The Old New Thing

Scrollbars part 10 – Towards a deeper understanding of the WM_NCCALCSIZE message

September 11, 2003 Sep 11, 2003 09/11/03

Raymond Chen

When your window is resized, Windows uses the message to determine where your window's client area lives inside your window rectangle. There are two forms of the message. The simple form merely takes a window rectangle and returns a client rectangle. This is useful for resizing a window...

You too can dress like Raymond

September 11, 2003 Sep 11, 2003 09/11/03

Raymond Chen

Yes, I'm the Raymond that Kraig Brockschmidt is writing about when he discusses "Dress Like Raymond Day...

Computers are still too hard to use.

September 10, 2003 Sep 10, 2003 09/10/03

Raymond Chen

UK survey reveals that one in seven computer users needs help turning the computer on and off...

Why do some people call the taskbar the “tray”?

September 10, 2003 Sep 10, 2003 09/10/03

Raymond Chen

Short answer: Because they're wrong. Long answer: The official name for the thingie at the bottom of the screen is the "taskbar". The taskbar contains a variety of elements, such as the "Start Button", a collection of "taskbar buttons", the clock, and the "Taskbar Notification Area". One of the most common errors is to refer to the Taskbar ...

If you see only one Elvis vs. Mummy movie this year, make it this one

September 9, 2003 Sep 9, 2003 09/9/03

Raymond Chen

Bubba Ho-Tep will be playing at the Varsity Theater in Seattle for a limited run. (Check the release schedule to see if it will be airing in your area.) Be there. Or the mummy will have already won...

Scrollbars part 9 – Maintaining the metaphor

September 9, 2003 Sep 9, 2003 09/9/03

Raymond Chen

When a document is displayed with scrollbars, the metaphor is that the window is a viewport onto the entire document, only a portion of which is visible at the moment. The default behavior of a resize, however, is to maintain the origin at the upper left corner of the client area, which breaks the metaphor...

It's a lot easier to write a column if you don't care about accuracy

September 8, 2003 Sep 8, 2003 09/8/03

Raymond Chen

Now that Longhorn Rumor Season seems to have kicked up, I'm reminded of Windows 95 Rumor Season. The great thing about writing a rumors column is that you don't have to be right! Even if you're wrong, you can just say, "Well, Microsoft changed it before they shipped," and nobody can say you were wrong. It'...

An insight into the Windows 95 startup sound

September 8, 2003 Sep 8, 2003 09/8/03

Raymond Chen

Doo, dudududingggggg.... ding.... ding... ding... In an interview with Joel Selvin at the San Francisco Chronicle, Brian Eno explains. Q: How did you come to compose "The Microsoft Sound"? A: The idea came up at the time when I was completely bereft of ideas. ...

Where is my program running from?

September 5, 2003 Sep 5, 2003 09/5/03

Raymond Chen

Another common question: "How do I find out where my program is? I want to be able to access support files in that same directory." Answer: GetModuleFileName(NULL...

Case mapping on Unicode is hard

September 5, 2003 Sep 5, 2003 09/5/03

Raymond Chen

Occasionally, I'm asked, "I have to identify strings that are identical, case-insensitively. How do I do it?" The answer is, "Well, it depends. Whose case-mapping rules do you want to use?" Sometimes the reply is, "I want this to be language-independent." Now ...

The Old New Thing

September 2003 - Page 3 of 4 - The Old New Thing