F.A.Q.

About the website
About the projects
About XP-Man

Website:

What did you use to make this site?
The Mozilla's HTML editor, the Notepad (I'm sure you guessed), Dreamweaver, patience and few knowledge. The site uses frames and style sheets (CSS). You are free to see the website html code if you are interested in. Everybody has started doing it.

Why is this site so simple?
There are some reasons for this. The first one is that I don't know HTML programming, even after doing it. Second reason, the purpose of this site is to show and give support for the programs I might do, if I waste all my time making a wonderful page, I'll have no time to write the programs, and then what do I want the site for? Finally, I want the page size to be very low since it's hosted on free servers which don't give much space and that are very slow. So if I add too much decoration to the site, I won't have space for the programs and the site would take too long to load if it does.

I've just found a bug or a grammatical / orthographic mistake in the site, what do I have to do?
I'll appreciate if you send me a email telling me where it is and if it's a linguistic issue please tell me how to correct it since English isn't my mother tongue.

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Projects:

What do you use to make your programs?
All the programs are made with Borland© Delphi™ 7 on Microsoft© WindowsXP™.

Are all the programs 100% free cost?
Yes. You can use them for any purpose without cost.

Can I distribute your software freely?
You can distribute it if you don't earn any money by doing it (*). I also require to add a clear reference to this site and me, its developer.
(*) Magazines and newspapers can distribute it in CDs with other software but they have to make a reference to this site, its author and there must be clearly expressed that the software has no cost. Also I would like the magazines and newspapers to make me know they are distributing my software, just curiosity.

Every time I start your software appears an error message saying a DLL is needed (vcl70.bpl or rtl70.bpl).
In order to save space the programs have been compiled  in a way that the vcl70 (visual component library 7.0) and the rtl70 (run time library 7.0) are not included inside the exe. However, they are necessary (it is called dynamic linking). I've done this because all Delphi programs need these libraries. And I think if you download them once and you copy them to the system folder so that all the programs can read them is more efficient than including them inside the applications and make you download them every time you download any of my programs. To solve the problem you have to get the BRTL70 (Borland Run Time Libraries 7.0) which are in the downloads section.

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XP-Man:

Take notice: This program just matches a manifest file to the executable; this file tells Windows XP to use its visual styles. That is the reason why an application which is not being executed on Windows XP won’t change its appearance by adding the manifest. What is more, XP-Man does not modify in any case the executable or the system, at any rate I will provide no guarantee. Use this program under your responsibility and assuming any risk that its use may produce.

What is the manifest file? The manifest file is a XML document containing some information required by Windows XP in order to use the visual styles. If you want you can open the Manifest files with a text editor like Notepad, but is very important not to modify the manifest.

Why it does only work with Windows XP?
The visual styles are only available with Common Controls version 6 which are only included since Windows XP.
What are the Common Controls? Any button, list, scrolling bar, menu, panel, tab; in short anything you see inside a window is generated by Windows through a library called Common Controls. Common Controls version 5 first appeared with Windows 95, and it still remain unchanged since then. With Windows XP, Microsoft had decided to add two different versions in the OS, version 5 and 6. The innovation with version 6 is that it makes possible to render bitmaps over the controls. When you see a button with the “XP look”, actually it is a button like the one you had in Windows 95 but with an image on it.

Why is the manifest necessary? Compatibility. This is Microsoft motto, and that is why by default Windows XP uses Common Controls version 5 instead of 6. Generally any application accepts the version 6, but there are some cases which it is not true. That is the reason why the OS won’t use version 6 unless you tell it to do so with the manifest.

Why does XP-Man (and other programs) use the “XP look” despite it doesn’t have the manifest? The fact that you can’t see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. XP-Man has the manifest attached in the executable itself. Even the OS programs and libraries have the manifest. For instance, if they didn’t have it, parts of the system like the screen proprieties would look like you were running Windows 95.

What does XP-Man exactly do? XP-Man is a very simple program that once you have told it the application you want to attach a manifest, it will extract the path to it and will get its name. Then it generates the manifest file with the information required (basically it is only necessary to know the name of the application). For example, imagine that the application you want to convert is “C:\Windows\test.exe”. XP-Man would create a file named test.exe.manifest in the same folder where test.exe is.

Why does my application stop working after attaching the manifest? There are to possible causes. The first one is that you have modified the manifest and the second one is that the application doesn’t support the use of Common Controls version 6. In both cases you should delete the manifest either manually or using XP-Man. If your case is the first one, then use XP-Man again to generate a new manifest and this time don’t modify it. If your case is the second one, then it is not possible to force the application to use the XP visual style.

I’m a programmer and my applications don’t have the XP look, what should I do? You just have to use XP-Man with your application, and distribute it with the manifest. It is very important to leave the manifest in the same folder the application is.

Why some applications like Word, Excel or other Microsoft Office programs don’t have the XP look even after using XP-Man with them? Just because they don’t use the Common Controls. It is the same situation if you add the manifest to a program that doesn’t use the standard buttons but its own buttons or images. It is also the same with applications which its interface has been made with DirectX (like a videogame). In these cases the manifest is useless or makes the program to fail.

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