FAQ

Welcome to the official, community-edited Enigma FAQ!

How do I use Enigma?

Enigma is not an application itself. It’s a suite of desktop widgets, or skins, which run on the Rainmeter platform. To use Enigma, you need to have Rainmeter installed.

If you’re brand new to the Rainmeter community, and you’ve never heard of any of this stuff before, I highly recommend reading Rainmeter 101, the official tutorial for using and customizing skins. It’s a great introduction to the strange and sometimes confusing world of Rainmeter, and it will likely answer many of your questions about Enigma, as well.

Note: the answers to many of the questions below will assume that you have read Rainmeter 101, or are otherwise familiar with using and editing Rainmeter skins.

How do I replace my Windows taskbar?

Rainmeter does not replace your Windows visual style, taskbar or Explorer shell. It is a standalone application which adds free-floating widgets, or “skins,” to your desktop. Many customizers use Rainmeter as one of several different components used to create an overall style or appearance. It often takes a lot of work to make these separate components blend together seamlessly, but the effort is rewarding, and the results attractive - which is probably what led you, in turn, to discover Rainmeter!

The easiest way to change the look of your windows and taskbar is to install a custom visual style. There are literally hundreds of these available on deviantArt, WinCustomize and elsewhere. (Note: most require you to use the Uxtheme.dll Patcher for XP, Vista and 7. The patcher is very easy to use, and poses no harm to your system.)

To replace the Windows taskbar, you’ll need a program like RocketDock or ObjectDock. Windows also has a built-in setting to auto-hide your taskbar. In addition, you can download Visage, our own little Autohotkey-based accessory which allows you to toggle the visibility of the taskbar with a hotkey.

Most dramatically, you can install a shell replacement, such as LiteStep or Emerge Desktop, which completely disable the default Windows Explorer desktop shell and replaces them with its own window manager. These are extremely powerful tools, with many additional plugins and themes of their own, but they are also complicated and occasionally error-prone. If you aren’t comfortable with in-depth Windows customizing and system tweaking, you should be cautious when trying these tools for the first time.