yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
I tried the latest release. Before activating VT, I started its config program and just clicked save end exited. Then I started VT and it crashed right away. But it crashed filesys.exe and not itself. It almost seems as if VT triggerede the crash in filesys.exe. :-/

Activating VT again just made it change the title bar and nothing more. The original background was still showing. Clicking returned to normal again. As if VT used a 1x1 tile setup.

Then I tried entering the config program again and it crashed upon startup:

VisualTaskConfig.exe NullReferenceException

at VisualTaskConfig.Config.Config_Load()

at System.Windows.Forms.Form.OnLoad()

at System.Windows.Forms.Form._SetVisibleNotify()

at System.Windows.Forms.Constol.set_Visible()

at System.Windows.Forms.Application.Run()

at VisualTaskConfig.Config.Main()

VTConfig crashes on each subsequent activation.

Starting Task Manager, it hangs when enumerating the running applications. Clicking cancel showed 4 VTs running. They apparently don't know about each others existance. Trying to kill one of them causes the Task Manager to hang.

I had to reboot the phone... not good. :-/

I uninstalled VT and reinstalled it, but with the same result. I had to reboot the phone again. This (0.92) was a complete no-go for me. :-/
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
I rebooted, deleted the wolf registry key and startet VisualTasks.exe and it crashed (seems to happen regardless of what I do):

Windows crash report contains this:

EvntType: WinCE501bExceptio

AppName: VisualTasks.exe

AppVer: 5.2.0.0

AppStamp: 48eb5583

ModName: coredll.dll

ModVer: 5.2.0.0

ModStamp: 6c23165e

Offset: 000631f0

OwnName: VisualTasks.exe

OwnVer: 5.2.0.0

OwnStamp: 48eb5583

Exception Information

API Cur Process: 0x00000000

API Cur Thread: 0x00000000

API OWn Process: 0x00000000

Info Flags: 0x0000000C

Current Process: 0x65CC9B12

Faulting Thread: 0x655C639E

Owner Process: 0x65CC9B12

Code: 0xC0000094

Flags: 0x00000000

Record: 0x00000000

Address: 0x03FAF1F0

Parameters: 0
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] nir36:
well, first the config app crashes, and then if you try to run VisualTasks.exe it makes the device run very very slowly and doesn't do anything.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Grondinm:
just tried this out on my vogue and i must say it looks really good...a few thing i noticed...the phone dialer is always listed as an app...should be ignored...and sometimes i see double apps or the wrong name. kije i saw the desktop 3 times one with the start menu open one without and one with the task manager open. also one was called total commander and i also saw the total commander window...but it's really smooth and has not crashed on me yet.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
On wich device did you try it..?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
OK, i will include a list of window names to ignore in one of the next releases.

The windows with same pictures could be caused by the first time scan-process. During this process, every 500 ms the window changes and a screenshot is taken. Perhaps the time is not enough for the window to be painted. I will make this time configurable by the next release.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
HTC TYTN II with wm6.1.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] mst46:
Tried 0.92 on my Diamond. Works really well and fast - good work :-).

I also realized too many confusing pictures (processes) as was already mentioned.

Ignoring some of them will surely improve the app further.

Keep it up,

mst
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] hanackin:
hi!

Thanks for this great app :D

Could it be possible to have some screen shots ?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] hklcf:
thanks you very much :P
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
I don´t have a prog to make screenshots...:-)

Just try it......i will release the next Version today....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
New release out...
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] nuke1:
Thanks, very nice. Some suggestions for the Xperia feel:

-There should be an option to remove text, and text should be always at the bottom of each panel if enabled.

-There should be a small gap between each panel.

-Maybe that bounce effect that Xperia has :D
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] ytsejam_:
does not work on my Wizard Qtek 9100..

it loads up (the taskbar shows Visual Task).. shows a blank (transparent) screen. tap on screen, it minimizes.. opened VTS again, and the same thing happen..
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] -Arturo-:
Hi Wolfman.

This version finally works for me but now Visualtask config crashes at startup:)

I've got Kaiser with WM 6.1.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
You have installed the .net framework? For the config tool, .net is essential.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] cruzzmz:
use pocket controller to rec the animation ... for the screen shot
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] -Arturo-:
Yes version 3.5 has been cooked in my rom.

This is the error i get when I try to open config file:
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
New version and screenshots online...
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
Tried 0.94. I started it. It flipped through all open windows and then showed them as tiles with some space between. The bottom of the screen had some leftover, translated up a bit. It looked a bit strange. I selected the today screen using VT and that worked. Then I activated the hardware button to start VT again and it did show up again, but when I selected an ikon now, VT showed some distorted graphics at the bottum and locked up.

