app. specific "Disable Visual Themes" bug - need workaround

S

samej71

Hello,

I believe I found a bug in Vista (Business). I have an application that has
an issue with the Aero interface, and a workaround for it is to turn off the
"Desktop Composition" feature in Vista.

I can do this system-wide, and the application works great. But, for obvious
reasons I'd rather leave desktop composition on for the entire system and use
Vista's per-application configuration to indicate it should be disabled for
this particular application only.

So I located the .EXE on disk (not a shortcut to the EXE), right-clicked and
chose "properties". On the "Compatibility" tab I checked "Disable desktop
composition" and then applied the change.

If I double-click the EXE to launch it, the desktop composition is turned
off and the program works great. But, if I double-click on a file associated
with the application, then the compatibility settings are ignored and it has
desktop composition enabled. I can switch back and forth (double-clicking
application directly vs. double-clicking an associated file) with repeatable
results.

I have not found any other place where I can set application-specific
compatibility settings. It would seem that Vista should use an application's
compatibility settings regardless of how the program is launched - but that
doesn't seem to be the case. I would like to think this a simple oversight or
bug.

I do not have multiple versions of the application installed. After
launching the application via file association, I found the .EXE in the
process list and selected "Open File Location." It opened up the folder with
the .EXE I already set the properties for, so I know it's launching the exact
same binary. When I open the properties for it again, I can see the "disable
desktop composition" is still checked, further confirming (in my mind) that
it should not launch with desktop composition enabled.

Does anyone have any suggestions for a work-around, other than disabling
desktop composition for the entire system?

Thank you very much for your time.

--James
 
P

PaulB

Hi,
What applications are you trying this with. I tested it with Adobe Reader
and it worked fine.
 

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