Taskbar oddity with Windows 10 1903 and Open-Shell 4.4.131

[CTVCAM8]

Hello I have found something weird happening with the combination of Windows 10 1903 and Open-Shell 4.4.131 and "Customized taskbar" setting.

No problem with "Taskbar Look" on "Opaque" or "Transparent" or "Glass" settings of Open-Shell along with Windows 10 "Transparency effects" turned on. Opened windows can be seen moving behind the taskbar.

Problem If Windows 10 "Transparency effects" is turned off and Open-Shell taskbar "Glass settings" selected, then the window behind taskbar does not move to the new location (see picture)

It's like the position is frozen. What's more bizarre is if I move the scroll bar, I can see it visibly moving in the old window location!

Changing to "Next desktop background" or adjusting taskbar height resets/refreshes to a new view.

Don't know if this is a Windows problem or Open-Shell/Classic Shell problem. Just thought you might want to know about it.

[NebelNidas]

Maybe Open-Shell could circumvent this, but basically it's a Windows problem. I had similar issues and wanted to report them, until I found out the problem was my transparency effects being disabled.

When having transparency effects off and auto-hide taskbar on, you get these behaviors:

• When you have a window underneath the taskbar and then show the desktop (by pressing Windows + D or the "Show Desktop" button on the taskbar), the taskbar will still show the windows as before, until it gets updated when collapsing.
• Same as above, but have two windows beneath the taskbar this time. Show the taskbar. Now Alt + Tab to the second window, the one, which currently is not selected. The taskbar again will not update.
• Sometimes, when timing it just right, you are able to show a window preview tooltip on the taskbar with the start menu being on top of it - when now switching through the preview tooltips, the blur part of the menu (when enabled) will also not update.

[CTVCAM8]

Thank you for commenting on this.

Well, if it's a Windows problem, there is not much point in making a complicated fix for it in Open Shell.

I can live with it.

[Marebul]

I may be a little late, but I just encountered the same issue after installing W10 21H2 LTSC. I was on 1809 before, where everything was fine. A tweak in Winaero Tweaker caused the issue : it is called "Increase taskbar transparency", and can also be enabled or disabled through registry (https://winaero.com/increase-taskbar-transparency-level-in-windows-10 for more details). Hope this helps nonetheless !

[vincolus]

I'm experiencing the same issue with the latest version of Open-Shell on Windows 10 (22H2 Build 19045.5073). It appears that the upper part of the taskbar is a static blurred image, capturing whatever was last displayed when the taskbar updated. Meanwhile, the lower part seems to be only transparent, showing any content I drag underneath it.

Interestingly, this problem doesn’t affect the Start menu, which still displays content—such as videos—correctly through the glass effect when open.

I've tested every combination of Windows 10 transparency settings (both under Colors and Ease of Access), but none seem to resolve the issue or make the effect refresh continuously, as expected.

I'm uncertain about what specifically caused this, but I could have sworn it worked properly until I altered the taskbar texture. Has anyone else encountered this? Reverting to default settings and reinstalling Open-Shell hasn’t helped.