Style generator

Software, you can search and see.

Attached; Introduction to WINDOWS XP topics

Windows XP adopts a brand-new theme management kernel, which is very powerful and can achieve dazzling effects, but it does not support unofficial desktop themes, plus! Simple themes in the library will be boring in a few days, so if you want to use third-party themes, you must solve them through unofficial methods.

I. Necessary software

1. Style XP

Style XP is the third-party XP desktop theme support and management software, and it is also the best at present. It uses the theme kernel of Windows XP and enhances many functions. It can import, select, replace and manage official and unofficial desktop themes, wallpapers and even login interfaces. After the software is installed, a background service StyleXP service will be added to XP, occupying 1-2MB of memory. This service is the basis for using third-party themes. In addition, its main program can choose two running modes, one is to keep running in the system tray, and there is an icon of StyleXP in the system tray, which can be clicked at any time to bring up the main interface; One is a way that does not consume resources, and the main program does not run at ordinary times. I suggest you choose the second method, because this main program is not exquisite to run and takes up 10-20MB of memory. In fact, the second way can also run the main program at any time to manage the theme.

Style XP is the exclusive software of * * * and has its own Chinese language. Following the version of 1.0 1L, Windows XP SP1.1.01p officially supports Windows 2003.

2.UxTheme.dll cracked version

UxTheme.dll is the core file of XP system theme support, which prevents XP from using third-party themes. If you don't want to install StyleXP, you can do it by cracking the UxTheme.dll file. In fact, the cracked version of UxTheme.dll was released as TGT soft release of StyleXP at the strong demand of fans, and Microsoft seems to acquiesce in this behavior, hehe, it is really rare. After using the cracked version of UxTheme.dll, you can manage and call third-party themes and styles in the display properties of XP without any other software.

After downloading the cracked version of UxTheme.dll, for example, rename X: \ Windows \ System32 \ uxtheme.dll, and then copy the cracked version and restart. Note that the system file protection of Windows XP is also involved here. Please refer to the following.

As long as you choose one of the above two schemes, each has its own advantages. It's up to you. Personally, I use the former, because when StyleXP runs as a service, it takes up very little resources, about 2MB, so it doesn't need to modify the system files, and the management theme is much more convenient than the display properties of Windows. The login interface can be changed and managed at will, and it doesn't need to change the system files. If you really like using desktop themes, you are unlikely to care about such a small amount of resources.

Two. Composition of desktop theme

An XP desktop theme can include several parts, such as style, wallpaper, screen saver, mouse pointer, system sound events and icons. Everything is optional except the style. Styles can define everything that everyone can see in the window, such as the appearance of the window, font, color, appearance of buttons, etc. , in the desktop theme.

Style determines the Windows in everyone's eyes.

You can open the directory X:\Windows\Resources\Themes, which is the directory where desktop themes are stored in XP. As you can see, there are as many files as xxx.theme. Theme file, which you can see in the "Theme" list of display properties. It is a Windows theme file, a general definition file of desktop theme, and its internal

It is in text format. Take Luna, the default official theme of XP as an example. If you open Luna.theme with any text editor, you can see its contents intuitively.

[Theme] is an icon that defines my computer, my documents, my online neighbors and the recycle bin. The icon defined by my computer in Luna.theme is X:\Windows\explorer.exe, 0, which is the first icon included in explorer.exe. There is no theme that contains a specific icon. This value is generally here. here

That is, it can point to a program file, a DLL file or an icon file.

[Control Panel \ Color] defines the colors of various window components, such as title bar, window background, text, etc. Many times, the color defined here is irrelevant, because the system will give priority to the color matching in the color scheme, which will be mentioned in the later part.

[Control Panel \ Cursor] defines the mouse pointer, and each line defines a pointer file, such as Arrow cursor and Wait cursor. Luna is empty here, which means using the default mouse pointer of Windows. The definition here must be specific. Cur cursor file or. Ani animation cursor file.

