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 Post subject: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2012 4:08 am 
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Hey everyone. I have a quick question that has been bugging me since I started using this dock. The System Tray icons are too big (see image below). How can I make them smaller?

They are larger than the regular icons and distorted a bit. This is the opposite from the original Windows 7 taskbar icons which were smaller. I would like to get them to match the original as far as size goes. Thanks for the help in advance.

Image


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2012 11:52 am 
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As you know, the size of icons in the Windows system tray is 16x16 pixels and cannot be changed. As such, applications that put an icon in the system tray usually provide very low resolution images as the source icon.

Now, when the dock displays system tray icons, this low resolution images must be displayed at whatever icon size the dock is using. Worse, if you are using magnify as the dock mouse over effect, what happens is that an image that is originally 16x16 pixels ends up being displayed at 128x128.

This, of course, causes the image to become extremely blurred (could be worse, without the Gaussian blur filters used, it would become heavily pixelated instead).

Image

Mind you, this is not Nexus fault. The dock can't make miracles, and all it has to work with is a tiny 16x16 pixel original system tray icon.

This is one of the reasons why Nexus has a second 'mode' which you can use to display the system tray on the dock: the 'grouped icons' mode.

In grouped mode, all tray icons retain their original 16x16 size, and they are grouped together into a single dock icon, as many as will fit. For instance, if the size of icons on your dock is 48x48, in grouped mode a single dock icon will display 9 system tray icons (a 3 x 3 grid).

Image

Now, if you are using Nexus Ultimate or Winstep Xtreme instead of the free version of the Nexus dock, you have a 3rd option: system tray icon customization.

Image

With system tray icon customization, you can replace the original tiny system tray icons with high resolution images of your choice. Winstep Xtreme and Nexus Ultimate even ship with high resolution replacements for the Windows 7 system icons.

System tray icon customization thus allows you to display system tray icons on docks at full size without the blurriness.

Another option if you are using Nexus Ultimate/Winstep Xtreme (which allow multiple docks, unlike the free version of Nexus which only supports a single dock) is to create an individual dock dedicated to the system tray. Since docks have icon sizes independent from one another, the dedicated system tray dock could display system tray icons at the original 16x16 pixels.

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Jorge Coelho
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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2012 9:22 pm 
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Thanks for the info. It makes sense. I have a new question, I was over at a friends house who has the Winstep Xtreme installed. He has a question about the NextStart hotspots.

What he wants is for the (NextStart) taskbar to show it's self over a maximized window when he bumps the top of the screen, much like the regular taskbar does when it's autohidden.

He tried a bunch of stuff including setting an internal command to show the taskbar when using the hotspot. This did work but it also makes the regular Windows 7 taskbar reappear... Is there any kind of command that will allow him to have the NextStart taskbar show when bumping the top of the screen without the Windows 7 taskbar coming back?

EDIT: We figured it out. What he was really wanting was to have access to the volume control while having max screen size for Google Chrome. He found the Show Volume Control hotspot and set it to the top edge of the screen. It works great. Thanks anyway.


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 9:05 am 
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Hi Jorge, I have an issue that is somewhat related - I notice that the icons used for customizing the system tray render at a lower resolution that I select.

For example, the icons I chose are 48x48px, but they appear to be rendering at 40x40px or less?

Is this normal?

Thanks


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 12:19 pm 
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Can I have a screenshot illustrating the problem, please? :D

Also, what is your screen DPI (large fonts)? 100%, 125% or 150%?

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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 1:23 pm 
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Image

As you can see, in my theme all the icons are from the same PSD template.

The clock icon (far right) and the up arrow (far left) are both rendering properly (pixel perfect).

The customized tray icons are being rendered at lower quality, and scaled up. It is like this no matter what size the icons are, they are always rendered at inferior quality.

The icons are at 48x48px, and the icons size setting is 48x48px.

Thanks.

EDIT: DPI is unchanged from default.


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 1:30 pm 
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Hard for me to notice a difference since I can't see the originals side by side.

Couple of questions though:

1. Are you using .ICO or .PNG files to customize those tray icons?

2. What is the mouse over effect for that dock?

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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 1:37 pm 
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Hi Jorge.

Mouse over effect is afterglow.

Icons are PNG files.

Here is the original for the blue '62': Image

Comparing to the image, it is sharper, 1:1 pixel mapped in the original, but for the tray items it is blurry and lower resolution upscaled.


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 1:47 pm 
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What happens if you drag & drop that PNG file directly into the dock as a new dock item? Does it appear blurry as well, or sharp as it should?

Also, the Afterglow effect is NOT being combined with the Magnify effect, or is it?

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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 1:49 pm 
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It appears sharp as it should, it always has.

It only appears blurry when I use it for a custom tray icon. Normal icons are fine.

It appears to be something in the custom tray icon code.

EDIT: No magnify effect.


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 2:40 pm 
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Ok, just looked at this and fixed it for the next release.

The cause was actually a combination of factors:

The system tray customization code caches a copy of the customized icon, which is then served to every object requesting a system tray icon. Because this cached bitmap is shared between and served to docks with different icon sizes, the systray code always requests and caches a high quality/large version of the image (i.e.; 128x128 pixels).

Now, this should only be important for .ICO files, which, as you know, might have different size versions stored in the same icon, and you want to get the best/largest one.

Because PNG files, unlike icons, only have a single image, the requested icon size should not matter - at render time the PNG image will simply be automatically scaled up and down as necessary by the object using that image.

However, a mechanism was added some time ago to prevent the usage of extremely large PNG images (imagine a huge screenshot of your desktop which you saved as a PNG file instead of JPG), because having to repeatedly scale down very large images to normal icon sizes is slow and kills performance.

Obviously, nobody (?) is going to use such a large PNG file as an actual icon for an item in a dock, but suppose you saved that PNG screenshot into the Windows Desktop, such an image would be used 'as is' in the Desktop tab of the Shelf.

The solution to that problem (and the mistake) was to force *all* PNG images to the requested icon size. So, because the system tray icon customization routine requested a 128x128 image for its cache, your PNG file would be scaled up from 48x48 to 128x128, only to be scaled down back to 48x48 when that icon was displayed on the dock. All this scaling up and down caused the fuzziness you were seeing.

I fixed this by only scaling PNG images that are actually *larger* than the requested icon size. Smaller PNG images will now retain the original size.

I'm only explaining this so you and other people understand the hidden complexity that is sometimes behind apparently simple requests. :D

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Jorge Coelho
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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 2:48 pm 
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Excellent Jorge, That makes a lot of sense.

Unluckily for me, my nexus ultimate just expired on the 9th and I can't afford to buy a newer version just yet.

Thanks again!


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 3:22 pm 
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Sorry about that... :cry:

Anyway, the fix will only show up in the next version, and it might take a while for that to be officially released.

Also, don't forget that a renewal of the Nexus Ultimate upgrade subscription for another full year is only $12.50. :D

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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 3:37 pm 
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Hi Jorge, how long until that fix makes it into the beta?

Thanks


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 Post subject: Re: System Tray Icons Too Large...
PostPosted: Thu Jan 12, 2012 4:22 pm 
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No idea, sorry... I released a new beta just yesterday.

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