WindowBlinds 5: What's new

Version 5

WindowBlinds is a software program for Microsoft Windows that enables users to completely alter the Windows graphical user interface (GUI) by applying specialized UI themes known commonly as skins (also called visual styles).  These skins can change virtually every element of the GUI such as title bars, push buttons, radio buttons, checkboxes, the Start bar, Explorer task panels, scrollbars, toolbar buttons, progress bars, progress animations, and much more.

WindowBlinds was first released in 1999 for Windows 95, 98, and NT 4.0.  Since then, it has been completely rewritten to take advantage of newer operating systems such as Windows XP along with adding a host of new features.

WindowBlinds 4 was released in 2003. This document outlines what is new in WindowBlinds 5.

WindowBlinds 5 works on Windows XP (32-bit and 64-bit as well as 2003 Server, Windows Vista support is due when Windows Vista ships).

The major new features of WindowBlinds 5.0 over 4.0 can be boiled down to this:

• Per-pixel alpha blended support for nearly all elements of the GUI such as title bars, borders, buttons, menus, special dialogs, start menu, etc.  This means that the graphics can be seamlessly be blended into whatever is behind the graphic. This makes possible spectacular looking user interfaces previously not possible on Windows. 
• No Dedicated Process.  WindowBlinds now works as an extension of the OS itself. It requires no special process to be running to work.
• Newer, easier to use Configuration program.
• Enhanced hardware acceleration support. WindowBlinds 5 makes use hardware acceleration to a much greater degree to speed up repainting, resizing, and moving of windows. It should be noticeably faster, particularly on slower machines, than Windows by default.
• Animated per-pixel title bars and frames. Title bars and frames can be animated. The animation in most cases is hardware accelerated meaning it should use no CPU for the animation.
• Toolbar icon changing.  WindowBlinds can change your toolbar icons for Internet Explorer and Explorer.
• Progress Animation changing. WindowBlinds can change progress animations (copy, move, etc.).  The ones in Windows XP by default are over 10 years old.

However, that's just the tip of the iceberg.  Below is a more comprehensive list of what's new:

• Internet Explorer 7 skinning
• Glow effects for title bar buttons
• Glow effects for most other controls on the system (put mouse over a button and if the skin supports it, a glow appears around it)
• Idle mode implemented for full-screen games (gamers should find their systems run faster if running WindowBlinds over the default Windows XP visual style).
• Explorer task panels that can appear on top.
• Support for MSStyles via SkinStudio conversion
• Improved compatibility with non-theme aware programs
• Support for over a dozen new languages
• Ability to change the hue, saturation, and brightness of skins by users using sliders.
• Skin memory management optimizations so that skins use less memory
• Countless new minor controls supported such as the ability to skin the shut down dialogs, please wait dialogs, etc. Like all controls, even these support per-pixel alpha blending.

In addition to these, hundreds of tweaks, fixes, and small enhancements have been added as well.

A shareware download of WindowBlinds 5 is available. It comes with several skins that support per-pixel alpha blending. It can be downloaded at: www.windowblinds.net

WindowBlinds can be purchased on its own for $19.95. It can also be purchased as part of the award-winning suite of desktop enhancement utilities called Object Desktop. Users who had WindowBlinds 4 can upgrade to WindowBlinds 5 for $15. The enhanced version has many features and options not available in the shareware version. To Purchase WindowBlinds go here.