[Control Panel \ Desktop] defines the display of the desktop, including the location and display mode of wallpaper images, and whether to activate the screen saver. The wallpaper =% windir% web \ wallpaper \ bliss.bmp in Luna is the "vegetable blue sky" that everyone sees the most.

Here, ScreenSaveActive=X corresponds to the following [boot] section scransave. Exe = xxx。 The former is related to whether the screensaver is allowed, and the latter is the specific address of the screensaver.

[VisualStyles] is the most critical part, which refers to the core part of a desktop theme:. Msstyles visual appearance style file, and Luna refers to the path =% windir% resources \ themes \ luna \ luna.msstyles, which will be mentioned later.

Further down is the definition of sound events, which is the same as the items we set in control panel → sound and audio equipment → sound.

Generally speaking, a complete theme basic file structure is a. theme file and a folder where other files such as style files are placed. The name of this folder can be found in the [VisualStyles] section. Got it. Theme files, everyone can edit according to their own preferences, as long as all files must be pointed to.

Effective, otherwise the theme can't be used.

It should be noted that. A theme file is not required, but. The msstyles style file is. Therefore, some themes can be used as usual. Theme file. It's just not visible in the list of topics that display properties, only visible in appearance.

Next, according to the path in [VisualStyles], we will open the Luna folder again, and now we can see the luna.msstyles style file. . Msstyles is the most important part of a desktop theme, and its content generally includes almost everything you see in Windows, including colors of windows, toolbars, buttons, background patterns, stereoscopic effects and fonts, which can basically determine the effect of a theme. Interested friends can use StyleBuilder, which is also a tool specially made by TGT software to edit style files. You will understand the important role of ... msstyles。 This is why there are many themes, but only this document can achieve extraordinary results. It is very important here. Msstyles files can only be placed in subdirectories of the X:\Windows\Resources\Themes directory, and the subdirectory names must be consistent with their own file names (without suffixes). For example, Luna.msstyles must be placed in x: \ Windows \ Resources \ Themes \ luna to take effect. You can try renaming one of the directories or files.

There is also a shell directory in most theme directories. Here, we take the official theme of luna as an example. There is a Shell directory with Luna.msstyles When you open the Shell directory, you can see three subdirectories, namely Homestead, NormalColor and Metallic, which just correspond to the three color schemes in Luna theme: olive green, default (blue) and silver. There is a shellstyle.dll file in all three directories. Shellstyle.dll's function is relatively simple. It defines the style of the left column in Explorer, including bitmap, font and color configuration, such as the button to close and open Details, and the note pattern displayed in the background at the lower right corner of the file list when the music folder is opened. Generally, if there are multiple color schemes in a theme, there will be multiple shellstyle.dll documents, and the content of each shellstyle.dll is different from the target color scheme.

Like ... Theme files, shell folders and shellstyle.dll are not necessary, and many themes do not have this content. Even if the existing shellstyle.dll is deleted, it will not have much impact on the theme, but the content defined by it will become the system default under this color scheme. You can try using other colors in the color scheme.

The shellstyle.dll file of the scheme can be replaced, and even the bitmap, color and font definition can be edited by Resource Hacker and other tools, which can sometimes achieve unexpected results.

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Three. Use of desktop themes

The basic file structure of the theme has been mentioned above, and it is much easier to talk about the installation theme after understanding the file structure. The desktop themes you download from the internet are varied, some are only a few hundred KB, and some may be tens of MB, just because the contents are different. Some have only one. Msstyles style files, some have several color profiles, and some have them. Theme files, including mouse pointer, wallpaper, sound events, etc. I've even seen a giant desktop theme with hundreds of MB of compressed content.

Here's how to install different themes.

Let me give you a hint. Under normal circumstances. Theme files and. The msstyles file is associated with the system default file, which means that double-clicking these two file systems will automatically open in the display properties. You can use it to preview the theme or style before installation. Of course, if the theme also includes other documents, you should pay attention to other documents.

