GridMove Lite Portable | Windows7/8 ready, combine w/ Aero Snap | XP/Vista Supp.

[helloall]

Hey all,


maybe some Windows 7/8/8.1 users are interested in trying my custom "GridMove Lite Portable" version.

I made it primarily as a preconfigured lightweight "out of box solution" which can be combined perfectly with the Windows 7/8/8.1 built-in "Aero Snap".
It extends the built-in "Aero Snap" function seamlessly.
(Since v1.3.2 it works very well for XP and Vista too)


(Last update 2013-10-12):
Download GridMove Lite Portable v1.4.1
Link removed because offline
mirror:



Feedback welcome!


Changelog:
new in v1.0-1.2
- new icon (@jgpaiva: feel free to use it in future versions if you like to)
- portable mode only: uses .ini-file only, does not read settings from windows users folder
- only 1 pre-configured self made grid for good usage combined with Windows 7 built in "AeroSnap" feature (grid supports dual monitor)
- pre-configured settings for Windows 7 (SafeMode, EdgeDrag @ Edge Time 250, most extra stuff disabled)
- removed most of the menus
- removed right-click-hotkey which changed the grid (not needed since it´s an one-grid-solution)
- changed grid-color slightly

new in v1.3
- Auto-Disable GridMove-Transparency if Aero (GPU based Desktop rendering) is disabled. (The transparency does not feel very good without GPU based Desktop rendering)
(Checks every 10 seconds for a change)
- Re-enabled and resolution change checker"
("ReloadOnResolutionChange", checks every 10 seconds)

new in v1.3.1
- auto-calculating caption-heights (now works for XP, Vista, 7. should work even with very custom caption-font-sizes, caption-heights, border-heights and windows classic- and accessbility themes)
hint only for users who use windows font-scaling above 100% (standard): GridMove also works with windows font-scaling above 100% (standard). BUT in Vista or 7 you have to use the old "Windows XP style DPI scaling" method. It´s a checkbox in the submenu of the font scaling menu you have to check.
- now detects os version: xp and vista/7. if vista/7 is detected caption-heights for some special windows (CabinetWClass,IEFrame) are calculated differently
- some minor changes and improvements

new in v1.3.2
- More Windows XP/Vista friendly: Added maximize function to dead top center area of the screen if XP or Vista is detected, Windows 7 does not need it since it has it built in (Aero Snap)
- Change EdgeTime to 0 if Windows XP/Vista detected, value for Windows 7 stays at 250
- Change name to "GridMove Portable 7Lite". Makes more sense i think
- some minor changes and improvements

new in v1.3.2a
- Fixed a bug in "Ignore/Unignore Window" function: Fixed errors with special characters like \.*?+[{|()^$ in exceptions list

new in v1.3.2b
- Set "resize-window-border" to 3 px because it´s calculated wrong in by Windows 7
- color changes (grid color and overlay color)
- GridMove now works with Windows Vista/7 high dpi "new scaling method":
The Vista/7 "new scaling method" is automatically disabled for GridMove via compatibility-flag. The registry-flag is only set once - the first time you start GridMove - so no worries
- some minor changes and improvements

new in v1.4 (2013-10-05)
- renamed to "GridMove Lite Portable"
- introducing windows 8 / 8.1 support
- updated icon (higher resolution)
- added file icon for .exe files
- minor bugfixes and enhancements

new in v1.4.1 (2013-10-12)
- improved windows 8 / 8.1 support
- tried to fix nasty GridMove-bug when using 2 or more displays - caused edgedrag not to work in some sporadic situations. looks good now, needs more testing
- new tray option: use transparency even without DRM
- new tray option: disable auto-reload on resolution change
- optimized tray menu
- now supporting up to 3 displays (2 before)
- grid border size now 2px instead of 1px
- changed about-menu (modern style and tabs reordered)
- changed first-run message and traytip
- nicer message windows for "Ignore/unignore window"
- minor bugfixes and enhancements
- files still compiled with AutoHotkey Basic (1.0.48.05 + latest upx) because of issues with AutoHotkey_L

[jgpaiva]

I have split this topic, in order to reduce the entropy in gridmove's topic

Is 65pt a good value for you? doesn't it inadvertedly start when you click other buttons at the top of windows?

[helloall]

Thanks for moving my post.

