Suspend-Resume

Did you ever dream of powering your computer and having all applications exactly the same way as when you left your machine the last time? Mighty Desktop can do this for you on multiple occasions:

• When you power up your PC in the morning: Just power up your machine, go to the coffee machine or whatever and when you come back the Windows desktop looks exactly as when you shut your PC down. Zero manual clicks necessary, no time wasted.
  
  
• When an updater like 'Windows Update' asks you to restart the PC
  
  
• When you need to reboot into another OS and back again (eg. secure crypto OS)
  
  
• After a power blackout
  
  
• When a quick shutdown is necessary, for example because you have to leave quickly or when the power is out and your PC is running on a UPS
  
  
• When you need to run several setup programs in a row, each of which requires a restart. Mighty Desktop will automatically reopen the folder where the setups are located after each restart.
  
  
• When you want to switch between two completely different tasks you work on: For example one task is the application A plus open explorer folders. Another task is application B with different explorer folders.
  
  
• When you wish to run an application that consumes a lot of free RAM (eg. a Game, Virtual Box, Hyper-V). Closing some apps and restarting them after running is the easiest, quickest and cheapest way to get more memory. No need to restart anymore.
  
  
• To cure the system's built-in 'Suspend' and 'Hibernate' function that fail sometimes if a lot of applications are open
  
  
• To save energy costs with more frequent shutdowns because this function makes it very easy. Even shutting down during a longer break could save energy and money. After a restart your PC always runs smoother and quicker than after a suspend/hibernate. Windows degrades considerably over weeks without shutdown.
  
  
• When you need to restart the Desktop as a programmer
  
  
• After a Windows Desktop crash it allows you to restore the previously open File Explorer folders easily.
  
  

Why loose time with starting the same apps and rearranging all the windows every morning, after the dinner pause or after a Windows or graphics driver update? Suspend-Resume fulfills your dream. Just continue where you left! Mighty Desktop makes a snapshot of the running applications as well as of all of the open File Explorer folders and restores them automatically on the next startup or login. It restarts the applications, reopens the previously open documents, and rearranges the windows and Explorer folders exactly as they were before (normal, minimized, maximized, same position, same size, etc.). And if you want to restore on a smaller monitor, that's no problem either.

Suspend-Resume lets you choose: You can go down to the empty desktop level, logged out level, suspend level or power off level.

Maybe you have some encrypted or attached drives that require a password at boot. No problem, Mighty Desktop can wait patiently for drives or files to appear. This will allow for entering passwords without any stress. And you can also let it wait until the Internet is connected.

Timed suspend/shutdown: You can choose to postpone these suspend operations to a certain time. So when for example your virus scanner is still scanning or a lengthy copy or zip operation is in progress you can just walk away and let Mighty Desktop do the suspend for you later automatically when ready.

Curing the Windows built-in Suspend-Resume: Most of the PCs can't do a Suspend resp. Standby and Resume operation without problems when multiple applications are running. Many times I experienced failures after a resume like not waking up, blue screens, unexpected reboots or subtle bugs like mouse not responding, devices not working aso. I ceased to use the 'Suspend' resp. 'Hibernate' function of Windows entirely. Later I found out that the problems can be quite well eliminated by closing all applications before suspending, but it's still not perfect. Mighty Desktop can close all apps automatically for you with just one click. This way you can now feel safe and use the much quicker Suspend function again. If you still experience Resume problems you have the option to fall back to a shutdown and restart using Mighty Desktop's Suspend-Resume feature.

About energy saving and environmental protection: With Mighty Desktop you can more frequently shut down and restart your system because you won't lose your current work state of open windows and applications. This behavior is profitable even for short breaks. For example it might be even profitable during a one hour long lunch break or even for short pauses like 15 minutes coffee breaks. Note also that your system will work considerably quicker and more reliable after a reboot than after a hibernation or sleep.

