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Aero effects without Aero

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pilgrim:
I have Aero disabled in Windows 7 because most of it I would never use, however there are two things that I use in both XP and 7.

The first is the snap option for which I use AquaSnap in both OS'.

The second is transparency. In XP I have long used PowerMenu, one of the reasons I have always liked this is because it puts the transparency option in the context menu of taskbar icons as well as in open windows, unfortunately it has not been updated since 1998 and will not work correctly in Windows 7, the developer has had countless requests to update it which they have so far ignored.

When I was looking for an alternative I came across a number of things, from an AHK script which I might go back and look at sometime, I like the idea but I'm interested in possible modifications to it particularly the possibility of adding it to the context menu, to Glass2k which I am currently using, it does the job and it has its own right click menu, the trouble is that when it is enabled it opens when you right click on anything, even links on webpages.

I am aware of other programs that include transparency but I already have programs that do just about everything else such as resizing etc, so all I need is a dedicated transparency program.
I wondered if anyone used or knew of any other programs that would do the job without doing lots of other things as well?

Curt:
What is wrong with the AquaGlass you already have in AquaSnap - is it maybe a too different kind of transparency? I have never tested it.
 

Curt:
-sorry, visitors made me have to abort my answer.

Here at DC we have been offered a generous 50% discount on Actual Window Manager, read the first post on https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=19382.msg173478#msg173478 for instructions. Check out the comparison chart, it is quite awesome: http://www.actualtools.com/products/comparison/

Personally I purchased a key for the full AWM: http://www.actualtools.com/windowmanager/, but of course you can also have what you merely asked for: http://www.actualtools.com/transparentwindow/

pilgrim:
AquaGlass in AquaSnap makes a window transparent only when you are moving it, you choose a default setting that works for all windows.

Interesting that you should mention Actual Window Manager as yesterday I was looking at THIS.

Buying software at any price is not something I even think about these days, the government seems to be trying to turn poverty into an art form.

As I said in my previous post I will have a look at the AHK script I found, since an exchange with skwire nearly two years ago I have numerous bookmarks on AHK which I go back to from time to time although at the moment it still means little more to me than Chinese. (I can feel the brain cells dying every time I look at it.)

pilgrim:
I wasn't sure whether or not to start a new thread for this, if the 'Powers that be' think I should perhaps someone would be kind enough to move it to wherever is appropriate.

Since my last post on transparency I have been looking into the AHK script that I found and discovered several others that are similar, after trying various things by making some very minor modifications to make it easier for me to use I have got as far as this:

; changing window transparencies
^WheelUp::  ; Increments transparency up by 3.125% (with wrap-around)
    DetectHiddenWindows, on
    WinGet, curtrans, Transparent, A
    if ! curtrans
        curtrans = 255
    newtrans := curtrans + 8
    if newtrans > 0
    {
        WinSet, Transparent, %newtrans%, A
    }
    else
    {
        WinSet, Transparent, OFF, A
        WinSet, Transparent, 255, A
    }
return

^WheelDown::  ; Increments transparency down by 3.125% (with wrap-around)
    DetectHiddenWindows, on
    WinGet, curtrans, Transparent, A
    if ! curtrans
        curtrans = 255
    newtrans := curtrans - 8
    if newtrans > 0
    {
        WinSet, Transparent, %newtrans%, A
    }
    ;else
    ;{
    ;    WinSet, Transparent, 255, A
    ;    WinSet, Transparent, OFF, A
    ;}
return

^o::  ; Reset Transparency Settings
    WinSet, Transparent, 255, A
    WinSet, Transparent, OFF, A
return

^g::  ; Press Ctrl+G to show the current settings of the window under the mouse.
    MouseGetPos,,, MouseWin
    WinGet, Transparent, Transparent, ahk_id %MouseWin%
    ToolTip Translucency:`t%Transparent%`n
   Sleep 2500
   ToolTip
return

In spite of spending several hours looking for answers, mainly on the AHK website, I still have unanswered questions:

1) All the scripts and information that I have looked at show transparency settings in values between 0 & 255, what I was looking for is a way to set it by percentage. Is that possible?
    I know that skwire did this with Frameless but I cannot find where I put the source code to see how he did it.
    What I had in mind was using hotkeys, say Alt + 1 - 9 for each 10% and using Alt + 0 as reset/off.
2) If 1 is possible is there a way to add the transparency settings to a window's context menu?
3) Is there a way that ALL transparency settings can be reset to opaque if you exit the script or reboot?

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