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Author Topic: ok finally about to do a round of work on Process Tamer - make your requests now  (Read 13822 times)

mouser

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ok i think i'm finally read to do a round of work improving process tamer;
suggestions and feature requests (and reminders of things i promissed to add) are welcome :)

kfitting

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One thing I've been wondering... could you make it easy to see all processes being tamed by Process Tamer?  Right now, mousing over the tray icon sometimes shows one process being tamed... sometimes it doesnt.  Perhaps a pop-up like you have for your reminder to register would work.  Just some way to look at all tamed processes without opening the program window.

Kevin

Carol Haynes

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* Reminders when it is disabled (for forgetful people like me) Balloon type message would do, and/or disable for x minutes would be nice when you are doing something which needs to be left alone.

* Rule based actions on running processes: eg. if "process CPU usage" < 1% for 10 minutes terminate and run xxx

Yes I know process guard can handle the last one but it would be nice to have this sort of thing in one place
« Last Edit: September 23, 2005, 10:02 AM by CarolHaynes »

Sentinel

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Excellent news mouser!  How I've waited for this moment.   :)

1. Ability to tame any processes not owned by the account ProcessTamerTray is running as and the ability to view/configure them in the Configuration screen.  This is the single most important feature to me and anything else is a bonus.

Other stuff I'd like to see but which isn't that important (in no particular order): -

2. Ability to automatically terminate any processes that have been 'out of control' (I'd term this as running at 100%) for more than a certain amount of time.  This would be configurable per process.

3. Ability to either take action or launch an exe/script if a certain issue arises such as a process taking too much processor time for a particular amount of time (as above) OR if it exceeds a particular memory threshold.  It would also be good if time of day coule be used in the determination.  e.g. if a service uses more than 50mb between midnight and 4am then ProcessTamer could launch as script to restart it.  I definitely think the ability to monitor memory usage would be a powerful addition and would put ProcessTamer within the Microsoft Resource Manager arena without the cost or bloat.

4. Automatically kill any predefined processes.  I think this might be useful to someone.  Maybe.

5. Do something or other with those annoying Tray Bubbles to stop messages for being displayed seemingly endlessly.  I'm not sure you can do much about this though (without a change of technology to something custom) as I'm sure the problems are very much Microsoft's.

6. Whatever everyone else has said - As long as it doesn't lead to a fat and slow application.  ;)
Designated "proofreading free" zone.
« Last Edit: September 24, 2005, 01:06 AM by Sentinel »

Carol Haynes

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Just a thought but how about the ability to impose a maximum memory usage on a specific process?

mouser

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i've been thinking about adding memory alarms and maybe some memory tweaking stuff to process tamer.. anyone who has any more detailed requests in this department i'd be happy to entertain..

Carol Haynes

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I wasn't think so much of memory alarms but more a memory cap so that you can say to a process "That's your lot mate".

Don't know how practical this is though ...

keso

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It would be nice that tray icon shows CPU load (similar to task manager icon).
That way i would know that some process gone wild even if system is responsive.

By the way, I didn't find any licence key on the site and spent a lot of time searching without success.
Being a busy man, I can't afford losing that amount of time, so I consider to quit (stop trying, and stop using a program), which is too bad.

Regards,

Vedran

mouser

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the key file page is here: https://www.donationcoder.com/Keys/

it's linked on the side of the process tamer homepage, and the download pages.. but maybe we need to make it clearer.

showing cpu load in tray is a good idea - i'm going to add it - just have to figure out best way.

mouser

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i've updated the main page and download page with a special graphic symbol and link to license key page - i think it stands out a lot more and should be easier for people to spot when they come to the site needing a freeware license key.

cartooncraze

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My main reason for using Process Tamer is to allocate as much PC resources as possible while running DVD Shrink. If I have a bunch of processes running while I am burning a DVD, it frequently will burn with errors. Being sick of stopping and closing all other programs and disconnecting from the internet, I longed for a program that would give resource hungry video editing programs the cpu resources that they need while in use. If you could make a one click program priority feature that would automatically restrict all uneeded processes to free up as much cpu as possible, this would be a great addition! I even think that this could be written and marketed as a seperate program aimed soley as a companion to video editing programs.

mouser

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i think you have a good idea there cartoon - and i think i might add such a feature to process tamer.
very good idea.
so like a simple menu command that lets you pick an app to get full priority until it finishes.

for waht you want however, an easy solution is just to set a rule in process tamer to always run your dvd app at high priority.
that should accomplish what you want.

Carol Haynes

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It is a good idea ...

Actually, Mouser, it isn't that simple ... if you run CD/DVD writer apps a high priority they can fail. I'm not sure why but I have had a few coasters from this (when I furst started using PT this is precisely what I did) and found a reference to the problem somewhere which said don't adjust process priority higher on burning apps as it may actually make problems worse.

I think it was something to do with system bottlenecks but I can't be sure, and I can't remember where the article was. I think it may have been on ulead's site.

mouser

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that's quite strange, i've never heard of such a thing and i'm not sure when that would be the case..
if you find the pointer to it do post.

so what then would you suggest we do?
have a way to tell process tamers to set all other processes to low priority?  theoretically the effect should not be much different, except if somehow the dvd writing app is shelling out the execution of other programs which are suffering when the burning app itself is set at high priority..

one thing to look for in that case is if the cd/dvd burning app actually launches a second program to do the actual burning - in which case you'd want to make sure you add a rule to force THAT program to high priority always, rather than the main user interface program.

Carol Haynes

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I have spent a while looking for the article ... no luck, all I can find are articles suggesting precisely what you said ...

Oh well another brainstorm ...

cartooncraze

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Well, I just burned 3 DVD's using DVD Shrink with Process Tamer set to Real Time (before I knew that I shouldn't) and I didn't shut down any other apps, nor disable my Norton Firewall and Antivirus, as we all know are very system hungry. If these DVD's play without any errors, then it will be confirmed. Process Tamer will be indispensible for anyone running video editing/burning software. I will let you guys know soon.

cartooncraze

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I hope I'm not nagging or being a pest, but I thought about one more thing that would be a great improvement to setting the priorities for running processes. I have no idea how you would do this, but do you remember the old Nortons Firewall? how it would run a pop up the first time any application tried to access the internet? it would ask you how you wanted to configure its settings. That would be great. The first time Process Tamer was installed it would recognize each app when it was opened the first time and prompt you to set it's priority, or if you wanted to ignore it. soon all of the programs on your PC would run "custom tailored" to your liking. But then you would most definitely have to start charging $99.00 for the program  :Thmbsup:

cartooncraze

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Okay. I have watched one of my DVDs burned using DVD Shrink with the priority setting at "realtime" and it played perfectly. I didn't shut down any programs or disconnect from the internet. Now I know that this program does work when using it for burning/editing software. I have 2 more DVD's to watch and if they have no burn errors then 3 times is a charm!