[cluberti]

BOFH, on May 2 2007, 07:56 AM, said:

Well no offence but it doesn't look like a "Visual Update", it just looks like a poorly ripped set of XP resources on an old older OS. The icons don't match the window appearance, neither do the replacement dialog resources, etc. Everything just looks jumbled and mis-matched like Windows Neptune.

Nice effort, but needs a more discerning eye to pull something like this off.

BOFH, on May 18 2007, 06:05 AM, said:

Cry?

If you'd like to provide something constructive to this conversation, like being that "discerning eye" to add value, please do (I'm sure help on this project isn't frowned upon). However, if you simply want to bash, take it somewhere else on the 'net where that sort of thing isn't frowned upon, because it's against the rules here. Relevant forum rule:

xper, on Apr 25 2004, 02:22 PM, said:

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[no1none]

awergh, don't get discouraged by those who only know how to criticize others (but don't know s*** about doing anything themselves hehe).
Youre doing great job from what I see on your screencaps, and even though I'm not XP or Vista icons fan, I do appreciate the fact you at least try to DO IT.

PS
Im trying to solve 'the riddle' of high color icons that most of the time disappear after shell update (I reinstalled quite few times NT4 on the same test machine, installed SP6 /postSP6/drivers/and did few settings and 9 out of 10 I loose the original high color icons when installing IE6 with shell update, but few times somehow they stayed there after shell update and its driving me nuts not to know what causes this )
Maybe you know anything about it?

This post has been edited by no1none: 19 May 2007 - 11:24 PM

[awergh]

dunno, most of the time ive been playing with nt4 without the shell update

[awergh]

im not upploading nt4vu2 alpha 1 today but i will upload some of the screenshots











TM0d did the msgina image

[no1none]

Looks great

[awergh]

thanks
i still havent uploaded it because i have some work i need to do but here are some more screenshots

with shell update, so there is no 256 colour systray fix


i will fix the icons in a later version

[xper]

@BOFH

7.a You are expected to be mature when discussing in threads. Racism, pornography, threatening, profanity, or excessive vulgarity is not tolerated. You will be promptly banned. No Exceptions.

7.b This community is built upon mutual respect. You are not allowed to flame other members. People who do not respect personal opinions and/or personal work will be warned in first instance. If you ignore the warning and keep on flaming, you will be banned without notice.

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[awergh]

NT4 Visual Update 2 Alpha 1

[New Features]
Shell Update Support
Newer image resources from Vista
More App Icons Patched
Includes TM0d's Explorer.exe Patch (Without Shell Update)
Better install Structure (less batch files)
Better installer.exe

[Notes (My installations)]
In the Internet Dialog when click on the Conection Tab Explorer.exe has crashed.
Winmsd.exe Complains about user32.dll shell relocation if shell update is not installed.
can anyone verify this?

NT4VU2 Patches:
Desktop Icons
Dialog Images
App Icons
CPL Icons and Images
Internet Explorer Icons
Start Menu Icons
Folder Icons
Setup Icons
Notepad Shortcuts
Systray Icons
(Thats all I think.)

(This is still a patcher it doesnt copy whole files except explorer.exe for an install without shell update)
Download 7.7MB
http://www.divshare....load/714856-0d7

[no1none]

awergh, personally I prefer 7z too, but probably most of people never heard of it.
I just had to explain to webbuddy whom I gave link to your update how to eat it bcause he thought its "some linux or Mac file"

PS
Perhaps you should consider i.e. rar at highest compression, or even better - make it selfextract? (~200kB more on a 7-8MB file doesn't matter anymore IMHO) for your next version.

This post has been edited by no1none: 23 May 2007 - 05:54 PM

[awergh]

i tried to make it an exe file but when i uploaded it, it complained that i wasnt allowed to do that, but only after id finished uploading so i uploaded it as 7z, ill host it as an exe next time

[awergh]

I seem to have found a bug in nt4vu2a1 when working on nt4vu2 for terminal server
It appears that these lines only modify these resources, but on a new install they need to be added which means that they dont seem to work has only had this result?

..\reshack\reshacker.exe -modify %windir%\system32\msgina.dll, %windir%\system32\msgina.dll, MSGINA_Bitmap.res,,,

..\reshack\reshacker.exe -modify %windir%\system32\winlogon.exe, %windir%\system32\winlogon.exe, winlogon_Bitmap.res,,,

[nebivedu]

We're sorry, this file has expired.

How can i dl NT4 Visual Update 2 Alpha 1? can anyone send me this file to nebivedu@yahoo.com?

