Atreyu

I have figured it out and thought I'd share. This works perfectly. I've included all the VB6 code and instructions of how to use it. Dreate a new module (no form is needed). Set the default startup item to Sub_Main(). Option Explicit Private Declare Function SystemParametersInfo Lib "user32" Alias "SystemParametersInfoA" _ (ByVal uAction As Long, _ ByVal uParam As Long, _ ByVal lpvParam As Any, _ ByVal fuWinIni As Long) As Long Private Declare Function SystemParametersInfoByLong Lib "user32" Alias "SystemParametersInfoA" _ (ByVal uAction As Long, _ ByVal uParam As Long, _ ByVal lpvParam As Long, _ ByVal fuWinIni As Long) As Long Private Enum enSystemParametersInfo ' SPI_NOMESSAGE = 0 '\\ To cope with Win95/WinNT differences! ' SPI_GETBEEP = 1 ' SPI_SETBEEP = 2 ' SPI_GETMOUSE = 3 ' SPI_SETMOUSE = 4 ' SPI_GETBORDER = 5 ' SPI_SETBORDER = 6 ' SPI_GETKEYBOARDSPEED = 10 ' SPI_SETKEYBOARDSPEED = 11 ' SPI_LANGDRIVER = 12 ' SPI_ICONHORIZONTALSPACING = 13 ' SPI_GETSCREENSAVETIMEOUT = 14 ' SPI_SETSCREENSAVETIMEOUT = 15 ' SPI_GETSCREENSAVEACTIVE = 16 ' SPI_SETSCREENSAVEACTIVE = 17 ' SPI_GETGRIDGRANULARITY = 18 ' SPI_SETGRIDGRANULARITY = 19 ' SPI_SETDESKPATTERN = 21 ' SPI_GETKEYBOARDDELAY = 22 ' SPI_SETKEYBOARDDELAY = 23 ' SPI_ICONVERTICALSPACING = 24 ' SPI_GETICONTITLEWRAP = 25 ' SPI_SETICONTITLEWRAP = 26 ' SPI_GETMENUDROPALIGNMENT = 27 ' SPI_SETMENUDROPALIGNMENT = 28 ' SPI_SETDOUBLECLKWIDTH = 29 ' SPI_SETDOUBLECLKHEIGHT = 30 ' SPI_GETICONTITLELOGFONT = 31 ' SPI_SETDOUBLECLICKTIME = 32 ' SPI_SETMOUSEBUTTONSWAP = 33 ' SPI_SETICONTITLELOGFONT = 34 ' SPI_GETFASTTASKSWITCH = 35 ' SPI_SETFASTTASKSWITCH = 36 ' SPI_GETDRAGFULLWINDOWS = 38 ' SPI_GETNONCLIENTMETRICS = 41 ' SPI_SETNONCLIENTMETRICS = 42 ' SPI_GETMINIMIZEDMETRICS = 43 ' SPI_SETMINIMIZEDMETRICS = 44 ' SPI_GETICONMETRICS = 45 ' SPI_SETICONMETRICS = 46 ' SPI_SETWORKAREA = 47 ' SPI_GETWORKAREA = 48 ' SPI_SETPENWINDOWS = 49 ' SPI_GETHIGHCONTRAST = 66 ' SPI_SETHIGHCONTRAST = 67 ' SPI_GETKEYBOARDPREF = 68 ' SPI_SETKEYBOARDPREF = 69 ' SPI_GETSCREENREADER = 70 ' SPI_SETSCREENREADER = 71 ' SPI_GETANIMATION = 72 ' SPI_SETANIMATION = 73 ' SPI_GETFONTSMOOTHING = 74 ' SPI_SETFONTSMOOTHING = 75 ' SPI_SETDRAGWIDTH = 76 ' SPI_SETDRAGHEIGHT = 77 ' SPI_SETHANDHELD = 78 ' SPI_GETLOWPOWERTIMEOUT = 79 ' SPI_GETPOWEROFFTIMEOUT = 80 ' SPI_SETLOWPOWERTIMEOUT = 81 ' SPI_SETPOWEROFFTIMEOUT = 82 ' SPI_GETLOWPOWERACTIVE = 83 ' SPI_GETPOWEROFFACTIVE = 84 ' SPI_SETLOWPOWERACTIVE = 85 ' SPI_SETPOWEROFFACTIVE = 86 ' SPI_SETCURSORS = 87 ' SPI_SETICONS = 88 ' SPI_GETDEFAULTINPUTLANG = 89 ' SPI_SETDEFAULTINPUTLANG = 90 ' SPI_SETLANGTOGGLE = 91 ' SPI_GETWINDOWSEXTENSION = 92 ' SPI_SETMOUSETRAILS = 93 ' SPI_GETMOUSETRAILS = 94 ' SPI_SETSCREENSAVERRUNNING = 97 ' SPI_GETFILTERKEYS = 50 ' SPI_SETFILTERKEYS = 51 ' SPI_GETTOGGLEKEYS = 52 ' SPI_SETTOGGLEKEYS = 53 ' SPI_GETMOUSEKEYS = 54 ' SPI_SETMOUSEKEYS = 55 ' SPI_GETSHOWSOUNDS = 56 ' SPI_SETSHOWSOUNDS = 57 ' SPI_GETSTICKYKEYS = 58 ' SPI_SETSTICKYKEYS = 59 ' SPI_GETACCESSTIMEOUT = 60 ' SPI_SETACCESSTIMEOUT = 61 ' SPI_GETSERIALKEYS = 62 ' SPI_SETSERIALKEYS = 63 ' SPI_GETSOUNDSENTRY = 64 ' SPI_SETSOUNDSENTRY = 65 ' SPI_GETMOUSEHOVERWIDTH = 98 ' SPI_SETMOUSEHOVERWIDTH = 99 ' SPI_GETMOUSEHOVERHEIGHT = 100 ' SPI_SETMOUSEHOVERHEIGHT = 101 ' SPI_GETMOUSEHOVERTIME = 102 ' SPI_SETMOUSEHOVERTIME = 103 ' SPI_GETWHEELSCROLLLINES = 104 ' SPI_SETWHEELSCROLLLINES = 105 ' SPI_GETSHOWIMEUI = 110 ' SPI_SETSHOWIMEUI = 111 ' SPI_GETMOUSESPEED = 112 ' SPI_SETMOUSESPEED = 113 ' SPI_GETSCREENSAVERRUNNING = 114 ' SPI_GETACTIVEWINDOWTRACKING = &H1000 ' SPI_SETACTIVEWINDOWTRACKING = &H1001 ' SPI_GETMENUANIMATION = &H1002 ' SPI_SETMENUANIMATION = &H1003 ' SPI_GETCOMBOBOXANIMATION = &H1004 ' SPI_SETCOMBOBOXANIMATION = &H1005 ' SPI_GETLISTBOXSMOOTHSCROLLING = &H1006 ' SPI_SETLISTBOXSMOOTHSCROLLING = &H1007 ' SPI_GETGRADIENTCAPTIONS = &H1008 ' SPI_SETGRADIENTCAPTIONS = &H1009 ' SPI_GETMENUUNDERLINES = &H100A ' SPI_SETMENUUNDERLINES = &H100B ' SPI_GETACTIVEWNDTRKZORDER = &H100C ' SPI_SETACTIVEWNDTRKZORDER = &H100D ' SPI_GETHOTTRACKING = &H100E ' SPI_SETHOTTRACKING = &H100F ' SPI_GETFOREGROUNDLOCKTIMEOUT = &H2000 ' SPI_SETFOREGROUNDLOCKTIMEOUT = &H2001 ' SPI_GETACTIVEWNDTRKTIMEOUT = &H2002 ' SPI_SETACTIVEWNDTRKTIMEOUT = &H2003 ' SPI_GETFOREGROUNDFLASHCOUNT = &H2004 ' SPI_SETFOREGROUNDFLASHCOUNT = &H2005 SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER = 20 SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE = &H1 SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE = &H2 SPIF_SENDCHANGE = SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE SPI_GETUIEFFECTS = &H103E& SPI_SETUIEFFECTS = &H103F& SPI_SETDRAGFULLWINDOWS = 37 End Enum Private Sub Main() Dim lResult As Long Dim intCtr As Integer Dim intDesktop As Integer Dim intVE As Integer Dim intSWC As Integer Dim strParameters As String Dim strBlissPath As String Dim arrParameters() As String Dim intNumParameters As Integer strParameters = Command intDesktop = -1 intVE = -1 intSWC = -1 intNumParameters = ParseString(Trim(strParameters), "/", arrParameters()) For intCtr = LBound(arrParameters) To UBound(arrParameters) Step 1 If InStr(1, UCase(arrParameters(intCtr)), "DESKTOP") Then intDesktop = Val(Right(Trim(arrParameters(intCtr)), 1)) WriteToLog (Chr(34) & "Desktop" & Chr(34) & " parameter found. Value = " & intDesktop) End If If InStr(1, UCase(arrParameters(intCtr)), "VE") Then intVE = Val(Right(Trim(arrParameters(intCtr)), 1)) WriteToLog (Chr(34) & "VE" & Chr(34) & " parameter found. Value = " & intVE) End If If InStr(1, UCase(arrParameters(intCtr)), "SWC") Then intSWC = Val(Right(Trim(arrParameters(intCtr)), 1)) WriteToLog (Chr(34) & "SWC" & Chr(34) & " parameter found. Value = " & intSWC) End If Next If intDesktop = -1 And intVE = -1 And intSWC = -1 Then WriteToLog ("No parameters found. Applying all performance enhancement settings.") intDesktop = 0 intVE = 0 intSWC = 0 End If If intDesktop = 0 Then WriteToLog ("Removing wallpaper.") lResult = SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER, 0, ByVal "", SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Removing wallpaper successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Removing wallpaper failed.") End If End If If intDesktop = 1 Then strBlissPath = Environ("WINDIR") & "\Web\Wallpaper\Bliss.bmp" WriteToLog ("Applying default wallpaper (Bliss.bmp).") lResult = SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER, 0, ByVal strBlissPath, SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Applying wallpaper successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Applying wallpaper failed.") End If End If If intVE = 0 Then WriteToLog ("Disabling all visual effects.") lResult = SystemParametersInfoByLong(SPI_SETUIEFFECTS, 0, 0, SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Disabling visual effects successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Disabling visual effects failed.") End If End If If intVE = 1 Then WriteToLog ("Enabling visual effects.") lResult = SystemParametersInfoByLong(SPI_SETUIEFFECTS, 0, 1, SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Enabling visual effects successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Enabling visual effects failed.") End If End If If intSWC = 0 Then WriteToLog ("Disabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34)) lResult = SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETDRAGFULLWINDOWS, 