How To Make A Windows Vista Theme

Windows customization isn't anything new, simply with Windows vii, customization got a lot easier with theme packs. Hither is how yous tin can create your own theme pack from scratch.

Creating a theme pack from scratch is a lot more than piece of work than using built in tools, but it gives yous a lot more flexibility by assuasive you to creating brand icons, RSS background feeds, and customizing every feature which may not be easy to do through Windows native tools. When you are going to create a theme that you tin share with others you volition want to take into account what exactly you volition be able to modify that others volition be able to use. Windows seven theme packs let you to customize the desktop background (including "slide testify" backgrounds, and RSS feed backgrounds), screen saver, system sounds, desktop icons, mouse pointers, and organization colors.

Customize your theme

Start the theme pack by gathering all the files y'all want to use for your customization. Remember to get items for every part you lot are going to customize. If you lot do not specify parts to theme, the organisation will use the defaults that come with windows. And then if yous don't find a mouse cursor you similar, Windows volition employ the default cursor for the organization. Once y'all take the files y'all want, put them all in a folder that y'all can easily get to. I am going to be building a theme based on the Matrix wallpapers we posted recently.

We will start the customization past generating the .theme file. This file is the center of your theme pack and will tell Windows which media file to utilise where. The .theme file is actually but a specially formatted text file and so start past right clicking in your folder and creating a new text certificate. Name the file whatsoever you want and open it with your favorite text editor.

The .theme file is going to be broken up into sections. The first department is the [Theme] section. The [Theme] section only has two options, the theme brandish proper name, and the theme icon. The display name can be any you desire the theme to be called in the command panel > personalize window, and the icon graphic must be a PNG file. The graphic volition exist scaled to eighty×240 so use something shut to that resolution or ratio.

Note: The theme icon will merely prove up under the Command Panel > Personalization window and so don't worry if you don't see the icon.

The remainder of the [Theme] department will tell windows which icons to utilise for the desktop icons (Reckoner, Documents, Recycle Bin, Network). For icon files you lot tin can utilize either standalone .ico files, or you can use icons embedded in .exe or .dll files also. For .exe and .dll files you need to specify which icon to employ with a comma and then say which icon you lot are going to use. (my.exe,0 or my.dll,-50). Each desktop item has a unique screen that identifies information technology and then make sure yous use the right string for each particular.

Figurer = [CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\DefaultIcon]
Documents = [CLSID\{59031A47-3F72-44A7-89C5-5595FE6B30EE}\DefaultIcon]
Network = [CLSID\{F02C1A0D-BE21-4350-88B0-7367FC96EF3C}\DefaultIcon]
Recycle Bin = [CLSID\{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}\DefaultIcon

Beneath each item you will specify the icon with DefaultValue except the Recycle Bin which will use values Full and Empty.

Later on the [Theme] section is the optional [Command Panel\Colors] and [Control Console\Cursors] sections. The colors department would be extremely hard to adjust manually simply if you actually want to try it you tin adjust the following items using RGB codes.

Notation: RGB codes range from 0-255 and are separated by spaces. And then black is 0 0 0 and white is 255 255 255.

ActiveTitle, Groundwork, Hilight, HilightText, TitleText, Window, WindowText, Scrollbar, InactiveTitle, Menu, WindowFrame, MenuText, ActiveBorder, InactiveBorder, AppWorkspace, ButtonFace, ButtonShadow, GrayText, ButtonText, InactiveTitleText, ButtonHilight, ButtonDkShadow, ButtonLight, InfoText, InfoWindow, GradientActiveTitle,
GradientInactiveTitle

Instead of doing this section by hand you could also adjust the colors using the control console > personalize > colors, and so relieve the theme file and then just copy and paste the colors section into the theme you want.

The [Control Panel\Cursors] department has an choice for which .cur or .ani files y'all want to use for each cursor. The valid cursors you can replace are the following:

Arrow, Help, AppStarting, Wait, NWPen, No, Size, SizeWE, Crosshair, IBeam, SizeNWSE, SizeNESW, SizeAll, UpArrow

If not cursor is defined the system defaults volition be used.

Later these ii sections comes the first mandatory section and that is the [Control Panel\Desktop] section. If you practise non have this part of the file the theme volition not be recognized every bit a valid theme. In here you will specify what the wallpaper paradigm volition be, how the image will be displayed and if the image is tiled or not. The three values you demand are Wallpaper, TileWallpaper, and WallpaperStyle.

