The XP Visual Style Manifest Wizard allows your application to take advantage of the new common control styles and appearances featured in Windows XP.

The XP Visual Style Manifest Wizard button brings up a wizard used to insert an application manifest into the resource section.

The wizard is very easy to use. There are two fields to fill out, application name and description, from which the wizard generates a visual style manifest for your application. See also: How to insert an application manifest.

The manifest indicates to the operating system that ComCtl32.dll version 6 should be used when it is available. Version 6 includes some new controls and new options for other controls, but the biggest change is support for changing the appearance of controls in a window.

Unlike earlier versions of ComCtl32.dll, version 6 is not redistributable. The only way you can use version 6 is to use an operating system that contains it. Windows XP ships with both version 5 and version 6. By default, applications use the user controls defined in User32.dll and the common controls defined in ComCtl32.dll version 5. If you want your application to use visual styles, you must add an application manifest that indicates that ComCtl32.dll version 6 should be used if it is available.

After generating the manifest, the wizard inserts it into the resource section of the executable and makes the necessary adjustments to the image.

The wizard is very easy to use - just follow the instructions and fill in the blanks accordingly. Microsoft recommends using the following format for your application name: Organization.Division.Appname. For example, Microsoft.Windows.MyCoolApp.

Pic.1 Here is how the common controls for an ordinary application look on Windows XP:

Pic.2 And here is how that same application appears after a manifest has been inserted. Inserting a style manifest is an easy way for legacy apps take advantage of the new look for common control styles on Windows XP:

Applications utilizing the more advanced common controls (ie. ListViews, Toolbars, etc.) must link to ComCtl32.dll and make the necessary initialization calls in order for the Windows XP Visual Style manifest to operate properly. Otherwise there is a probability that all of the controls using ComCtrl32.dll will fail at creation. Having a link to ComCtrl is optimal - necessary in most cases but not all. Inserting a style manifest into such an application that doesn't meet these basic requirements may render it inoperable.

It is impossible for Resource Tuner to add the linkage to ComCtl32.dll or to insert the initialization code for you. However, the wizard will alert you if it is unable to verify that the target file meets these requirements.

As always, we recommend that you make a backup copy of the target file before modifying it.