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Classic Shell is a collection of features that were available in older versions of Windows but are removed from Vista and Windows 7. It brings back the classic start menu that Windows 7 doesn't support, adds a toolbar for Windows Explorer and adds couple more smaller features.

Classic Start Menu is a clone of the original start menu, which you can find in all versions of Windows from 95 to Vista. It has a variety of advanced features:

* Drag and drop to let you organize your applications
* Options to show Favorites, expand Control Panel, etc
* Shows recently used documents. The number of documents to display is customizable
* Translated in 35 languages, including Right-to-left support for Arabic and Hebrew
* Does not disable the original start menu in Windows. You can access it by Shift+Click on the start button
* Right-click on an item in the menu to delete, rename, sort, or perform other tasks
* Available for 32 and 64-bit operating systems
* Has support for skins, including additional 3rd party skins
* Fully customizable in both looks and functionality
* Support for Microsoft’s Active Accessibility
* And last but not least – it's FREE!

Added a setting to track and display the recently used programs
The middle mouse button can be used to open the start menu
Fixed an incompatibility with X-Mouse and other mouse bugs
Fixed some problems with separators

- Ctrl+Shift+Click in the start menu runs the program as administrator
- The uninstaller offers to back up the ini files
- Some improvements to the settings
- Fixed a bug that was blocking the toolbar on Windows Vista
- Fixed an incompatibility problem with QTTabBar
- Fixed a start menu bug that was causing a flicker when Windows was running
for too long
- Fixed a hovering bug in the start menu

- Fixed a compatibility bug with older applications (you see the message "The ordinal 345 could not be located in the dynamic link library COMCTL32.dll")
- Fixed a problem with the backing up of the ini files during uninstall

* Fixed a bug in the "EnableContextMenu" setting
* Fixed a compatibility bug with Restorator

- Replaced the ini files with a graphical interface for editing all settings
- Added a setting to force sorting headers in Windows 7 (based on the
Explorer7Fixes tool by Ian Prest)
- Added more settings
- Added special handling for specific folders in the start menu - Computer,
Recycle Bin, Network, etc

- Added a toolbar command for creating a new folder
- Added a way for the custom toolbar commands to receive all selected files
- Added a white list and a black list to limit which processes can load Classic
Explorer
- Fixed the Z-order problems when the start menu is activated by hovering
- Fixed the spontaneous expanding of the All Programs menu
- Small improvements to the settings UI

- Fixed some minor problems found in the previous version
- Added the contents of the GodMode folder to the search in the start menu

- Fixed some minor problems found in the previous release. Most notably the
corrupted text in the toolbar buttons
- Added a check if a new version is available
- Ctrl+Click in the navigation pane opens the folder in a new window
- Alt+Enter in the search box of the start menu shows properties of the
selected item
- The recent documents list can be sorted by name or extension

- Fixed a small problem in the automatic check for a new version

Added support for Windows 8 Consumer Preview:
- Added customizable start button
- Added a Metro skin for the start menu
- Updated all settings for Windows 8
- Fixed the missing caption in IE10
Added a setting to control the menu shadows
Added toolbar commands to map and disconnect network drives
Improved the responsiveness of the check for a new version
The check for new version is a separate component that can be skipped during install

- Windows 8 is now officially supported
- Added more customization settings for the start button
- Added a setting to disable all Metro hot corners
- Improved the initial setup of the start menu
- Added support for split menu buttons
- Improved the usage of the Aero colorization in skins
- Fixed some bugs found in the previous version

- Added support for jump lists in the main menu
- Added support for displaying and launching Windows Store apps in Windows 8
- Faster skipping of the Metro screen in Windows 8
- Fixed some bugs found in the previous version

- New setting to disable the taskbar transparency
- Improved compatibility with future versions of Windows
- Fixed some bugs found in the previous version

- Fixed incompatibility with the taskbar of Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012

Version 3.9.5 release candidate (Sep, 2013):

Windows 8.1 RTM is officially supported
Added animated menu transitions for the Windows 7 style
Added status bar for Explorer in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 to show the total size of the selected files and the free disk space
Improved hovering functionality for the start button
New feature allows administrators to modify the default settings without locking them
Fixed many bugs reported during the beta