Quit Video | 'q' or 'ESC'
Toggle Play/Pause | 'p' or 'Spacebar'
Frame Step | 's'
Back 10 sec | 'Left-Arrow'
Ahead 10 sec | 'Right-Arrow'
Toggle Full Screen | 'f' or 'Double-Left-Click'
Select Stream | 'w'
Vol Up | '0' or 'Asterisk'
Vol Dn | '9' or '/'
Toggle Mute | 'm'
The FFPlay window
MUST have focus to respond to the viewer's requested button action. By using hover as the action trigger focus is maintained by the FFPlay window and does not change. Any mouse click outside of the FFPlay window changes the focus and those buttons no longer send the code to FFPlay, but instead, the code goes to the currently active window (which can produce undesirable actions).
Hovering over the top button, toggles the visibility of the entire list of actions.
This removes the possibility of accidentally activating an action or sending a key code to a different window. Rather than having a constantly visible 'Menu' button, I chose to hide the entire button list (my preference). You toggle the visibility by hovering in the upper-left skin area. I am thinking of hiding them after any hover action to prevent inadvertent actions.
I may change this but my reasoning was to try to achieve button controls, while not changing focus, and also reduce the chance of accidental button actions by toggling their visibility which also leaves an uncluttered view window.
An interactive plugin would allow a more conventional interface; this method is my workaround. Ideas an thoughts are welcomed. Thanks.
