Now Some "Aero" Glitz for the Rest of Us Vista Addons and Applications Discuss Now Some "Aero" Glitz for the Rest of Us in the Windows Vista forums; Hi Friends: I installed Actual Transparent Windows (ATW) by Actual Tools. I don't know now to use the program yet and, thus, I don't know what all doesn'...

[Znod]

Hi Friends:

I installed Actual Transparent Windows (ATW) by Actual Tools. I don't know now to use the program yet and, thus, I don't know what all doesn't work. I know that I have trouble saving changes sometimes. My only accomplishment to date is that I can get all wiindows plus the task bar and the start menu to be transparent to any degree I want.

ATW has had no obvious effects of 5384 functioning. Also, its installation did not affect my performance score of 2--except that my memory score dropped from 3.5 to 3.4. I think I could get the .1 back by tinkering with virtual memory (VM). I increased my memory score by .1 earlier by playing with VM.

Does anyone think that transparency of the either the type I will display below or the Aero type matters except for Glitz? I can see how transparency might help you know what's "beneath" sometimes, but is being able to do such things important? What do you see as the usefulness of transparency.

Well, anyway, here is a screenshot showing the transparency effects I have been able to get to date. I'll post more here on ATW if I discover anything important. Here's the screen shot.

I am going to have to work on the screen shot. It is too big. The, ha ha jpeg is attached. I can see that I have some work to do on attaching files here. I'll keep trying.

[dazzlin]

Well, there's a little more to Aero than just the glass effect. Aero also provides live taskbar thumbnails and Flip3D, for instance. So, ATW won't provide you with a true Aero experience, but it may be enough for what you want.

[Znod]

Right, at this point all I am dealing with is transparency. I will be trying a few other programs that might add some other effects for us underpriviledged. I don't think I will be able to duplicate thumbnails--which I like. I'll bet developers will get on the bandwagon and provide the missing glitz for "the rest of us."

Briefly, how do I attach an image that will be large-ish and not violate the size requirements without using other online space? Can it be done?

And, did you see the questions I rasised about transparency above? What do you think about the usefulness of transparency.

[dazzlin]

Personally, I think you've covered the benefits of transparency well. ie, the benefits are mildly useful, but nothing earth shattering. Kinda cool, though. AFAIK, there's no good way to attach a large image without violating the size requirements, other than making the image look bad. I'll consider upping the size requirements though. On most boards I frequent, people just link to large images located elsewhere (usually free image hosting sites).

[Znod]

An increase in the size limit would help for sure; it's a tad too much trouble for me, personally, to post elsewhere and link--when I just want to do something quickly and adequately. I managed to quess at what would give me about 39.1k for the image I attached earlier. I ended up with an image of about 36k and substituted it for my earlier one. Check it out. It shows my screenshot better, of course, than before. But, it still is pretty small. 200k would be great, but even 100k would help a great deal. But, whatever, I am enjoying the site. It is very well done.

[dazzlin]

Ok, trying to compromise here to help the users, but still not overload the system. So, let's test this (if you don't mind) and see how well it works. I've upped the size limit to 60K, and pixel sizes up to 800x600 (with thumbnails enabled) for both .gif and .jpg. Let me know how it works for you.

[Znod]

I will try some different approaches. It will take a little while, and we are leaving the house now. But, cool.

[Znod]

I just happened to have a 58.1k version sitting around. So, here is 58.1k--virutally max. And, it looks like max actually is 58.6k. What a nice coincidence. Enabling thumbnails is a good idea.

OK, I looked; it's not bad. It is not quite big enough to see some of the detail--especially in the task bar, but one can get the idea from it.

[Znod]

Here is a file that keeps the height and width of my original screen shot constant--with a size of about 56k.

Well, that didn't work. Let me rethink things. Is there a site constraint on heigth and width in inches?

[dazzlin]

800x600 pixels is the size restraint.