0, vbNullString, SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Disabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34) & " successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Disabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34) & " failed.") End If End If If intSWC = 1 Then WriteToLog ("Enabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34)) lResult = SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETDRAGFULLWINDOWS, 1, vbNullString, SPIF_UPDATEINIFILE Or SPIF_SENDWININICHANGE) If lResult <> 0 Then WriteToLog ("Enabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34) & " successful.") Else WriteToLog ("Enabling " & Chr(34) & "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" & Chr(34) & " failed.") End If End If End errorhandler: WriteToLog ("Error: " & Err.Number & " occurred. Description: " & Err.Description) End Sub Private Sub WriteToLog(ByVal strMessage As String) Open App.Path & "\ImprovePerformance.log" For Append As #100 Print #100, Now() & ": " & strMessage Close #100 End Sub Private Function ParseString(vstrKey As String, vstrDelimiter As String, ByRef rstrRetArr() As String) As Integer Dim mintPos1 As Integer Dim mintPos2 As Integer Dim mintLen1 As Integer Dim mintLen2 As Integer Dim mintCount As Integer On Error GoTo Errhnd mintLen1 = Len(vstrKey) mintLen2 = Len(vstrDelimiter) mintPos1 = 1 mintPos2 = InStr(mintPos1, vstrKey, _ vstrDelimiter, vbTextCompare) mintCount = 0 ParseString = mintCount If mintPos2 = 0 Then mintCount = mintCount + 1 ReDim rstrRetArr(mintCount) As String rstrRetArr(mintCount - 1) = Trim(vstrKey) ParseString = mintCount Exit Function End If If mintPos2 = 1 Then mintPos1 = mintPos2 + mintLen2 mintPos2 = InStr(mintPos1, vstrKey, _ vstrDelimiter, vbTextCompare) End If While (mintPos2 > 0) mintCount = mintCount + 1 ReDim Preserve rstrRetArr(mintCount) As String rstrRetArr(mintCount - 1) = Trim(Mid(vstrKey, mintPos1, mintPos2 - mintPos1)) ParseString = mintCount mintPos1 = mintPos2 + mintLen2 If mintPos1 <= mintLen1 Then mintPos2 = InStr(mintPos1, vstrKey, _ vstrDelimiter, vbTextCompare) Else mintPos2 = 0 End If Wend If mintPos1 <= mintLen1 Then mintCount = mintCount + 1 ReDim Preserve rstrRetArr(mintCount) As String rstrRetArr(mintCount - 1) = Trim(Mid(vstrKey, mintPos1, (mintLen1 - mintPos1) + 1)) ParseString = mintCount End If Exit Function Errhnd: ParseString = 0 End Function This will allow you to enable/disable all visual effects on an XP workstation. These settings are system-wide and should remain after reboots. Here's how to use it. Double clicking on it disables all visual effects AND removes the desktop wallpaper. If this is not desirable, you can customize what it changes using parameters passed from the command line: Parameters: [/desktop:0 or 1] --- 0 disables the wallpaper. 1 applies the default wallpaper (Bliss.bmp) [/swc:0 or 1]---0 disables "Show Windows Contents While Dragging". 1 enables it. [/ve:0 or 1] ---0 disables all visual effects. 1 enables them. Examples: C:\ImprovePerformance.exe /swc:1 /desktop:0 /ve:0 -This will enable "Show Windows Contents", disable the desktop wallpaper, and disable all visual effects. C:\ImprovePerformance.exe -This will disable everything, same as double clicking it. The app will also produce a log file, named "ImprovePerformance.log" located in the same directory as the .exe. Here's a sample of this log: 3/26/2004 9:25:24 AM: "Desktop" parameter found. Value = 0 3/26/2004 9:25:24 AM: Removing wallpaper. 3/26/2004 9:25:25 AM: Removing wallpaper successful. 3/26/2004 9:30:39 AM: No parameters found. Applying all performance enhancement settings. 3/26/2004 9:30:39 AM: Removing wallpaper. 3/26/2004 9:30:40 AM: Removing wallpaper successful. 