New Version of ExplorerPatcher

jerrypc1 · Mar 24, 2022

The-Hive said:
@jerrypc1 Is it ok I wonder? I haven't really looked, apart from EP everything else works fine (I think) I was debating whether to roll back or not but at the moment I think not

@The-Hive seems good to me so for everything I tried so for still works fine

valinet · Mar 24, 2022

The-Hive said:
Well updated to the latest Dev Build today 22581.1 and back to a transparent taskbar but at least it is fully functionable, any way uninstalled EP for the time being

The latest pre-release (43.2) addresses this, the taskbar should now show properly in OS builds 22581+.

AndreTen · Mar 24, 2022

valinet said:
The latest pre-release (43.2) addresses this, the taskbar should now show properly in OS builds 22581+.

Thanks! Taskbar is Working fine now.

Only glitch left in Insider Dev is not working right click on Start

stevemagruder · Mar 24, 2022

43.2 fixes the taskbar background but I'm still getting the File Explorer restart when hovering over a taskbar icon.

stevemagruder · Mar 24, 2022

OK, I did some extra testing. There is a conflict between EP and 7+ Taskbar Tweaker. 7+TT has a hover-related control where when it's set to show previews, I get the File Explorer restart upon a hover. When this control is set to do nothing on hover, the File Explorer restart problem doesn't happen. The only way I can get the previews, which I want, is to not run 7+TT. So, for now, I have uninstalled 7+TT. Note that this conflict doesn't happen on my other Win10 laptop with the same setup, and it didn't happen on my main Win11 laptop before I upgraded to the beta.

valinet · Mar 24, 2022

stevemagruder said:
OK, I did some extra testing. There is a conflict between EP and 7+ Taskbar Tweaker. 7+TT has a hover-related control where when it's set to show previews, I get the File Explorer restart upon a hover. When this control is set to do nothing on hover, the File Explorer restart problem doesn't happen. The only way I can get the previews, which I want, is to not run 7+TT. So, for now, I have uninstalled 7+TT. Note that this conflict doesn't happen on my other Win10 laptop with the same setup, and it didn't happen on my main Win11 laptop before I upgraded to the beta.

I mean, yeah, it’s not totally unexpected. By default, taskbar thumbnails are broken in these newer OS builds, EP does some things to revive them. Check the commits for more details. And File Explorer does not restart - it probably crashes and gets restarted by its parent. If you enable crash dumps, it would probably make one which would offer much better insight over what is happening.

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

The-Hive said:
Woops, Left Shift I don't know where that came from Duh me

Hahahaha! Good laugh!

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

AndreTen said:
Hope it does. There is a lot of info about problems with right clicking Start in Windows 11

It did!

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

valinet said:
Well, Microsoft/the compiler completely shoveled up the `explorer!UpdateWindowAccentProperties` method and now it only contains the new, broken code path, and thus acrylic fails to apply to the taskbar properly, hence it becoming fully transparent. Again, thank Microsoft for flipping everything they can get their hands on.

Seems to me Microsoft is disabling everything that makes Windows more usable or takes the UI back to something of our choice.

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

Wynona said:
It did!

Oops! I misread you post. What I meant is that the Taskbar stayed on top! Yay!

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

The-Hive said:
One thing to try @Wynona hold down Left rubbish and Right Click Start Button, may work, it does on mine

I installed the latest version of EP, held down left Shift and still can't get right click to work.

Wynona · Mar 24, 2022

Wynona said:
I installed the latest version of EP, held down left Shift and still can't get right click to work.

I changed from the Windows 10 view to Windows 11 and lost my Quick Launch Bar but can now right click on the Start Menu. Since I can add my most used apps to the Taskbar, no need for Quick Launch.

valinet · Mar 25, 2022

You really seem to hate the documentation: Symbols · valinet/ExplorerPatcher Wiki

If you’re on Dev builds and symbols haven’t downloaded, WinX doesn’t work. Or maybe it doesn’t work because they removed the code all together or because some other symbol was removed. I said a million times already, but it’s hard for the message to reach everyone it seems, I don’t have all the time in the world to fix EP weekly on Dev builds. The goal is to fix it on major stable W11 updates. Also, I fail to understand why run bleeding edge W11 and then a program that undoes all the changes they do, what’s the point anymore…

People now have learnt my email address, I get bombarded with support mails, no one reads the wiki.

valinet · Mar 25, 2022

Things broken in Insider Preview that will eventually be fixed but they're not a priority:

* Taskbar being fully transparent (fixed for now)
* Taskbar thumbnails not working (fixed)
* Disable Snap quadrants not working
* Disable Recommended section in Windows 11 Start menu not working (the live visual tree of the menu probably changed again; it should be an easy fix in lvt.c once the new visual tree is inspected) (this is a phony report, just checked on it, it seems to work fine)
* When pressing volume keys, no volume flyout is shown, because the old one was probably tossed away and no one linked the new one to the old shell; maybe enabling the old one would still be cool, idk, as usual, it has to be investigated
* WiFi flyout does not work anymore, I think (the patch for it is probably broken, the pattern I was searching for may not be there in the binary anymore - InjectShellExperienceHost is the starting point and the article here: Functional Windows 10 flyouts in Windows 11)
* Toasts and parts of the new shell seem to display on top of the taskbar, yet another thing they broke
* Win-Tab seems not to work anymore
* Disable rounded corners is broken

As you see, the list is pretty huge, and with each update it will become worse. I hope to fix this at least until the first 11-based LTSC ships. Although, to be honest, I wish there was en easier way, fighting the upstream is a lost cause imo.