[awergh]

i can upload the newer version nt4 visual update 2 alpha 2 although i have had some weird results with it but i obviously should upload it elsewhere without a short expiry time

[awergh]

NT4 Visual Update 2 Alpha 2

Features:
NT4 Terminal Server support. (no shell update)
Fixes:
Copies 3 files instead of patching them because i can seem to patch bitmaps into the files if they dont already exist there, so no more bitmapless logon dialog on new installs
Some minor bugs with patching

Known Errors:

Quote

The system DLL user32..dll was relocated in memory the application will not run properly. the relocation occured because the DLL C:\winnt\system32\shell32.dll occupied an address range reserved for windows nt system dll'.

this occurs on nt4 without the shell update but i dont know why and i dont know how to fix it really, can i have some advise on that.

I had some weird results on an NT4 installation where regedit, user32, cmd.exe didnt get patched for some reason and i dont know why can anyone verify this?

I havent updated installer.exe at the moment but is it just me or is it broken

Can i please have some feedback and advice so i know how to fix more stuff, because id prefer that i wasnt the only tester to give feedback.

Download 9.64MB
http://www.divshare....load/842022-0a7

PS: this release maybe a little premature but it is an alpha and i might be more busy in the comming weeks so if i release it sooner it would probably be better

[budious]

Link above expired, anyone have a mirror link or able to email the file? budious at gmail dot com, thanks! I just broke out the NT4 disk to revive an outdated laptop, this visual update looks promising. Keep up the good work.

This post has been edited by budious: 18 June 2007 - 11:20 PM

[alexanrs]

no1none, on May 20 2007, 02:05 AM, said:

Im trying to solve 'the riddle' of high color icons that most of the time disappear after shell update (I reinstalled quite few times NT4 on the same test machine, installed SP6 /postSP6/drivers/and did few settings and 9 out of 10 I loose the original high color icons when installing IE6 with shell update, but few times somehow they stayed there after shell update and its driving me nuts not to know what causes this )

Windows NT 4 without the shell update uses icons from cool.dll (if it works like Win95+Plus) due registry settings. When the shell update is installed, it erases those settings and icons are once again loaded from shell32.dll. Also, if you look closely, these icons are NOT 16 color ones, they are 256-color ones, but they do not look as fancy. I could be wrong, of course, and MS added these COLL.DLL icons into the original Shell32.dll, in this case, only resource editing would do...

awergh, on Jun 5 2007, 04:31 AM, said:

Known Errors:

Quote

The system DLL user32..dll was relocated in memory the application will not run properly. the relocation occured because the DLL C:\winnt\system32\shell32.dll occupied an address range reserved for windows nt system dll'.

this occurs on nt4 without the shell update but i dont know why and i dont know how to fix it really, can i have some advise on that.

I've seen that in WinXP+just about any Vista icon pack. I think it is because it makes SHELL32.DLL bigger, so it uses memory in an address range that overlaps the one that was originally intended for an system dll. Since the shell update replaces the SHELL32.dll with a newer version that contains more icon formats, odds are that it also has a different default start address, and therefore doesn't overlap that system dll. You could try patching SHELL32.DLL to use another start address if it detects the older version.

About 32-bit icons, you could try patching gdi32.dll to add an GdiAlphaBlend function. If you go to the Windows 9x forum you might notice a project called KernelEx, it patches the system DLLs and adds unimplemented funcions: if you use the same logic and implement that function, you might as well be able to use that Win2k Revolutions Pack DLL and add true 32-bit icon support to your project

Btw, awergh, keep up the good work.

[awergh]

i remember the better icons being in shell32,dll when i patched it, but not sure cant remember.
ive been busy so i havent done anything on nt4vu2 but will resume soon.
i need a way to use another file as well as shell32.dll so that i dont get the error. just like Tihiy uses imageres.dll in rp.
kernelEx hasnt done anything with gdi32.dll, there maybe something comming for 32bit icons but i dont know yet

[awergh]

another link for nt4vu2a2
http://www.divshare....oad/1046981-beb

[marxo]

Can someone give me the patched files in a rar file? This reshack patching is not working for me....

[budious]

Thanks for the mirror, worked great for me!

Off topic question, where or how does one perform the shell update of explorer 4.0 -> 4.7 , I've read several threads mentioning this but have not found the original thread discussing the installation or containing files.

Edit: I found the information regarding IE4 and fortunately had a FrontPage 98 installation cd sitting around with IE4 installation files on it.

This post has been edited by budious: 24 June 2007 - 10:00 PM