[Elevati0n]

Vlanla: Man can u try to install in Win 7 with your method? Just extract those files, rtename 19/21 file to EC...reg and install.cmd?
I did the same in mine Win 7 RC and works...

[ahmadus]

i just install it in win 7 naturally and works fine just right click on the menu bar at cverflw , and Hop , thats it
the PNg image file is ugly man why ??

[Kittierocker]

hi do u need direct x 9.0?? or can it work with out it?

[matonga]

Got it running (mostly) until I went into C:\ and it finally crashed.

Ok, I managed to kill explorer.exe, let's try again.

Let's see:

• slow, I mean cpu load, not animations which btw are fairly smooth (using a Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz and 1GB RAM)
  
• text looks like low-res... are you drawing text into a texture?
  
• I'm really intrigued at how are you getting those .pdf previews I'm sincerely impressed by this one feature (maybe IExtractImage?)
  
• couldn't preview .doc files... I guess it's because Microsoft Office isn't installed in my machine

Other than that, it looks really promising.

It would be good to have it follow your selection when navigating explorer's listview items (files/folders).

Whatever, looks very awesome. I hope you continue this project, looks very good up to now.

[vhanla]

Elevati0n, on Jul 16th 2009, 04:44 AM, said:

Vlanla: Man can u try to install in Win 7 with your method? Just extract those files, rtename 19/21 file to EC...reg and install.cmd?
I did the same in mine Win 7 RC and works...

No luck here, maybe I need to install codecs or something else. It is an empty Windows 7, no programs yet...

I'm back with XP

[Elevati0n]

Sorry to hear that man
I never open my WinXP partition since Win 7 became a REAL OS ..even my hackintosh Leopard was put away

If you wanna I will archive my CoverFlow folder and you can try if will works.
Give me a email address to send that to you
Hope will work

[zool06]

is it possible for you to try emulate coverflow like in iTunes or Safari (the actual coverflow that work in windows environment)

[ahmadus]

hi guyz
i dont understand why i have an ugly preview of files and ugly font too

in the screenshots i see that everything is fine
someone have the same thing ??

[matonga]

@ahmadus:

Yes here I have the same thing. The preview of files is ok here, but font is like being blitted to a low-res texture.

However this is the first CoverFlow I've seen for Windows' Explorer (indeed I thought it was just impossible to put this thing just there, let alone the integration with Explorer and using IShellFolder, etc..., I mean, vemod must have had a hard time writing this so we should be pacient and supportive with this guy )

[ahmadus]

matonga, on Jul 18th 2009, 11:24 PM, said:

@ahmadus:

Yes here I have the same thing. The preview of files is ok here, but font is like being blitted to a low-res texture.

However this is the first CoverFlow I've seen for Windows' Explorer (indeed I thought it was just impossible to put this thing just there, let alone the integration with Explorer and using IShellFolder, etc..., I mean, vemod must have had a hard time writing this so we should be pacient and supportive with this guy )

Yeah man you're right ,
you know what i just think that Cover flow in vista or seven explorer is gonna be Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge , i'm sure of that

we have just to be patient for another better release of That,
God bless you guyz

[Elevati0n]

Same here Ahmadus...same low-res texture blittering for font ;( but..its okie for first try of this app

[vemod]

That sounds good to me

I just added a new version (0.1.0.3) to the first post.

About (text) resolution: The text is rendered to a RenderToSurface. In the first version this was locked to 512x512 pixels and the backbuffer was locked to half of the screen size i.e. 960x600 for a 1920x1200 screen. The new version includes the option to have the full screen button like in iTunes and also an option to select the sizes of the backbuffer and textures. If you select to use the full screen option (or if you don't but are picky with text quality) you should also set the backbuffer size to the same as the screen size and raise the Text Texture size to 1024. This should give a rather smooth text output. RenderToSurfaces does not anti-alias so another option is to render the text with GDI+ and put it on a texture. I think this will have to be a later project.

If your computer is capable (hardware acceleration and lots of video memory) you can gain very high quality by fiddling with these settings. If it isn't you can really force it on it's knees. On the Dell Dimension 2400 test computer (the one without video memory) the animation speed suffers if I choose the full screen backbuffer and it just wont show 1024x1024 text textures. The quality you can get depends on your hardware.

Associated icons just have the size they have. I think vista icons include a 256x256 image, don't they? On xp (again I think) you could use an app like "Icon packager" to get hi-res icons.

About speed: I do, despite the above remark, think the animation is quite smooth (at least far smoother than the cover flow in iTunes) the problem with speed IMHO lies in the calls to IExtractImage during the rendering. Each of these calls can take up to a second and just locks the whole thing and makes it seem like it is not responding. If you uncheck "Use Thumbnails" in the settings application IExtractImage will not be called and only associated icons and image preview will be shown. It looks boring but it is way faster. The calls to IExtractImage could probaly be put into a separate thread. I think this will also have to be a later project (holy moly batman).

Here are my current settings:
 settings.jpg (66.73K)
Number of downloads: 109

Edit:
Forgot to mention: I won't be able to work seriously on this app for a couple of weeks now, but I will be back after the holiday

This post has been edited by vemod: 19 July 2009 - 11:06 PM

[Panta]

Great addon but... any plans for a safer version for Vista/Seven users - i.e., not using VB6/DX8 but a compatible technology instead?

This post has been edited by Panta: 19 July 2009 - 11:14 PM

[ahmadus]

Wow , i love you man , this version 1.0.3 Works great and the explorer.exe works fine tooon my seven 7100 , not so hungry for memory as the precedent version ,
well there is something else here
i cant access to the setting a message " Runtime error 383 'text property is read only'
i dont know what is that
any help ?

This post has been edited by ahmadus: 20 July 2009 - 09:36 AM

[Elevati0n]

Wow..nice update...but now I have a strange view in coverflow. File/Folder icon is strange...low-res?! or what? and for audio/video files...look in this screenshot...text is placed over icon and arrows looks very weird. What can I do?

[ahmadus]

Elevati0n, on Jul 20th 2009, 10:55 AM, said:

Wow..nice update...but now I have a strange view in coverflow. File/Folder icon is strange...low-res?! or what? and for audio/video files...look in this screenshot...text is placed over icon and arrows looks very weird. What can I do?

Have you tried to uninstall the first release before installing the new one ??

i think thats your problem there mate

[Elevati0n]

of course
Was uninstalled...
No way to see anything else other than I showed to you in my previous post in screenshot

Maybe I must try your method to install...just choose those files only..and not use "setup"

Do not double post - mps69

[bSAYZ]

hi, vemod
for version 1.0.3
No text at all !!!

[vespalino]

I got the error "Runtime error 383 'text property is read only'" too (Win XP,SP3).

Any suggestions??

[Elevati0n]

bsayz: try to choose another font...one of windows defaults
PS: installed again with the 2nd method to install...no luck...same "view" like in my previous screen
PPS: @mps69 - sorry for double post. Rushin' and much work to do and...you know. Thanks

This post has been edited by Elevati0n: 20 July 2009 - 02:27 PM