MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219

[WhiteLion]

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219
Supports Windows 95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/2003
Upgrades to TrayIcon Pro from Wingo, Trayicon, Trayicon Standard, Trayicon Menu or Trayicon Standard products are for free, please send an E-mail
Product Support [email protected]
DownLoad Trail here http://dl.filekicker.com/send/file/167696-ZLUX/tpsetup.exe
Meta Products is currently discontinuing all other versions of this product
Tested On: WinXPPROSP2, Pentium4 2.8 with 512 ram





More screenshots can be viewed here http://www.metaproducts.com/mp/TrayIcon_Pro-Screenshots.htm

TrayIcon Pro is a Windows 95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/2003 application that was developed to let you quickly run your favorite applications and folders directly from the system tray.
TrayIcon Pro lets you add icons for these applications and folders to the tray itself or into menus that sit behind icons in the tray. Finally, the functionality of our whole TrayIcon range is brought together in one easy-to-use application.

The new version adds support for Netscape Bookmarks and Opera Hotlists as well as a history of recently browsed URLs. So, you can easily browse Web sites directly from your tray!

Another great feature is the ability to minimize any of your application to the system tray. TrayIcon Pro adds its button next to the standard Minimize/Maximize/Close button to all windows. You can choose to minimize the application to a separate tray icon or to a menu in the tray.

The new version allows you to protect icons from being started with a password - to limit access to some programs if the computer is shared between several users.

Here is my input.

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro is good...very good.
http://www.metaproducts.com
It is fairly easy for newbie to figure out "How To" program it without the need to dig to through the Help files.

The way it's GUI works is whats a bit abnormal.

The GUI is both tabbed and each Tab also changes with the selection on it's drop down list. While programming my user settings I found the GUI's interface to be a bit of niggle for it was un-Windows like to me. However, once I figured it out, it was a cinch....just remembering How To find an particular option setting each time was a different story.

The program's installer was smooth. I had no complaint from either Kaspersky or ZAPS.

TrayIcon Pro displays a list of shortcuts which you pre-program. To bring the list up...the amount of time....compares to me initially opening my Windows Start Menu. There is a very big hesitation. I only programed TrayIcon Pro with my DeskTop shortcuts.

I have roughly 100 DeskTop shortcut's. I have 3 HD's on board and I do expect things to be slower then average due to the amount I have.

TrayIcon Pro is just a menu of my shortcuts. The same as your regular Start Menu.

I wanted & wished more from it.

It teased me.

It's memory usage grows bigger the longer it's used. It doesn't matter if it's menu was accessed or not. It's memory usage tops at about 20 megs but never lessens after it reaches that.

I found it hard yet easy to use. The hard part was I could open things faster without it by just clicking on my DeskTop Shortcuts what this product is supposed to replace. To give it a fair shake I tested a few other products of same category and I found the above statement to be true with all

I could open things just as fast with TrayIcon Pro as I can via XP's Menus. I found I was forced to read through TrayIcon Pro's list & that takes time. I'm just so accustomed to using Desk Top Icon positionings instead of actually reading to find what I need.


I tried and tested other alternatives.


I found 2 others that meet my needs but still lack.

They are both "Docks"

I don't care for DOCKS yet I do like their punch much.


They both beat Object Dock, in my book, when it comes to their memory consumption.




Y'z Dock wins when it comes to memory consumption.
It's Memory consumption is almost NIL when the "auto-Hide" feature is used....yet it is very snappy.
Download: http://gwbn2.onlinedown.net/down/yz_dck0083.zip

RK Launcher is a spin-off of Y'z Dock it is an improved GUI of the original Y'Z's
Download: http://home.cogeco.ca/~rklauncher

It accepts gadgets from StarDock consumes more memory and I think is stolen code.

Both are freeware. Y'Z' Dock's development appears to have been discontinued sometime in either in 2002 or 2003 and the website is now down(hence the direct link). It's author, M.Yamaguchi works for Konami and it appears that he really upset Apple when he made this app & released it for free to all Windows user  I would love to see a Vista version of it done by him.

