What's new in 8StartButton 2.7.0
Apr 27, 2015
- Service release including component improvements and minor bug fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.6.8 (Nov 14, 2014)
- Service release including a few UI changes and improvements, as well as minor bug fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.6.7 (Sep 10, 2014)
- Multiple improvements including minor fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.6.6 (Aug 25, 2014)
- Service release including various minor fixes and a few improvements
- Updated UI components including fixes and improvements
New in 8StartButton 2.6.5 (Aug 25, 2014)
- Service release including various minor fixes and a few improvements
New in 8StartButton 2.6.4 (Apr 10, 2014)
- Support for Windows 8.1 Update 1 (April 2014 Update)
New in 8StartButton 2.6.3 (Feb 24, 2014)
- Several rare issues fixed, including a couple of unhandled exceptions
- Multiple code improvements and optimizations
New in 8StartButton 2.6.2 (Feb 10, 2014)
- Service release including several optimizations and bug fixes
- Serveral optimizations on systems with DPI settings higher than the default 96 DPI
New in 8StartButton 2.6.1 (Jan 21, 2014)
- Service release including several optimizations and bug fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.6.0 (Jan 3, 2014)
- Service release including several minor changes and a couple of fixes
- Additional code optimizations
- Some changes to the error logging and error report feature
New in 8StartButton 2.5.3 (Dec 19, 2013)
- Service release including several minor changes and a couple of fixes
- Lots of code optimizations for a better all-in-all performance
New in 8StartButton 2.5.2 (Dec 3, 2013)
- Fixing a bug that caused the online update feature not to detect an active internet connection
New in 8StartButton 2.5.1 (Nov 27, 2013)
- Service release including several minor improvements and fixes for some rare issues
- Improved file explorer
New in 8StartButton 2.5.0 (Oct 31, 2013)
- New File Explorer like File Browser with full Windows File Explorer functionality, like context menu, file operations etc.
- Updated log file and error report servers
- Updated language files
- A couple of minor fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.4.3 (Oct 16, 2013)
- Fixing a few minor bugs
- Some modifications to the error logging and reporting feature
- Updated UI components
New in 8StartButton 2.4.2 (Oct 3, 2013)
- A few modifications related to file explorer context menu actions to force a directory refresh if items are renamed, deleted, or created
- Some additional cosmetical changes, including a few new icons for the start tiles section
- Fixing an issue that caused start menu items to appear in the start menu although their target was not existing
- Fixing a problem that caused icons of some start menu items not to appear in the start menu
- Fixing an issue that caused some start menu items not to be executed properly
- A few other (minor) issues fixed
New in 8StartButton 2.4.1 (Sep 21, 2013)
- Added an info screen that is displayed once the left Windows key is used the very first time
- Internal improvements in the recent programs feature
- Lots of internal code optimizations and some code cleanup
- Some more updated start tile icons
- Updated language files
- The second tile of the 'Computer' start tile got lost in one of the previous version updates for some reason - it is back again
- Fixing a problem in Windows 8.1 where a custom start button was not painted properly under certain circumstances
- A few minor issues fixed
New in 8StartButton 2.4.0 (Sep 17, 2013)
- Traditional and simplified Chinese translations added
- Multiple code optimizations of the code responsible for the display of the start menu
- Left Windows key functionality can be disabled if required (see 'Settings')
- Improved detection of left Windows key press
- A few changes related to the Windows key functionality
- Some UI elements now change their forecolor for a better visual appearance depending on the Windows tint color (dark or bright color)
- Some updated application icons
- Updated language files
- Fixing an issue that caused the start screen and the search screen not to open if the left Windows key functionality was enabled
- Fixing a localization issues in the start menu
- Fixing a few logical issues that caused some unwanted behavior while the 'Settings' screen is about to be shown
- Fixing an issue that caused the icon extraction from a .lnk file to fail under certain circumstances
New in 8StartButton 2.3.1 (Sep 13, 2013)
- Successfully tested on Windows 8.1 RTM
- Some minor adjustments and code improvements
- Some adjustments to the way a custom start button is painted on Windows 8.1
- Fixing a cosmetical issue on Windows 8.1 that caused a 'ghost' start button effect
- Fixing an issue that caused that an incorrect symbol was used if a radial menu item action was changed
- Fixing a null reference exception in relation to the radial menu
New in 8StartButton 2.3.0 (Sep 9, 2013)
- The left Windows key functionality is back - now you can control the 8StartButton start menu, as well as the radial menu with the left Windows key of your keyboard
- Fixing a rare start menu icon resize problem
- Some more updated start tile icons
- Optimized resources making the main executable smaller
- A few code optimizations and minor improvements
New in 8StartButton 2.2.4 (Sep 2, 2013)
- Added an additional error handler and a corresponding error message that catch issues related to execution attempts of applications that cannot be executed on Windows 8
- Added some additional system data to the logging feature covering information about memory, if running in virtual machine, and some more important system specifications
- Fixing some more minor issues
- Performance improvements by code optimizations
- Some cosmetical changes, including a few new start tile icons
- Updated language files
New in 8StartButton 2.2.3 (Aug 21, 2013)
