WindowBlinds is loaded in resident memory and merely acts as an overlay.
StyleXP uses Windows XP's own UI engine to make it work, doesn't stay in resident memory, and has little to no memory footprint.
"The basic misconception that people who advocate visual styles is the claim that "visual styles are 'native' and WindowBlinds is some bloated third party add-on." This is a claim made by non-technical people who confuse bundling with nativity. Let's talk about how visual styles work:
On a Windows XP install, there is a file called "Luna.msstyles". This is the "skin" that is known as "Windows XP style". It is 4 megabytes. When you load Windows XP, a service known as "Themes" is loaded into memory. If you look in your tasklist, you'll probably notice a few processes called svchost.exe. This is one of them.
When you switch from "classic" to "Windows XP style", this service loads up Luna.msstyles,, has uxtheme.dll verify that it is digitally signed and then uxtheme.dll "skins" the GUI. If the program in question is theme aware, Windows XP "skins" its buttons and scrollbars and other goodies. If it is not theme aware (i.e. 99% of apps) then it will just handle the title bar and possibly the scrollbar.
So what does this mean? Windows XP includes a program that loads up a skin and applies it to the system. The difference between that and a third party program is purely one of bundling. The bundled file, uxtheme.dll by default handles .msstyles files. On Windows 95, Microsoft Paint could only handle .BMP files. So does that make .JPG and .GIF files non-native? Of course not."
Jengo
Pasco, WA | USA
Comments
StyleXP uses Windows XP's own UI engine to make it work, doesn't stay in resident memory, and has little to no memory footprint.
but to go along with the thread, StyleXP is better.
On a Windows XP install, there is a file called "Luna.msstyles". This is the "skin" that is known as "Windows XP style". It is 4 megabytes. When you load Windows XP, a service known as "Themes" is loaded into memory. If you look in your tasklist, you'll probably notice a few processes called svchost.exe. This is one of them.
When you switch from "classic" to "Windows XP style", this service loads up Luna.msstyles,, has uxtheme.dll verify that it is digitally signed and then uxtheme.dll "skins" the GUI. If the program in question is theme aware, Windows XP "skins" its buttons and scrollbars and other goodies. If it is not theme aware (i.e. 99% of apps) then it will just handle the title bar and possibly the scrollbar.
So what does this mean? Windows XP includes a program that loads up a skin and applies it to the system. The difference between that and a third party program is purely one of bundling. The bundled file, uxtheme.dll by default handles .msstyles files. On Windows 95, Microsoft Paint could only handle .BMP files. So does that make .JPG and .GIF files non-native? Of course not."