Whether the path is correct or not, otherwise it will not be previewed normally.

The first case: there is a theme file.

This situation is the easiest to install. Just keep the directory structure of the original theme and copy it. Theme files and folders to the X:\Windows\Resources\Themes\ directory to complete the installation. To give the simplest example, everyone downloaded a theme online. Assuming the theme is "Naco", the directory structure after installation should be like this:

X: \ windows \ resources \ themes \ naco.theme (optional)

x:\ Windows \ Resources \ Themes \ Naco \ Naco . ms styles

X: \ windows \ resources \ themes \ naco \ shell \ xxxx \ shellstyle.dll (optional)

.....................

After copying is completed, right-click the desktop and select Properties to open the Display Properties window. Because there is a theme file, you can see the theme in the theme list. Select the theme name and click Apply, and Windows will automatically switch to the theme display. If the theme has multiple color schemes, open Appearance and click Color Schemes.

You can see the optional color schemes in the list. Selecting each item will show the actual effect in the preview box above.

The second case: there is no theme file.

Again, in this example, suppose the theme is called "Naco", and the theme has only one Naco.msstyles style file and one shell folder, and there are several color schemes under the shell folder, or there is no shell folder at all, then please first create a subdirectory under the X:\Windows\Resources\Themes directory, and the name must be "Naco".

",as I said before, the name of this directory must be the same as the style file name, and then copy the Naco.msstyles file and the Shell directory into this subdirectory. The directory structure is as follows:

x:\ Windows \ Resources \ Themes \ Naco \ Naco . ms styles

X: \ windows \ resources \ themes \ naco \ shell \ xxxx \ shellstyle.dll (optional)

.................

Open the display properties window. Because there is no. theme file, I can't see the "Naco" theme in the theme list, so I have to go to the "Appearance" page. Normally, you should find the "Naco" item in the "Windows and Buttons" list, which is actually a list of styles. Select "Naco". If the style has multiple color schemes, there will be multiple items in the color scheme list below. Selecting each item will show the actual effect in the preview box above. Click Apply in the lower right corner to apply the style and color scheme to the current window.

As mentioned earlier, a theme is a common definition file and its structure, so you can create a theme without a theme file.

Select a style without theme file in "Windows and Buttons" of "Appearance" and click Apply. At this time, Windows will switch to the newly specified style, switch to the Theme page, and the theme list will be displayed as XXX (change). Click Save As to save the new. Theme files in the X:\Windows\Resources\Themes\ directory. Sure, here it is. After saving, you have created a new theme, and you can use the corresponding style by choosing this new theme in the future.

Here's a trick. After reading the second part, we know. Theme file. Therefore, in the preservation. Theme file, all definitions currently used in the system, such as wallpaper, mouse pointer, icon, screen saver and sound, will be saved in the newly created theme file. Therefore, you can directly use this technique to create your own personalized theme without manual editing. Theme file. For example, you can first set the desktop wallpaper as your favorite picture, call up your favorite mouse pointer, use your favorite sound events and screensavers. , and then "save" all the parts as a new theme file, so that you can choose this theme file in one step in the future. Of course, it must be noted that when saving theme files, all kinds of resources will use absolute paths. For example, the reference location of the mouse pointer and sound file comes from the directory of another topic. Therefore, once the actual location of the file changes, Windows will prompt an error when using the theme again, because it can't find the file in the theme. Therefore, the best way is to create an unchangeable directory to place these needed files, and then create theme files, so that mistakes are not easy to occur.

Four. Extension of Desktop Theme Application: Icon

Friends who use more themes will find that many desktop themes contain content other than Windows themes, such as many beautiful sets of icons, but no matter how you switch themes, you never see these icons appear in the system (except a few can be found in. Theme file). In fact, this is because Windows themes do not support icon themes. These sets of icons are generally used by other software. Here, I would like to recommend a widely used icon theme software: IconPackager.