After that I as trying to save my phone from having to reboot, but failed. I rebooted and uninstalled VT again. I'll try the next version... ;-)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
New version out....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
I tried 0.945 and it seemed to work just fine UNTIL I used the config tool. After that, I had to reboot to get rid of a hanging VisualTasks that slowed down the phone. The only thing I changed with the config tool was setting the transparency to 255 (solid black) and change the layout from empty to 3 (even though default was equal to 3). After saving and quitting the config tool, I activated VT but now it only showed VisualTasks in the titlebar. Rest of the screen was unchanged. Seems some of the config options still can cause VT to hang.

It is clearly getting better. :-)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Hm, very strange...did you have all reg-keys under HKLM\Software\wolf\tools\VisualTasks? Is there a file called apps.conf in the VisualTasks directory? If it still hangs, try to delete this file....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
By the way:108 downloads. It would be nice to hear if the app works or not....! :-)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] iago_00:
in my emulator it runs a bit slugish. when i choose a window the animation is slow.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Christian72D:
I tested it both on my Prophet and my Touch Cruise, on both it works great.

Only two things to mention: would it be possible to disable the name of the program under the tiles?

In the exclusion list it would be great if one had all windows that are running and could click the to add them to the list.

But i don´t know if i will use this program because most times i have not more than 2-3 programs running and these i can switch with the taskmanager from HS++, but it´s a very nice and interesting program!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
That is normal for the emulator. On a device it should run smooth, depending on the kind of device....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
I have now installed VT again and started it. Before installation I cleaned the registry (\Software\wolf entry) and deleted the VisualTasks in PRogram Files (called Programmer, Danish wm).

I can activate it without problems and select the windows I want. Then I started VTC (config) and clicked exit right away. No problem. VT still works fine. Then I start VTC again and click Save and get an error right away that says "ArgumentNullException" and I can just click Ok. VTC doesn't exit. I click exit and VT still works.

VTC obviously has a bug somewhere.

Starting VTC again after the mentioned bug makes VTC give the same error even before it has shown the current options. Clicking ok makes the options show and I can modify them. There is no "apps.conf" in the VT directory.

Starting VTC again (clicking Ok to the error box) and changing the layout to 3 makes it possible to Save without error. Exiting VTC and starting VT makes it enumerate the windows again and I can continue to have VT working as expected (i.e. its working ;-) ).

I can now start VTC without getting an error. I change the background opacity to 255 (solid black, I could do with another colour perhaps) and Save. Starting VT makes it enumerate the windows again and it continues to work normally. However, slight problem: The black background in VT is misplaced, not covering the left-hand side of the screen. Approx. 1/6 of the screen in the left side is not covered by the black background. It still shows part of the program that was active when VT was activated. VT hasn't crashed yet :-).

Changing the border from 0 to 5 (was set to zero because of the above mentioned error) reveals more problems. While VT works and the left hand side remains uncovered by the black background, approx 1/6 of the top of the screen contains corrupted data. It looks like image data being displayed with wrong width (making vertical lines become very skewed). It still hasn't stopped working.

I presume that my previous attempt must have been based on earlier data in the registry/application folder which VT didn't guard itself against. Still, a few graphic anomalies are showing and VTC has a bug.

I just remembered that I have the graphics driver from htcclassaction.org installed. Could this be the reason for the graphic anomaly? (Not sure if that driver is opengl or directx or both...)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
How do I quit VT?

Also, if VT uses polling to capture images, how do I make it stop polling? (I assume by setting poll interval to 0?)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
There is also an issue when flipping between landscape and portrait mode: VT clears the list of known windows and starts from scratch with just 1 window. Couldn't you make it remember the list and just show the icons with the wrong width/height (i.e. swapped)?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Normally VT is quit by successfully saving options with VTC.

The interval is the time to switch from one app to the other. An apps normaly needs some time to completly draw it´s window. So by setting it to a higher value you can be mor sure to get the "real" screenshot! Setting it to 0 would make the switch to fast. I will change it in the next release, that if you set it to 0 there will be no scan at start
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Hm, the driver could be a problem, but i´m using standard GDI functions for drawing and for getting the resolution. If these functions deliver wrong resolution settings, it would make problems. Wich resolution runs your device?

I´m still wondering about the null pointer exception in VTC. Normaly there CAN´T be a null pointer....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
OK, i know what´s the problem with VTC. As a first help: clear the registry wolf entries, after the first start of VTC SELECT A LAYOUT, then save! After that, you can start VTC without problems. Bugfix in the next version...
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
New release online..
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
240x320 or 320x240. The part of the screen that VT doesn't draw contains corrupted pixels, either from previous windows or something almost completely garbage. The HTC driver from htcclassaction.org is an opengl es driver. I take it VT is D3D...

