Classic Shell: Forum

Classic Shell 4.3.0 was just released. Download it from here: http://www.classicshell.net/downloads/latest

Here’s what’s new:

• Improved support for Windows 10 Anniversary Update (AKA Redstone)
• Taskbar skinning - change background color, texture, and text color
• New Metallic skin with many new skin features (Skin options of the Metallic skin allow you to change the menu color, background image, text color and text size via the GUI. More advanced features can be customized by editing the skin).
• New menu animations
• New ability to execute some start menu commands from the command line
• New buttons for Explorer to change folder settings and to create zip archive
• New ability to change the font and size of the status bar in Explorer
• Multiple minor improvements and bugfixes
• Installer is available in Spanish

Next release is Classic Shell 4.3.1.
Previous release was Classic Shell 4.2.6/4.2.7 beta.

Besides above mentioned overview, here is the detailed change log for Classic Shell 4.3.0:

New features in Classic Shell 4.3.0 over Classic Shell 4.2.6/4.2.7 Beta: (see here for article with screenshots)

● New "Remove highlight" item for the All Programs button, which will clear every highlighted item in All Programs
● Ctrl+F focuses on the search box in the main Start Menu when a submenu isn't showing
● Ctrl+left/right arrow will move the selection to the previous/next column on the same row without opening a submenu
● The Left/right arrow keys (without Ctrl) also wrap around the columns so if there is no folder to expand/close, they can be used to select the item in the adjacent column on the same row

Other minor changes in Classic Shell 4.3.0:

● Compatibility with Windows 10 Redstone 1 Build 14393
● The Settings window has Minimize and Maximize buttons
● The Settings window can be moved with Alt+Space -> M
● Multiple reliability improvements to showing Windows 10 Start Menu
● Fixed the problems with the taskbar on secondary monitor on latest release of Windows 10
● Fix for jumplists in the Midnight skin when the search box is hidden
● Added Icelandic to the list of supported languages
● The flag icons on Language tab in Settings are larger if the DPI is 144 or higher
● New internal skin option "SEARCHBOX", which is true when the search box is visible to allow skins to use different settings based on that
● New internal skin settings, Main_icon_size and Main2_icon_size. You can set them to "none", "small" and "large" independently to get different sized icons in left and right column of a 2-column menu
● For a skin, the emblem alignment can have two values. If the first alignment refers to the second column, and there is no second column, the second alignment will be used.
o Emblem1_alignmentH=left2|right2
● If you put "none" in the tooltip for Edit Menu Item dialog (from Customize Start Menu tab), the tooltip won’t show for that item (similar to "none" for the Icon field)

For Classic Shell 4.2.5 and earlier, version 4.3.0 also incorporates all the features and changes from Classic Shell 4.2.6 beta/4.2.7 beta

Major new features in 4.2.6/4.2.7 Beta: (see here for article with screenshots)

● Classic Start Menu supports fade, slide and random animations also in Windows 7 style
● New feature to select the text color for the taskbar on Windows 7, 8, 10
● New feature to set a texture for the Taskbar and Start Menu for Windows 7, 8, 10!
● Settings to set taskbar color and transparency for Windows 7, 8, 10
● Metro Settings in search results have a "Pin to Start Menu" right-click command
● New Explorer toolbar commands to toggle hidden files, system files, file extensions, open Folder Options and create a ZIP file
● New setting for the font of the Explorer status bar (Windows 8 and up)
● Many new skin features
o Skins can use PNG and JPEG resources
o Textures are supported in Start Menu skins, up to 4 with tiling pattern and a mask
o Skins support logos/emblems drawn on top of the menu background, up to 10 emblems, first 4 can have a mask
o Menu shadow can be disabled as a skin setting
o All Programs tree in Windows 7 style can be completely transparent and use the background from the main menu
o Fresh skin options which now support colors, bitmaps, and more
o New "Metallic" skin that showcases the new skin features. Skin options of the Metallic skin allow you to change the menu color, background image, text color and text size via the GUI. More advanced features can be customized by editing the skin

Minor new features and changes in 4.2.6/4.2.7 beta:

● New setting to set hover sound for the Start button
● If a menu item's Label field has a user-defined accelerator key using an ampersand (&) character, it will be executed when you press the key, ignoring other items that begin with that letter
● You can hide All Programs item in Windows 7 style menu from Settings UI (previously only as a Group Policy)
● Some Start Menu commands are now available from cmd line. e.g. ClassicStartMenu.exe -cmd restart. Other commands include confirm_logoff, advanced_boot, update_restart, update_shutdown, hybrid_shutdown
● New setting to select the last item in the shutdown menu instead of the first
● The Shutdown menu has separate items for shutdown/restart without installing updates
● The Invert Metro Icons setting now works without a restart of the menu
● Metro icons correctly update their color when the system color changes (Windows 10)
● The search thread runs at normal priority instead of "idle" so even if the CPU is busy at startup or doing long-running tasks like video encoding, the search will be fast
● Corrupted/damaged Metro Apps are hidden from the Apps menu

Bug fixes and minor changes:

● Recent documents will not show redundant items with full path
● Fixed a bug where you can select two radio buttons in the skin settings

Other minor changes in Classic Shell 4.3.0:
● Due to a change to prefer user-defined accelerator keys using an ampersand (&) character in the Start Menu, access to some items via their first letter is prevented.

● If you use <No Skin>, some icons may not show up in the Start menu.

_________________
Links to some general topics:

● Compare Start Menus

● Read the Search box usage guide.

I am a Windows enthusiast and did Classic Shell's testing and usability/UX feedback.