[Stardock Windowblinds 10.82 Patch
Everardo Laboy
Sadly, that did not solve the problem. I started command prompt as administrator, navigated to the folder containing the purge_wb bat file, and ran it. That produced some output, as below (at end). Then I shut down windows 11 and the computer, waited a few seconds, and turned the system back on. Then looked at the event viewer, and there is a new error record after the time I turned the computer back on still mentioning that the windowblinds service could not start.
I do notice, looking at the registry, that there a number of non-muicache related entries still present for windowblinds. Perhaps one of these is at fault? In particular, I notice a key "Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\WindowBlinds" which has a child of ImagePath, and that has a string value of "C:\Program Files (x86)\Stardock\WindowBlinds\WBSrv.exe". There is another key "Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\WindowBlinds" and another "Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\Regedit". (There are several other mentions of windowblinds in the registry, but these I have called out seem explicitly to mention something about windowblinds service, and are also not part of muicache entries, which latter seem likely harmless). A quick eyeball of the bat file doesn't seem to suggest these entries that I have are targets of the bat file actions.
Are you able to say with confidence if any of these remaining keys would result in still trying to start a now-nonexistent windowblinds service? Are there other keys or items I should look for that would account for my observed "error" events?
Quoting Jafo, reply 5
To uninstall Windowblinds you first need to exit the program and revert to 'standard windows', then you can uninstall as easily as any other program.
If you uninstall while the Windowblinds is still loaded the Windows shell won't recognize it has been removed and will still want to reload it on reboot.
The solution is actually to reinstall, exit...and uninstall ...
No, you can't have both running at the same time. Curtains have its own advantage and limitation so does Windowblinds. It is hard for me to list down all the differences. I can simply say that Curtains is a cut down version of Windowblinds but with some added advantages that Windowblinds can't do.
Given the only OS option to alter the taskbar are the colour I cannot see why you would think you can achieve more with that than with Curtains. The taskbar support is almost as much as with WindowBlinds. If you look at the XP luna theme you can see how the taskbar can look different.
The Start10 support is designed to me much simpler to use than the WindowBlinds one as a common complaint with making skins was the time needed to make all those parts. It actually makes life easier to achieve certain effects as well.
I think you may have misunderstood the colouring system. Each layer has the option to be recoloured using one of those three colours. As recolouring usually uses hue shifting, the colour you set in the editing page for colours is the base colour. Then when the user picks a colour the difference between the new colour and the old is used to hue shift the layer. Some of the included styles have support for this.
The purpose of offering three colours like this on a per layer basis is to offer greater control to the end user of the style. A style could expose one colour for the titlebar buttons, and another for the taskbar, or start button or anything in between. With WindowBlinds you have just one colour which is far more limited. There is also no need for mask images with curtains as you can control it on a per layer basis.
We do not expose changing system colours currently as system colour changes tend to cause application slowness on style change and some applications handle these poorly using the wrong colours on the wrong parts. It is possible this is an area we will revisit in the future though.
The purpose of the product is not to replace WindowBlinds, but to provide a nice simple to use entry level product for those who want simple changes to their UI. It is therefore of concern that you seem to have had such trouble with the interface.
I am sorry you are finding the software confusing. I assume the confusion is with creating styles vs actually using them.
Given the only OS option to alter the taskbar are the colour I cannot see why you would think you can achieve more with that than with Curtains. The taskbar support is almost as much as with WindowBlinds. If you look at the XP luna theme you can see how the taskbar can look different.
The Start10 support is designed to me much simpler to use than the WindowBlinds one as a common complaint with making skins was the time needed to make all those parts. It actually makes life easier to achieve certain effects as well.
We do not support additional buttons on the titlebar and will not do so in the future. That is not the purpose of the software which is to provide maximum compatibility.
