The panel allows users to capture external application. It can have lots of application specific problems.

Version 4.1, Released April 29th, 2005, New Features:
- Added translation support. Anyone who wants to translate this panel - you're welcome.
- Wait Forever not remembered bug fixed.
- Fixed the redraw issue where the window will disappear after autohide until mouse-over.
- When Release Capture is not relevant it will be disabled.

Version 4, Released March 10th, 2005, New Features:
- Release Capture / Recapture added to the right click context menu.
- Ability to start searching for the window again when its process is terminated.
- Ability to center the captured window in the panel.
- Ability to suppress the notification when the window to capture is not found by the panel.

NEW FEATURES for v3:
- Capture engine much improved, no more crashing and hanging of DS.
- New panel icon.
- Option to run file only if it's not already running.
- DSPACKAGE installation file.

NEW FEATURES for v2:
- Option to auto-size the captured window to the size of the panel.
- Option to release capture / recapture the window.
- Option to not close the captured application on exit.
- Some bugs were fixed.

Some ideas for capturing:
- Notepad (only the text area, not the whole window)
- Trillian
- Calculator

Installation:
1) Download the DSPACKAGE file from the Extenstion Exchange page.
1) Open the DSPACKAGE file while Desktop Sidebar is running.

Please post feedback in this thread.

-GoMa

Great plugin! .I suggest you to use:C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v1.1.4322\regasm.exe /regfile c:\plugin.It will create a file that you can add to the zip file and the user wil be able to register the plugin by clicking on that file.Try it!

I like your panel but it could have been better if it could capture an application and still let the user to use it outside the panel.I was trying to capture Windows calculator,but I could only use it from the panel.I don't if it is possible but it will be better to fix it.

yyy - what do you mean by using it outside the panel? If you want you can open another instance of it and use it outside DS.

But if I capture an application I can't launch it again normally,not with the plugin.

Of course you can - I just captured the windows Calculator, and then launched it (Start->Programs->Accessories->Calculator).
What's the problem?

-GoMa

Oh,yes,you're right.I'm really realkly sorry.It didn't work for me before,probably my computer stuck. But now when I tried to capture Windows Messenger I couldn't use it outside the panel.
Can you try to add an option to shrink applications?It will be very cool because it takes a lot of space in my sidebar.

yyy - I'll try, though I don't promise anything.

-GoMa

Thank you very much. .Good work!

mhh....I think the best plugin

This is a plugin for everything!!!

...and the best is to use it with trillian!!

TOP!

Really cool. Still having some weird crashes trying to capture a TV window but it did work for a bit. The problem I first ran into was it wouldn't size in right. And then a memory exception.
But I'm going to keep at it.

Such a cool tool though.

Indian_Mayhem -
Thanks!
Concerning the problem you had with the memory exception - some programs have problems when their window is captured, because they expect it to be there but it's not . Can you try to capture the same window with BandIt and tell me if it works?
And what do you mean by "it didn't size right"?

-GoMa

Very impressive. I agree that it would be nice to have a auto-fit type of feature that would shrink or stretch the program to the width and/or height of the panel, but I'm sure you have a life beyond DS. Excellent Panel! Great Job!

~acommonjo

The sizing issue was me thinking that the panel would try to resize it automatically. I presized the TV window to fit the space I wanted and it did it perfectly.

The new funky thing I noticed was I broke the capture when I resize the application within the panel. Bandit seems to retain the capture when I try to do the same thing.

But I haven't seen that error occur again. But I try it with Samurize soon to see if I can do some real neat stuff with it.

I'm writing a small guide to make it working with Mediamonkey. I will send the link here soon.

Want to see a VERY funny side effect?

Drag the "Finder" and drop on your desktop. Once this is done you will need to either reboot or End Task on "Explorer" and then use the Task Manager to launch a new "Explorer" because Explorer itself will be captured... and I mean the main one that includes your desktop, not IE.