When I scroll VT, it reveals even more of the uninitialized data. And VT scrolls the uninitialized data just fine, indicating that VT is actively drawing it that way. Scrolling the corrupted data out of the screen and the scrolling it back shows the exact same corrupted/uninitialized data. Not knowing how you perform the scrolling, I would guess that you have the whole image stored as a texture which you draw onto the screen. In that case, the texture contains the corrupted data...

I haven't experimented with 0.95 yet. Tomorrow.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] ljinsane:
just downloaded and installed and so far I like it over dynamo3 as it is way faster and that is a must for this type of applications (especially when showing off :) ). Great work and I will be donating
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Thank you very much...:-)

If anybody has some inspirations for future releases, let them hear....!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Blowfish64:
Being able to run the setup part without getting an "argument null exception" error while trying to save would be a good start for me ;).
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] castrogne:
Well great program!!

Here are my problems using it, if it can help to make it greater:

- I had one "out of memory" error when trying to launch configuration tool many times

- The "Phone" windows is still there even if I put it in ignore windows...

- Problems with Manila2D : some windows appears twice... And when I clic on it it crashes

- Some windows without name appear... and then crash when click : wtill manila problem?

thanks :p

EDIT :

screen1 : show a window without name

When clic on "desktop" : goes on last open app, even if it's not the picture (exemple : activesync)

screen2 : 3 windows without name, the first one is outlook, second one make crash, last one is manila2D.

thanks :)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
0.95: The graphics problem remains, although less. The left hand side is black as it should be, but the 1/6 of the top still contains non-black pixels. Scrolling up does not initialize the background to zero, but contains non-black apparently random data.

Swapping between horisontal and vertical works ok (although corrupted background is present in both orientations). Swapping works with VT active (showing on screen) and passive (being in the background). Nice. :-)

Scrolling in landscape mode (320x240) doesn't work right. The icons are not scrolled correctly. First of all, the icons are broken up, scrolled to different positions, i.e. an icon is broken in two (or more) and are not aligned after the move. It looks very bad. :-/

Also, in the last couple of releases, VT has shown 1 additional icon that was previously never shown. It has a somewhat corrupted icon (looks like garbage). When clicking it, VT always returns to the previous application (the one active before VT was activated). The name is "MS_SIPBUTTON". I don't know what application this belongs to.

A last issue is with the installer or rather the uninstaller. It does not remove the VisualTasks folder in the Start Menu. This makes new copies of VisualTasks folder on every install: "VisualTasks", "VisualTasks (1)", "VisualTasks (2)", and so on.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
The MS_SIPBUTTON is an application window. You should put this into the ignore Apps-List!

Did you try using a Background picture?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
The first window at the upper left always has no name. It is the last active window.

For the Phone window: on my german Window Mobile the Phone window has a blank (space) after the word. So you can try "Phone ". And watch out for upper/lower case!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Did you try the latest version? If so, try to delete the HKLM\software\wolf\tools\VisualTasks reg key before running the app!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] castrogne:
Here an exemple of what appear after some time using the phone...

We can see:

- 3 "phone" windows : I haven't tried to add a blank space, i will...

- in the middle : The windows that made the phone crashe if i clic on it

- _SPITBUTTON : ??

Thanks

EDIT :

Ok so

- No more "Phone" when add to ignore "Phone " (with blank space)

- No more "_SPITBUTTON" when add "MS_SIPBUTTON" to ignore

- still one window that make the phone crash...
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
I have now tried with a background picture (240x293... it is what I had) and this helps. The image is placed to fit the lower edge and the top of the background remains corrupted (320-293=27 pixels). Transparency to 255 makes the background solid black (except the 27 pixels that are random) and lowering the value to e.g. 100 makes the image show more clearly. Using an image obviously initialises the background properly. I just have to find an image of the right size.

But when scrolling, the image is scrolled as well. The new area at the bottom of the screen again contains uninitialized image data (uninitialized texture data).

Scrolling in landscape mode is still corrupting everything on screen, icons, background, to a point that even scrolling back is corrupted. In portrait mode, scrolling back always works (i.e. the icons are drawn correctly, the background isn't).
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] kwoodall:
Any chance you could make this Smartphone compatible and work with dpad input in place of touchscreen?

Kermit Woodall

Managing Editor

GadgetNutz.com
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
The corruption is actually leftover pixels from the last application to use the render enginge (D3D or OpenGL, not sure what VT uses). If 3D hasn't been used prior to VT using it, the content of the 3D buffer is garbage.

In any case, you need to initialize the 3D background regardless of what you want to do.

If the transparency has to work properly, you have to make a snapshot of the screen and use it as a texture you draw on the background with. You can fade it as you please by adjusting the alpha transparency or draw another surface on top that is semitransparent (depending on setting).

