DDE, Screen Savers

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GetRight Screen Savers

These screen savers show the status of files being downloaded by GetRight! These require GetRight 3.3.3 or higher.

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e-motional.com software has created the following GetRight-compatible screen savers which can show the status of downloads in progress. Click on a title to download the free trial version.

Rivers and Lakes Screen Saver (3,674 KB)      [More info]
	See images of beautiful rivers, streams, waterfalls, and lakes.
Seashores Screen Saver (3,446 KB)      [More info]
	See images of beautiful ocean beaches, crashing waves, lighthouses.
Space Central Screen Saver (3,330 KB)      [More info]
	See images of stunning galaxies, nebulae, stars, and planets.
Impressionist Art Screen Saver (4,349 KB)      [More info]
	See images of classical art from Monet, Cezanne, and others.
e-motional Images Screen Saver (468 KB)      [More info]
	Use your own images to create a digital photo album.

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Headlight Software's Sample Screen Saver (for source code, see below). Simple and not perfect, but it is kinda cool.

Michael Burford's GetRight Sample #1 (1.01). 53KB ZIP file.
(This is just a small sample that flickers at times and it seems to crash itself when exiting sometimes; but it shows how it works and it's free!)

To install, just unzip and put the .SCR file into your {WINDOWS}\SYSTEM directory. Then use the normal Display control panel to pick it!

If you're a developer, see below for how it is done!

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Developers: How these are done!

GetRight 3.3.3 and higher support a simple DDE server. While I'm sure developers will have other suggestions (like Adding new downloads) the purpose in this version is to provide basic information about downloads in progress to another program.

The obvious use I'd like to get out of this would be some cool screen savers that show the status of GetRight downloads!
My Personal wish: something like the Windows OpenGL ones that bounce text around--but I leave that as an "exercise for the reader" :)

I will provide links to any useful things created. (HeadLight Software retains the right to Not link to any too--but as long as they're not offensive or something, I'd expect to link to them.)

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Another programmer, Lucian Wischik, made some nice C++ components to make it easy to add this GetRight status information into your own programs. See Here!

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Download the source code for "Michael Burford's GetRight Sample #1 (1.01)". (Uses MFC; I've compiled it with VC++6):

Download

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Quick Info:

The DDE service and topic is "GetRight|DownloadInfo" and the item is "#" where # is a number from 1 to n. When the DDE server returns a blank for a number n, then you've reached the end and should stop requesting.

Unless more downloads start or stop, for a given number # you will get info back about the same download. But if downloads have started/stopped, the numbers may change!

The reply is:
"FileName|SizeInBytes|Percent%|EstTimeRemaining".

The service is setup as "request only" service--poll it on a timer every few seconds or so.

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Simple Visual Basic Sample to Get the Info:

Create a project with one button and two textboxes.

Private Sub Command1_Click()
    On Error GoTo Done
    Dim i As Integer
    
    '** Download #'s start at 1!
    i = 1
    text2.Text = ""
    
    Do
        '** Setup and request the data
        text1.LinkMode = 0
        text1.LinkTopic = "GetRight|DownloadInfo"
        text1.LinkItem = i
        text1.LinkMode = 2
        text1.LinkRequest
        '** values are:
        '**     FileName|FileSize|Percent%|EstTimeRemaining
        text2.Text = text2.Text + " " + text1.Text
        i = i + 1
    '** As long as getting something not empty, do the next one.
    Loop While (text1.Text <> "")
    
Done:
End Sub

More Visual Basic samples

Uses a timer to avoid flickering if updated a lot. (from Mikkel Paulson)

Option Explicit 
Dim iCount As Integer 

Private Sub Form_Load() 
    lblDownload.LinkMode = 0 
    lblDownload.LinkTopic = "GetRight|DownloadInfo" 
    lblDownload.LinkItem = 1 
    lblDownload.LinkMode = 2 
    lblDownload.LinkRequest 
End Sub 

Private Sub tmrUpdate_Timer() 
    lblDownload.LinkMode = 0 
    lblDownload.LinkTopic = "GetRight|DownloadInfo" 
    lblDownload.LinkItem = 1 
    lblDownload.LinkMode = 2 
    lblDownload.LinkRequest 
End Sub