I have been trying to learn WinStep before switching over from Stardock's Object Desktop. It's quite a lot of work, and not without issues. Here are some systray problems I am encountering. Any advice would be appreciated:

1. The transparent background on detached + floating and/or docked in startbar doesn't work very well. Sometimes it's transparent. Other time only some pixels show through from the background. Is this just buggy?

2. Is there any way to get a floating systray to expand to the left? i.e., if I detach and float the systray in a location of my choice near the screens right edge, can new icons be made to appear expanding to the left? Otherwise the tray expands beyond the screen's edge.

3. With the detached systray, Windows Explorer crashes from time to time. When this happens, the systray moves to the upper right and seems to be controlled by Windows only. In other words, NextStart cannot change anything about the systray. Shutting down NextStart results in a weird Windows task bar with a detached systray remaining in the upper right! Only logging out and in fixes this.

1 - Microsoft never exposed any API to handle the systray and its content. The systray service is handled by Explorer, and, short of replacing the shell, not much can be done with the systray. Stardock came up with one solution and Winstep with another. Both have their drawbacks.

Stardock's solution actually replaces the systray and has/had problems such as missing systray icons, Vista problems (AFAIK), etc... Winstep, on the other hand, 'hacks' the real Windows systray and manipulates it in a way that it SEEMS to be a part of NextSTART. In reality, it still is your old Windows systray, with several 'tricks' applied onto it.

For instance, to accomplish systray background transparency, a complex algorithm is applied to the systray's image that tries to separate actual systray icons from the background. This works well if the background is a solid color or a normal gradient, but sometimes fails miserably if the systray background is a 'complex' bitmap.

2 - I'll have to look into this.

3 - NextSTART should be able to deal with an Explorer crash by re-capturing the systray (note that when Explorer crashes, however, not ALL tray icons re-appear on the systray - this is actually a problem with the applications providing the actual systray icons, not with NextSTART).

Maybe something got broken in one of the previous releases and NextSTART is not doing what it should in case of an Explorer crash - I will have to look into this by crashing Explorer myself. I'll let you know what I found out.

One question, though: is that systray at the top right corner of the screen actually 'live' (i.e. do systray icons in it respond to right mouse clicks, etc...)?

Yes, the systray in the top right corner is fully functional.

Now for more information: It seems that the taskbar that ends up in the top right corner is not specifically linked to explorer crashes, but rather something to do with screen savers. I cleared my event logs and walked away from the computer. Upon return the systray was in the upper right and functional. NextStart lost control until I logged back in again. There were no errors in any of my system event logs.

The screen saver used at the time was "Dream Aquarium". So then I tried Windows' "Pipes" screen saver and the same thing happened. I walked away, came back in an hour and when I moved the mouse to end the screen saver, I found the systray in the upper right.

This problem does not happen when a screen saver is just previewed.

The problem also does not happen when I have NO screen saver.

FYI, I have all Power Saving features disabled.

Does this mean NextSTART actually crashed or became un-responsive? If not, what happens when you toggle NS Task Management (main NextSTART menu -> Settings)? According to your description, my bet is that you will get the Windows taskbar back but the systray will remain at the top right corner.

Anyway, I know why the systray might appear at the top right corner (NextSTART needs to do this when it needs to refresh the transparent systray background and shape, but it is usually too fast for the eye to notice) but I have no idea why it would actually remain there (i.e.; it indicates a simple SetParent API call fails).

I also noticed a lack of response from other users, which seems to indicate an isolated issue - on the other hand, how many of the others run with a floating systray?