I think you may have misunderstood the colouring system. Each layer has the option to be recoloured using one of those three colours. As recolouring usually uses hue shifting, the colour you set in the editing page for colours is the base colour. Then when the user picks a colour the difference between the new colour and the old is used to hue shift the layer. Some of the included styles have support for this.
The purpose of offering three colours like this on a per layer basis is to offer greater control to the end user of the style. A style could expose one colour for the titlebar buttons, and another for the taskbar, or start button or anything in between. With WindowBlinds you have just one colour which is far more limited. There is also no need for mask images with curtains as you can control it on a per layer basis.
We do not expose changing system colours currently as system colour changes tend to cause application slowness on style change and some applications handle these poorly using the wrong colours on the wrong parts. It is possible this is an area we will revisit in the future though.
The purpose of the product is not to replace WindowBlinds, but to provide a nice simple to use entry level product for those who want simple changes to their UI. It is therefore of concern that you seem to have had such trouble with the interface.
I do not create Windowblinds but I've gone into a lot of skins in SkinStudio and I can change things to suit my needs in certain skins. I call it tweaking. The point being is that I understand how SkinStudio works and how much work goes into making a Windowblind.
As far as Curtains is concerned it appears to be a lot simpler but I can see where someone could get confused trying to "tweak" or even create a skin. My advice there is trial and error. It doesn't seem to be that involved. Certainly not as involved as creating a Windowblind. I think if one can work in Photoshop or Gimp it helps when working with layers and saturation and coloring etc. At some point I may even try and create a skin in Curtains.
I can't see Curtains replacing Windowblinds. If Stardock did that I feel it would be a huge mistake. Neil says Curtains will not replace Windowblinds and I take him at his word. As far as creating a unique and total UI in Win10 Windowblinds is the last word as far as I am concerned. Curtains is fun to play with and much better than the "stock" options available that Win10 has to offer but is not a replacement for Windowblinds.
What I'm trying to do is having a basic, stable Windows 7 skin on Windows 10 Pro. Using SecureUxTheme, a Windows Theme downloaded somewhere, and OpenShell for the Start Menu and Taskbar, this is what I currently have:
WindowBlinds: Skins more. A new skin starts with the Diamond skin. A skin will have a few hundred image files, most/all of which need to have proper settings (margins etc) for them. Defines system colors, which adds variety but can also interfere with programs that mismatch them. Most technical adjustments need to be made through Skin Studio. Most image changes need to be done through SkinStudio.
Curtains: Doesn't skin as much, uses Windows itself. Makes good use of the Windows Light and Dark modes and Windows Accent colors. If a person basically likes the Win10 look and just wants to change the window frames for example, that can be done by creating a new skin without having to create and make settings for a few hundred images. A skin can have very few images, they seem to be running 15 to 40 images right now. Adjustments are made directly in Curtains, and/or by directly editing images from Explorer. Since Curtains doesn't try to skin as much, it seems to be less intrusive on various programs, which can detract from the overall "Skinned" look but also lets them primarily display as designed which can make life easier.
I've tried Curtains now, but got nowhere near to what I'm trying to achieve as in below screenshot. Also, I had to do a system restore afterwards, because Curtains wouldn't give me a way to undo the skinning
Tbh, I don't see how the program can be usefull for me. At least I would suggest you add the possibility to change windows color, something we can't do natively in windows 10 but can be done easily by modification of the registry.
Well, I will keep using windowblinds. I was thinking that curtains could be something good if it could have permitted to tweak windows appearence easily and by the fact it seems something really light in ressources, but the possibilities appear, for me, too limited.
Quoting cedricpalacios, reply 14
Honestly, Curtains is a brand new program because they couldn't deal with windowblinds bugs with win10
That's just rubbish. And what bugs might that be you are referring to? Windowblinds work very well in my opinion and it's not bugs that WB can't skin all parts of the Windows UI and/or web browsers and some apps. That's because of the way they are coded and has nothing to do with Windowblinds not working, or bugs as you call it. Instead of just being a negative troll, point out the bugs instead.