Phr33x Tw33x #35

Simon says there's nothing wrong with some personalised touching up, now and again. So let's make a list of it, and get some spunk happening.

Adding eye-candy to your browser

Both Internet Explorer and Outlook Express make use of a little animated logo, in the upper right corner, which indicates if Internet/email activity is taking place. If your ISP provided you with an installation CD, you may find that they replaced this logo with their own. Let's Atomicify things a little, and replace it with our own spunky little animation.

You should all know the basic principles of animation, where one frame is simply a little different from the next. When displayed in rapid succession it gives the appearance of movement. The more frames you use, and the smaller the changes between frames, the smoother the movements appear to be.

So the images we need to construct will be similar to a strip of film, composed of a sequence of individual frames. As the animation starts playing, the first square frame is displayed, then the next frame, and so on. When it reaches the end, it loops back to the start.

To create our own animation, we need two BMP files, which are identical except for the size. One must be 22 pixels wide and the other 38 pixels wide, for the various toolbar sizes in Internet Explorer. The height will be determined by the number of frames you wish to use. In other words, if your animation contains 20 frames, one image would be 22 pixels wide by 440 pixels high, and the other would be 38 pixels wide by 760 pixels high.
When creating your sequence, stack the frames vertically, with the first frame at the top.

However, If your creative inspiration has left you, or you have the artistic eye of a slug, you can download the ones I used here, from www.atomicmpc.com.au/downloads.asp. Once you have your images, save them into your Windows folder.

When the browser isn't active, such as when a page has finished loading, it will just display the first frame in your strip. Alternatively, you can create a different image to display when idling. Of course, the 22 x 22 and 38 x 38 pixel dimensions would apply.

Now take a well-trodden a trip to your registry, and browse to HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Internet Explorer/Toolbar.

Create two new string values, if they don't already exist and name them 'SmBrandBitmap' and 'BrandBitmap'. In the 'value data' for each of these, specify the full path and filename to relevant image files. 'SmBrandBitmap' represents the 22 pixel image and 'BrandBitmap' is the 38 pixel image.

If you have also created a separate non-animated image, browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Internet Explorer/Main and create two string values named 'SmallBitmap' and 'BigBitmap'. Set each value as the full path and filename of your static images.

To revert back to the boring old icons, just delete those string values from the registry.

Background ahoy!

Now let's get real clever and put a background across your Windows toolbars. Actually, it's not that clever, but it's pretty neat anyway.

This time, create yourself a BMP which is any old size you like. Whatever size you make this, it will be stretched and cropped to fit the full size of your toolbar. Don't make the image too dark, however, as it will make your buttons difficult to see.

Once again, we have put a sample for you to use on the website for the laziest of you. It may take some time to resize it to suit your screen size and resolution.
In the registry, under HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Internet Explorer/Toolbar, create a string value called 'BackBitmap' and set the value to the full path and filename of your toolbar image.

Happily, no reboots are required, and your new and improved animations and toolbars will be there in the very next Explorer window you open.

And finally, a quickie from the 'Potatocake':
Add wallpapers to Display Properties window

'So, I'm sure that I'm not the only one who is tired searching forever to change their wallpaper, and gets irritated by the fact that it'll remove my last wallpaper from the list once I choose another one. This will allow you to add whatever wallpaper you want onto the list without fearing that they will disappear, or having to look for it again through tons of folders. Here's how you do it. . .
1. Right click and copy, the wallpaper that you like and would like to add to the list.
2. Go into “C:/Windows/Web/Wallpaper”
3. Paste your wallpaper into that folder.
That's it! Now, you can go through all of your wallpapers and just add them to that folder, and they will remain on the list even if you choose another wallpaper! No more tiring searches for your wallpapers.'