- Added additional drive types to the 'File browser' screen on the start menu, which was limited to fixed HDDs before
- Made it so that from the start menu's settings button the view style of the file browser can be set to tile or list view
- The system drive is now pre-selected in the 'File browser'
- A couple of internal improvements and optimizations
- Some modifications to the error handling module
- Updated language files
- A few minor bug fixes
New in 8StartButton 2.2.2 (Aug 15, 2013)
- A few changes and improvements to the error logging feature
- Made it so that we can now control from remote whether or not error logs should be submitted during online update check (if enabled by user)
- Updated language files
- Added an online version check to the setup
- Several minor internal improvements to the start menu generation
New in 8StartButton 2.2.1 (Aug 13, 2013)
- New 'File Browser' feature in the 8StartButton start menu for quick, easy and simple file browsing from within the start menu without using the Windows File Explorer
- Full right click context menu support for the new 'File Browser' file list
- The registered edition now includes an option to submit error log files during online update check - this option is enabled by default and can be changed in the 'Settings'
- Start menu tabs are now unlabled, but show an icon representing the tab functionality; this gives us more room for future feature additions
- New designed color selection window for radial menu items background color selection
- Updated UI components
- Updated language files
New in 8StartButton 2.2.0 (Aug 8, 2013)
- Several changes and improvements to the "Don't use a start button" feature, including a few fixes of some non logical behavior issues
- Improved task bar location detection
- Improved right click detection to open the context menu if no start button is used
- Improved 'Start area' detection on Windows 8.1
- Updated English, German, Spanish and Korean language files
- Fixing an issue that caused a recurring mouse hang under certain conditions
- Error logging added - log files can be browsed from the 'About' screen - log files are encrypted
- Easy FTP upload of error log files - see 'About' screen
New in 8StartButton 2.1.4 (Aug 5, 2013)
- Some changes related to the detection of the account expiration date and the detection of a valid registration
- Some additional improvements if running on Windows 8.1
- Updated user interface components fixing a couple of minor issues
- Detecting changes in the 'Recent documents' folder was extremely CPU intensive on some machines under certain circumstances
- Fixing some localization issues
- Fixing some minor, pretty rare issues
- We recommend running 8StartButton on Windows 8.1 (Preview)
New in 8StartButton 2.1.3 (Aug 1, 2013)
- Changes in the recent documents folder are now detected and the start menu updates itself accordingly
- New color selection for customized start tiles providing lots of additional colors and theme colors for easy selection
- Improved application name detection in the recently used applications list
- Some changes to the 'Settings' screen giving us more room for future features
- Some changes to the way the start menu is generated to reduce the risk of thread related issues
- Updated language files
- Fixing an 'Index out of range' crash on start up
- Fixing an issue where the color of a start tile was not pre-selected in the color selector
New in 8StartButton 2.1.2 (Jul 31, 2013)
- Korean and Spanish language files updated
- Some more error handlers included to catch some of those nasty ones
- If the recent docs list is empty an appropriate message is displayed in the list
- Several improvements and code optimizations
- Some UI elements were not translated to the selected language
- Fixing an issue that caused the list of recent documents not to refresh if an item has been removed from the list
- Fixing an issue that caused some unwanted entries to appear in the list of recently used programs
New in 8StartButton 2.1.1 (Jul 29, 2013)
- Added a few additional error handlers catching some rare issues
New in 8StartButton 2.1.0 (Jul 27, 2013)
- New 'Recently used programs' feature similar to the one in the Windows 7 start menu, including context menu support
- Added some pre-definded actions to the tile editing screen
- Added an option to allow a smooth fade in and out of the 8StartButton start menu
- Added a '8StartButton starting ...' message that actually only appears if start up of 8StartButton is pretty slow (on virtual machines, or on slow hardware configurations)
- Even more optimizations for Windows 8.1
- Made it so that the start tiles can now be set to have an automatically generated background color based on the Windows desktop ink color (see 'Settings') - for those who don't like the colorful start tiles
- Made it so that the online update check can also be de-activated from the 'An update is available' dialog
- Lots of minor changes and cosmetical improvements to the start tiles screen, including slightly larger start tiles
- Re-designed tile editing screen, now with a tab interface, and a sample tile that shows the current settings before they are saved and applied
- Several cosmetical improvements in the start menu
- Several changes to the start menu related to the new 'Recently used programs' feature
- Removed some info boxes that appeared on the very first start
- Faster start menu generation
- Updated German and English language files reflecting the changes in this version
- Fixing an issue that caused that the current (custom) image was not displayed in the image selection box on the start tile edit screen
- Fixing a start tiles colorization issues that caused some tiles to show different border colors
- Fixing an issue that caused the windows desktop ink color not to be read from the registry properly if some specific colors were used
- Fixing an issue that was responsible for some Windows components not to execute if started from the start menu, like Help & Support, File Explorer etc.
