I still seem to have a problem. I'm running both NS & WS together. Let's say I bring up a saved theme (eg. BIC) in NS. I then bring up my saved BIC theme in WS. Everything is then OK. If I then switch in WS & NS to another theme (eg. Fusion ) but then go back to the BIC theme in NS, NS is OK but WS has reverted to the pre-save config. If I then load the BIC theme in WS, it is OK but in doing that, NS has reverted back to the default (or pre-save config.). Why is this happening? What am I doing wrong?

You got me confused with all that going back and forth between BIC and Fusion!

Anyway, I have an idea of what might be happening: as you are probably aware, WorkShelf and NextSTART, although being individual programs, can also work as a suite. What this means is that they can communicate with each other so that, among other things, when switching themes in one the other automatically assumes the same theme.

This Theme Integration feature can be turned on and off by a switch in both applications. Open NextSTART and WorkShelf Preferences, navigate to the Themes tab and click on the Theme Options button. A dialog panel with open and in it you will find a 'Enable Theme Integration' check box.

My guess is that you have this option turned on in one of the applications but off in the other (ok, my mistake, I agree that this check box should affect both applications, regardless of which application you used to toggle it).

Either that or you have the Preferences panel of, say NextSTART, open when you switch themes in WorkShelf (and vice-versa). This has the potential to confuse NextSTART when you close its Preferences panel.

I'm going to try & explain the problem again since the THEME INTEGRATION does not seem to work with respect to SAVED themes. The only way I can get WS & NS SAVED themes to work together is as follows:

1. Save a theme config. in NS and UNCHECK "enable theme integration".
2. Save a theme config. in WS and UNCHECK "enable theme integration".
3. In order to use these 2 saved configs. together (in the future), load the
theme in WS & in NS (with "enable theme integration" being
unchecked).

Here is my confusion: I would have expected to achieve this by CHECKING "enable theme integration" - not by unchecking it !! In other words, "enabling theme integration" does not seem to work on SAVED themes - one cannot, in the future, load saved themes & have them work (in their "saved" config. if "enable theme integration" is checked.

Look inside the c:\program files\winstep\themes folder and make sure there aren't themes with duplicate or similar folder names (sometimes a manually created folder name of a theme is not the same as the name of the actual configuration files - .wst for NextSTART and .wsw for WorkShelf - and that can lead to problems such as duplicate theme names or the applications loading the wrong theme configuration file).

Enable theme integration in both applications. Now close the Preference panel of both applications. Load a theme through WS's left mini-tab context menu (Appearence and Sounds -> Themes). What exactly happens?

Before doing what you suggest, let me point out that I installed WS & NS in separate folders as follows:

1. C:\Utilities\Nextstart
2. C:\Utilities\Workshelf

I then installed the same themes in Nextstart\themes and Workshelf\themes. Could this be why I have to have "enable theme integration" unchecked?????

If I had installed your way, would I be able to load saved WS & NS themes by only loading EITHER the WS or NS theme (with "enable theme integration"
checked ??).

I have to run & will return in 5 hours. Thanks for your help.

You did WHAT?!

No wonder then. Think about it, the theme files for each program are in physically separate folders - one application does not know about the other. Worse, when you download a theme from the net, you have to import it into BOTH programs (while otherwise you would only import it once, and it would not matter which of the two applications you used to do this).

In order for theme integration to work, you must install BOTH applications into the same folder.

I never received an e-mail advising me of your reply so I just got to it now.
Is there a way I can rectify my installation while keeping my RESAVED themes (7 of them) or do I need to reinstall everything & reconfigure everything?

I suppose I could reinstall both WS & NS as per default (as sub-directories of WinStep) and then overwrite & add from all my current RESAVED themes into the "themes" directory. Will there be separate "themes" directories for both WS & NS or will there be just 1 "theme" directory under Winstep?

Obviously, I currently have separate configured themes for WS & NS.

Sorry for allthe confusion. I first downloaded NextStart & later downloaded WorkShelf and I usually install programs in their own folders. That was the wrong thing to do in this case - as hindsite has shown.

There should only be one themes folder under the ...\winstep directory. How you do this now depends on what changes you did - impossible for me to advise you, it all depends on what you changed and where.