Posted by Howard Casto on 13, 2001 at 9:03 PM:
In Reply to: Re: Windows shell replacements as a frontend? posted by enemyace on 13, 2001 at 8:17 PM:
: Desktop X was pretty bad at first, but I think it's gotten better. I haven't messed with any skinning for a long time, so I'm not sure. LiteStep has a huge following, and is can me made to do almost anything, although it takes some knowledge of how to configure it's .ini files. HoverDesk is pretty cool, but I'm not sure if it's as flexible as the other two.
I'll have to give these thingys a second chance maybe....
: My idea is this:
: You start up windows and up pops a screen with just a big graphic for each element of your system (Arcade emulators, console emulators, PC games, movies, and music... Maybe also a tiny button somewhere to access the system or switch back to windows). Somehow you would use your joystick to select the area you wanted to go to and that would take you to the corresponding frontend, emulator, game, movieplayer or mp3 player. There must be some way to move between elements with the keyboard in these shells, so I believe it would work with joysticks that emulate the arrow keys (but maybe not, maybe it's just a pipe dream).
: It just struck me that you could probably do all this with Flash or Director as well, assuming that you could make the buttons perform commandline entries. Does anyone know if windows can be made to boot into a Flash movie as the shell?
Yeah you can get win to laucnh anything as the shell... as long as the drivers are loaded for the prog first (is almost never a prob)
: BTW, Howard, I'm not trying to replace your frontend. I like it very much and would use it for my arcade games area, it's just I need my multimedia too! =)
You gonna like the next version of Rd then... due to popular demand it now launches anything! I just put hte finishing touches on this addition a few hours ago and it seems to work perfectly.... more on that later though
Btw for the xp users out there, you can use active desktop and the new xp skinning utilites to make a very non-windows look.... still too windowsy for me, but you might wanna look into it
: : The only one I've ever tried is Desktop X and it totally sucked....(this was a looooong time ago though so it could be better now) You still need mouse support, which is fine for you guys who want to put trackballs on your machine, but not ok for me.
: : Haven't tried the other two though... are they any good?
: :
: : : Has anyone ever used a windows shell replacement such as LiteStep, Desktop X, or Hoverdesk as a frontend? The machine would boot straight into the shell program and never look like it running windows. I'm thinking it could be used in a similar way to Skeleton's MAGMA software setup, where the first frontend launches other frontends, emulators, games, movieplayers, mp3 players, or whatever. You could also set it up to launch batch files like Skeleton's system does.
: : : These windows shell programs give you total freedom graphically, and some of the skin people have made are quite beautiful. Anyone have any ideas or experiences with this?
: : : -EA