Permanent Apps

Usually a user would like to have some applications or documents running resp. open at any time. I like for example 'Notepad++' very much for its simplicity (a huge thanks to the developers!) and want to have it open constantly. The same goes for my browser, my E-Mail program, my chat clients and my cloud storage provider. With the 'Permanent Apps' feature you can instruct Mighty Desktop to keep your beloved applications running at all times even if they don't have the option "Start with Windows" or alike. You can tell Mighty Desktop how often it should check that, for example once after a restart, once after login or at a time interval.

As an administrator of a server you might want to assure that a certain service is up and running all the time. Since services can crash at any moment it can be helpful to have a supervising tool that can detect this and just restart crashed processes. Also, a crash of the Windows Desktop (explorer.exe) can sometimes end plugins. And some plugins are just unstable if for example the internet connection is switched off for a longer time period, eg. "DropBox" and "BoxCryptor 2". Mighty Desktop can make sure that such plugins are always up and running.

For example, if DropBox is silently exiting, you may not even notice that documents are not synced anymore. To eliminate this risk:

• Name: Dropbox.exe
• Pathname: C:\Program Files (x86)\Dropbox\Client\Dropbox.exe
• Arguments: §regex§^[/]systemstartup$§or§^[/]home$§regex§
• Window Title: *

Permanent Apps can also be used to assert that an often consulted document is always open. In the following example a text file 'Lookup.txt' is opened automatically after the login and will be reopened if it was closed by mistake or by a reboot:

• Name: 'notepad.exe'
• PathName: C:\Windows\notepad.exe
• Arguments: C:\Lookup.txt"
• WindowTitle: "Lookup.txt - Editor"
• WindowClass: "Notepad"
  

Optionally the window's position and size can be fixed

• Frame: Pos:309,442 Size:1003,563
  

You could also put it in minimized state for later use.

The possible recurrences for the check whether it is already open are: After some seconds, after a resume, at logon, at workstation locking or unlocking, when a remote PC connects or disconnects, when a remote PC is taking or leaving the control or finally after a time span of your choosing. Read more about that in the Watchdog chapter.

Notes:

• Adding is very easy. You can simply point on the window of the application. We recommend to always point on the window's title resp. frame because in some applications the content is generated by a different process (eg. Internet Explorer).
  
  
• You can also Drag&Drop an item from File Explorer onto the grid. If you specify a link (*.lnk) it is even better because it will protect your entry from becoming invalid if the third party application contains a version number in the path and later performs an update. An example for that is the WhatsApp desktop client.
  
  
• It is recommended to switch the 'Enabled' box off during an update of an app to avoid interference. The easiest way to do this is to use the right-click menu of the notification icon.
  
  
• After starting a process Mighty Desktop waits for the time that is defined in the Settings tab and then attempts to reapply the specified appearance to the application's main window. If an error is displayed an increase of the waiting time could be the solution.
  
  
• There is a special handling for cases where multiple versions of a program are installed side by side. For example WhatsApp has one folder for each version with the version number in its name and on each update you get a new one. To cope with this you can replace the actual version number in the path by the notation "{Version}". Mighty Desktop will then automatically search for the highest version number it can find and run this one. The version placeholder can be used in folder names as well as in file names.
  
  
• There is a special handling when Mighty Desktop is not run in Administrator Mode. In this case the system can return an empty string for the pathname of some processes. It is advisable to always fill the 'Process Name' field so a process can be identified precisely.
  
  
• Go to Window: Tries to find the window of a process according to the current entry and then shows this process in the Process List. If nothing matches, it analyzes what does not match and displays it in the Log panel. Helpful in case of non-matching properties. For more see section "Process identification" in chapter "ProcessBot".
  
  
• Go to Process: Tries to find a process with the process parameters of the current entry without checking the window properties and then switches to the Process List and highlights the process. If nothing matches, it analyzes what doesn't match and displays it in the Log panel. A good diagnostic tool. For more see section Process Identification of ProcessBot.
  
  

'Switch NumLock On': You can instruct Mighty Desktop that in the case when ALL items are run it should switch on the NUMLOCK key on the keyboard so you have always the digit keys available. This isn't done if only a part of the items are run.

Concrete settings for special programs at present (alphabetical)

You can add these to your list if needed.