Mr GRiM
August 20th, 2013, 03:53 AM
Glass look
Your windows will be rendered with transparent borders. This look allows you to see what is behind the border. The key element is the blurring of content behind the glass borders to prevent it from being too clear and disturbing. The result is very smart window border!
63849
Fully native
The utility is completely integrated into Desktop Window Manager without breaking any system protection or modifying system files. All rendering is done via native Direct3D device. Any colorization settings adjusted in Windows Control Panels are respected. Use color intensity slider to adjust the amount of the transparency.
No custom skinning engine used. Due to the native nature of this utility your Windows theme is composited together with the glass effect. All features controlled through DWM API (e.g. DwmEnableBlurBehindWindow or DwmExtendFrameIntoClientArea) are supported including the taskbar or custom Start menu blur effect.
63850
63851
Low resources usage!
This library tries to utilize all DWM resources as much as possible to minimize RAM and VRAM usage. No redudant objects are created, no background service is running. The result is light-weight library which behaves exactly in the same way as Aero Glass in Windows 7 did. No performance degradation!
Theme your windows!
You can change the look of your windows borders completely without touching your Windows theme or using unsigned theme. This allows you to bring back several effects such as window shadow, caption glow effect, rounded borders or simply change the appearence of caption buttons. You just modify single bitmap in your favourite image editor and everything will look as you want!
The wait is over for Windows 8 users, the final build for Aero Glass has been released to early donators.
Aero Glass for Windows 8 is a free software with no limitations. If you feel that you like this application a lot, you can donate arbitrary amount of money. Technically, if you don't want to donate, you can still use Aero Glass library without any constrains application will just ask you to donate several minutes after execution. As a bonus, all donators automatically gets an unlimited access to any beta of upcoming versions and to any possible secret features.
The amount of donation totally depends on you, but if you donate at least 3 Euro you can use following form to generate license code for your computer. You can generate license code for two computers per each 3 Euro you donated. This form serves for recovering lost license codes too. Fill in your PayPal e-mail and machine code, press Generate button, store downloaded file to your Aero Glass folder and restart DWM process to activate your license.
You can find the donate page here http://glass8.berlios.de/donate
I have decided to make my own installer for Aero Glass which you can use as an alternative, it has a couple of extras like AGTweaker included as well a safety precaution in the event that you uninstall Aero Glass and were using the Bypass Theme Signature for custom themes, my uninstaller will return you to the default Aero theme before completing the uninstall and asking you to restart to complete the changes, Big Muscles on the other hand will ask you to do a restart but if you were using a custom theme at the time then upon reboot you will be met with a black screen and need to do a system restore in the advanced repair options.
AERO GLASS for Win8 v1.2
* inactive frame blur/color balances are not altered by theme opacity settings when user set them manually
* blur deviation settings is applied everytime colorization is changed (so no DWM restart is needed now)
* custom theme resource can now be loaded globally from HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
* glass is disabled when running on a battery
--> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:DisableGlassOnBattery (DWORD 0x0 / 0x1 = default)
* implemented glass reflection (aero stripes only)
--> HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:ColorizationGlassReflectionIntensity (DWORD 0x0 = disabled (default) / other values = enabled)
AERO GLASS for Win8 v1.1
As some users were requesting, I've implemented algorithm to generate gaussian blur offsets and weights:
* you can change blur deviation in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:BlurDeviation (DWORD, default = 30)
* do not set it too high (low performance) or too low (glitchy look)
* setting blur deviation to 0 will result in transparent non-blurry frames
When you upgrade your CPU, you can now generate new additional license for free.
Download my Installer from the link below
63847
64089
64113
New tool I made to tweak the Aero Glass Blur effect, also included in my installer.
Aero Glass Blur Tweaker v1.1 for Aero Glass for Windows 8
http://oi40.tinypic.com/16a3by9.jpg
This is a simple little app that I made to toggle the various settings used with Aero Glass for Windows 8 by BigMuscle
Featured Settings:
EnableLogging: Enables logging / logging of license messages is always enabled
DisableGlassOnBattery: When your AC power is unplugged and computer is running on the battery then the blur effect will be disabled to decrease power consumption.
ColorizationColor
ColorizationColorBalanceInactive: The intensity of the color.
ColorizationBlurBalance
ColorizationBlurBalanceInactive: The amount of the opacity of the windows frames.
BlurDeviation: Standard deviation for Gaussian blur.
RoundRectRadius: Radius of rounded windows corners.
CustomThemeResource: Path to PNG file with theme resource.
ColorizationGlassReflectionIntensity: Aero stripes effect.
BypassThemeSignature: Allows the use of Custom unsigned themes.
Enable/Disable Aero Glass
Download here http://www.mediafire...BlurTweaker.exe (http://www.mediafire.com/download/cy65ezmcs8ev9tx/AGBlurTweaker.exe)
Or Download the Original installer for Big Muscle
63848
64092
I have 4 more machine code activations available and would be happy to give a couple of those to deserving members, if you would like to be one of the lucky ones then please post your machine code that is generated after 5 minutes in the comments below.
