u/WorldlinessSlow9893

I mean... When I look at the Windows 11 start menu... It kinda feels off. Most of the time it isn't really "docked" to the Taskbar when it is centered or when it will be on the left side, it is just a disaster.

For me I prefer the Windows 10 layout, as just when you look at it and understand the "psychology" behind it, then the first thing you did, was go with your cursor to the left-bottom corner, move up and YOU already are in the Power options menu.

The same principle is in Windows 9x, but there the Cursor still can't be really docked in the corner, as there will be the text of "The Windows name" so you have to slightly move it right again to press the button.

But on Windows 10? You are there instantly and you can even remember the movements to a muscle memory and you probably can shutdown it in just a matter of seconds. (I used it mainly to open File Explorer that way, as those buttons are customizable)

And Windows 11? That is completely off. Now what is this? Now I had to first look at the taskbar, calculate the movement where my mouse should go if it will be centered and then AFTER calculate a distance between the actual power option or the File Explorer shortcut now being on the OTHER SIDE to click on that frickin button.

Yeah adding it to the left will avoid the Start button problem, but the Start menu will still be a disaster. As now when you move your mouse really quick to the left-bottom and you go slightly up... There's a desktop. Not the start menu, so you HAD TO move BACK to the right side and be careful to not fast click on the desktop instead on the button...

But well... Tell me your opinion :)

You'll not realize how excited I am rn.

What you are seeing is the "thing, anyone said it is impossible." And I made it work!

It took me 1 month. First experimented with the Windows' drivers, but to get access to the screen information (frame buffer) first, it needs to be running in a **Native Mode** when all the Kernel drivers load, including WDDM that will have the Buffer inside.

But that is still too late. You can display graphics, even play **DOOM** on that level while all NT calls are heard by the kernel and the Win32 Mode (GUI environment) hasn't even started yet.

To make a system root "Driver" it needs a "Start" parameter in the registry assigned to 0 when it will be in the place when `winload.efi` will load it as quick as it can... But it has one problem.

At that time, Windows isn't even fully loaded and the driver has no chance to even get any info from the Hardware itself, so it is just useless and in many cases, the driver will not even run. As "drivers" can be particually as "mods" it still isn't enough...

But then it hit me something... Windows is running on top of **UEFI** and... You can do a LOT OF STUFF...

If in that stage, Windows is basically requesting ANYTHING from the UEFI, the Screen,... , basic information it loads...

What if I could make an *.efi file, that Already gets the FrameBuffer first, that Windows?

Then I started messing around, getting some basic text to be displayed where I can on the screen, then implemented some Bitmap logic... It worked! And it was surprisingly easy to draw anything in UEFI.

So I "grab" a little bit of code from the EfiGuard (don't run it on your main PC if you don't know what you're doing) which is also a "simple" EFI program that just hooks to the winload.efi and bootmgfw.efi and doesn't even triggers any of the KPP (Kernel Patch Protection),...

I needed it because by this, we could also see the kernel calls, including:

- You can even restore for exp. The progress bar thing that was on Windows 2000 `InbvUpdateProgressBar`

- And other stuff I don't have in my head rn. :D

So now you can add ANY BITMAP, ANY COLOR, ANYTHING to the Windows' boot screen!

*(Oh and it will work only with Secure Boot to be off.)*

But, when I was testing it... I kinda realized, that the KPP must be turned off, as Windows even detects other EFI stuff happening near it, causing it to not even go into the stage of booting...

I'll be fixing this more. Stay tuned!

Seriously, what tf is going on?? Now for some reason I've my dislike button hidden in those 3 dots on Long form videos...

Anybody has it like this too? Or am I here the only one?? YOUTUBE, STOP, DISABLING, THE, DISLIKE BUTTON.

(for the nerds, yeah, HAL.DLL is counted as Drivers)

^(Don't really want a promotion but it is still interesting, if you want to see the full discovery:) ^(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZAUPki-aXQ)

Hey! If you know some "Windows basics" into the programming or you know some of the internal calls/how Windows works, then this post still may be mindblowing :D

We all know that Windows has just "one" GUI environment and that is the Win32 SubSystem, where all the Graphical User Interface starts. Your Windows, Buttons,... (uxtheme.dll, dwm.exe,...)

While this "environment" is also mainly controlled with a driver win32ss.sys that holds Windows "Windows" and it is like that a really long time, since of the first release of NT 3.1. But the really first thing what Windows is doing at start, is loading a UEFI file bootmgfw.efi, which initializes the boot manager and hands over control to the Windows Kernel (ntoskrnl.exe).

And here comes the mindblowing part that most people completely miss:
Before win32k.sys or the Desktop Window Manager (DWM) first it runs in a purely Native NT environment.

Long before Session 1 (your user session) spawns, the Session Manager SubSystem (smss.exe) initializes Session 0. At this ultra-early stage, the Win32 subsystem doesn't exist yet. There are no standard windows, no mouse cursor and none of the Win32 API calls we are used to as developers. (so user32.dll, shell32.dll, gdi32.dll,... don't work.)

Instead, the system relies strictly on ntdll.dll and raw Native API calls (like NtDisplayString).

Normally, this native environment is just a brief, invisible from the public eye and used (made) to run autochk.exe (chkdsk at boot) or Blue Screens of Death (BSOD) before csrss.exe kicks in and starts the Win32 subsystem. But what if you block Win32 from loading entirely, or hijack this early native phase to see what the NT kernel is really capable of?

And did you know, your path like C:\Your\Folder\File.exe is actually fake? When you are in the NtNative state of Windows, even those paths aren't real. They have a completelly different structure, something like Linux has...

For exp. "C:\Windows" means in NtNative: "\Device\Harddisk1\Partition1\Windows" and with this, it is totally possible to make folders like "con", aux,... as for the ntoskrnl itself isn't that "dangerous" the reason why you cant make it, is the Win32 SubSystem blocking you from. As that layer is from the MS-DOS era,...

Let me know what you guys think, or if anyone else here has experimented with the Native NT subsystem!

I know that it is rn. just a "hacked GPU" but when I found how to import a mouse/keyboard driver, it would be super awesome!

It was made from scratch as I saw an old image on X that there was claiming to be "Windows is based on MS-DOS" which is not true from Windows XP.

So I made a fixed version to may "clear" the misinformation the old "image" had, I guess all of you should be fine here :D

If there will be something "of" comment me :3