There is also my old tried and true fall-back app which is the one I think I will return to. I use it all the time to save my DeskTop Icon's Positioning. It's fantastic for that and only needs to be run if the the positioning gets messed up. Accidentally grabbing an icon and hitting the edge of your screen with it will definitely mess them up & some games will too. It also has a feature to make the background of your icon labels invisible. That isn't even the best part yet. It has super duper bonus feature which auto hides your DeskTop Icons, until you mouse over 'em

It's called Iconiod http://www.sillysot.com/

It is Sillyware and free for all. The Silly part of it is that it can actually make your DeskTop Icons Dance! That is really fun to do at the office to someone who is getting on your nerves

BTW, Iconiod is also working perfectly in my Vista RC1 OS. I don't know whether or not if it's installer will, but when installed via XP and launching the executable via Vista it will run.



 
WL

[brotherS]

I haven't bothered to read any reviews before I take the time-out to write this one. Forgive me if this review of mine is unorthodox.

-WhiteLion (October 22, 2006, 02:37 AM)

Hi! It sure would help if you read the 3 'pinned' posts in https://www.donation...index.php?board=42.0 and then edit your review after doing so.

You don't have to stick to the standard 100% but it sure would be nice to have some more info:
- what does it do? (copy this info from the author or some review site)
- for which OS?
- free or not?
- screenshots?
- how is it rated on other sites?
- etc.

Thanks

[Darwin]

Welcome, Whitelion. I tend to agree with you on almost every point in your review (though it would be nice if you provided a link to TrayIconPro ). I've tried all of the docks that I've been able to get my mits on, and even purchased ObjectDock Pro (to get the tabbed docks), and agree with you that they are nice in principle but really don't deliver in practice. Having said that, my experience with ObjectDock has been that its feature set blows everything else away and its resource usage is minimal. In fact, Stardock's apps in general seem to be very well behaved. The only time I run into trouble with them is when I have many different Stardock apps running, then I run into the limitations of my integrated graphics (Centrino notebook). I digress...

I don't have ObjectDock running (though I did reinstall it to see if I could fall in love with it, but that's not happening...). The app that I settled on to provide the functionality that TrayIcon Pro offers, is TrueLaunchBar . I'm also anxiously awaiting a functional beta of VistaStartMenu 2 , which is supposed to be released imminently.

Overall, I run a tight ship - minimal icons on my desktop and a very organised start menu. I use TrueLaunchBar to access folders in My Documents and to create specialised folders from which to launch programs. Both of these features are possible from the Start menu but the way in which XP's start menu (using either the default or the win9x/2k layout) functions doesn't "work" for me... I'm not clear how, or if I'd use VistaStartMenu, but I like the developer's ideas and will try it out when a functioning version is released.

I'm also monitoring development of Mouser's LaunchBar Commander - it looks very promising, though I am in the camp that feels that it might be profitable to merge it with Find and Run Robot...

[WhiteLion]

TY for your posting pointers BRO I read 'em all up and re-edited to the best of my abilities. I have no idea on how to find previous reviews though
I apologize for my hurried initial post.


Thanks for Welcoming me to this nice Forum Darwin
I also Thank You Much for taking the time-out for replying and giving me some valuable input in order to help me with possibly solving my yucky looking DeskTop Quest.

To be fair in my review I did also re-install OBjectDock. I didn't mention it because the version I have is very old. I liked the Tabbed feature  of ObjectDock the best, yet I felt like I was crippling it by setting it to that style of view at the sametime. Geeze, let's face it the regular view packs way more eye-candy The tabbed view is more usable yet not so pretty. I feel like I am in a battle on which interface to use...the damn if you do and don't approach(sortva).

ObjectDock(my Old version) did run much better on this machine I have now then it did the last time when I used it on my old machine.
I offered no input on it because again my version is old and I have inside knowledge that it has been greatly enhanced in the past few years.

In fact all of StarDock's products have been and now come all together in a buy once packaged form which is very cheap. Not to mention all the free DLs of Themes, Skins and Gadgets a paid user gets. I need to start saving some pennies.

I also found a mostly unknown sort of an endorsement by Microsoft for StarDock's products with the XP enviroment.
The link will take a bit for me to dig up so I will only post it here if you are very interested in reading it up.