- Fixing an issue that caused the 'Send to' options in the start menu context menu not to work
- Fixing some mixed up custom command buttons in the start menu
- Fixing some 'Welcome Dialog' colorization issues
New in 8StartButton 2.0.2 (Jul 17, 2013)
- A few changes to the code that loads and displays the start menu
- Updated language files
- Fixing a start menu colorization issue that caused that an incorrect color was used for the start menu
- Some changes to the setup engine fixing an incorrect detection of the Windows version number
New in 8StartButton 2.0.1 (Jul 9, 2013)
- A few changes to the way 8StartButton detects the Windows 8 version
- Updated Spanish language file
- Some minor bug fixes and improvements
New in 8StartButton 2.0.0 (Jul 4, 2013)
- Re-designed start menu with tab functionality giving you faster and easier access to start menu, start tiles and recent documents
- Officially supporting Windows 8.1 (Preview)
- On Windows 8.1 the 'new' Windows start button can be used with 8StartButton - no need for a custom start button if not required
- On Windows 8.1 the background color of the start button can be customized if a custom start button image is used
- Recent documents feature giving you quick access to recently opened items
- Added a 'Search for programs and documents' box to the start menu screen and to the start tiles screen
- Added an option to specifiy the size of the start and search panel when opened by 8StartButton (currently not supported by Windows 8.1)
- Added an option to the radial quick access menu configuration to open an Explorer window with all Modern (Metro) apps installed
- Added an option to the 'Run' drop-down menu of the 8StartButton start menu to open an Explorer window with all Modern (Metro) apps installed
- Added an option to remove the 8StartButton logo watermark from the start menu
- Custom buttons on the start menu now show a tooltip with the target
- Korean language file added (status of v1.2.5)
- Lots of code improvements and optimizations
- Updated language files (English and German only, others still include some English lines)
- A few updated start button images
- Fixing a bug where tile rotation continued even for a tile taht currently to be edited
- Fixing an incorrect mouse position calculation that caused the radial menu buttons not to properly react to mouse clicks under certain conditions
- Fixing an incorrect start and search panel size calculation if task bar was located on the right hand side of the screen
- Fixing that the tooltips of the radial menu items where still displayed even if the menu was closed
- Fixing a flash-up of the start menu during start-up
- Fixing a few additional localication issues
New in 8StartButton 1.2.5 (Jun 17, 2013)
- Fixing a few user interface translation issues
- Additional performance optimizations
- Updated language files
New in 8StartButton 1.2.4 (Jun 6, 2013)
- Multiple code optimizations
New in 8StartButton 1.2.3 (May 27, 2013)
- Microsoft contacted us and asked to remove multiple icons from the included icons library that were too similar or almost identical to Microsoft application icons, like the icon for Internet Explorer and a few others. We are sorry that we had to remove those icons, which might mix up your tile icon settings.
- Although used by other software vendors, too, we have also removed the start button Windows logo images and created our own ones.
New in 8StartButton 1.2.2 (May 8, 2013)
- Service release fixing a few minor issues
New in 8StartButton 1.2.1 (Mar 26, 2013)
- Spanish language file added
- Brazilian-Portuguese language file added
- A few optimizations and internal improvements
New in 8StartButton 1.2.0 (Feb 22, 2013)
- It is now possible to use 8StartButton **without** a start button. We know that this sounds stupid, but we heard what quite a lof of people requested: we made the bottom left corner of the desktop sensitive to 8StartButton, and if you now move the mouse there, the 8StartButton radial 'QuickAccess' menu is displayed immediately, without the use of a mouse click. This is a major improvement in usability and satisfies those users who do actually not want a start button, but still long for a start menu, though. This option can be enabled in the 8StartButton settings (right click the start button, select 'Settings'). An introduction to this feature is displayed automatically when this version is started for the very first time.