Lim_Dul · Mar 25, 2022

valinet said:
You really seem to hate the documentation: Symbols · valinet/ExplorerPatcher Wiki

If you’re on Dev builds and symbols haven’t downloaded, WinX doesn’t work. Or maybe it doesn’t work because they removed the code all together or because some other symbol was removed. I said a million times already, but it’s hard for the message to reach everyone it seems, I don’t have all the time in the world to fix EP weekly on Dev builds. The goal is to fix it on major stable W11 updates. Also, I fail to understand why run bleeding edge W11 and then a program that undoes all the changes they do, what’s the point anymore…

People now have learnt my email address, I get bombarded with support mails, no one reads the wiki.

Oh boy... What I learned from all my years in IT is that documentation unfortunately doesn't help in like 80% of cases, especially for the purposes of 1st Level Support. Most will rather write, call, ask someone - even if the answer is RTFM. I mean, very often 1st Level Support's role basically IS reading back the documentation / FAQs / checklists to the user on the phone...
You have created absolutely wonderful and extensive documentation uncharacteristic for a hobby FOSS project but any hopes that this would reduce support efforts is naive based on my experience. What extensive documentation usually helps with are the power users or the devs themselves - especially on collaborative projects - who are more likely to seek out information themselves.
Rather than the docs and FAQ, especially for this generation, you'd probably have achieved more with TikTok-Videos.

At this point I think the only way to happiness for you is treating this purely as a personal hobby project - do whatever works for you and makes you happy and ignore feature / bug requests that don't affect you personally.
I know it sounds harsh but you said yourself that you haven't found co-devs and you really don't owe the world anything. You are now basically suffering for the unbelievably crappy design decisions MS have made for W11. Even I started booting more often into Linux after switching to W11. Without EP the interface would be close to unusable from a Power-User perspective and thus it's not unexpected that the project attracted thousands of people world-wide.

P.S. Is the E-Mail address people found out about by any chance the one listed in the README.md on GitHub? I'd remove it. Providing such a direct way for users to interact with you can only cause headaches since it's working by pushing information onto you instead of you deciding when you pull information.

cbiweb · Mar 25, 2022

valinet said:
You really seem to hate the documentation: Symbols · valinet/ExplorerPatcher Wiki

If you’re on Dev builds and symbols haven’t downloaded, WinX doesn’t work. Or maybe it doesn’t work because they removed the code all together or because some other symbol was removed. I said a million times already, but it’s hard for the message to reach everyone it seems, I don’t have all the time in the world to fix EP weekly on Dev builds. The goal is to fix it on major stable W11 updates. Also, I fail to understand why run bleeding edge W11 and then a program that undoes all the changes they do, what’s the point anymore…

People now have learnt my email address, I get bombarded with support mails, no one reads the wiki.

I for one am extremely grateful for your work. Win11 is the first version in 25 years that I was not going to use. But then I found out about EP. I can deal with the other changes in 11, but Quick Launch is a necessity for me, since I use it extensively. I fact, I rarely need the Start menu because everything I need on a regular and irregular basis is in Quick Launch.

With each new stable update I look forward to also having a stable EP that works with it, and appreciate the work it takes to make that happen.

I'm on beta team for a Web browser, and it's amazing how many other beta users expect perfection on a non-release product. If one is going to use beta, one must expect breakage. It comes with the territory.

Anyway, just my 2 cents fwiw. Have a great day!

valinet · Mar 25, 2022

Thanks for the support, guys!

Yeah, it’s very unfortunate, and the thing is, I am not here for support, that’s the thing. It’s simply impossible, at this point, to service EP on all fronts (dev, support etc) and still be able to do anything else (which I have to do). And even bug reports, some people live under the impression that if they report something, it’s going to get fixed right away, disregarding that I may not have time, may not know how to fix it, may take tons of time and effort to fix properly, may need more thorough investigation from their part etc.

For the time being, I will just disregard support emails. I don’t want to remove the email from GitHub as in a few cases it’s useful to connect with interesting people, opportunities etc.

Regarding quick launch, last version introduced some functionality that can help in replacing that. You can read about it here: Quick Launch toolbar replacement · Discussion #819 · valinet/ExplorerPatcher

Lim_Dul · Mar 25, 2022

Regarding upstream breaking things - that is to be expected with such hacky solutions as EP reliant on somebody else's code™, however, I'm slightly optimistic that the core functionality will be with us for some years to come.
I mean, look at Microsoft's feeble attempts at replacing the Control Panel, which they have failed to do since like... Win NT 3.1 or something? :wink:

valinet · Mar 25, 2022

Lim_Dul said:
Regarding upstream breaking things - that is to be expected with such hacky solutions as EPcrliant on somebody else's code™, however, I'm slightly optimistic that the core functionality will be with us for some years to come.
I mean, look at Microsoft's feeble attempts at replacing the Control Panel, which they have failed to do since like... Win NT 3.1 or something?

Yeah, maybe. Thing is, older stuff is coded using public APIs, which are guaranteed to move forward and not break compatibility.

Unfortunately, the later stuff is developed in all sorts of undocumented frameworks they never released to the public. Actually, there is a HUGE amount of undocumented APIs nowadays. DirectComposition for example, they built all the Windows 8 (afair) stuff around it, but that was never offered publicly, so they’re free to change the internal implementation whenever they please and of course won’t bother to fix old stuff. That’s the most frequent cause these things are broken in Insider builds.

And yeah, even though that was the aim from the beginning, I will treat this as a personal hobby project and implement only the things I see of value/interest in there. I mentioned this already in the post about closing the forums, it’s not like I have much free time to work on this either.

chip222 · Mar 25, 2022

While we are talking about Quick Launch , I have found this project to be an excellent replacement that works with win 11 and is under active development.