Having said that I immensely agree with you that ObjectDock's Features definitely does blow everything else I have tested to date away.
StarDock's eye-candy is able to be used with each and every one of their APPs making all their goodies kinda universal in their products.
The list of eye-candy grows each and every day, anyone can DL 'em for free and use them. Any individual can use 'em & get 'em even if they don't own even 1 of StarDock products....the system icons are fantastic for starters

I disagree with you slightly only on ObjectDock's memory usage. It is minimal and falls in the mid range category of similar products that have tried lately. That could be due to the version I have and I'm sure the newer versions may be much better.

I never ran many of StarDock's simultaneously. Maybe 3 at tops with no probs.

You need to upgrade badly...lol. I just got my current PC, Dell Dimension P4(Hyper-Threading enabled), 512 ram, DVD-R, CD-RW, GeForce 5200 128megs, Linksy's 4 port Firewire, CreativeLabs soundcard, 80gig HD with XPRO SP2 CD including a transferabley 4 month warranty by Dell for just 300 US even, right off of eBay from a private seller 6 months ago. Way cheaper then my first store PC, a HP Pavillion with half of everything above minus the firewire ports that I paid a cool grand for and came with HP's crappy support. It was also a tad cheaper then building my own and I ended up with extra goodies.

Thanks for your links for the Vista start menu & True LaunchBar. I am bringing both in now in order to try.

I also have already checked out Mouser's LaunchBar commander but I didn't get to far when it came to programing it.

It was FARR that initially brought me here to this forum.

I don't use FARR for launching Apps(I should go try that) but I do love it's speed performing on-board file searches and it's ability to manipulate the found files.

[vegas]

Nice Review.  Not a product I have a need for, but, that really was a well done second effort!

[Darwin]

Agreed - I do need to upgrade. Would you please, please stress to my wife how important this is?! I can dream... Actually, I am hoping that work will buy me a new notebook, effectively allowing me to do an end run around my financial mana er, wife 

About ObjectDock Plus - on my machine it uses between 800kb and 3 MB of RAM and negligible CPU depending on whether or not I have one dock or two open. The last time I installed it, I just used the default docks from which I removed the weather widgets (have never gotten them to work for Canadian ciites) and added a few shortcuts and it ran in this configuration at under 2 MB. Not bad when you consider that in this configuration it is duplicating my system tray, my taskbar and my start menu plus providing me with a bunch of other functionality, such as a calendar. In the case of the taskbar, it is actually triplicating it because the taskbar is on both the main dock and the tabbed docks by default (can't figure out why that is set up like that by default, but there it is). Anyway, to my way of thinking this is an acceptable resource "hit". Like vegas, though, I just don't have a use for it and I uninstalled it earlier today. I *think* I'd use it a lot if I wasn't so hooked on TrueLaunchBar - which I bought using a donationcoder discount AFTER I had purchased ObjectDock Plus.

Anyway, rather than buy a new computer, I just install ObjectDesktop every six months or so and play around with the GUI. That way I effectively get the geewhiz, neato effect of a new computer for nothing (well, for the $45 or so that ObjectDesktop and ObjectDock Plus cost me a year ago). I find that this effect wears off after about a week, at which point I uninstall everything and revert to Windows Classic (themes service disabled) and I am as happy as a bug in a rug! Your review of TrayIcon Pro just happened to come at the end of one such week, so I had everything installed this morning and was able to check into ObjectDock's resource usage.

[WhiteLion]

Thanks Vegas...I needed that 



What's your wife's cell phone #, Darwin? 


J/K


Well since your outdated piece is used for work related activities also be sure to point out that your productivity would be greatly enhanced if you have a machine which can keep up with you...that your current glorified calculator often slows you down thus causing you to forget where you were


I totally forgot to mention in my review about MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219 that it does have an option to show only the shortcuts' icons without having their names listed. The icons were very small in the shortcut list and that made it kinda  tough to recognize 'em with a speedy glance. The size of the icons could be due to my screen resolution 1024x768pixels which I am using. I never thought of that until now. If MetaProducts could give the user a choice of which size the icons will displayed in TrayIcon Pro it would be a great move. Lowering it's memory usage & speeding up it's menu display time would be definite pluses. Also if the shortcuts' menu could have a user choice for it's background color...with the nearing release of Vista a glass background option would be really sweet

I did check out the Beta of VistaStartMenu 2, yesterday. I think it is a super concept. I love how it's menu allows side scrolling. That is well needed and long over due need for many Windoze users. I can hardly wait to see a fully functional version of it also.

