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Desktop boundaries

Report bugs with the Rainmeter application and suggest features.
kati42
Posts: 35
Joined: May 4th, 2009, 4:25 am

Desktop boundaries

Post by kati42 »

I would like to be able to programmatically set the desktop boundaries. Right now apparently Rainmeter can reserve desktop area, but only until the resolution changes. However, I have a laptop that I hook up to an external monitor at times. So I change my resolution fairly often.

Not only that, but my laptop is actually a convertible tablet. This means that my *aspect ratio* changes fairly frequently. I am planning to have a button on my config to swap between two configs based on whether I'm using portrait or landscape mode...

But the lack of programmable desktop boundaries has really been a blocker for my Rainmeter development. I was trying to make it work with Desktop Coral and AutoHotKey scripts that would execute when I click the button to swap Rainmeter configs, but so far I haven't figured it out.

(If you're having trouble following why I want different conficts portrait/landscape: I have a 1280x800 screen, which in "normal" landscape orientation, does well with a sidebar. A bar along the top or bottom takes away from the 800 height, which means less height for applications. However, in portrait mode, it's 800x1280. Then the sidebar is subtracting from the 800. So in that orientation I would prefer a top-bar.)

Of course, yet another issue is that I'd like to be able to use a !bang to change the dimensions of an image object, but I'll make that a separate post....
dragonmage
Developer
Posts: 1270
Joined: April 3rd, 2009, 4:31 am
Location: NC, US

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by dragonmage »

This is harder one to get around. I've already made some requests for improvements to DesktopWorkArea, but I don't think anyone has gotten to them yet.

I don't have any experience with Desktop Corral, so I don't think I can help using it to workaround Rainmeter's problem.
kati42
Posts: 35
Joined: May 4th, 2009, 4:25 am

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by kati42 »

Well, as long as you want your boundary to be the same size on the same edge, DesktopCorral is a very useful program. Unfortunately, my needs are more complex with the aspect-ratio changes I have as a tablet user.
kati42
Posts: 35
Joined: May 4th, 2009, 4:25 am

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by kati42 »

I made a request on the DesktopCoral forums, and the author is going to add command-line parameters to set location & size. So we can use !Execute to move the location and size of DesktopCoral.

This is good news, because it means that we can, in the config, set the reserved area. And if our config changes in response to a resolution change, we can update the boundary automatically. :)
User avatar
GhostMatrix
Rainmeter Sage
Posts: 141
Joined: April 18th, 2009, 8:26 pm
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada 45.5658°N, 73.5898°W UTC -5

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by GhostMatrix »

@ kati42

This is a great news!
It's very kind of him to do this for you (and us)

Please give thank to him for this from all of us! :)

GM
If at first you don't succeed; call it version 0.1

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dragonmage
Developer
Posts: 1270
Joined: April 3rd, 2009, 4:31 am
Location: NC, US

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by dragonmage »

Yes, please thank Mouser for us. I hope this will be handled in house soon.
kati42
Posts: 35
Joined: May 4th, 2009, 4:25 am

Re: Desktop boundaries

Post by kati42 »

I may not have time to test this for a few days, but mouser posted a new beta of DesktopCoral that supports several command line options. The post with the link and documentation of the options is located here:

http://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/bb/index.php?topic=18854.msg169776#msg169776

If you use it and like it, make sure to thank mouser and/or send him a couple bucks through DonationCoder...