Assuming the 2D framebuffer to be the same as the 3D framebuffer doesn't always work, certainly not with the TYTN II.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
VT doesn´t use any kind of 3D rendering, just standard-GDI.

For the transparency i do exactly what you are writing. I´ve got an idea, i will try it tomorrow!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Has anybody else this kind of problems...?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] nickdollahz:
Yeah it seems like the Layout drop down menu default set to blank makes this happen. Once you set the Layout drop down menu to 2-4. It works.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Even if the picture is not the right size, it should be stretched to the complete screen-size, from 0,0 to deviceResolution-X,deviceResolution-Y!

Setting the transparency to 0 would display the Background image as it-is!
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Next Version out....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
0.96 is MUCH better. :-)

The background is fully initialized and the image is scaled to fit the screen, in both horisontal and vertical mode. Also, scrolling shows no more uninitialized pixels anywhere. VT looks so much better now. :-)

That is not to say I didn't find anything that could be fix/improved upon... ;-)

First the up/down scrolling: When scrolling the image up, I have to make 4 upward motions to scroll fully to the next 3 rows, yet I only have to scroll 3 times to get back. Scrolling 3 times up reveals most of the 3 new rows, but there are about 3-4 pixel lines of the old screen left. Minor detail and is probably easy to fix. Then I wonder why the scroll speed in portrait mode is so fast that the next row appears to be without animation, yet in landscape mode, the next row is shown with a sliding motion.

The left/right scrolling: I understand the reason why you decided to slide the whole screen instead of just 1 column. I was just a bit surprised. Makes good sense. Maybe you should offer a fullscreen slide in the up/down scrolling as well. I think that would be welcomed. And the a similar slide speed problem is seen here: Portrait mode sliding appears to be much faster than in landscape mode.

Maybe the sliding in portrait mode simply is much more efficient than in landscape mode. Maybe different speed settings could be offered depending on the orientation of the screen?

Did you fix the uninstall problem? The one with Visual Tasks folder remaining in \Windows\Start Menu\Programs ?
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
One more suggestion. Have you considered the option to use a smoothing scaling instead of the nearest neighbor scaling? It would provide much nicer icons. Sure, it could slow down the start of VT, but I don't think it would be noticably much.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
The speed-differences between portrait/landscape is a general windows mobile problem. In landscape mode the device is normaly much slower than in portrait. I´m using a G900 with 480x800 Resolution, and i can tell you: in landscape nearly every application has a worse graphic performance..:-(

The uninstall problem is unfixed..:-)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
i not really know what you mean....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
Well, the icons don't look as pretty as they could. :-P

Try taking an image and scale it down to 1/3 of the original. (use GIMP or Photoshop or similar). Notice that the resulting image is much nicer than the scaling VT achieves.

The difference is that GIMP/Photoshop uses all image data to make the icon whereas VT only uses 1/9 of the image data (1/3 (width) * 1/3 (height) = 1/9 (area)).

VT could use a smoothing downsampling to make the icons look better.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
Ok, actually i´m using half of the hight/width of the device for the snapshots. That means, using a 240*320 device the snapshots have a resolution of 120*160. Using a 3x3 layout without spaces the pictures are scaled down (by StretchBlt) to 80*106. The only thing i could do is making the snapshot quality configurable, so that you could use the whole 240*320 resolution for the pictures. I´ve tested it, but the only effect i can see is that the quality gets better by using the zoom-effect when switching a task. And you will have a higher memory usage.

I think Photoshop will use a much better alghorythm for downscaling than the standard GDI-function StretchBlt.

But i will make it configurable in the next release...:-)
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
Well, whether you use the 120x160 or the 240x320 image for the icons wont matter much if you use StretchBlt to make the 120x160 images. It will of course matter for the zoom effect when you select an application to switch to. For that purpose, the fullsize image option would be welcomed (despite the increased memory usage).

You need a better downsampling algorithm to use for the icons instead of StretchBlt. I have been searching around and found these hints:

Or this (has code available in source, but uses floating point and is maybe too slow. Can't tell until it as been testet):

http://www.codeguru.com/Cpp/G-M/bitmap/specialeffects/article.php/c1779

There is also GDI+ but I am not sure it exists for windows mobile.

I may be able to find something better or make it myself..
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
OR maybe:

Call SetStretchBltMode(COLORONCOLOR) before calling StretchBlt().
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
I´ve tested all available StrechBlt modes for windows mobile, and there are no real differences....
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] galmok:
Ok. Then a custom image shrinking algorithm would be useful. The icons would be so much nicer to look at.
[Windows Mobile Apps and Games] Wolfman-XP:
That could be. But i don´t think that i can do this..:-)