Chicago95 VS ExplorerPatcher

If that's a concern for you, there are themes for GTK3 and GTK4 that replicate classic 3D widgets and remove much of the excess padding in modern apps. https://github.com/B00merang-Project/Windows-95 https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95 (You should install both; Chicago95 is more actively developed, but B00merang gives you a GTK+4 theme that's currently missing from Chicago95.) Works reasonably well as a daily-driver, giving you a similar look to the modern SerenityOS GUI on a standard Linux system. Even the modern GTK+4 "responsive" apps work as designed, with some non-critical graphical quirks.

https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95

Chicago was the code name for the development version of the highly anticipated Windows95

Haven’t tried it, but there’s https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95

Might be looking for something closer to this: https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95

I bloody want my Linux and apps on it to look like this or something of this flavour. Most retro themes are poor quality shams (Chicago95[1] is the only good one, yet still not perfect). I feel like I would gladly pay serious money for a really high quality conversion of all the parts, including themes for all widget libraries and no quirks.

[1]https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95

Chicago95

Related: you can make Linux look like Windows 95 (98/2000/XP), icons and all: https://github.com/grassmunk/Chicago95

It works really well.

You can use https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher to change the hotkey

> Windows 11 brings absolutely nothing on the table

It also removes a leg from the table, the one labelled 'usability'.

Attaching a 3rd-party leg to fill the gap helps (https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher), but it's not an ideal solution

ExplorerPatcher

I had more problems with it being wide, merging all app windows in a single icon, showing only icon rather then app title, and not being able to move to top of screen

That may be fixed with https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher which restores win10 bar, there's no builtin solution to any of the above afaik

Thanks for letting me know. I looked into it, and apparently it's still even possible to activate on later versions of Windows with registry edits and helper software: https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher/discussions/167

Not going to install something that seems so vague, but I do use ExplorerPatcher [1] on my Windows 11 machines to basically re-create Windows 10 UI and fix all of the annoyances I have with Windows 11. I've got the old right click menu, the old task bar, the old alt-tab interface, pretty much the whole thing. Only reason I use Windows 11 over Windows 10 is because Windows 11 seems to handle my triple monitor setup better, especially when waking up from sleep.

[1] - https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher