Integrating into the Start Menu

  • Article

At any given time there can be 20 custom Start menu strips displayed to the user, each containing up to five tiles. As a general rule, the application should have at least three entry points to make use of a custom Start menu strip. The following image shows an example:

A sample custom Start menu strip

In Windows 7, creating a custom Start menu strip is much simpler than in previous versions of Windows Media Center:

  • In the registration XML file, add an attribute to the application element to define the name of the application's custom Start strip. For example:

    StartMenuStripTitle="My Start Menu Title"

  • In the registration XML file, add an attribute to the application element using the Custom Start Menu category to define the application's category. For example:

    StartMenuStripCategory="Custom Start Menu\MyApp"

  • Each tile in the custom Start menu strip corresponds to an entry point. Specify which Start menu strip the tiles belong to by specifying the application category, and specify the order for up to five tiles in that strip. For example:

    <category category="Custom Start Menu\MyApp" order="3"/>

  • Images on custom Start menu strips should be a 16:9 aspect ratio. All other tiles are square (1:1).

For more information, see the Registration sample, located in the [WMCSDK_InstallPath]\Samples\Registration folder.

Sample Explorer

  • ApplicationContext > InstallApplication

See Also