Hpow to create a background process/application?

27 Jan 2006 10:36 PM

Steve Wertz

Is there a walkthrough or how to that describes the general method
for creating an application (in Visual Basic Express) that has no
initial UI, but runs in the background with an icon in the system
tray. A context menu from the notify icon will of course bring up
an application UI for settings and exiting, etc...

This process will simply change the contents of a text file every
5 minutes or so. I don't think I want a Windows Service, and even
if I did, I don't seem to have a template for it in the project
designer. I thought I saw one once...

I basically have the functionality of one right now by using a
Windows Form with WindowState=Minimized, Enabled=false,
ShowinTaskBar=false, and a NotifyIcon (no context menu yet), but
the application takes up 30megs of memory and doesn't even have
any code added to it yet. There must be a more efficient way.

I see some links in the help files and the MSDN site, but either
the links are broken or I can't find the link to the sample code
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/vbref/html/vbsamwindowsformssystemtraysample.asp
(where's the code?)

Anbody have any pointers/links to a working sample or tutorial
would be appreciated. What is the terminlogy for such an
application - it used to be a TSR, but that's pretty ancient.

TIA!
-sw

27 Jan 2006 11:40 PM

Jeremy

Quick solution,

On Form load, set the opacity to 0...

28 Jan 2006 3:10 AM

Steve Wertz

On 27 Jan 2006 15:40:45 -0800, "Jeremy" <slayer3***@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>Quick solution,
>
>On Form load, set the opacity to 0...

OK. I guess that's one way. I was wondering if there was a
different, preferred approach. I guess this is it then.

Why is the app so huge in memory? it's 92K on disk, and I haven't
even added any code to it. I figured I must be using the wrong
approach. Opacity won't fix the memory issue.

-sw