IconPackager icon theme is the most common theme among the themes containing icons. IconPager is a powerful Windows icon theme tool, which integrates icon management, icon conversion and icon theme making. Judging from the name of the software, its biggest function is the application of IconPackager. Icon sets contained in many XP desktop theme packages will be added to the IconPager icon theme definition file, which can be opened with IconPager, which is convenient to replace all icons at once. This replacement method has no effect on the system. In fact, it is only replaced in the icon cache of Windows and can be restored at any time. Here is a brief introduction to the usage of IconPackager and its icon theme. For convenience, hereinafter referred to as IconPackager is IP.

Make a noun explanation first:

. Icl file: the abbreviation of ICon Library, a 16-bit Windows DLL library file made by icon editing software (such as Microangelo), but with different suffixes, which is dedicated to icon packaging. There is nothing in it except icons. The advantage is that a large number of icons can be compressed into a file, which is convenient for use and communication. The icons inside can be used directly without unpacking. By default, Windows XP supports this icon library format. There are two ways to publish icon themes in IP format. The first and most common way is the form of icon+. Iptheme definition file. Icon themes published in this form are usually in a separate directory. There may be many icons. Ico file, single. Icl (as mentioned above) logo library file is also the most important. Iptheme file. I have to make another noun explanation.

. Iptheme is an IP-specific icon theme definition file, just like. The theme file mentioned in Section 2 is also in text format. It can be opened with any text editor, and the content is clear at a glance. [Software Information] is a description of IP software, so don't worry. The following [Package Information] is the definition of icon content. For example, the icon "My Computer =%ThemeDir%02.ico" is defined as the 02.ico file in the icon theme directory, which is preceded by the location where the icon is displayed in the system and followed by a specially defined icon file. Or it may be: My computer =% medir% 0 1. icl， 1。 This definition refers to. ICL icon library file, the number 1 followed by a comma, indicates the first icon in the icon library file.

If IP is installed in your system, just double-click it. The IP file IP will automatically start, then open this icon iptheme, and then click "Icons &；; Cursor ",you can see various specific icons defined in the icon theme on the right, which are divided into eight categories: desktop, start menu, folder, drive, other, file type, mouse pointer, quick launch bar, etc. , which basically covers all icons in Windows, and even file formats of many third-party software can be found. For dissatisfied icons, double-click the icon item to change it, or select the icon item and click Change ... on the right. Locate the desired icon and confirm that it will be loaded in IP. Click Apply in the lower right corner to apply the current icon theme, and wait for a few seconds for the icon theme of the system to be replaced. The number of icons to be replaced depends on the number of icons contained in the icon theme. If the icon theme icon types are complete, basically the icons in the whole system will be unrecognizable. It should be noted that the icon definition in IP is an absolute path, which means that once the icon defined in IP is moved, it will be invalid in IP.

Another subject publishing form of ip is single. IP file. This file is an icon compression package in IP-specific format, including icon file in icon theme and icon theme definition file of IP. It can't be opened with other software. It is the same as. Theme when using. Just double-click it and it will be loaded into IP, but IP will decompress the compressed package to itself first.

Reinstall in the installation directory under the themes directory, and restore the original. The location of the ip file will not affect the use of icon themes. In addition, IP icon themes can also contain mouse pointers, which are defined in the same way as icons. Let's first find a relatively complete IP icon theme and study the definition file.

This tutorial only talks about the application of icon themes. As for other functions and applications of IP, you can study them yourself. In short, IP is a powerful and easy-to-use icon tool, but it is not difficult to use at all. Use it to make your own icon theme and distribute it to your friends to ensure pants. A good desktop theme and a good icon theme can definitely make the whole system look brand-new.

Fifth, the expansion of desktop theme application: modify system files;

The above four steps, I believe that everyone's Windows is a little unrecognizable. The following is a further application: modify system files to make Windows unlike Windows.

