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Author Topic: TicToc Title  (Read 9130 times)

BTJ

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TicToc Title
« on: January 14, 2013, 03:42 PM »
I have really enjoyed TicToc for several years on Win XP.  Well I finally moved to Win 7 64x and I find that TicToc flickers.  It flickers randomly about once a second.  This happens on a virgin install with only Firefox installed.  It is very annoying.  Is there any chance in looking at this problem?

tomos

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #1 on: January 14, 2013, 04:02 PM »
Have you tried the various compatibility modes?
(dont know would they help but best to check I guess)
Tom

tomos

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #2 on: January 15, 2013, 11:53 AM »
hi BTJ was talking to you on irs, but got distracted...

XP mode is a virtual copy of XP that you run within 7 (disclaimer - I haven't used it).

Compatibility is more attractive, cause the app runs in 7 - but hopefully it runs more like it did on XP.
Try out a couple of the compatibility settings, run the app, and see if it improves.
Tom

BTJ

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #3 on: March 21, 2013, 02:07 AM »
Thanks for the reply.  I tried all the compatibility modes but I still end up with the flicker.  Someone suggested recompiling the program but that's all greek to me.

BTJ

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #4 on: March 30, 2013, 11:35 AM »
Is there someone out there that can do the magic on TicToc Title code to make it run on Win7 64?

skwire

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #5 on: March 30, 2013, 12:44 PM »
Hi BTJ.  I looked at Skrommel's code and what it's doing is creating a separate, transparent GUI window that gets positioned near the min/max/close buttons.  I'm going to guess that the graphics engine in Windows 7 is different enough from the Windows XP engine to make the GUI flicker like you're seeing.  For the record, it does not flicker on my Windows 7 install.

There are some drawbacks to Skrommel's method of using a separate GUI:
  • The positioning of the TicTocTitle GUI assumes the classic Windows theme; that is, if you try to use TicTocTitle with, say, the Aero look, the TicTocTitle GUI text overlaps the minimize button.
  • The TicTocTitle GUI font's style, colour, and weight are static; that is, they don't change if you change the font of your windows themselves.  Yes, there are settings in TicTocTitle to change this but, again, it's a manual thing.

One solution would be to modify the actual window title text itself.  This method would use the window's current font style, colour, and weight.  However, one drawback I can foresee is that I don't know if it's possible to (easily) right justify the text on a window.  What I mean is that the clock text portion would just be at the end of the current window title, possibly after a separator character like a pipe (|) or the section character (ยง).

skwire

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #6 on: March 30, 2013, 03:56 PM »
I've been messing around with the code and I have it working, flicker-free, with the following caveats:

  • You can no longer set the size of the text.  Style and weight still work.
  • Any settings changes require you to restart the application.

Knowing this, are you still interested?

BTJ

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #7 on: March 31, 2013, 01:36 PM »
Skwire, I  can't thank you enough for looking into the TicToc.  I would be interested in seeing what the fixed size of the font but doesn't sound like much of a problem.

skwire

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #8 on: March 31, 2013, 01:50 PM »

BTJ

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #9 on: March 31, 2013, 11:02 PM »
Ho soooo nice. I could cry, I have it back.  I was constantly looking up on the title bar for the time or date. So nice to have it again. I like the format (Ddd  "W"week  "D"day    yyyy.MM.dd   H:mm).  When I am feeble minded which is most of the time, I can reassure myself what day of the week it is quickly in the title bar.

 I am a photographer and when I want to dump a set of pictures to a client I use the day of the year number on all the pictures (ie D90 is today; file name: Sanders SKS4516 D90.jpg).  After the client reviews them and make changes I dump him a new set with the new day of the year number.  The day number is shorter than yyyy.mm.dd format and the client doesn't even know what the number means - sometimes a good thing.  I also use the day of the year for sequentially numbering document revisions in stead of longer yyyy.mm.dd.

I use the week number for accounting purposes.  It is sure easier than trying to tack down the calendar date of Monday of each week in a year.

I am pleased a punch with the modifications.  I no nothing about these programs.  I have coded in basic, fortran, dbase, excel (not vbasic) but have no idea what is going on there.

Thank you very much skwire.
« Last Edit: April 01, 2013, 09:21 AM by skwire, Reason: Removed some errant \"javascript:void(0);\" text. »

skwire

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #10 on: April 01, 2013, 09:17 AM »
You're very welcome.  I'm glad the program is working again for you.   :)

mouser

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Re: TicToc Title
« Reply #11 on: April 01, 2013, 02:34 PM »
Love reading threads like this  :-*