WindowBlinds 4 sneak preview
Friday, August 23, 2002 by Frogboy | Discussion: WinCustomize Talk
WB 4 isn't likely to come out this year but the betas for it will.
And even with the current internal alphas, I think it is safe to say that WindowBlinds 4 won't just be faster than msstyles on any hardware, it'll be so dramatically faster than msstyles on any hardware configuration (regardless of video card) that there won't be further debate on it. WB3/msstyles will feel painfully slow compared to WB 4. In short, there should be no more "YMMV - your mileage may vary". No matter whose machine it's being run on, fast, slow, whatever, WB 4 should appear faster to the point that they notice the difference fairly quickly.
It'll also be equally as compatible as msstyles thanks to new XP APIs Microsoft put in that we are going to be using. Let me give you an example - those apps that put their own buttons on title bars - they'll now work. Their button will show up on the title bar.
I won't touch on the actual new features of it until later on, but we think you'll find them equally cool.
We still have more versions of WindowBlinds 3.x to come out. Skincast is due in 3.5. The task pane won't get into until 4.0 though since we can't just read shellstyle.dll since that's a copyrighted DLL.
And even with the current internal alphas, I think it is safe to say that WindowBlinds 4 won't just be faster than msstyles on any hardware, it'll be so dramatically faster than msstyles on any hardware configuration (regardless of video card) that there won't be further debate on it. WB3/msstyles will feel painfully slow compared to WB 4. In short, there should be no more "YMMV - your mileage may vary". No matter whose machine it's being run on, fast, slow, whatever, WB 4 should appear faster to the point that they notice the difference fairly quickly.
It'll also be equally as compatible as msstyles thanks to new XP APIs Microsoft put in that we are going to be using. Let me give you an example - those apps that put their own buttons on title bars - they'll now work. Their button will show up on the title bar.
I won't touch on the actual new features of it until later on, but we think you'll find them equally cool.
We still have more versions of WindowBlinds 3.x to come out. Skincast is due in 3.5. The task pane won't get into until 4.0 though since we can't just read shellstyle.dll since that's a copyrighted DLL.
joetheblow
Reply #2 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:20 PM
Reply #2 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:20 PM
Are you sure this is a WindowBlinds 4? As oppossed to calling it WindowBlinds 3.8??
Just wondering.....
Just wondering.....
moshi
Reply #3 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:33 PM
Reply #3 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:33 PM
you won´t be the first that does things better and faster than Microsoft itself 
wonder why that shellstyle.dll is such a big problem as StarDock is always promoting their good relationships with Microsoft ...
wonder why that shellstyle.dll is such a big problem as StarDock is always promoting their good relationships with Microsoft ...
Frogboy
Reply #4 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:57 PM
Reply #4 Friday, August 23, 2002 1:57 PM
Shellstyle.dll is a copyrighted DLL. It's really as simple as that. We don't want to encourage people to be distributing system DLLs.
It's the same reason we don't support longui.exe's here, it's a copyrighted program.
It's the same reason we don't support longui.exe's here, it's a copyrighted program.
Tarkus
Reply #7 Friday, August 23, 2002 2:48 PM
Reply #7 Friday, August 23, 2002 2:48 PM
That's cool that third party buttons will be displayed on titlebars. That will be a signficant improvement for many of us.
Oh, and the speed will be great, too.
What is Skincast?
Oh, and the speed will be great, too.
What is Skincast?
feline
Reply #8 Friday, August 23, 2002 3:01 PM
Reply #8 Friday, August 23, 2002 3:01 PM
i agree, what is skincast?
as for 3rd party buttons to toolbars
the big question about th 3rd party toolbar buttons is will this work on win2k, or is it going to be winXP only?
oh yes, when can i try an alpha version? i want my powerdesk toolbar mods back!
as for 3rd party buttons to toolbars
the big question about th 3rd party toolbar buttons is will this work on win2k, or is it going to be winXP only?
oh yes, when can i try an alpha version? i want my powerdesk toolbar mods back!
dendillon
Reply #9 Friday, August 23, 2002 3:03 PM
Reply #9 Friday, August 23, 2002 3:03 PM
rippeed from here: https://www.stardock.com/products/windowblinds/whitepaper_wb3.html
"SkinCast
Stardock has been working on a distributed skin mechanism for some time and it finally becomes a reality with WindowBlinds 3. Users can subscribe to different skin “channels” and each week (or more often) the channel can update the user’s GUI. It should be noted that WindowBlinds not only can change the Windows GUI but the wallpaper instead. Thus, SkinCast can be used to deliver new wallpapers, skin updates, and much more to the users who subscribe to those channels. By the launch, Stardock will have a “Most popular skin” channel which will let users download the most popular skin used by those not subscribed to that channel plus a WinCustomize channel which will take the most recently featured WindowBlinds skin from WinCustomize and provide that. SkinCast has also been developed for corporate use. IT managers will be able to create new Windows GUIs using Stardock SkinStudio and then distribute those branded or extended GUIs to their users (or customers) through SkinCast. A corporation who signs up with SkinCast can have their channel added to the list. This feature can be extended to consumer use as well where popular skin authors could have their own SkinCast channel and users could subscribe to that channel to receive the latest skin by their favorite skin author."
"SkinCast
Stardock has been working on a distributed skin mechanism for some time and it finally becomes a reality with WindowBlinds 3. Users can subscribe to different skin “channels” and each week (or more often) the channel can update the user’s GUI. It should be noted that WindowBlinds not only can change the Windows GUI but the wallpaper instead. Thus, SkinCast can be used to deliver new wallpapers, skin updates, and much more to the users who subscribe to those channels. By the launch, Stardock will have a “Most popular skin” channel which will let users download the most popular skin used by those not subscribed to that channel plus a WinCustomize channel which will take the most recently featured WindowBlinds skin from WinCustomize and provide that. SkinCast has also been developed for corporate use. IT managers will be able to create new Windows GUIs using Stardock SkinStudio and then distribute those branded or extended GUIs to their users (or customers) through SkinCast. A corporation who signs up with SkinCast can have their channel added to the list. This feature can be extended to consumer use as well where popular skin authors could have their own SkinCast channel and users could subscribe to that channel to receive the latest skin by their favorite skin author."
joetheblow
Reply #10 Friday, August 23, 2002 7:32 PM
Reply #10 Friday, August 23, 2002 7:32 PM
hhmmmm wow, that sounds cool. I want a channel. I guess this will be like cable or something.
voo
Reply #11 Friday, August 23, 2002 8:18 PM
Reply #11 Friday, August 23, 2002 8:18 PM
heh this is such an exciting time Nothing can beat ObjectDesktop just keeps getting better and better Never ending 
WindowBlinds4 will be that fast the skins will come shooting off with new features
WindowBlinds4 will be that fast the skins will come shooting off with new features
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Reply #1 Friday, August 23, 2002 12:44 PM