In fact, many UIS are saved in some executable files. exe。 dll。 Ocx, etc. ), such as button icons, animations, menu text, layout of programs and dialogs, etc. Editing these files allows you to change your Windows interface at will, which is not as difficult as you think. Backup! Since it is a system file, I believe everyone dare not delete it casually, so we must make a good backup and clearly indicate the geographical location of the file. Once the modification fails, start DOS to restore the backup file immediately. Furthermore, a good habit is to back up, overwrite, restart, check and then change the next file after one file is changed. The most taboo thing is to change a bunch of files and overwrite them at the same time. As a result, something goes wrong, but I don't know which file is broken. Remember: Back up system files before editing them!

Resource hacker, I believe many people already know this excellent free software, and the most gratifying thing is that it has a perfect sinicization.

PE resource editor is also a free software, and its code is open. It may need two delphi 6 runtime libraries (rtl60.rar, vcl60.rar). Not inferior to resource hackers at all.

EXeScope, * * * enjoys the software, and can edit the binary file of 16 bits.

ResBuilder, TGTSoft (the one that makes StyleXP) is a powerful free software. Its home page says: "With ResBuilder, the designer of skin/logon/ shellstyle has a simple way to change the alpha mask bitmap in the resource file. ResBuilder automatically converts 32-bit BMP to png, so that you can edit 8-bit alpha mask in your favorite editor. Good for the LogonUI.EXE file. There is also a text and hexadecimal editor. . In addition, it can be edited. xml。 The integration of ini into executable files is very attractive.

HEX editor, since there is UltraEdit, I won't say anything else.

File replacement

We know that a file can't be replaced when it is used, and most system files about UI are enabled at startup, which brings us trouble to replace system files. The following two softwares can help us.

CopyLock, Windows 9x/2k, free software, "is a small program that allows the replacement of one or more files currently in use (such as comctl32.dll system files).

Replacer, Windows 2k/XP, Free Software "is an easy-to-use XP/2K system file exchanger. It uses a drag-and-drop interface to get input. "

Others:

ResThief, free software, when an executable file or other binary file is dragged onto it, it will expand all the resource files in it and put them into a directory.

SmartView, a free software, "is a free Windows program that allows you to select a directory. You can view all bitmaps, metafiles, icons and thumbnails saved in executable files."

Modify and import 16-bit and 32-bit files.

Several resource editors mentioned above can modify 32-bit files, but we will still encounter 16-bit files (especially in Windows 9x system), so we have to use eXeScope at this time.

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Edit file:

The usual method is to simply extract resource files (bitmap, animation, etc. ) from the file, edit and replace it in the file. Or modify the layout in the dialog box, modify the text in the file, etc. , can be done in the editor through simple operations. Bitmap editing tool (. bmp。 Ico, etc ) and animation (. Avi, etc ) you can use it yourself. Attention should be paid to the file size, color index and transparent color designation of the modified resource file. A better way is to edit the original resource file.

Usually the transparent color will be purplish red (r, g, B:255, 0, 255), but sometimes it is also in the background color of bitmap. You often come across a bitmap file, which contains several buttons with different functions. In another picture, there may be corresponding pictures of mouse hovering and mouse pressing. A better way is to edit the original picture. For XP, we will see that many bitmaps have Alpha effects (such as buttons in the explorer toolbar). An effective way is to rename the file. Png (originally. Bmp) is extracted immediately with the resource editor, then edited and saved with photoshop and other software, and then opened and saved with Ms Paint. bmp。 (Note: I have not tested this method myself)

HTML editing in. Dll file!

Besides bitmaps and dialogs, there are some things saved in HTML, such as IE's About (shdoclc.dll, section 23) and Friendly http Error Information Page (shdoclc.dll, section 2 1 10). Resource hackers can easily edit this, just click "Compile Script" after editing. However, to replace. gif/。 The jpg and other pictures quoted in HTML are not suitable for resource hackers, but eXeScope is competent and happy. In addition, you can completely replace any. Gif tape. Gif animation.