I also downloaded True Launch Bar and promptly lost it somewhere, LoL. So I downloaded it again just now and I have just installed it as I am writing this. WoW!

I see or should I say I don't see it anywhere in my Task Manager! Now this is the kind of puppy I really really do like

It has many options so it will take me a day or 2 of playing with it before I can let you know what I think. It looks super great so far. Thanks for telling us about it.

I am the same way has you when it comes to running StarDock's goodies. About once a year I install it all and play with it for a week or so and I act like a little kid playing with it all, then I just stop using it . I usually keep WindowBlinds going after that for a few months but not the rest of the stuff. I love themes though and I can't live without 'em. I remember when I first switched over to XP there was not very many programs made for it during the first year. Not many themes either, so I used WindowBlinds all of the time back then and I also ripped the Themes from my Win98 copy and they worked well in XP & still do. I think the 98Themes will work well with the way you have your calculator setup.

My copy of ObjectDock is probably over 3 years old. It averaged from 3megs when idle to 11megs of memory while it's menu was being accessed that's really not bad at all but horrible when compared to your version. Your version or any new version would be nice to have.
The memory usage of todays ObjectDock just may beat out the top contender that I found for consumption, Y'Z Dock.

[Darwin]

Just an update (couldn't find this thread last week!): VistaStartMenu 2 has been released as a functional beta and is quite stable. Check it out here

[WhiteLion]

 :Thmbsup:Thanks! I too came across it while I was checking out the latest goodies here http://shellcity.net/.

It is a really awesome concept.


I  have an update to add myself. It also comes with a story.

Do any of you here happen to remember TechTv? Shows like Call For Help and The ScreenSavers were my daily diet in 2002. They offered good solid PC advice for both the casual and more advanced PC users. I found them to be invaluable when I was a newbie to PCing.

Back in 2002, The ScreenSavers offered all their viewers a shareware program for free. It was a Launcher and/or a file searching utility. I got it and it quickly became invaluable to me, although it's interface was rather plain, it is/was FAST!

Somehow, I eventually lost it, just lost it and I eventually forgot it's name. Yet I never got past missing having it. I have been looking for it off & on for a very long time.

During that course, I have tried many launchers and searching utilities with the hopes of re-finding it or at least a suitable replacement.

AppRocket http://www.candylabs. Came the closest on speed but it uses indexing which eventually makes it buggy & starts crashing when used with a super large database.

FARR was the best substitute that I eventually found and that is how I ended up here.

Shortly after my last post here I began re-missing that long lost launching app again. With a last ditched effort I once again tried to re-find it. That is not an easy feat when one can not remember a proggies name or who even made it.

After a few hours of searching this time I hit paydirt on GooGle
With a simple 2 word search: Screensavers search

I finally refound my long lost and favorite launcher! It's called KeyLaunch!
It's made by Xavier Flix & can be DLed from here http://software.xfx.net

I was so elated with finally having it back that I immediately bought it when I discovered that it is still being developed.

After I installed it, I noticed that it wasn't has fast as it used to be. Back in 2002 I think I had only a 2 gig HD. Now I have 3 hard drives onboard with the smallest being 80 gigs...lol.

With that in mind I came up with a few ideas to speed it up and to also improve it's users interface. I was so excited with refinding the app & with my ideas that I began a correspondence with it's developer, Xavier Flix.

He loved my ideas and also admitted to becoming very motivated upon hearing them.

He has now begun to work on developing KeyLaunch 3.0. It's going to have an interface comparable to AppRocket's with added options to set up more than 1 user customizable pre-defined search thus regaining the speed it once had on smaller hard drives.

He's going to send me the his first Beta as soon as he gets it more stabilized and I can hardly wait!

Stay tuned!


WL

[Darwin]

KeyLaunch sounds interesting - I'll watch for the next version.

Thanks, Whitelion. Cool find.