I'm going to add myself to the group that says I love this plugin. Here's a list of issues and suggestions for moving forward with it:

1) Allow a captured application to be "uncaptured" without having to close it.
2) If another application is "captured" in the same panel because you decided to dock something else in there... the previous application should first be "uncaptured" or at least shutdown. I found that the original captured application is left captured and running but non-accessible.
3) Allow each "capture panel" to permanently store the previously captured information which is automatically launches and recaptures the next time you run DS.

I've found that if a window is captured that does not have focus, it can't get focus inside the capture panel.

Thanks everyone!
I'm going to add an option to resize the window (as if you resized it yourself).
Indian_Mayhem - I think I know what causes the resize issue (that causes the capture to be broken). Did you try to wait one second after you resized the window? (The panel automatically repositions the window into the panel every second if it gets out).
Mattisking -
1) I'll add an option to not close the captured application when sidebar closes.
2) I am killing the process of any previously captured application once a new one is captured. How did you find that out?
3) The panel retains its properties, doesn't it? Do you mean that one panel at a time works, but more than one doesn't?

-GoMa

I'll give you a more detailed report later. I had a lot of problems with Trillian tonight and a few others. Did you see that previous post about capturing explorer? (I did that accidentally)

The first attempt to resize went slighty okay, but I tried to resize immediately after that and it went behind DS (ontop always).

But I've now had it running for awhile now with no issues. It is really neat with Dscaler as well especially since you can hide everything but the video. Again, bravo. I agree with Mattisking having a way to release it if needed would be nice.

So I realized that capturing the DirectDraw window instead of the TV application frame is a much better in terms of stability and autoresizing if you resize DS.

Hi,I have good ideas to use with that panel:Try capturing MSpaint or small games like minesweeper.That way you'll be able to draw from DS and to save pictures or to play while your'e waiting or just for fun.Indian_Mayhem offered a games panel-you can do it with that panel!
Have fun

OK, so this panel flickers like crazy when I move my mouse over the window and then out of it. I don't think it needs to be updated unless that is cause by the fact that DS is updating the panel view since the skin is changing on mouse over. Second, this works great in a stack. However, if the window isn't large enough, I can't use my scroll wheel on the mouse to scroll through the list. The scrollbar works, but does not update as you move it up or down. It updates the view when you let go. does that make sense? I'd like to use my scroll wheel in this panel. But this is an excellent feature.

I don't really understand your problem, eitaneko - do you mean I should add scroll buttons to the panel if the window is too large? If so, it will only add more flickering!

-GoMa

Before capture, i can use the scroll wheel on my mouse to scroll. Once capture, the scroll doesn't work. It would be nice to support that.


I can't tell if the flickering is caused by your panel or by the hover function in DS. It flickers when I hover over, and then move my mouse off the panel. I guess it's part of the update function and not really a problem. I think all you really need to update is on window paint events.

eitaneko - that's exactly what I'm doing - refresh the window on the paint event.

-GoMa

Humm, very cool plugin

Is posible to reduce the flickering ? or make something so that it's not so apparent (maybe a fade in fade out, so it doen't really flicker)

I have found a very interesting utility for the panel, capture a explorer window sure you can do a similar thing with the toolbar panel, but it's not the same as having a true explorer

I have tried to capture not the whole explorer window but only part of it, I have found than for example I can capture the inside of the notepad without problems (by inside I mean no toolbar, no menubars, nothing, only the white part) it works fine, but when I try to capture the inside of a explorer window (the main files view or the tree view window) it doesn't work... it show the window for a couple of seconds and then disapear... do you know why ?

Edit: as a sidenote, when I try to capture the files view of dreamweaver in the panel the panel goes crazy, cpu utilization goes up to 100% and the sidebar hangs...

Drakecoldwinter -
Thanks for your comments.
The problem with this panel is that not every application lets you capture their windows. What I mean is that they depend on the fact that their windows are where they expect them to be, and if not they "go crazy". Because of that there are a lot of application specific issues with this panel.

