I've found a way to edit the standard start menu items in Vista Media Center, but its a hack.Using this hack I've succesfully removed items and even entire strips from the start menu. I suspect that its also possible to change the position of menu items, but I haven't tried yet. You'll need a resource editor like ResourceTuner from HeavenTools.com.1. Make a backup of the %SYSTEMROOT%\ehome\ehres.dll2. Change the security settings of the %SYSTEMROOT%\ehome\ehres.dll to give yourself ownership of the dll. Afterwards change the file rights to full control. If you're running with UAC, then you might need to do some more steps here.3. Open the ehres.dll in the ResourceTuner.4. Expand the HTML nodeNow the files we're interested in are among others:STARTMENU.XML - defines the main start menu stripesSM.ACTIVITIES.XML - defines the menu items under the Task menuSM.MUSIC.XML - defines the menu items under the Music menuSM.PICTURES.XML - defines the menu items under the Pictures & Video menuSM.TV.XML - defines the menu under the Tv menu5. Choose SM.MUSIC.XML for example, rightclick the node and select Edit Resource. The XML file opens.6. Now remove the XML tags defining the menu items you do not want. Alternatively make the element into a comment by changing the tag to <!-- old tag content -->. It might take a while to get an overview of the structure and maybe some trial and error before the logic of the xml file sinks in. Do not remove the <home:App /> elements though.7. When you're happy with the changes, click Ok and accept the changes.8. Select Save As and select the original file (overwriting the existing).9. Open Vista Media Center and check that the changes work.Now, since this is a hack, I take no responsability of how you might break Vista Media Center, destroy your computer or otherwise corrupt the world using this hack.Also note, that a software update might overwrite your hacked ehres.dll file effectively removing your changes.
Thanks for the post. I will give this a try tonight :) One step closer to making it Wife Friendly.
myTV Moderatorthetvdb.com Administrator
Hi, i just found this method posted over at Australian Media Centre Forum. I wanted to thank you as this is perfect! I have finally been able to remove pictures from the strip, and have live tv appear as the first menu item.
Cheers,
aanda6
Anybody have any idea how to add the Internet TV Beta button to the TV bar for my dad's Living Room HP machine? It's also missing the "Explore" option under the Online Media bar.
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I just went to try this and i got the message in resource tuner "This file has no resources." Maybe it doesn't work in x64?
Edit: Used a different program and it worked great, thanks.
Yeah, you needed an x64 version of resource tuner. Good that you found one.
I haven't played around with it as yet, but Advent (who made the MCE Menu Customiser) is working on updating it to make editing the menus a GUI.
Another thing that might be useful to people here is that apparently you can change the max number of oem strips (for example, myTV, or myMovies, or BigScreen weather, etc.) to more than 2, using the Startmenu.xml
Edit: Unfortunately I was mistaken, you can make many copies of the same two start menu strips (I was able to make 3 myTV strips, for example) but VMC doesn't recognize OEMPlaceholderIndex ="2" to make it a third different strip.
Where did you read that?
I did try changing it from 2 to 3, and then enabling 3 strips, but it only displayed 2 of them.
See the edit above, I was able to make it show three strips if there were multiple copies, and I assumed that'd work for a third strip. I hadn't actually installed the third strip to know for sure, but assuming we can make VMC recognize placeholder=2 as the third strip it might still be possible.
So myMovies adds a custom icon for myMovies in the TV & Movies stirp. How can I add myTV here? This would make it perfect for being wife friendly.
Here is the xml from the dll for this section:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?><uidescription platform="Television"
xmlns:home="http://schemas.microsoft.com/MediaCenter/ehshell/MediaCenter.Home"><home:App AppId="[TV]" Title="#SM.TV.Title"><home:PackageMarkupQuickLink ResourceProviderId="Spotlight" TitleId="2011" ImageBaseName="StartMenu.QuickLink.MoreTV" TargetPageId="2012" TrackingId="-201" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVMorePartnersEP]" Priority="99"/><home:PartnerQuickLink ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVPartnerEP]" Priority="4"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.RecordedTV" Title="#SM.TV.RecordedTV" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVRecordedTVEP]" Priority="0"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.Movies.Library" Title="#SM.Movies.Library" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[MoviesLibraryEP]" Priority="5"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.TV.LiveTV" Title="#SM.TV.LiveTV" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVLiveTVEP]" Priority="1"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.TV.Guide" Title="#SM.TV.Guide" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVGuideEP]" Priority="2"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.Movies.OnTV" Title="#SM.Movies.OnTV" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[MoviesOnTVEP]" Priority="6"/><home:PackageMarkupQuickLink ResourceProviderId="NetTV" TitleId="101" ImageBaseName="StartMenu.QuickLink.Browse.TV" TargetPage="BrowseHome.mcml" TrackingId="-200" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVBrowseEP]" Priority="6"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.Movies.PlayDVD" Title="#SM.Movies.PlayDVD" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[MoviesPlayDVDEP]" Priority="5"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.TV.Search" Title="#SM.TV.Search" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVSearchEP]" Priority="3"/><home:QuickLink Icon="SM.TV.Setup" Title="#SM.TV.Setup" ViewTemplate="QuickLinkView" AppId="[TV]" EntryPointId="[TVSetupEP]" Priority="3"/></home:App></uidescription>
I wonder if you could change the LiveTV or TV Guide tile to start myTV actually. Try replacing the AppId and EntryPointId with the values provided in another thread (can't be bothered to look them up right now :p)
Otherwise you could add myTV to the strip in place of, but not simultaneously as My Movies.
It's like communicating with god. You pray and pray and pray for that bike, but you never get a response or the bike.Then you figure out how it works; you steal a bike and pray for forgiveness.
You wouldn't need to customise the strip using the hack, you could use Advents MC Menu Customiser to drop the myTV app into the space where my movies is (to the left of the recorded tv tile).
That's what I've done.
Yes, but if I do that wont I loose the myMovies tile?
I think the aproach I am at now is making my own custom trip for the tiles my wife needs. I got a new one added called Main Menu, and I got the myTV Main and New Eps added. Now I am trying to find the info for adding myMovies. I cleaned up sports and all of that, so the number of stipes I have is low now.
You would, but who wants to use MyMovies :D
I used the app about to create a custom strip called video and have added all the video programs I have installed (myTV, mcorganizer, my trailers se and playmovie).
Then I disabled to Photos & Videos strip.
I am waiting for myDVD :)