[lanux128]

KeyLaunch sounds interesting - I'll watch for the next version.

-Darwin (November 06, 2006, 11:42 PM)

yes, KeyLaunch is interesting, even though it looks similar to Farr...

[Alexander - MetaProducts]

WhiteLion, thank you very much for your review.
I forwarded your remarks to the developer, he should fix found problems in the next version.

Regards,
Alexander Bednyakov
MetaProducts Corporation

[vixay]

If you are talking about keyboard based launchers... then these are the ones i've heard off and tried...
I currently use Find&Run robot... (DOH! I just figured it out now that FARR = Find And Run Robot!, lol... just wasted my time to post this then, though the other apps are useful too)

I am surprised that it isn't more popular on the web, currently launchy is the most popular out there...

Find&Run Robot https://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Mouser/findrun/ (free/donationware, ~1.5 MB)
 -> I like it, though a bit slow at times (after key is pressed), and takes some configuring to work just right... though the most powerful of th bunch  This is the one i use though, so i a am a little biased

Launchy  http://launchy.net/ (free, open source, ~0.6 MB)
 -> Simple, easy, fast, free open source,  

SlickRun http://www.bayden.com/SlickRun/ (free, only 170KB! (requires delphi libraries though))
  -> haven't actually tried this one yet...

I tested out SlickRun. I thought it is really neat. Then I started to think...that it is just a glorified keyboard shortcut app with an added pain of having to find a little box to type into.
I played with it some more and I ended up concluding that it is both of the above. 
It is more than a glorified short-cut handler because it allows one to make memorable keyboard combinations by tagging the key combos to a name of your own chosing.
That is a very nifty for me. It also makes it truly the first keyboard shortcut handler which I actually could handle trying to use everyday.

I give it   
Thanks for telling me about it.

-WhiteLion (November 16, 2006, 04:37 AM)

Anyway now to complete the list, i should add the ones you guys mentioned above...

KeyLaunch http://software.xfx.net/utilities/kl/index.htm (shareware $12, ~2.7 MB)

Looks good, i haven't tried it yet though.

/edit note: added some more info, and reviews

[Darwin]

Hi Whitelion,

Just an update: the latest beta of ObjectDock 1.49 (b5) is out. I installed it to see how it performs and did the following:

Shutdown the main dock (leaving only the tabbed dock)
removed taskbar and system tray tabs
removed all docklets
removed start menu
redirected a couple of shortcuts to my favoured apps (Take Command for the command prompt and PSP X for graphics)

Closed it and restarted it: RAM usage varies between 12 and 15 MB. Not good... The latest stable release (from August - 1.3), as noted above, ran much more lightly.

Just thought I'd update this "thought". I'm off to whinge about it on the Stardock forum. The other thing that this exercise made me appreciate is that with TrueLaunchBar loaded there really is little incentive to run ObjectDock and I doubt it's going to make it to the end of the week on my system.

[Darwin]

I received a reply from the developer:

Yes, the default Speed Optimization setting has changed from "Optimize for Memory" to "Optimize for Speed". Was having too many people get a bad experience with it having little bits of choppyness when it was doing routines to save memory, I decided that along with the new zoom algorithm I'm using I'd rather give people the best performing dock experience possible

If you're in need of more memory though yes you might want to look at moving it back to "Optimize for Memory"

I can confirm that doing as he says "tames the beast", though RAM usage is in the 4-5 MB range now.

[WhiteLion]

<a href="http://software.xfx....ilities/kl/index.htm" &nbsp;class="postlink" target="_blank">KeyLaunch's</a> developer wrote me a few days ago. He said that he has the 3.0 version working already! He will be releasing a Beta of it in the very close future.
He sent me some screenshots of it, which I promised not to share, but
I will tell you that it has an entirely new & trim interface with much improved searching options which will greatly enhance it's speed . Every suggestion I had given to him for KeyLaunch 3.0 he has implemented in it & then some with this new version. I still can't get over that as I type this. I pretty much pestered the poor guy with my ideas after he actually listened to one of them. 
I even went has far as telling him about this awesome forum and a bit of the ideals and concepts that it's foundation is based upon, inorder to invite him here. He thinks this place sounds pretty great and also that the monthly draw here is very...interesting.


