CoolTrayIcon, ver. 3.2.0

[Properties] [Methods] [Events]
[Known Bugs] [Hints] [Comments]

CoolTrayIcon is a tray icon component. It allows you to easily implement tray icons in your own applications, with various appearances and behaviors.

CoolTrayIcon can from ver. 3.1.0 be used in a service.

Properties

Icon	The icon to display in the tray. This icon is 16x16 pixels and max. 16 colors. If you use an icon file (.ico) containing more than one icon, Delphi will use the first icon. If it's 32x32 it will be scaled down, which probably won't look good. NOTE:* Assigning a new TIcon object to Icon will cause the icon in the tray to redraw. However, this is not the case if you change Icon through the TIcon.Assign method, or change it through TIcon.Handle. In those cases you must call the method Refresh (see below) to redraw it.
IconVisible	Whether to display the icon. This property has no effect in design mode.	Default true
Hint	The tray icon's hint (max 64 chars), which is displayed when you move the mouse cursor over the tray icon. NOTE: The time until the hint window closes is determined by Windows, so don't bother trying to change the interval. You can't.
ShowHint	Whether to show the hint.	Default true
PopupMenu	The popup menu you want to display when the icon is clicked.	Default true
LeftPopup	Do you want the popup menu to pop up when you click the left mouse button? Default is false, meaning only the right button will work. NOTE: LeftPopup must be false (or the popup menu unassigned) if you want to double click the tray icon without displaying the popup menu. LeftPopup must be false if you want CoolTrayIcon to handle a menu that has a default menu item.	Default false
Enabled	Default true. Works like Enabled for other controls, enabling/disabling keyboard and mouse input. Useful when you want to temporarily disable the popup menu, say while you are displaying an about box or some other modal window.	Default true
IconList	An ImageList containing icons. If it contains other images than icons, the tray icon won't change when using CycleIcons, but no error occurs. NOTE: When you assign to IconList IconIndex is set to 0.
IconIndex	The current icon in the assigned iconlist (or 0 if no iconlist is assigned).
CycleIcons	Animate tray icon by cycling through all the icons stored in IconList and assigning them to Icon. When you set CycleIcons to true, it will begin with the first icon in IconList. NOTE: CycleIcons can be true even though you have no IconList. No cycling will occur in that case, but the cycle timer is still active, which will consume some resources.	Default false
CycleInterval	The time interval in milisecs. before selecting a new icon from IconList.
DesignPreview	When true, enables you to preview the tray icon in design mode. You can watch what the icon looks like, see its hint, enable/disable it, test the popupmenu, and animate it via CycleIcons. NOTE: Set DesignPreview to false to avoid the design time icon appearing when you run your program. This is only a problem in the Delphi IDE, not in the finished exe-file. I couldn't find a way to kill the design icon in run-time, so you'll have to do it yourself. NOTE: Setting DesignPreview in run-time has no effect.	Default false
Handle	The tray icon's handle.
WindowHandle	The tray icon's window handle.
StartMinimized	This property applies only when the owner of the tray icon component is a form. Should the main form be hidden when the application starts up? NOTE: Remember to set the form's Visible property to false if StartMinimized is true.	Default false
MinimizeToTray	This property applies only when the owner of the tray icon component is a form. Do you want to hide the main form instead of minimizing it?	Default false

Methods

Refresh	Redraw the tray icon. May be necessary when changing the icon, depending on how you do it (see above).	Returns true or false
ShowBalloonHint	Show a balloon hint (a kind of "sticky" popup hint). NOTE: Balloon hints are available in WinME, Win2000, and WinXP only. Calling this method in other Windows versions has no effect. NOTE: You can use a max. of 64 chars for the title and max. 255 chars for the text. The hint is visible for 10-60 seconds, or until the user clicks it.	Returns true or false
BitmapToIcon	Renders and returns an existing icon based on the bitmap given as parameter. The bitmap should be 16x16 pixels. Specify a color to be shown transparently or clNone for no transparency. NOTE: Bitmaps that are not exactly 16x16 will be scaled up or down.	Returns true or false
ShowMainForm	This method applies only when the owner of the tray icon component is a form. Show the main form. NOTE: It is important that you use this method when displaying the form, as it contains important calls that affect how the form and the application display themselves. See the demo app.
HideMainForm	This method applies only when the owner of the tray icon component is a form. Hide the main form.

Events

OnClick, OnDblClick, OnMouseDown, OnMouseUp, OnMouseMove	Work like the similar events for other controls.
OnCycle	Fired just before the icon changes via CycleIcons. Returns the next index in the assigned imagelist.

Known Bugs

Someone complains the component's hint will not show when CycleIcons is true. This happens in WinME. I've been unable to reproduce this error, but please tell me if you get it.

Hints

How do you start your app. with the tray icon visible and the main form invisible?
Very simple: at design time set StartMinimized and IconVisible to true and set the form's Visible property to false.
What is the proper way to restore the form?
ALWAYS use the method ShowMainForm! This method contains important calls that affect how the form and the application display themselves.
How do I hide the application's icon from the taskbar?
Well, it's very simple:
```
  ShowWindow(Application.Handle, SW_HIDE);
```
To show it again, use SW_RESTORE or SW_SHOW as parameter. Also, if you display a child form the application icon will become visible again automatically.
Can you retrieve the client coordinates of the tray icon and not just the screen coordinates? (In other words, can you determine where the cursor is situated inside the trayicon itself?)
To the best of my knowledge, you cannot. The parent of the tray icon is the TASKBAR (you would think it was the TRAYBAR, but that seems to be some dummy canvas that the taskbar uses in its paint method). The best I can do is retrieve the tray icon's position in the traybar, but this is not much use.
Why does the tray icon not appear in my NT service app.?
Set the service's Interactive property to true.

Comments

The CoolTrayIcon component is freeware. Feel free to use and improve it, but please include all original files if you redistribute the zip-file. If you have any comments or corrections to the component I would very much like to hear them. A lot of Delphi programmers have already told me they like the component and use it, which is a huge boost for my ego. Thanks a lot, guys - especially those of you who gave suggestions and pointed out the bugs.

The component should work on any Windows platform (Win9x, ME, NT, 2000, XP). The demo exe-file may have to be recompiled (?), though I don't think so. If you experience any problems related to the operating system you use, please tell me. Also, it should work in Delphi 4 and up (2 and 3?) and C++Builder 3 and up. Again, tell me if I'm wrong.

A word about services: CoolTrayIcon has been updated in ver. 3.1.0 so it will no longer automatically assume its owner is a form. This allows you to use it for other purposes such as service apps. that have no form. Some properties and methods don't make sense without a form, but rather than creating a superclass without these properties/methods I've simply let them stay in CoolTrayIcon itself. You can use the properties/methods in your service app., but they will not do anything. I figured the component would be more flexible and easier to extend into child classes this way.

Get the latest version from http://www3.ewebcity.com/troels/delphi.asp.

Troels Jakobsen
delphiuser@get2net.dk