65px was a the maximum height value you can drag the explorer window under windows 7.


The thing under Windows 7 is:

You can even drag the windows-explorer window below the "explorer-adress-bar" (showing the path), not only in the upper caption-area.
And to make it worse other "normal" maximized windows like Firefox have a smaller caption height (which is almost as small as under XP).
So there is no perfect value to use.

I had no real problems with 65px, although i could provoke the EdgeDetection when dragging some menus in the window, which is not correct.


I think that´s what you mean?



To minimize the "problem" i now changed the value again:
- 35px (windows font size @ 96dpi standard)
which is the exact max. caption height. i´m ignoring the fact that you can drag the windows-explorer window below the "explorer-adress-bar" (since nobody drags a window at this area)
- 46px (only if windows font size higher than 96dpi detected)
which is the exact max. caption height when using a window font-zoom of 200 percent.



I can imagine only one solution for the "problem":

We have to detect if a window is really in "dragged state" to avoid the EdgeDetecting firing when dragging window menus and moving the cursor to the left edge of the screen at the same time. (for example)

But this is not possible as far as i read in the AHK docs and forums?

[helloall]

New idea to solve the problem:

Almost all windows which have a higher caption height like the windows-explorer window have the class name "CabinetWClass".

I think i will detect this and set the higher value only for this class.
We´ll see.


Edit:

Exact values should be the following, i think:

Normal windows @ non-maximized state:
30px caption height for GridMove

Normal windows @ maximized state:
22px caption height for GridMove

Special windows "CabinetWClass" @ non-maximized state:
34px caption height for GridMove

Special windows "CabinetWClass" @ maximized state:
26px caption height for GridMove


Will try to implement it.

[jgpaiva]

Yes, I imagined something like that might happen. In win7, the height of the titlebar of a window changes with a few things.

[helloall]

I think we got an rock solid solution now.

I filtered two window classes (CabinetWClass,IEFrame). These two are the only special window classes i´ve found in Win7. All other windows seem to be standard windows with normal caption height.

Normal windows now use:
29px (seems to work perfect for both non-maximized and maximized state)

Special windows (higher caption) now use:
33px (seems to work perfect for both non-maximized and maximized state)


As you can see i corrected the value down by 1px as a result of more testing.
Now they seem to be the perfect values to not start inadvertedly but nonetheless it works every time you drag the window)

Updated first post with new download v1.2

I´m very happy with the result.

[helloall]

New version v1.3 - updated first post:

- Support Windows 7 "Classic View" (small caption height, but explorer window caption is still a few pixel higher)

- Auto-Disable GridMove-Transparency if Aero (GPU based Desktop rendering) is disabled. (The transparency does not feel very good without GPU based Desktop rendering)
(Checks every 10 seconds for a change)

- Re-enabled your resolution change checker"
("ReloadOnResolutionChange", checks every 10 seconds)

Question: Do you remember why you disabled it? I think it´s a good idea?


I delayed one of the checks so that there is one check every 5 seconds and not two checks every 10 seconds.

[jgpaiva]

From what I remember, I disabled the resolution change because people had trouble with it being constantly changing, but I can't remember why.
I think it only happened to few people, but it was really annoying and made gridmove unusable.

[helloall]

Thanks for your reply. Since it works very well on my Win7 after some minimal changes, i´ll leave it activated by now. Maybe it was a problem with XP. Let´s wait. Maybe we can add it to the config to disable it for those rare cases.

At the moment im trying to calculate the caption height dynamically, so all themes and custom settings (custom caption font sizes etc.) work.
Works good so far. New version coming soon.

In addition i would like to detect the operating system. No idea how that works... Will read...

Greets

[helloall]

New version v1.3.1 online - updated first thread.


Maybe we should "advertise" GridMove a little more
I´ll post it on some blogs.

Good night...

[helloall]

New version v1.3.2 online

I think i found an "old" bug when adding exceptions for windows. Windows with class name containing characters conflicting with RegEx stuff (like + in Notepad++) results in messing up the exeption values in the .ini file. Will try to fix it, but i´m no RegEx god.  

Edit:
v1.3.2a online with RegEx fix for exceptions list

[helloall]

Hey jgpaiva,

do you may have a little hint how i can color the  (grey) semi-transparent area which previews the area the window gets resized to?