Alexander,
I regret that I wasn't in full favor of TrayIcon Pro. I love all of the other <a href="http://www.metaproducts.com/" &nbsp;class="postlink" target="_blank">MetaProducts</a> software which I have tried in the past. I know that TrayIcon Pro can be very useful for many, but it's solution just didn't work for me. I'm just so used to having immediate access to my desktop icons & to their positioning that I quickly find myself losing patience while I am using any alternative program solution that will allow me to access my DeskTop shortcuts any other way. Out all of the programs, I have now tried, that use menus and/or sub-menus to access shortcuts, none I liked. So please don't feel that I think your product is inferior because I don't. Far from it. I actually like TrayIcon Pro the best out of the ones which offers a menu access solution.
I thank you Alexander for just being here and listening to my words.
I also thank MetaProducts for TrayIcon Pro and especially for that warm mushy feeling I got inside when I learned that sometimes even big companies do actually care about the little guy and what he has to say. 



Vixay,
Thanks, I'm going to check out <a href="http://www.bayden.com/SlickRun/" &nbsp;class="postlink" target="_blank">SlickRun</a>.  Even though I'm a heavy duty mouse user it sounds pretty interesting.

SlickRun is a free floating command line utility for Windows. SlickRun gives you almost instant access to any program or website. SlickRun allows you to create command aliases (known as MagicWords), so C:\Program Files\Outlook Express\msimn.exe becomes MAIL.
Enter a web URL into SlickRun and it will launch your browser and navigate to the specified address. Run multiple programs in a few keystrokes, jot a note, look up a definition... SlickRun is the most natural way to interact with your computer.

Darwin,
That's one fast fix! I'm glad for you.
I did try TrueLaunchBar. When I tried though I basically just installed it and I thought it looked really neat. I was busy working on something else at the time so I left it running with an intention to play with it later. I grew tired and just plume lost my energy to. Anyways, I never did get a round tuit..lol. I just became re-enamored with <a href="http://www.sillysot.com/" &nbsp;class="postlink" target="_blank">Iconiod</a> instead. Which I am now allowing to run at every boot & seems to be the best solution for me. It runs under 2megs of memory at all times with no memory spikes or any hesitation when it makes my invisible shortcuts re-appear. It only has one problem that occurs when it comes to re-correcting lost icon positions, sometimes it can't. I think that's because I habitually dump my temp files. It appears that's where Iconiod stores the positioning info in a file that is always 1kb in size. I have tried backing up the file but it doesn't work. There's no options to change it's backup folder path nor am I sure if it's even the correct file. Ah well, I'm still very very happy with it.

Maybe I should...drop it's author a line


Not! J/King



Hugz to all,

WL

[Darwin]

I'm waiting for Keylaunch 3 to be released - I've been checking the site regularly so that I can "swoop" in and download a trial when it is released into the wild. Anyway,... ObjectDock is still installed on my system but hasn't been run since I posted the above. I'm going to leave it in place for now on the off-chance that I am motivated in the future to play with it, but it's not really looking too likely at this point. Actually, I am fighting the urge to get rid of it because I don't like unused apps on my system.

Whitelion, I'm glad you've found a solution that works for you! I've used iconoid in the past and liked it. I used it to save my desktop layout  - I used to use a multi-media projector to give Powerpoint presentations and always had to change the resolution on my notebook from 1024*768 to 800*600 and back again. This always messed up the arrangement of icons on my desktop. I only have 3 icons on my desktop now, and don't use a multi-media projector at the moment, so don't have anything installed to handle that.

[WhiteLion]

That's a bummer hear about your feelings on ObjectDock, but I agree with 'em. It is awesome at first but that feeling seems to fade quickly with it here too. That happened to me with all of the Docks eventually.
Y'Z's Dock kept me happily playing with it the longest out of 'em all.

I have some more news for you on KeyLaunch 3. Xavier Flix just wrote me about a 1/2 hour ago. He sent me a very early early nearly pre-Alpha version to test tonight! WaHoo! It works! Many of the options are not available yet, but it can search & launch very fast on my machine now! The very first version of KeyLaunch that I had was so fast back in 2002 that it seemed to be magic. Now I think it has taken a giant leap in re-capturing that magic it once had on those smaller HD's of the past, without clunking your system down with any file indexing.

