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»What
are Desktop Themes?
»I
don't want to buy Microsoft Plus! Are there any programs that work like
it?
»How
can I install any themes that I've downloaded?
»What
are Startup and Shutdown screens?
»What
tools do I need to make a Desktop Theme?
»How
can I make icons for my theme?
»How
can I make cursors/animated cursors for my themes?
»How
can I make wallpaper for my theme?
»How
can I make sounds for my theme?
»How
can I make startup and shutdown screens for my theme?
»How
can I make a great theme?
»What
are Desktop Themes?
A Desktop Theme is a collection of cursors, animated cursors, sounds,
wallpaper, and even screensaver assembled to some theme. To use Desktop
Themes, you will need Microsoft Windows 95 and Microsoft Plus!
»I
don't want to buy Microsoft Plus! Are there any program that works like
it?
Yes! There are some shareware/freeware program which can run any
themes without having to buy MS Plus! like: Desktop
Themes v1.73 (103 KB) lets you install, use and create Desktop Themes
without Microsoft Plus! for Windows 95.
Desktop
Themes offers the same functionality as the Plus! version with a few
additional features, such as the ability to create your own themes by
creating and modifying a ".theme" file. Please email the author,
Jonathan Potter or visit his homepage.
FreeTheme
v1.1 (1,653 KB) is a FreeWare Theme loader for Windows95. With this
program installed you can load themes without the MS Plus! package.
FreeTheme was written by Klaus Thrane. Please visit the author's homepage.
»How
can I install any themes that I've downloaded?
If you download an executable theme, you can execute it from
Windows Explorer, Start-Run, or whatever you prefer. By default, the
Desktop Theme will extract the files to C:\Program Files\Plus!\Themes\
which is the default directory for your Microsoft Plus! Themes.
If you download a zipped theme, you have to unzipped it first with a
program like WinZip
95 or TurboZIP
97 then extract it to C:\Program Files\Plus!\Themes\ After the files
have been installed, simply start your Desktop Themes program from the
Control Panel window and select the new theme.
»What
is Startup and Shutdown screens?
Many of these Desktop Themes include special Startup and Shutdown
screens. Unfortunately, the usual Desktop Theme manager from Microsoft
Plus! does not support alternative Startup and Shutdown screens so you
will have to install these manually if you wish to use them. If you are
not familiar with file copying and moving, don't try this.
To install alternative Startup and Shutdown screens: Locate the LOGO.SYS
in your C:\ root directory and the LOGOS.SYS and LOGOW.SYS files in your
C:\WINDOWS directory. These are the normal Startup and Shutdown screens.
You should copy these to a suitable back-up directory. For example, make a
directory in C:\WINDOWS called Screen Backups and copy your LOGO.SYS,
LOGOS.SYS and LOGOW.SYS files there.Copy the alternative LOGO.SYS to your
C:\ root directoryCopy the alternative LOGOS.SYS and LOGOW.SYS files to your C:\WINDOWS directory
The next time you startup or shutdown your computer, you will see the new
screens. If you don't want to use the alternative screens anymore, simply
copy your backups of the normal screens back into their original
directories.
»What
tools I need to make a Desktop Theme?
Microsoft
Resource Kit Utilities You'll need this kit if you wanna make your own
desktop theme. This tool includes an Animated Cursor Editor and an Image
Editor. The Image Editor is used to make and edit cursors and icons, and
the
Animated Cursor Editor used to make .ani files for any animated cursors.
Microangelo
for Windows 95 This utility provides access to icons of all sizes and
color formats used by Windows 95. Browse, manage, create, and edit icons
from 8x8 to 64x64 pixels in size and up to 256 colors. Explorer-like
Browser specializes in locating icons on your system. Double-click to open
icons for editing in Studio, libraries for viewing in Librarian. The
Engineer replaces system icons, removes shortcut arrows.Download this
utility (version 2.1 - 640 KB) here!
WinZip
95 or TurboZIP
97 This is a 32 bit zip extractor for windows 95. You will need this
to extract any themes. This utility has supported long file names.
»How
can I make icons for my theme?
The easiest way to create icons is with Microangelo
utility. Create the picture in the 32x32 grid. Then rename the cursor
(.CUR) to an icon (.ICO) when you are finished.You need to create 4 icons:
My Computer, Network Neighborhood, Recycle Bin Empty, and Recycle Bin
Full. You can use the standard icons that come with Windows 95 too (COOL.DLL).
The icon numbers are 16, 17, 20, and 21. So, in the theme file, it would
be listed as:
My Computer:
DefaultValue=%WinDir%System\Cool.dll,16
Net Neighborhood: Default Value=%WinDir%System\Cool.dll,17
Recycle Bin Empty: Default Value=%WinDir%System\Cool.dll,20
Recycle Bin Full: Default
Value=%WinDir%System\Cool.dll,21
»How
can I make cursors/animated cursors for my theme?
