Windows 7 - ANN: Classic Shell 0.9.8 -now with skinnable start menu

Hi, everybody.

After 2 weeks of coding I finally have skinning support for the classic start menu. Use one of the 5 default skins or make your own (to match that shiny Windows theme of yours). You can change images, fonts and colors as you like. See the attached screenshot.

Get it while it's hot: http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

If you want to create your own skin, first read the tutorial: http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/skintutorial.html

Disclaimer: I am NOT an artist. The current skins are the best I can do . I'm sure there are many talanted people on this forum that can do far better .

P.S. If you are not familiar with Classic Shell - it is a shell extension for Windows 7 and Vista that has a classic start menu, a toolbar for Explorer, and other features.

I think of the many start menu options out there, this is the best--easy to work with.

I have some questions though:
1) Are there any plans to have the sub-menu or the menu support glass backgrounds (and not opaque)?
2) Any plans to have an option for no caption? but with the aero glass? I tried to get rid of the caption but I think it defaults to having one.
3) It's been mentioned before, but are you working on having the Search bar functionality? I've seen it on the "Classic Start Menu" program, but I don't like the lack of customizability of that app.

1) Having glass background is a significant amount of work. Currently I am reusing a lot of code from Windows itself, but it hasn't changed much since Win95 and is incompatible with glass. I have to reimplement most of that code to have a menu on top of glass. It is on the wishlist, but for the long term.
2) This is doable. I am planning to have an additional pack of skins, and that can be one of them. I don't know when I will have time to do that though. If you are up to it, you can make one yourself.
3) The whole point of the classic start menu is that it doesn't have search. The search box steals all keyboard input. You can't access programs and sub-menus by their first letter any more. My theory is that before you open the start menu you should know if you want to search or if you know where the program is. If you want to search - Shift+click to open the searchable menu. Otherwise just click to open the classic menu.

Wow, quick feedback, thanks =)

Ahh, your rationale for #3 makes sense. Personally I've never used the first letter to navigate the classic menu. I've also found the search option is useful for running programs as administrator--giving you a chance to right-click.

As for a caption-less skin, I didn't know that was possible. Tinkering with it, I realize all you need to do is just change the second number of the main_bitmap_slices to 0 and presto, no caption. Thanks!

Also, I was wondering if it would be possible to "make new folder" directly in the start menu by right clicking (versus doing it in Explorer)?

Oh, and I love how this only takes 2.5MB of memory, so small, lean and powerful!

Setting the second number to 0 is not enough. At the very least you should add 1 to the first number. Otherwise there will be one pixel lost at the end.

But the full solution is:
Main_bitmap_slices_X=0,0,0,15,1,13
Caption_padding=0,0,0,0
Main_padding=12,10,10,8

And if you want small icons:
Main_large_icons=0

I was just thinking earlier today about "New Folder". It is already on the todo list. It is not hard to do by itself, the tricky part is finding translations of the phrase "New Folder" in all languages.

Yeah I actually just added the extra pixel to the third number. So instead of:
Main_bitmap_slices_X=7,0,1,6,1,13

I changed it to:
Main_bitmap_slices_X=7,1,0,6,1,13

This is a wonderful and well made program. Thank you very much!!

One question: Win XP used to have a File and Folder Tasks menu which allowed for emailing a file with a single click. This seems to have disappeared in Win 7. Is there any way of making an icon for the Windows Explorer Toolbar that would allow one to email a file with a single click?

Thanks for all of your efforts.

I think Windows 7 doesn't have the Tasks pane any more. I haven't used it on XP, so I don't really miss it. Maybe you can start another thread asking if it can be turned on.

Otherwise, you can right-click on a file, go to Send To -> Mail recipient. I haven't used that either, but I suspect it will do what you ask.

Thanks very much for the quick reply.
It does work to right click, click on send to, and click on mail recipient, but that requires 3 clicks, and there doesn't even seem to be a keyboard shortcut.
Since mailing a file is a common function for many people, it would be a really useful button to have (perhaps next to the delete and properties buttons which you made).
Thanks again for all of your efforts.

I did some prototyping and the results are promising. Most likely this will make it in the next version, probably some time next week.