I can't share my alpha copy with you...yet. I wish I could.

I can now do the next best though. Xavier agreed to let me give you guys here a "sneak peak" of it. He is happy with how the interface looks now...& so am I. There may be a few more adjustments to the interface before KL3 is released but they should be only minor ones.

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219

MetaProducts TrayIcon Pro 1.7.219

It's going to retain all the features and keyboard friendliness that it currently has now and also have added new features to make it even more user friendly.

I can barely wait for the time to come for when you guys can test it.

I'm sure that Xavier will let you be one of the first. 

[WhiteLion]

Oops! I nearly forgot!

Vixay,

I tested out SlickRun. I thought it is really neat. Then I started to think...that it is just a glorified keyboard shortcut app with an added pain of having to find a little box to type into.

I played with it some more and I ended up concluding that it is both of the above. 

It is more than a glorified short-cut handler because it allows one to make memorable keyboard combinations by tagging the key combos to a name of your own chosing.

That is a very nifty for me. It also makes it truly the first keyboard shortcut handler which I actually could handle trying to use everyday.

I give it   

Thanks for telling me about it.

[Darwin]

Wow. I like what I see in the screen caps of KeyLaunch 3 - looks great! Thanks for posting them.

[vixay]

Oops! I nearly forgot!

Vixay,

I tested out SlickRun. I thought it is really neat. Then I started to think...that it is just a glorified keyboard shortcut app with an added pain of having to find a little box to type into.

I played with it some more and I ended up concluding that it is both of the above. 

It is more than a glorified short-cut handler because it allows one to make memorable keyboard combinations by tagging the key combos to a name of your own chosing.

That is a very nifty for me. It also makes it truly the first keyboard shortcut handler which I actually could handle trying to use everyday.

I give it   

Thanks for telling me about it.

-WhiteLion (November 16, 2006, 04:37 AM)

Glad I could help, i'll append your rating to my post above...


The keylaunch screens look really good. How is it's memory consumption & all? any stats for us?
Furthermore is his trial version time-limited or what? I think that keylaunch could get a boost in popularity if it was mentioned to all the lifehackers our there... as they are only aware of Launchy right now (most don't know about FARR either). One thing though, it should work right out of the box for everybody, and customizing should be important only for Power Users, that will help with adoption.

[WhiteLion]

KeyLaunch is now using the .net framework that has made it much more appealing to the eye but it comes with a cost. A signific one at that when it comes to memory usage. KeyLaunch 2 sits happily under 4 megs of memory while I have gotten KeyLaunch 3 up to almost 28 megs of usage. KL3 averages staying in the range of 17-22megs usage.
Xavier knows of this problem and will quickly fix it as soon has he figures out how to.

KeyLaunch 2 used to drop to it's knees when searching over large folders containing 25,000+ files.
That no longer happens with KeyLaunch 3. KeyLaunch 3 can handle scanning folders of such size while it continues with scanning others because now it is also multi-threaded.

KeyLaunch 3's searching engine has been greatly speeded up also. That combined with the ability to now easily direct it to look in specific areas should fully give it back the magic it once had.

Remember I've only had the privilege to test a nearly pre-alpha of KeyLaunch 3 to date.

Xavier is entering the Beta stage of development now. He is going to send me a early stable beta sometime today or tomorrowish to try.

I am still in disbelief that not only has he actually listened to my mere suggestions, that he has actually implemented them and has made such radical changes in KeyLaunch's basic architecture with the speed that rivals a rocket.

That dude sure has one loyal customer now and totally Rocks in my book!

However, I promise you guys that I will try my best to remain unbiased in my opinions on where KeyLaunch is concerned...although it may be hard. 

[WhiteLion]

I hope you all had nice Christmas.

Here's just a quickie update.

Xavier, the maker of KeyLaunch, has not yet sent me a early stable version of KeyLaunch. Nor has he corresponded with me since my last post. I think the Christmas rush had alot to do with that on both of our ends. I think I will drop him a line tonight.

