change color to the title bar

General
1

Hi all
Xojo

Grateful for their responses, which will be greatly appreciated

I need to change color to the title bar of Window object
Operating system: Windows 10
Type Application: Desktop application
It’s possible?

Thank you
Raul

2

Unfortunately this isn’t as simple as it seems. The colour of the title bar is system wide. You’ll either need to implement your own window title bar using a window without one or draw into the title of the window which is something I have been meaning to look into but haven’t found the time, yet.

Is this just a style thing or do you want to do something like flash the title bar? because that can be done using api calls.

4

Thank you so much

The color of the title bar is only for style
Any ideas for the following:
how to implement my own window title bar or draw in the title of the window?

regards
Raul

5

What about Human Interface for Windows ?

6

Thanks Emile

The title bar in windows desktop applications, only shown in white and by style I need to assign another color

regards
Raul

7

Raul:

That is what I understand. Background color suggestions:

• change the title background to red when a wrong entry have been done,
• change the title background to green when a correct entry have been done,
• change the title background to … when… [to be defined].

Do you know what are the “Human Interface Guidelines”for Windows (exists also for Linux and the first comes for Apple).
If not, make a search with your favorite search automate on the internet. Sometimes it is really useful.

8

Have you considered placing a canvas immediately at the top of the window and changing the color in THAT instead of the title bar?

9

Thank you so much
Tim Jones
If I tried to place a canvas, but my window is Movable Modal type and when I overlay it on the title bar the canvas is NOT displayed at the time of execution.
When I put it in the lower part of the title bar if it is displayed.

My idea is to superimpose the canvas in the title bar

Greetings and blessings
Raul

10

Fwiw: For Raul’s original question and Julian’s initial reply.

I remember the possibility to do just that in the times of Sibyl
(a Delphi look-a-like) for mainly IBM OS/2 (version 4 or later);
the Windows version of it never worked well.

You had to recompile a set of system files (mainly Pascal / assembler),
which took only a few minutes, to change some system colors, like the
title bar you asked for.

I had, for my own use, compiled several sets for Red, Green and Yellow
libraries to replace the dull blue title bars when appropriate.

However, it is unlikely that those system files will be available e.g. in
basic-format for current versions of Windows.

11

That was my point - this is the only way to get something sloe to what you’re looking for in Xojo and modern Windows.

What other’s were pointing at is this would not be good UI design since it goes against the Windows UI design guidance. Changing the title bar colors went away with Windows XP. When you start stepping too far away from the Windows design norms, your application starts to look “odd” and amateurish. In fact, Microsoft’s design guidance actually calls out using a Header area much like I describe above. In this case, not only can you use color to add impact to the message of your dialog, you can also add “corrective” or step-oriented control that are more obvious to the user.