-GoMa

Well, I managed to kill my desktop pretty good....I told it to capture the taskbar. Word of advice guys...don't do that. =P

Ironclad I did that as well man did I have fun :-)

-Reg

I think you can call it one second. It's more like a half a second where I've caused it to break the capture. It's more where I'm trying to resize and then I have to let go to get a different part of the window to resize. If that made any sense.

The other factor which you alluded to earlier is that I think it is also partly PowerVCR II's fault. I can't seem to get it to do the same problem with Dscaler. Miranda does very well in there as well.

But either way, you've definitely opened a new world for me. I'm now at a point where 2 DSs with 1600x1200 resolution isn't enough to hold all that I need. My only request would be a way to release the application and to capture the application from the panel (where I don't have to go to the properties). But I'm still highly satisfied with it.

Props

Updated the panel and added some options. See first post for updates.

-GoMa

I tried to capture ICQ Lite, but the CPU usage of the sidebar increased to 99%, and it just got stuck.

Same shit happened with MSN Messenger.

Nice!

But still some problems:

:::::::::::::::::

DS crashes on many applications if you want to capture them and select the option "start with DS". It crashes on many programs that had been working before (in the first Beta)

:::::::::::::::::

capture -> release capture -> close captured program -> recapture

:::::::::::::::::

if "start with DS" is disabled and program is not started before DS, also a crash occurs.

:::::::::::::::::

Well, xman, in crashed do you mean hung? If so, than it's expected to "crash" because the program doesn't exist and it searches for it. I'll add a check when recapturing to see if the process is still alive. I'll also try to improve the window search code.

-GoMa

Right! Sorry for the impreciseness.
In every described situation DS hungs and uses nearly 100 percent of the CPU. So the process is still alive...

I also waited a few (perhaps 5?) minutes but nothing happened.

Or should I just wait?
I'll try it

Well, xman, in the situations you described there is no point in waiting because the application has closed and the window is gone forever . As I said, I will add code to check whether the application has closed so sidebar won't hang.

-GoMa

Are there any more suggestions for the panel? I think it is completed for now.

-GoMa

I had an interesting problem. When I captured a window, then released the capture, then closed DS....when I reopened DS, it captured my window again automatically, even after I released it before closing. The recapture option is a good one, but it needs to be reset on closing of DS or removal of the panel.

Also, it would be neat if when you release the capture, it could return the window to its previous size and position.

eitaneko -
Can you explain yourself better?
Do you mean that you released the capture, closed DS (and didn't close the captured program), relaunched DS and the same instance of the app was captured? Or maybe you mean that you did close the released application, relauched DS and the application was run and captured again? If it is the latter, then this is by design.

-GoMa

Sorry for the ambiguity:

I use Gaim as an IM client. I capture the entire window of the buddy list to put into the capture plugin (I have it set to not run a second copy of the app when I do the caputre). I then want to release the capture so that I have my buddy list back on the desktop so I can close DS. When I press release, it returns to my desktop as expected. I then close DS. When I reopen DS, the buddy list (same instance) automatically gets recaptured into the panel. It is definitely the first option you suggested.

Do you have the "Run file..." option selected? If not, then again, it is by design to capture the same instance (or another instance if it is open).

-GoMa

No, I don't have the run option set so I guess my "problem" is by design. However, I assume that if you release a capture, the plugin shouldn't necessarily assume you want to recapture on startup. Maybe there should be an option to clear the panel's memory. I appreciate the design, but I think I need the choice.

This plugin is awesome!

I've got Miranda going sweet, (i just couldn't wait 'till the next build of DS)

I took a screenshot of my DS and copied and pasted the blank background to use as a miranda background, so apart from the scroll bar, it looks fully skinned.

I guess we'll have to see what the built in Miranda panel looks like in the next build.

Thanks sPiel and Indian_Mayhem!
eitaneko -
I'll try to add an option - "Do not capture again if capture is released".

-GoMa

Or have the panel reset when it is removed or DS is closed. Thank you so much! This panel is amazing!