- Updated language files (please note that the Russian and the French language files still contain some English lines!)
- Several internal changes related to the new functionality
- A couple of performance improvements
New in 8StartButton 1.1.4 (Feb 17, 2013)
- Performance optimizations during button paint and mouse position detection
- A few additional design changes and fixes on systems with DPI settings larger than 100%
- Several other code changes fixing multiple rare bugs
- Fixing a bug where the task list disappeared if the task bar was located at the top of the screen
New in 8StartButton 1.1.3 (Feb 14, 2013)
- Fixing a design issue in the radial quick access menu on systems with DPI settings larger than 100%
New in 8StartButton 1.1.2 (Jan 29, 2013)
- Several internal optimizations and code improvements
- A few changes in error handling
- Fixing a SingleInstance error under certain circumstances
New in 8StartButton 1.1.1 (Jan 26, 2013)
- Some changes to the radial QuickAccess menu related to larger DPI settings than default
- The radial QuickAccess menu now closes when the mouse left clicks outside of the menu. Before it remained open unless the start button was clicked again
- Fixing a bug that caused the first 5 tiles to start rotating again on restart, even if the second tile of a tile was removed before
New in 8StartButton 1.1.0 (Jan 24, 2013)
- We have added a new radial 'QuickAccess' menu, which lets _YOU_ decide if you want to open the Windows 8 start screen, the apps screen, or the 8StartButton start menu each time you use the start button. Additional the QuickAccess menu can be customized to your needs, with custom button actions (registered edition only), or with pre-defined system actions. This new menu can be enabled by right-clicking the start button, then select 'Left mouse click shows...' >>> 'Radial QuickAcess menu'
- Several modifications related to the new QuickAccess menu
- Updated language files
- Updated introduction
- Updated user interface components
New in 8StartButton 1.0.12 (Jan 16, 2013)
- Fixing a bug that caused several special characters on certain keyboards to stop working properly. For this to be fixed we had to disable the left Windows key functionality to open the 8StartButton start menu. We are investigating this issue and are hoping to get this functionality back into the software in a future release.
New in 8StartButton 1.0.11 (Jan 9, 2013)
- Fixing an issue that caused customized tiles not to rotate properly
New in 8StartButton 1.0.10 (Jan 4, 2013)
- Service release including a few global changes and fixes
New in 8StartButton 1.0.9 (Dec 11, 2012)
- The left Windows key now opens the 8StartButton start menu if pressed
- A few minor code changes and improvements
New in 8StartButton 1.0.8 (Dec 11, 2012)
- Added a 'System tasks' option to the 8StartButton right click context menu and to the 'Commands' menu of the 8StartButton start menu. This option provides quick access to all system control tasks
- Fixing a bug that caused the 'Go to desktop' feature not to work properly under certain circumstances
- Multiple code improvements
New in 8StartButton 1.0.7 (Dec 11, 2012)
- Several improvements of the code responsible for the start button creation
- A few minor bug fixes
New in 8StartButton 1.0.6 (Dec 11, 2012)
- Added an 'Expand' and a 'Collapse' button (> and
New in 8StartButton 1.0.5 (Dec 11, 2012)
- Fixing a bug that caused the user interface to automatically turn to German on closing the settings section
New in 8StartButton 1.0.4 (Dec 11, 2012)
- Fixing a bug that caused a mix up in tile customization when a second tile was added to a specific tile and the mouse moved over another tiles during customization
- Fixing a design issue that caused some buttons on the 'Settings' screen not to be visible if the Windows taskbar color was close to white
- Russian localization added
New in 8StartButton 1.0.3 (Oct 24, 2012)
- Multiple improvements, covering missing start menu icons, missing start menu entries
- Fixing an issue that caused some of the common start menu items not to be listed in the 8StartButton start menu
- Fixing a few localisation issues
New in 8StartButton 1.0.2 (Oct 1, 2012)
- Fixing an issue that caused the shutdown function not to work properly under certain circumstances
New in 8StartButton 1.0.1 (Sep 29, 2012)
- Fixing an issue that caused an incorrect menu item to be visible in the free edition