Why? Why not? May as well give it a try...

I had an idea: Windows 8 Build 7989 and 8102 (dev preview) are both winmain_m3 builds from about the same time in development. So why not see if their files can be exchanged?

Right now, I haven't gotten much unlocked. So far all I've done is do sfc /scannow to fix corrupt files, run RedPill Enabler and stick 8102's shsxs.dll in System32 as well as a couple Registry tweaks. Metro is still locked down but I did unlock a little something...

You can't tell from the picture, but there is a slide/swoop effect during logon that showed up after I put shsxs.dll in System32, and yes, I have YouBettaHideYoPearl enabled. Like I said, Metro is still locked down so I don't have that working yet. I seem to remember someone saying that Metro in the early milestone builds was tied to licensing? Or maybe I'm getting that mixed up with the build hash... Well, I did manage to get the build activated with a Windows 7 Ultimate key, surprisingly Internet activation still works even though my test computer is set to April 22nd, 2011... Metro still didn't load so I guess it's not tied to licensing.

Another thing that may be locking down Metro are the slc.dll checks. There are a number of slc.dll checks that Metro does to see if it should load, and back when we all needed slc.dll patches, no one had the proper version of shsxs.dll in order to run Metro, so it's likely all the slc.dll patches don't include the Metro checks; I only tested RedPill Enabler.

Well, more to come should I figure stuff out. I'll see if I can get a friend to help me out with the slc.dll problem.

Well, I certainly hope that you can get it to work. Sometimes, I've wondered if these earlier builds even had such features as the Start screen (the Start screen seen in the June 1st, 2011 video on YouTube was obviously from a video released probably several weeks after Windows 8 had already entered the 80xx build range, so that doesn't really count as "early" in that regard).

But, if Build 7989 and similar builds do indeed have such features as the Start screen, I would be very interested in seeing them this early.

Hmm, turns out the login animation is part of the redpill patch. Oh well, I'll keep playing around to see if I can get something to work.

I really hope you can unlock metro! good luck!

Protip: Don't swap slc.dll from build to build, it has a tendency to break everything.

I kind of expected that Found anything already?

Some interesting findings at MDL: http://forums.mydigitallife.info/thread ... Build-7989

No, I haven't found anything yet. I've seen the stuff on MDL already and I've tried a few of the registry tweaks listed there; I may have more success poking through the Registry of 8102 and seeing what's there and what's different between the two builds.

great! I hope that you can! Did you already saw the differences between twinui.dll and twinapi.dll from 8102 and 7989? the diferences are a lot big, at least on size, but I know that it already existed on these early m3 builds even on m2 because of some pictures on "Building Windows 8 blog from: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012 ... ility.aspx yeah there are evidences that those pictures are from old builds such as 7927, 7955 and of course 7989.

How does the project is going?

EDIT: I've compared twinui.dll.mui from 7989 and 8102, and I found many entries and text that are equal like "Start" "CharmsBar" "Pin" "Unpin" "Share"...

EDIT2: So I remembered that on 8102 all Immersive(Metro) Apps where in \Program Files\Applications so I tried the same on 7989 it worked like on 8102 I had to take ownership the folder and then I got access to it I saw there a app(in a folder of course) "microsoft.help_1.0.0.0_neutral_neutral_8wekyb3d8bbwe" probably Windows Store? then I opened AppxManifest.xml and it contained this:

"<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<Package xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/appx/2010/manifest">

<Identity Name="Microsoft.Help"
ProcessorArchitecture="neutral"
Publisher="CN=Microsoft Corporation, O=Microsoft Corporation, L=Redmond, S=Washington, C=US"
Version="1.0.0.0"
ResourceId="neutral" />

<Properties>
<Framework>false</Framework>
<PublisherDisplayName>Microsoft Corporation</PublisherDisplayName>
<Description>MS Help</Description>
<DisplayName>MS Help</DisplayName>
<Logo>MSHelpLogo.png</Logo>
</Properties>

<Resources>
<Resource Language="en-us"/>
</Resources>

<Capabilities>
<Capability Name="internetClient" />
<!--
We need PrivateNetworkClientServer until we have an internet-facing production service and
then for all internal test builds.
-->
<Capability Name="privateNetworkClientServer" />
<!--
We need defaultWindowsCredentials until Beta; today access to all servers hosting
our content is controlled by domain user credentials in addition to RP.
-->
<Capability Name="defaultWindowsCredentials" />
</Capabilities>

<Prerequisites>
<OSMinVersion>6.2</OSMinVersion>
<OSMaxVersionTested>6.2</OSMaxVersionTested>
</Prerequisites>

<Applications>
<Application
Id="MSHelp.Application"
StartPage="MSHelp.htm">

<VisualElements
DisplayName="MS Help"
Description="MS Help"
Logo="MSHelpLogo.png"
SmallLogo="MSHelpLogo.png"
ForegroundText="light"
BackgroundColor="#FF0000">

<DefaultTile
ShortName="MS Help"
ShowName="true"
/>

<SplashScreen
Image="SplashScreen-1x.png"
BackgroundColor="#FF0000"
/>

</VisualElements>

</Application>
</Applications>

</Package>"

Why don't you try to export the entire registry from 8102, and just merge the .reg file into 7989?