Thanks :-D

Edit:

Found it in this moment, thanks anyway.

Autohotkey is very fun btw. Very easy to get used to. But im very glad that you did the math stuff.

[jgpaiva]

hi,

I see you've been busy
Yes, autohotkey is easy to use. But be careful, its usefulness is very limited, if you want to learn some language, you'd be better off with something like python.

Regarding the color, you must change the background color of the window which creates the transparent overlay.

I'll have to take a good look at your code to extract the fixes to add to the main GridMove branch

[helloall]

After much testing i think a light grey is the best color for both non-transparent and transparent mode. (Almost the same grey you used, but i found some slight color touch in that grey so i replaced it by some clean grey)

But split it into two vars to be more flexible:

[Select]

 if(DwmIsEnabled) {
    Gui,2: Color, %ResizePreviewColorTransparent%
    WinSet, Transparent, %ResizePreviewTransparency%,
  }
  else {
    Gui,2: Color, %ResizePreviewColorPlain%
    WinSet, Transparent, OFF,
  }

Hope that´s correct. It works anyways. :-)

I'll have to take a good look at your code to extract the fixes to add to the main GridMove branch

-jgpaiva (May 18, 2010, 10:23 AM)

Yeah, just tell me when you´re back on the project and we get stuff together so you can take the things you want to apply to your source.  



Question:

Do you know if there is anything to be said against replacing the trigger outlines (which use a Bitmap (grid.bmp) right now) by a drawn line which could be colored more easily than the repeated Bitmap.

Did you use a Bitmap file for a reason?

I made a quick test and it seems to work well?

[Select]

Gui, add, text, Y%TriggerTop% X%TriggerRight% W1 H%TriggerHeight% 0x7

Don´t know how to color that new line.
Everything i tried does not work.



Btw: Just tested GridMove with my Win7 x64 and a non-admin user account and UAC @ standard. Seems it works without any problems.

[jgpaiva]

IIRC, using a bitmap with a solid color and stretching it for the length of the grid was faster than repeating it though the whole line.

I have never testes what you mentioned in your post. Might be faster to render, though.
I know there's some way to paint text with another color, I even used it to paint the letters on the grid with red.

Btw: Just tested GridMove with my Win7 x64 and a non-admin user account and UAC @ standard. Seems it works without any problems.

-helloall (May 19, 2010, 12:35 PM)

Cool, I have observed some strange behaviour (specifically with windows live messenger) in such setting, though

[helloall]

You´re right. Since it´s only stretched i´ll leave it this way. For some reason i initially thought it was repeated which makes no sense since there was a width and height for the loaded image. Maybe because of the typical image-repeating i do in XHTML/CSS stuff most of the time.

Today i tested GridMove again with higher font-dpi-scaling in Win7  (new win7 scaling method, no "xp-mode" scaling) and it worked. That´s confuses me because i remember i tested it and it did not work. That´s because i wrote down the hint.
This are mostly extreme scenarios but i´ll test some more.
At the moment it works good on my test-system with 200% dpi size. Additionaly i switched DWM off and on like crazy to check if all the checks are working.

Btw: Just tested GridMove with my Win7 x64 and a non-admin user account and UAC @ standard. Seems it works without any problems.

-helloall (May 19, 2010, 12:35 PM)

Cool, I have observed some strange behaviour (specifically with windows live messenger) in such setting, though

-jgpaiva (May 20, 2010, 05:23 AM)

What happens?

[helloall]

Man, ugly long testing.  

I think we got a solution for the new dpi scaling method in Vista/7 higher than 100% which causes GridMove malfunction:

Code: AutoIt [Select]

1. if(WindowsVista7Detected) {
2.     RegRead, regDpiAware, HKEY_CURRENT_USER, Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers, %A_ScriptDir%\GridMove.exe
3.     if(regDpiAware != "HIGHDPIAWARE") {
4.       RegWrite, REG_SZ, HKEY_CURRENT_USER, Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers, %A_ScriptDir%\GridMove.exe, HIGHDPIAWARE
5.       Reload
6.     }
7.   }

This disables the "new method DPI-scaling" only for GridMove.
You also can do it manually when you right-click GridMove.exe -> Properties and look at the Compatibility Tab. It´s the next to last checkbox.

