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First some background:

Windows XP ships with a nice new logon screen. This screen is called logonui.exe. Since the release of Windows XP, technically knowledgeable users have learned that you can take a resource hacker to the .exe and change the bitmaps and settings of the .exe. Users then soon began releasing alternative logonui.exe's.

The problem was that only technical people were really able to create them. And it required people to download a .EXE and replace their own (a key system file). What has ended up happening is that artists who would be the target audience, have generally not embraced this type of customization because of the difficulty. Worse, many of the logonui.exe's floating around are actually someone else's graphics ripped and used without permission.

Stardock's solution is LogonXP. A new program that lets users distribute .logon files (which are just .ZIP files renamed). These files merely contain the bitmaps and a text file describing what they're for. LogonXP does more than just apply them, it provides a nice GUI for creating your own where you simply walk through and change the bitmaps. It also provides layout templates to make it easier to put your Users at the top, bottom, left, right, etc.

It also has numerous safety and recovery features should things go awry during the process of using it.

By making it more accessible, more artists will be able to create their own logons and share them with others.

LogonXP is freeware. There is no enhanced or plus version of it.

This is a developer's release meaning we haven't ironed out the bugs or put together samples to include with it (if you would like yours included, comment below with a link to it and we'll check it out). It can import most of the logonui.exe's floating around so that you don't have to use a resource hacker anymore to deal with the bitmaps inside.

The .logon format is open and anyone is free to use it as they wish.

To download this developer's release go to:

https://www.stardock.com/files/logonxp089.exe

AccessFolders is a program that lets you quickly jump to any directory from the standard Windows file/save dialog.

A new beta for the popular MP3 player, WinAmp is now available at Nullsoft's site.

Now if you have some WinAmp 3 skins, upload 'em!

The Windows replacement shell geOshell has been updated to 4.8.2.9.

The file:
http://www.geoshellx.com/beta/geoshell_4.8.2.9.zip

The docs:
http://www.geoshellx.com/beta/geoshell_4.8.2.8[full]with_docs.zip

http://cagle.slate.msn.com/news/GingertheScooter/1.asp

First some technical details:

Windows XP comes with a logon program called logonui.exe. This contains the nice looking logon screen when you bootup. Very soon after release, technical proficient users discovered they could use a resource hacker and make their own logons. These replacement logonui's have become quite popular. But because they it requires using a resource hacker, most casual users and artists have not really been comfortable using it.

The result has been that mcuh of the logonui's floating around us other people's graphics (rips). I.e. some author's wallpapers are taken by someone else and turned into a logonui without permission.

Moreover, since you're replacing the actual logonui, if something goes wrong, very bad things can happen.

That's where LogonXP comes into play. When you install LogonXP, it works like most other skinnable programs, your logons are in sub-directories. Those subdirectories contain no EXE's but instead contain a collection of bitmaps and a text file describing where they go. So it's very easy to make your own. LogonXP then talks to the LogonUI and applies it. No additional overhead or resources are required to do it this way.

LogonXP also has several safety features - if you somehow "hose up" things it lets you restore to the default Windows XP logon and ensures that you can always recover via the Ctrl-Alt-Del logon pop up.

LogonXP also can import Logonui.exe and save them in its format (there is no logonui.exe format as it's Microsoft's .exe afterall). So you can take your logonui.exe's you've downloaded and import them very easily (and reliably) into LogonXP.

LogonXP is going to be freeware.

If are interested in creating your own XP logons and would like to try it to either make your own XP logons or convert your logonui.exe's, email [email protected] to get a private build.

For those of you who have been asking for a CursorEx section, here it is - CursorXP, the successor to CursorEx is now available. have fun!

CursorXP 1.0 is the successor to Ricciosoft's CursorEx. Alberto Riccio has been on the Stardock team for the past 2 years on DesktopX. CursorXP represents months of new development to streamline the core code to be faster.

Customers of CursorEx will automatically be added to the database and be able to download CursorXP Plus.

CursorXP is free, Stardock also provides CursorXP Plus for $10 which adds additional special effects and features.

How skinnable is XP? Very. Why? Because unlike Windows 95/98/ME, XP isn't trapped with that evil 128K GDI limit which absolutely was poison to skinning.

But there is no one particular solution to customizing XP. There are a host of first party and third party ways of doing it.

Breaking XP into its parts you have:

1) The GUI
2) The Start bar
3) The logon screen
4) The desktop
5) The icons

So what does XP bring to the table in these areas?

With the GUI, you have 3 different skin types you can now use (all of which require a third party program to utilize). You've got .msstyles skins. The good thing about msstyles is that they cost nothing to use and they're fairly fast. The bad news is that they aren't very flexible. Can't move the buttons, very limited in the size of borders, etc. The second format is UIS2 which is what 99% of WindowBlinds skins are made with (and a host of third party programs have licensed it as well - Download accelerator, ACDSEE, ICQPlus, etc.). UIS2 is very powerful, you can do animations, move buttons anywhere (even to the bottom left hand corner of a window if you wanted). Every border can be any size you want. The downside is performance and reliability. That kind of flexibility means that skin authors can go hog wild and many do and the result is that many skins are slower than they should be and there is also the issue that windows are actuallys lightly larger than they visually appear because of the independent border sizes. For most people, these are minor and the most popular skins aren't crazy and newer skins are quite fast (as fast as an msstyle).

The third skin type for XP is called UIS1 and it will become widely available with WindowBlinds 3.1. During the beta of XP (last year), there was a lot of discussion over whether msstyles was partially based off of UIS1 because they are so similar. The problem with the original UIS1 was that it couldn't handle any transparancies so most skin authors didn't use it. The new UIS1 coming out with WB 3.1 allows for transparancies. It's basically the same as an msstyle except you can move the buttons anywhere you want. The advantage of UIS1 though isn't in its flexibility but in its performance - it's twice as fast as an msstyle (literally). And of course UIS1/UIS2 can work on any version of Windows.

Anyway, you have 3 different skin formats on XP to choose from and they all work pretty well.

Then you have the logons. There is a program called LogonUI that makes it so that you can change your start up. There are other logon programs in the making as well that will let you do that in different ways.

You then have the icons. Windows XP is the first Windows OS to support alpha blending in the icons which is a big deal. It means icons can be blended into the background. it's hard to go back to a standard type of icon after seeing that.

Then you have the Start bar. There are quite a few programs that can enhance or replace the XP Start bar. There's Hoverdesk (www.hoverdesk.net), NeXTStart (www.winstep.net) and now there's ObjectBar (www.stardock.com/products/objectbar).

And last there's the desktop itself. There are basically two programs that handle that fully (other than Litestep but I haven't tried it on XP). There's Talisman (don't have the URL handy) which is a full blown environment and then there's DesktopX (www.desktopx.net) that uses the new alpha blending features in XP to a huge extent (full animated alpha blended objects on the desktop on the fly).