I'm posting here now to tell you about a new alternative which I just found last night for clearing my desktop of all those ugly, yet so handy icons/shortcuts.

Last night, while surfing, I managed to some how run into <A href="http://www.idesksoft...m/>DesktopIconToy</A>. After I installed it and started it, it promptly messed up my icon arrangement, so be forewarned! Later when I got un-mad at it, I started to play with it and soon found myself becoming intrigued with it.

I found it offers more configuration abilities than my old and trusted and heavily used solution, <A href="http://www.sillysot.com/"%20&nbsp;class="postlink"%20target="_blank">Iconoid</A>. It seems to be extremely more snapper to show the icons while also staying under Iconiod normal average memory usage. That gives it straight up pluses in my book.

It also has the added sweet ass ability to hide icon text until moused over.





<A href="http://www.idesksoft...com/screenshort.html">More ScreenShots</A>

What cool things could you do with Desktop Icon Toy?

Dance Desktop Icons
You can drag and drop desktop icons to make them run around the desktop, and double click the desktop to stop the running icons. According to your drag and drop time, the desktop icons will run with different speed, more quickly, more speed.
Hover Effects
You can add visual effects when mouse hover desktop icons, like dance icon, shake icon text and blink icon text.
Icon Size
You can change the desktop icon size to 48x48, 64x64 or 128x128.
Automatically Hide Desktop Icons
You can automatically hide desktop icons when mouse off the desktop or desktop icon. This can give you a pair of bright eyes to see your beautiful wallpaper.
Arrange Desktop Icons
You can arrange desktop icons by many shapes, such as:
Clock (all the icons will be aligned as a clock showing the exact hour)
Circle (creates a circle in the middle of the screen)
Cross (creates a cross in the middle of the screen)
Around (all the icons will be positioned around the desktop)
And more...
If you like, you can also:
Arrange the icons precisely with <CTRL + Arrow Key>.
Add animation effects when arrange desktop icons.
Configure to automatically re-layout when change screen resolution, adding/deleting icons.
Customize layout order (eg: place "My Computer" to last one).
Sort icon by name (Ascending or Descending) .
Remove Icon Texts
You can remove the classic ugly text of desktop icons, optional, instead of a cool pop-up tooltip. The whole desktop will become neat and tidy.
Lock Desktop Icons
Have you ever need to place some desktop icons in a specific place for better working, but always by careless or windows move them to back? Use this function, you needn't care this problem again. You can also add animation effects for it.
More Funny Things
You can remove all desktop icons, and only keep the icon texts.
You can change desktop icons to small mode, all the icons will become small, and icon texts will be placed on the right of icons.
Other Features
Remove desktop icon shortcut overlay.
Save and restore desktop icon layout.
Change icon background or text color, and you can even make the background of icons transparent.


System Requirements

Windows NT4/2000/XP/2003 operating system

My top 3 criteria for these icon hiding programs until moused over are:
Restorability(reliability of) of lost icon positions
Memory + CPU usage
Configurability and ease of use


Iconiod has a bug that really bothers me. It stores it's saved icon location file in a temp folder. I dump my temp files regularly thus lose Iconiod saved positions file usually when I most need it. I have tried saving this file to another location and it does not work when re-inserted.
I do not yet know if DesktopIconToy suffers with this flaw yet, since I have only been using it for a tad over 24 hours now.


DesktopIconToy is giving me a problem with renaming files/shortcuts. While doing so my cursor goes erratic along with the file name text.
Iconiod renaming files/shortcuts are done with normal ease, but the cursor needs to stay positioned on your desktop.

Iconiod is freeware
DeskTopIcon Toy Co$ts 20 bucks US.


I really like DeskTopIcon Toy's ability to not only hide my shortcuts but their text too, until moused over.

Is it snappiness and the above mentioned ability worth shelling 20 bucks out for? I don't know yet.

If it can retain memory of icon positioning then maybe it will be worth an investment.....if I can figure out how to stop the strange effect it does when I renaming desktop files.















 

[cranioscopical]

Thanks for taking the time to present this information. 

[Darwin]

Whitelion - whatever happened with Keylaunch and the beta testing? I just checked and Keylaunch is still at v.2 on the website... two years on