Overview

What is Blackbox Lite?

Blackbox Lite is an extended desktop theme, or desktop shell replacement, for Microsoft Windows. In Unix terminology, Blackbox Lite is called a window manager. Blackbox Lite replaces the theme and taskbar (shown below) by replacing the application that displays them, the desktop shell application.

Much like Microsoft's "Virtual Desktop Manager", Blackbox Lite provides multiple virtual desktops. The taskbar below shows the start button followed by numbered buttons for each virtual desktop. Beside each desktop number is the group of applications on that virtual desktop. On the right side are the system tray icons followed by the clock.

Blackbox Lite is derived from bbLean which is derived from Blackbox for Windows, which is a work-alike of the original Blackbox for Unix. Blackbox for Windows has discontinued development.

What is a desktop shell replacement?

"Desktop shell replacement" is a way to change the theme or add features. Wikipedia describes various replacement shells. The shell is the application that draws the taskbar, start menu and system tray. It controls window placement and decorations. It allows you launch applications and manipulate windows using the keyboard and mouse. The shell is not an integral part of the operating system, but rather, it is just a Windows application that is started automatically by Winlogon when a user logs in.

Why replace the shell?

A replacement desktop shell can eliminate certain things that can make the taskbar non-responsive. This can occur in part because the default shell is also acts as a file manager. Windows Explorer, the default shell, integrates the shell and file manager together in a single process. As a result, when something slows down or temporarily consumes all resources of the file browser, it can cause the the taskbar become non-responsive. Blackbox Lite is designed to address this issue by intentionally excluding features that are CPU and memory intensive, so that the desktop is less sensitive to temporary resource exhaustion. A separate, light-weight shell can help ensure that the desktop performance is faster and more uniformly responsive.

Blackbox Lite does not replace the file manager. It still uses Windows Explorer for file browsing, but it invokes a separate process. One can obtain further performance benefits by replacing the file manager with, for example, xplorer or Directory Opus. See wikipedia for a comparison of various file managers.

What is different about this shell?

Blackbox Lite focuses on speed and low overhead. Whereas the Windows Explorer shell bundles many features in a single large executable, Blackbox Lite has a small main executable containing only core features and optional dynamically loadable libraries (DLLs) for additional features. For example, hot keys and the task bar are each a separate, optional DLL that can be disabled to save memory. They can be replaced by 3rd party modified DLLs (mods). This allows one to choose between alterative features, or minimize memory usage by choosing fewer DLLs, or choose extensive features by loading many.

Blackbox Lite is a unix work-alike. It was inspired by and behaves like the original Blackbox window manager for Unix written by Brad Hughes. For usability purposes, it has standard Windows start menu items and hot keys. Aside from these, Blackbox Lite works just like Blackbox for unix. It uses the same configuration file names and syntax for menus, hot keys and window decorations; so it is compatible with the hundreds of Linux Blackbox themes available at http://themes.freshmeat.net. This also means that one can share configuration settings between Unix and Windows desktops.

Why no icons on the desktop?

Blackbox Lite uses less memory so that, when resources are exhausted, the desktop will continue to be responsive. So, by default, Blackbox Lite doesn't draw application icons on the desktop on purpose, because icon pixmaps cause a dramatic increase in memory resource consumption. Using more memory would mean that the desktop would be more vulnerable to resource exhaustion.

Because Blackbox Lite is intended to be fast and light, it avoids using bitmaps wherever possible. Instead, it uses vector graphics and fonts that conserve overhead. Instead of desktop icons, it has "Desktop" menu via the Start button and via a hot key. This reduces the need to minimize all windows on the screen in order to get to the desktop icons. As an option, one can load a 3rd-party extension for desktop icons.

Blackbox Lite emphasizes usability.

How easy is it to use Blackbox Lite? A common definition of 'usability' is the time or difficulty for an average user to complete common tasks. This author views usability not as a measure of quality, but rather as a measure of performance in a closed loop that includes the end user.

Blackbox Lite is designed for usability by emphasizing compatibility with Windows native start menus, shortcut keys and mouse button actions. Although it also contains more elegant methods of navigating the shell, we purposely retain as many navigation methods as possible that the average Windows user is accustomed to. This is intended to remove obstacles to those switching from the default shell, and make it easier to begin using Blackbox. For the same reason, Blackbox Lite also focuses on documentation intended to make it easier to learn about extended features.

Where to download Blackbox Lite

The latest version of Blackbox Lite may be downloaded from http://blackbox.whiteoaklabs.com,

How to Install Blackbox Lite

Blackbox Lite uses a traditional Windows installer, BlackboxLiteSetup.exe, as shown below.

If you want to run Blackbox Lite rather than the default shell, check "Replace the windows explorer shell." However, you can also instead choose this later, after installation, by selecting Start -> Programs -> Blackbox -> Enable.

If you choose "Replace the windows explorer shell," the following three dialogs are shown. They determine whether Blackbox Lite is invoked for all users or only for the user that has installed it.

Blackbox Lite Quick Start

A primary purpose of Blackbox Lite is to allow you launch various applications and manipulate windows using the keyboard and mouse.

The default Blackbox Lite task bar is displayed at the bottom of the screen, and consist of:

• A Start button that pulls up the Start menu
• Numbered labels for each virtual desktop
• Beside each label, applications running on that virtual desktop.
• System tray icons
• The clock

You can access the Start menu by:

• clicking "Start" on the task bar
• right-click on the desktop background
• pressing and releasing the "windows" key.

To switch back to the default Windows Explorer shell, rather than Blackbox Lite, select Start -> Blackbox -> Disable, as shown below, and then reboot or log in again.

If the shell dies, or there is no shell running, you can restart the shell using the task manager. Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL to invoke the task manager, select "Run" from the toolbar. Then, if you want to run the default windows shell, enter "explorer" and click "OK." If you want to run Blackbox Lite, click "browse," and locate the blackbox.exe executable in whichever location was chosen during installation, and click "OK".

 

Tips

If the shell stops running, there won't be a taskbar, desktop icons or hot keys, which makes it difficult to start applications. That makes it hard to restart the shell.

Although the installers avoid typical failure scenarios,it is nevertheless possible for installation or configuration of the shell to fail. It's also possible that extensions or bugs can cause Blackbox to fail. This is a cause for concern for those users that are unfamiliar with using the task manager to start applications.

How to restart the shell

To start a shell, one can use the task manager, as follows:

• Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL to invoke the task manager
• select "Run" from the toolbar

 

Then, select either the default windows shell, explorer, or blackbox, as follows:

To run the default windows shell, enter "explorer" and click "OK."

 

To run Blackbox Lite, click "browse," and locate the blackbox.exe executable in whichever location was chosen during installation, and click "OK".

Copyright © 2007 Rich Murphey.