Wallpaper can be a .bmp, .gif, .jpg, .png, or .tif file. TileWallpaper is either a one or 0; 1 indicates the wallpaper should be tiled while 0 disables the tile. WallpaperStyle can be the post-obit values. 0 ways the image is centered, 2 means the image is stretched, 6 volition fit the image to the screen, or 10 will will resize and crop the image to fit the screen.

After you lot have the [Command Console\Desktop] section defined you tin motion on to the next optional department [Slideshow]. [Slideshow] is how you lot tin can brand rotating backgrounds for Windows vii. This section has the following attributes: Interval, Shuffle, RSSFeed, ImagesRootPath, Item*Path (* represents which pictures will exist included in the slide show). The attributes can be defined with the following values: Interval shows the corporeality of time to expect before changing the wallpaper image (in milliseconds), Shuffle is a 1 or 0 to determine if images are displayed in alphabetical order or shuffled, RSSFeed points to the URL of the images RSS feed you want to use, ImagesRootPath is the binder containing your images, and Item*Path determines how many items are included in the slideshow. Each Detail*Path entry points to one wallpaper image so you need to specify each image manually.

Notation: ImagesRootPath and RSSFeed cannot exist used together.

Following [SlideShow] is another optional section chosen [Metrics]. [Metrics] section shows dimensions of various display elements, such as the window edge width, icon superlative, or scrollbar width. The NonclientMetrics and IconMetrics values are binary structures defined by NONCLIENTMETRICS and ICONMETRICS in winuser.h. In other words, you lot probably don't desire to edit this department by paw. If yous are going to change the value of whatever window boarders I would suggest doing that through the control console and saving the modified theme. And so export the [Metrics] section into your desired theme. Non-the-less, hither is an example of a [Metrics] section.

Adjacent is the required [VisualStyles] section. This section allows you to signal to a .msstyles file that tin exist modified for customization. If yous use a .msstyles value in this department you volition demand to remove the [Metrics] and [Color] sections of your theme because the .msstyles volition supplant both of those sections. The valid attributes are Path, Color, Composition, Size, ColorizationColor, and Transparancy. These options makes information technology easier to customize an already existing theme. For example, if y'all set the path attribute to %SystemRoot%\resources\Themes\Aero\Aero.msstyles you tin can easily brainstorm customizing the default Windows Aero theme.

Following [VisualStyles] is the optional [Sounds] and [AppEvents] sections. For this section you tin either specify each audio manually by using the path to a .wav file like so:
[AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\SystemExclamation]
DefaultValue=

Or you tin can specify one of the built in audio schemes with
SchemeName=
You can apply ane of the built in sound schemes or specify the .dll file containing the theme.

Post-obit [Sounds] is the [Boot] section. The [Boot] section only has one value for SCRNSAVE.EXE point this value to any .scr file you desire to utilise for your screensaver.

Finally is the required [MasterThemeSelector] which simply has one attribute and you lot don't have a choice for the value. The simply affair that goes in this section is MTSM=DABJDKT which indicates that the theme is valid.

One time you lot have all of the required and optional sections in the file, save the file to whatsoever yous want to call information technology and change the extension from .txt to .theme. Brand certain you are viewing known file extensions when changing the extension otherwise the truthful extension will exist hidden.

Packaging your theme pack

The terminal step it to package all of your media into a .themepack file. The .themepack file is but a .cab file with an extension alter. And so if yous already have software that tin can create a .cab file, simply utilise that software to compress your theme folder with all of your media in it and change the extension. If you don't already take a cab packing program y'all tin cheque out CabPack which is freeware.

Here's an case of the Matrix Theme nosotros built from scratch.

Determination

Once yous take your theme pack yous can apply it to your ain arrangement before sharing it. If there is anything else that needs tweaking y'all can either go back and change it in your .theme file your you can change it through the Windows GUI and then re-save the theme for sharing. Now go out there and share your favorite theme tweaks with the residue of the world.

Links

Microsoft theme pack reference
CabPack

Source: https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/24609/create-a-windows-7-theme-pack-from-scratch/

Posted by: hubbardripplexprem.blogspot.com