You need to create 14 cursors with Microangelo
or Microsoft
Resource Kit Utilities. Cursors are made in 32x32 pixels. You can make
all or none of them animated. The 2 cursors that are normally animated are
the Wait and Busy icons. The Wait icon is shown when Windows 95 is doing
something. The Busy icon is shown when Windows 95 is too busy to handle
any other mouse clicks / commands. The rest of the cursors are:Arrow -
Normal pointer.
Help - Displayed when you click on the ? in a dialog box.
NWPen - The Pen cursor.
No - Displayed when an option is not selectable with the Arrow cursor.
Size NS/WE/NWSE/NESW - Will show up when resize a window.
Size All - Displayed when you can move a window.
Crosshair - Looks almost like a target sighting for precision selection.
IBeam - Displayed when you are in a text region.
Up Arrow - Never seen this cursor in action!
»How
can I make wallpaper for my theme?
You need a graphic manipulator like Windows Paint, PhotoShop or
PaintShop to create a wallpaper. You don't need to create a .BMP
wallpaper, .JPG is probably the best to save your wallpaper because they
are 3-10 times smaller than the bitmap. Also, make sure the picture is in
640x480, 800x600, or 1024x768 saved in a decently high quality.
»How
can I make sounds for my theme?
You need a .WAV editor or Sound editor to create sounds like
CoolEdit. There are 20 sounds you can provide for different events. Try to
match a good sound for the sound event (e.g. someone asking a question for
the Question sound event, a theme song for the Windows Start sound event,
etc). Here are the sound events:
Default Sound - Just what it says.
rogram Error - Played when there is an error.
Maximize - Played when you maximize a window.
Minimize - Played when you minimize a window.
Restore Up - Played when you restore a window larger.
Restore Down - Played when you restore a window smaller.
Menu Command - Played when you select a program/option on a menu.
Menu Popup - Played when you look through program menus/option menu.
Open Program - Played when you open a program.
Close Program - Played when you close a program.
Ring In - Played with a program that uses the ringing options.
Ring Out - Played with a program that uses the ringing options.
Asterisk - Not sure when this is played.
System Default - Not sure when this is played.
Exclamation - Played when you do something that is not supported.
Windows Start - Played when you start Windows 95.
Windows Exit - Played when you exit Windows 95.
Critical Stop - Also known as System Hand.
Question - Played when a program ask you a question prompt.
Empty Recycle Bin - Played when you empty the recycle bin.
Sounds events that you can use with the same WAV file so you don't have
duplicate WAV's:
Default Sound and System Default
Program Error and Critical Stop (System Hand)
Maximize and Restore Up or Maximize and Minimize
Minimize and Restore Down or Maximize and Minimize
You don't need to use the highest quality for sounds (Stereo, 44KHz, 16
bit). All of the files you download from my site have WAV's that are in
Mono, 11KHz, 8 bit quality. And most of them sound great unless the
original sound was bad quality.
»How
can I make startup and shutdown screens for my theme?
A great part of the theme is the startup/shutdown screens. There
are 3 screens that are needed:
Startup, Shutting Down, Shutdown Complete.
Please do not mess with this screens in Windows98
unless you know what you are doing!
These 3 files will replace the original Windows 95 screens that you see
when your starting or shutting down windows. These files are located in
the C:\ and C:\Windows directories named LOGO.SYS, LOGOS.SYS, and
LOGOW.SYS. The .SYS extension is just for Windows. It is actually a .BMP
file saved in 320x400, 256 colors and then renamed to a .SYS file. You can
even animate the screens. For more on animating, go to the XrX
Animated Logos home page. See FAQ
#3 for more details about startup and shutdown screens.
»How
can I make a great theme?
You need a text editor (notepad) or Theme Create. Here is where
the entire theme comes together with all the commands Windows 95 needs to
set it up. There are a couple of ways to make the .Theme file. Copy an
existing .Theme file that has colors and fonts that you like and rename it
to your theme name.Use Theme Create to build a .Theme file.
There are some variables you can use in the .Theme file to point to
certain locations for the files. The first is %WinDir% (you need the %
signs) which tells Plus! to look in your default Windows 95 directory. The
second is %ThemeDir% which tells Plus! to look in your default theme
directory. These variables make the .Theme file more flexible on different
machines. Some people may have Windows 95 set up in C:\Windows
and others may have it in C:\Win95 or some variation.
Also, it makes it easier to write %ThemeDir% then C:\Program
Files\Plus!\Themes. |