What are the critical system files used by Metro?
Of couse, just swapping files from a newer build to an older build might break things...

But, since 7989 and 8102 are from the same branch, it should work.

the critical files used from Immersive UI are: twinui.dll twinui.dll.mui twinapi.dll twinapi.dll.mui windowsuiimmersive.dll(?) shsxs.dll(m3 and older only)

EDIT: Immersive UI is the internal name for Metro UI
EDIT2: The registry entries that lock or unlock Immersive UI on 8102 are "RPEnabled" "RPInstalled" and "SHSXSWasEnabled"

Recently I've been more concerned with getting my Internet connection back up. Brownouts are evil.


Yeah, MS Help was just a quick rename of the Windows Store, I do remember hearing about that back when one of the 79xx builds first leaked.
This comment is interesting:

It would appear that the Store was locked down with both domain checks (like the Superbar in early Win7 builds) and RedPill. It also appears that opening the Windows store to the public during Beta was planned right from the start.


I'll have to get 8102 installed but that's a good idea.


I've read from someone else who was trying to do the same thing as I that some of the files that would load Metro were

so that's something to play with.

------------

I did see this on My Digital Life. The guy did manage to write his own shsxs.dll but since the real shsxs has a DUI XML resource in it that can't be written from scratch, his project failed.
Or so everyone thinks. When he put his homemade version of shsxs.dll in System32, it broke the Start Menu, the User Tile and the desktop. I don't know what this DUI XML resource does, but I think it could be possible that the desktop isn't broken, it's just that Metro was actually running but invisible since several resources were missing.

In this thread, there is a link to what I am assuming is the same homemade shsxs.dll however that file was deleted from MediaFire a long time ago. So, does anyone still have that homemade version?

It was also here: viewtopic.php?p=263078#p263078
Removed as well.

But doesn't Metro UI loads charms pictures and some other things from shsxs.dll?(at least on 8102) if shsxs.dll don't have those things Metro UI will not be displayed completely, but however it's an old build in twinui.dll there are some charm pictures so...it may work.

Installed 8102, dumped its registry, stuffed it in 7989 and this is what happened:

So, uh, apparently that doesn't work! I don't exactly fancy going through two registries by hand and seeing the differences though.


I wonder, is this what the beta scene in the "good old days" used to be like, playing around with builds to see what you could do with them, what was hidden and what would make your GPUs melt?

Isn't that a Windows Recovery MinWin or something, and not the OS itself.

Suggestion: Why won't you try to replace on 7989 all the files used for metro with 8102 ones? and then use reg keys to unlock it, of course that probably you will get something similar to metro ui of 8102, if it doesn't work try to replace the "mui" files too

REMEMBER, to NOT have "YouBettaHideYoPearl" activated because it doesn't work right on 8102

I guess that will be my next experiment, to replace various Immersive files in 7989.

Does anyone know what RP_VersionCheck() in 8102 returns? Apparently, it needs to return a value of 23 (in 7989) in order for Immersive to work.

Updates?

Update: Don't expect updates every five minutes. I'll work on this whenever I free time and then I'll update you all if I can get something working or if I need help.

Bro tip : there is no code for the start screen in 7989. you can try all your life you won't manage to do it.
the code for metro start screen appeared in approx winmain 8010
or for fbl_uex, 7960 (yeah fbl_uex has always a lot of advance over winmain)

I don't exactly buy that. If we say that actual code for Metro began in winmain 8000, that would mean Metro's stability would be far behind the rest of the OS. The Dev Preview (8102) was far from perfect but it was much more stable than I would expect for something that in theory would practically be pre-alpha.

And also, if Metro only showed up in winmain 8000, why is it that Windows 8 builds going back to at least 7927 (M2) try to call shsxs.dll?

Metro is definetly present in builds even as back as 7850, but it's incomplete and heavily locked down, hence no one finds it and thinks it's not there...

I was having a chat with @canouna from winunleaked forums and he told me this,



@D-Jul is right in a thing, yes 7989 WinMAIN contain metro but not the full metro, that appeared in 801x WinMAIN and probably in 7960 fbl_uex like @D-Jul said, 7989 Metro is similar to D9 conference Metro according to @canouna, it is incomplete but workable.
Metro is there since twinui.dll and twinapi.dll exist, I remember that those already existed in 7850, so Metro is there since the first days of Windows 8.

ggpm, no metro start screen in 7989 at all. The Metro Apps may be there though, as the APPX thing was already implemented.
And SHSXS + registry entries + all the unlocking stuff just unlocks goodies... maybe the prototype file system I forgot the name (protdead was its signature), and APPX maybe.
Actually WinMain branch just contains nothing interesting before 8010-8020.

Just the informations I got from canouna 6 months ago.

edit : but it would be a great thing to unlock all possible things on 7989