Your windows will be rendered with transparent borders. This look allows you to see what is behind the border. The key element is the blurring of content behind the glass borders to prevent it from being too clear and disturbing. The result is very smart window border!
63849
Fully native
The utility is completely integrated into Desktop Window Manager without breaking any system protection or modifying system files. All rendering is done via native Direct3D device. Any colorization settings adjusted in Windows Control Panels are respected. Use color intensity slider to adjust the amount of the transparency.
No custom skinning engine used. Due to the native nature of this utility your Windows theme is composited together with the glass effect. All features controlled through DWM API (e.g. DwmEnableBlurBehindWindow or DwmExtendFrameIntoClientArea) are supported including the taskbar or custom Start menu blur effect.
63850
63851
Low resources usage!
This library tries to utilize all DWM resources as much as possible to minimize RAM and VRAM usage. No redudant objects are created, no background service is running. The result is light-weight library which behaves exactly in the same way as Aero Glass in Windows 7 did. No performance degradation!
Theme your windows!
You can change the look of your windows borders completely without touching your Windows theme or using unsigned theme. This allows you to bring back several effects such as window shadow, caption glow effect, rounded borders or simply change the appearence of caption buttons. You just modify single bitmap in your favourite image editor and everything will look as you want!
The wait is over for Windows 8 users, the final build for Aero Glass has been released to early donators.
Aero Glass for Windows 8 is a free software with no limitations. If you feel that you like this application a lot, you can donate arbitrary amount of money. Technically, if you don't want to donate, you can still use Aero Glass library without any constrains application will just ask you to donate several minutes after execution. As a bonus, all donators automatically gets an unlimited access to any beta of upcoming versions and to any possible secret features.
The amount of donation totally depends on you, but if you donate at least 3 Euro you can use following form to generate license code for your computer. You can generate license code for two computers per each 3 Euro you donated. This form serves for recovering lost license codes too. Fill in your PayPal e-mail and machine code, press Generate button, store downloaded file to your Aero Glass folder and restart DWM process to activate your license.
You can find the donate page here http://glass8.berlios.de/donate
I have decided to make my own installer for Aero Glass which you can use as an alternative, it has a couple of extras like AGTweaker included as well a safety precaution in the event that you uninstall Aero Glass and were using the Bypass Theme Signature for custom themes, my uninstaller will return you to the default Aero theme before completing the uninstall and asking you to restart to complete the changes, Big Muscles on the other hand will ask you to do a restart but if you were using a custom theme at the time then upon reboot you will be met with a black screen and need to do a system restore in the advanced repair options.
AERO GLASS for Win8 v1.2
* inactive frame blur/color balances are not altered by theme opacity settings when user set them manually
* blur deviation settings is applied everytime colorization is changed (so no DWM restart is needed now)
* custom theme resource can now be loaded globally from HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
* glass is disabled when running on a battery
--> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:DisableGlassOnBattery (DWORD 0x0 / 0x1 = default)
* implemented glass reflection (aero stripes only)
--> HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:ColorizationGlassReflectionIntensity (DWORD 0x0 = disabled (default) / other values = enabled)
AERO GLASS for Win8 v1.1
As some users were requesting, I've implemented algorithm to generate gaussian blur offsets and weights:
* you can change blur deviation in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DWM:BlurDeviation (DWORD, default = 30)
* do not set it too high (low performance) or too low (glitchy look)
* setting blur deviation to 0 will result in transparent non-blurry frames
When you upgrade your CPU, you can now generate new additional license for free.
Download my Installer from the link below
63847
64089
64113
New tool I made to tweak the Aero Glass Blur effect, also included in my installer.
Aero Glass Blur Tweaker v1.1 for Aero Glass for Windows 8
http://oi40.tinypic.com/16a3by9.jpg
This is a simple little app that I made to toggle the various settings used with Aero Glass for Windows 8 by BigMuscle
Featured Settings:
EnableLogging: Enables logging / logging of license messages is always enabled
DisableGlassOnBattery: When your AC power is unplugged and computer is running on the battery then the blur effect will be disabled to decrease power consumption.
ColorizationColor
ColorizationColorBalanceInactive: The intensity of the color.
ColorizationBlurBalance
ColorizationBlurBalanceInactive: The amount of the opacity of the windows frames.
BlurDeviation: Standard deviation for Gaussian blur.
RoundRectRadius: Radius of rounded windows corners.
CustomThemeResource: Path to PNG file with theme resource.
ColorizationGlassReflectionIntensity: Aero stripes effect.
BypassThemeSignature: Allows the use of Custom unsigned themes.
Enable/Disable Aero Glass
Download here http://www.mediafire...BlurTweaker.exe (http://www.mediafire.com/download/cy65ezmcs8ev9tx/AGBlurTweaker.exe)
Or Download the Original installer for Big Muscle
63848
64092
I have 4 more machine code activations available and would be happy to give a couple of those to deserving members, if you would like to be one of the lucky ones then please post your machine code that is generated after 5 minutes in the comments below.