3/26/2004 9:30:40 AM: Disabling all visual effects. 3/26/2004 9:30:40 AM: Disabling visual effects successful. 3/26/2004 9:30:40 AM: Disabling "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" 3/26/2004 9:30:40 AM: Disabling "Show Windows Contents While Dragging" successful. 3/26/2004 9:30:53 AM: "Desktop" parameter found. Value = 1 3/26/2004 9:30:53 AM: "VE" parameter found. Value = 0 3/26/2004 9:30:53 AM: Applying default wallpaper (Bliss.bmp). 3/26/2004 9:30:54 AM: Applying wallpaper successful. 3/26/2004 9:30:54 AM: Disabling all visual effects. 3/26/2004 9:30:54 AM: Disabling visual effects successful. 3/26/2004 9:31:02 AM: "Desktop" parameter found. Value = 0 3/26/2004 9:31:02 AM: "VE" parameter found. Value = 1 3/26/2004 9:31:02 AM: Removing wallpaper. 3/26/2004 9:31:02 AM: Removing wallpaper successful. 3/26/2004 9:31:02 AM: Enabling visual effects. 3/26/2004 9:31:03 AM: Enabling visual effects successful. 3/26/2004 9:31:09 AM: "VE" parameter found. Value = 1 3/26/2004 9:31:09 AM: Enabling visual effects. 3/26/2004 9:31:09 AM: Enabling visual effects successful. Enjoy, and let me know if you have any problems/questions.

Anybody know if the SystemParametersInfo() API function can be used to do this?

I have not tried this, and it is a good suggestion. It's VERY likely to be against company policy, but we may be able to work with it depending on the details. I'll begin searching for information on uxtheme.dll, how to use it to create a custom visual style. I've not done this before. Your reply is appreciated. Thanks Alanoll. I'm beginning to like the "mood" of this forum. Everybody seems friendly and willing to help out. Hard to find anymore.

Hello everybody! I've been searching all day for an answer to this. MSFN has come the closest to answering the question, but like many people here, I still have not been successfull in getting it to work. The problem is with the Visual Effects in XP. We have an application which records the screens of call representatives, and since moving to XP we've seen performance decrease as a result of the added effects. Currently we're telling their managers to have them manually disable all of these settings, but obviously it would be far better if we could automate this. And this is where I come in. I've written a small script that will disable all of the visual effect settings using registry entries I've found numerous places on MSFN. But like everybody else, these settings are not applied even after a reboot. If you go into the Visual Effects settings you can see that they are all disabled, but for whatever reason, XP is not recognizing it, and all menus continue to fade etc. There's obviously something else that must take place. Often, when you apply new themes or Visual Effects, XP presents a "Please Wait" screen while the settings are applied. If you're on a slower machine, this "Please Wait" screen will appear for a longer time and the screen will slowly turn grey as it works. I'm curious as to what is happening during this time. Is XP somehow re-loading it's shell? Is there an API call or something I could use to invoke this functionality after applying the registry settings? I've noticed that restarting the Themes service will reload the theme, but not the Visual Effects (also confirmed here on MSFN). According to one post in MSFN, rebooting twice should help. In another, setting the "FX" property to 3 (custom) and everything else to 0 claimed to work, but it didn't for me. In fact, the "3" part did, but even with everything else at 0 all visual effects remained checked. I've exhausted all my resources looking into this. I'd be eternally grateful if anybody can help out.