Rainmeter Causing Tooltips Issue

[sl23]

I recently updated MuLab which added a new Tooltip system to it's menus. This is when I noticed it first. One minute the Tooltips worked in this app, then after an update it stopped working. I also noticed that another function in MuLab stopped working. When you hover over a menu item group, the sub group opens to show the content of this sub menu.

I contacted the developer of MuLab about this and during his efforts to sort it out, thinking it was a MuLab issue, I thought about other apps having issues with tooltips. I remember months earlier noticing that apps had stopped using tooltips. But the info wasn't important as such, just button names. Didn't cause any concern, so I sort of dismissed it.

Now though, it's impeding the functionality of my DAW. For some reason, I just thought to close Rainmeter to see if the problem was solved. It worked. Closing RM removed the problem with tooltips and the menu group hover to open issue.

So here I am with video as proof that RM is the cause. I started with RM closed, hovered over SynWrite toolbar items to show it's tooltips. Then hovered over MuLab's toolbar to show tooltips here. After this, I opened a Menu and hovered over the sub menus to show them opening. I repeated all of this after starting RM to show how none of it worked.

Please can you solve this system wide bug. Thank you.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fVxm79A1lmYDOmf9IAFsJ8zMXK44jNFT/view?usp=sharing

[jsmorley]

There is no video, so it's hard to be sure, but I suspect your skins are in fact overlapping the external item that has the tooltip.

You can see how big a Rainmeter skin actually is by holding down CTRL-ALT and clicking it.

[sl23]

Sorry, I was collabing with MuLab dev. He said he thinks he sees what's going on. I've just asked if he can explain it. I may not understand but you might.

I've just uploaded a link to the video on GDrive in the post above.

[sl23]

I think I see what you're saying. That a skin is overlaying the windows of other apps and causing tips and hover malfunctions?
That isn't the case. I have 5 skins in use. 3 located at the bottom of the screen, at Stay Topmost position, and one in the top right, which is at desktop level. The final skin is deactivated unless specific apps are started. This skin I called Screensaver, which is simply a darkened background to cover the desktop and reduce other windows brightness, allowing the emulator windows to be more highlighted.

This skin is Deactivated on RM start. So I can't understand how this could be the cause. I tried the CTRL+Alt click on the Desktop to see if the skin is somehow active but invisible, no red background appears.

Jo has requested not to be contacted and will not investigate this further, due to time constraints.

[jsmorley]

Yeah, well the issue is with any skins you have that are in front of the application window. That is going to interfere with mouse detection.

[sl23]

So if a skin is 1 pixel and is set to Stay Topmost, it affects the entire screen?
Is there a way around this? Or is it intrinsic to how RM works?

[jsmorley]

So if a skin is 1 pixel and is set to Stay Topmost, it affects the entire screen?
Is there a way around this? Or is it intrinsic to how RM works?

No, but a skin that is the size of the entire screen, and set to Stay Topmost, certainly would.

[sl23]

What I don't understand is that it WAS working a short while ago. Jo released an update to MuLab which added tooltips to menu items. I updated and tested it, it worked. Then the next update a few days later added some more and then they didn't work, nor did the menu hover function. Why would that be?

I had already created a MiniLauncher to go on the side of the screen, which was running during the initial test of MuLab's hints.

I have just tried a little test. Unloaded MiniLaunch which is now placed above the taskbar, at Stay Topmost. Problem still active.
Then Unloaded my Taskbar skin, which I can see protrudes invisibly above the TaskBar by about 1 or 2 pixels. Problem solved.

So I'll try to reduce the skin height of the Taskbar skin to see if that works. But that's a great deal of work!

It seems the Taskbar is a safe area. Unless there is something within a skin that is the issue?

[sl23]

No, but a skin that is the size of the entire screen, and set to Stay Topmost, certainly would.

So only the area of a skin causes this interference?

If a skin is deactivated when not required, does this remove the cause?

The screensaver skin is set at default position, or it would cover everything and be useless for it's intented purpose.

Why would a Skin set over the Taskbar cause issue at the top of the screen?

[jsmorley]

I personally don't recommend putting skins on top of the Windows taskbar and setting them to Stay on Top. This will cause a constant fight between the skin and Windows, which will struggle to keep the taskbar on top.