3

Possible Duplicate:
Transparent Command Prompt in Vista?

Linux and other *nix based operating systems usually have an option for transparent command window displays. Is there a way to get this kind of eye-candy in Windows 7?

How can I make my command-window background transparent?

Community
  • 1
Dan Esparza
  • 1,238
  • 3
  • 13
  • 25

3 Answers3

5

GlassCMD works on Vista and Windows 7:

alt text

and unlike the terminal on UNIX and UNIX-like systems that ship with GNOME/Sawfish, behind the window you can see other open windows as well, not just the wallpaper you have set.

Gaff
  • 18,569
  • 15
  • 57
  • 68
John T
  • 163,373
  • 27
  • 341
  • 348
  • 5
    That's not true. gnome-terminal, the default terminal console on several popular linux distros has actual translucency/transparency available when compiz is enabled. – Shane Sep 13 '09 at 06:20
  • 1
    I'm referring to the transparency settings you can attain from editing the default terminal profile. You can do a lot with compiz but that's besides the point. – John T Sep 13 '09 at 06:23
  • 1
    But it works without Compiz. As long as your WM supports compositing, adjusting the "default profile" gives true transparency. – u1686_grawity Sep 13 '09 at 07:25
  • Yes, you need a compositing WM. IIRC You also usually need to turn compositing on as it's off by default. – John T Sep 13 '09 at 07:51
  • GNOME's default supports CPU-bound compositing, it's just disabled. – Phoshi Sep 13 '09 at 09:55
  • 3
    Hmmmm .... My antivirus shows a trojan in this download ... – Dan Esparza Feb 04 '11 at 20:47
  • @Dan it's not a trojan... Antivirus isn't always right. – John T Feb 04 '11 at 22:37
5

Take a look Console. It's an open source replacement for the windows command shell terminal that supports many interesting features, including transparency. Not sure if it will work on Windows 7, but it's worth a try.

zdan
  • 5,096
  • 1
  • 23
  • 17
  • Correction: It's a terminal replacement, it still uses the same cmd.exe shell. – u1686_grawity Sep 13 '09 at 07:25
  • All the same, it offers transparency to background. It also features tabs so you don't have to have several command windows open at once. And, it doesn't need to use cmd.exe; I have Console set up to run Cygwin bash and PowerShell as well, which is not hard to do at all. – Chris Charabaruk Sep 13 '09 at 16:06
  • I have this installed on Windows 7 (x64) and it works a treat. Plugged into my Cygwin installation's bash shell, as well. A much-needed improvement over the archaic `cmd.exe`. – Mark Jan 09 '12 at 13:25
4

The standard command prompts can be made transparent in all versions of Windows starting from Windows 2000 up to Windows 7 with help of Actual Transparent Window utulity. ATW recently includes this feature and works on both 32 and 64 bits Windows. Please note this is not a command prompt replacement, it works with the native cmd.exe.