I have created an application that runs in the taskbar. When a user clicks the application it pops up etc. What I would like is similar functionality to that in MSN when one of my friends logs in. Apparently this is know as a toast popup? I basically want something to popup from every 20 minutes toast style fom the application in the taskbar.
My existing application is winforms based written in C# with .net 3.5
This is pretty simple. You just need to set window in off-screen area and animate it's position until it is fully visible. Here is a sample code:
public partial class Form1 : Form
{
private Timer timer;
private int startPosX;
private int startPosY;
public Form1()
{
InitializeComponent();
// We want our window to be the top most
TopMost = true;
// Pop doesn't need to be shown in task bar
ShowInTaskbar = false;
// Create and run timer for animation
timer = new Timer();
timer.Interval = 50;
timer.Tick += timer_Tick;
}
protected override void OnLoad(EventArgs e)
{
// Move window out of screen
startPosX = Screen.PrimaryScreen.WorkingArea.Width - Width;
startPosY = Screen.PrimaryScreen.WorkingArea.Height;
SetDesktopLocation(startPosX, startPosY);
base.OnLoad(e);
// Begin animation
timer.Start();
}
void timer_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
//Lift window by 5 pixels
startPosY -= 5;
//If window is fully visible stop the timer
if (startPosY < Screen.PrimaryScreen.WorkingArea.Height - Height)
timer.Stop();
else
SetDesktopLocation(startPosX, startPosY);
}
}
There's support for notification balloons in Win32 (I'm not a .net programmer), with some useful properties as old new thing explains.
There's also a system wide semaphor which you should lock to prevent more than one popup from any application appearing at once.
There's a a couple of pages on the toast semaphor on msdn - the toast semaphor and in the broader context of usability. I also came across some example code to use the balloon api from C# while looking, but can't vouch for it.
You're moving the form out of the screen to the right, and then raising it. It would never actually raise into the desktop view. X-axis is right and left, Y-axis is up and down. Adding to the X-axis makes it go further right, and adding to the Y-axis makes it go further down.