Works very well. I think UAC will ask for permission the first time it´s set to the registry. Afterwards it won´t be set again and we´re good i think.

Good night


Edit:
New version online

Edit 2:
I´m happy to report that UAC does not show a message when the compability-flag is written to the registry the first time GridMove starts. Nice.

[krusader23]

Hi,
I've tried to set a custom grid in the GridMove.exe.ini file and it didn't work. So I've renamed the two already present grids and added my grid (simple2.grid).
This is the part of the GridMove.exe.ini file, that I've changed:

[Select]

[GridSettings]
GridName=Grids/simple2.grid

And this is my simple2.grid file (in the Grids directory):

[Select]

[Groups]
NumberOfGroups = 3

[1]
 TriggerTop    = [Monitor1Top]
 TriggerBottom = [Monitor1Top] + [Monitor1Height] /2
 TriggerLeft   = [Monitor1Left]
 TriggerRight  = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3
  GridTop    = [Monitor1Top]
  GridBottom = [Monitor1Top] + [Monitor1Height] /2
  GridLeft   = [Monitor1Left]
  GridRight  = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3

[2]
 TriggerTop    = [Monitor1Top] + [Monitor1Height] /2
 TriggerBottom = [Monitor1Bottom]
 TriggerLeft   = [Monitor1Left]
 TriggerRight  = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3
  GridTop    = [Monitor1Top] + [Monitor1Height] /2
  GridBottom = [Monitor1Bottom]
  GridLeft   = [Monitor1Left]
  GridRight  = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3

[3]
 TriggerTop    = [Monitor1Top]
 TriggerBottom = [Monitor1Bottom]
 TriggerLeft   = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3
 TriggerRight  = [Monitor1Right]
  GridTop    = [Monitor1Top]
  GridBottom = [Monitor1Bottom]
  GridLeft   = [Monitor1Left] + [Monitor1Width] /3
  GridRight  = [Monitor1Right]

GridMove says that:
There was an error while opening the grid file. Reverting to default config. Please select another grid from the templates menu. ErrorCode:001.

And the next error:
Error: menu does not exist. The current thread will exit.
Specifically: Templates
line #
---> 2011: Menu,Templates,DeleteAll

Also, I can't find the templates menu... (should it appear in the menu when I click the icon on the taskbar? there is no such entry in the menu).
I'm using 1.3.2b version on Windows Tablet Edition 2005

Regards

[jgpaiva]

Hi krusader23.
Try re-installing gridmove, and instead of renaming the grids, just make a copy with a new name.
You don't need to edit the .ini, just add the file to the grids/ folder and then select the grid from the templates menu (after selecting "refresh this menu").

[krusader23]

The only menu that shows to me is:

GridMove Lite Portable | Windows7/8 ready, combine w/ Aero Snap | XP/Vista Supp.

[helloall]

Uhm - my version was never ment to use custom Grids. As stated above it´s an "out of the box" solution and the menu is cut down to some few entries.

You can´t change the Grid name in the GridMove.exe.ini like in the full version. The two existing grids in my version are switched hardcoded (one grid for xp/vista, one for win7)

[helloall]

Nothing going on here, huh?

I got a small update (v1.4) for testing future Windows 8 compatibility, compiled with latest AHK/64bit. If anyone wants to use it, just let me know.

[tomos]

I made it primarily as an "out of box solution" which can be combined perfectly with the Windows 7 built in Aero Snap. It extends the built in Windows 7 Aero Snap functions.
(Since v1.3.2 it works very well for XP and Vista too)

-helloall (May 13, 2010, 02:57 PM)

hi Helloall,
could you elaborate a little on what this one does - or on how it is different from the regular Gridmove ?
thanks, Tom

[helloall]

Oh, you're right:

In times where standard users often have best use for simple apps with no need for configuration, i thought it might be a good idea to make a preconfigured lite-version of GridMove with only one preloaded grid.
This version has some fixes and compatibility-updates (GridMove now works with larger scaling settings in Windows) to the original version and imho extends very nicely the integrated snapping-mechanism of Windows 7/8 "AeroSnap" without having you to disable this integrated snapping mechanism.

I see if i can make some screenshots...

Greets

[tomos]

I see if i can make some screenshots...

-helloall (October 04, 2013, 06:30 AM)

that would be helpful

Is it possible to download it?
(the link in first post no longer works)