Changing the avatar in messenger
I'm writing in application that manages Avatars across different applications etc.
I'd like to be able to overwrite the users MSN image.
I know how to locate the images in the Local Settings folder, and they are all .PNG files but renamed to .DT2. There are also associated .ID2 files with them.
Unfortunately, it's not as easy as just replacing the .DT2 files with a different PNG file.
Either messenger is very fussy about the exact format of the PNG file (I've kept it the same resolution, but I notice for example the MSN images have sRGB blocks in them, which my PNG files don't) *or* the ID2 files are in some way attached and dependant on the images, possibly an encrypted hash value or something (I'm just totally guessing there...)
Can anyone help me with this please?
Is there either some kind of SDK or instruction to replace a user's avatar, or some way of generating these ID2 files. Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
You cannot replace a .DT2 by a PNG, because Messenger stores a signature of the image data and metadata in the .ID2 file. You can only add an image if you know how to create a .ID2 file.
If you want to change a user's display picture on runtime, you could create an Add-in and set the UserTile property of the AddInProperties class to a specific Image object. Add-ins can be written in any .NET language, like C# or VB.NET. To learn about the Windows Live Messenger Add-in API
look here.
Thanks for the reply - I'm revisiting this after some time away.
I find the Add-In's a bit confusing. I'm not entirely sure how you install one, it appears the user has to manually install an add-in from within messenger - and that it requires a registry change to see the Add-In page?
I've seen other Apps that do exactly what I want, they can read the contacts list and cycle your avatar picture. They also seem to work on older versions of messenger before Live (I think) and don't appear to install any add-in (unless there is some transparent way of doing this I cannot see).
Are they using some unoffical methods of accessing messenger perhaps?
Does anyone have any info on this?
Thanks