A Mighty close operation, meaning gently closing an app, is more powerful than the original one of Windows. For example it knows how to close an open command shell while Windows' close operation is stopped and thus prevents a successful shutdown.

A practical additional function can be performed: Windows has predefined folders where applications can store some small files with temporary data, mainly the so called TEMP folder. But many applications forget to delete their files so it will get bigger and bigger. These files shouldn't be deleted manually because applications rely on them. Only if all applications are closed it is safe to delete them, and only those who are older than a week. In the Suspend-Resume tab you can just check a box and Mighty Desktop will clear them for you at shutdown. You can also do that manually by pushing a button in the Windows Extensions tab.

Resume: This does the same as calling the 'Restore Application State' function of the Desktop tab with the name 'On Going Down'. More see there.

More info:

• Copying entries to the clipboard copies their command line. You could use that in a Windows command shell resp. the tab Command Shell of the main tab Windows Extensions.
  

• Only apps where the 'Commandline' can be successfully queried can be saved and closed. If Mighty Desktop hasn't enough rights it isn't able to perform these functions properly. You can recognize this if you see an empty 'PathName' or find something like 'NoAcc' in the process' properties . To cure this you need to restart Mighty Desktop in Admin Mode (see tab 'About').
  
  
• If a save of the application's state is requested but there is no application running, the command will be ignored. This serves as a protection against the scenario of first closing all applications manually and then doing a mighty shutdown. So you won't lose your valuable saved state.
  
  
• For a Mighty Shutdown/Restart/..: If the resume has not yet been performed after a boot the application state will not be saved (which would destroy the state from the previous shutdown). So you don't have to worry to do a Mighty Shutdown even if a resume has not yet been done.
  
  
• If a closure of all apps was executed the automatic start of apps like the Permanent Apps is suppressed. This suppression is released as soon as you start some by one of the buttons in this or other tabs.
  
  
• You can cancel an automatic or commandline ordered resume by holding [Ctrl][Alt][Shift]
  
  
• Cryptomator volumes may only be accessible by Mighty Desktop if they are mounted on the same privilege level that Mighty Desktop is currently running on.
  
  
• You can put an icon on your desktop which executes a Mighty Shutdown or alike. See Desktop Shortcut tab.
  
  
• Many applications put the current document's name or some changing value in the title bar. This makes it hard for Mighty Desktop to identify a window after a restart. To make this more precise Mighty Desktop is using the window's class name and its id value in addition. But unfortunately a handful of programs go a step further and even change the window's class name. To counter this there is a tab Process Variations where Regular Expressions can be added. If a window can't be found a warning message will appear in the log panel. More info to this topic can be found in the chapter Process Identification.
  
  
• There is a difference between double-clicking a document in File Explorer and opening it by the menu functions in the application. In the first case Mighty Desktop can restore the document because its path is visible in the applications command line but in the second case Mighty Desktop has mostly no way of finding out, so it can't reopen it. But if the application has an interface for communication (API) Mighty Desktop can be programmed to find it out. For example this is already done for Microsoft Visual Studio. Other apps are on the TODO list. If there is no such API the least Mighty Desktop can do is to reopen the app and you can then manually use the 'Recent Documents' function inside the app to reopen the document.
  
  
• LibreOffice does not follow the usual standard. A special logic has been implemented to restore LibreOffice documents.
  
  
• Sometimes updates of applications change their appearance greatly, even window titles and class names. As a result Mighty Desktop can't match such windows to the one in the saved configuration. In rare cases it can even apply the appearance to the wrong window. Please keep that in mind and don't be too hard on it.
  
  
• At the moment some special File Explorer windows like "My Computer", "Recycler" aso. can't be restored because not enough info is available to the outside. Maybe in a later version.
  
  
• Only stand-alone applications can be managed (UWP not). More on this is explained in the Process List chapter.
  
  
• You can press [Esc] to remove the "Mighty Shutdown in progress..." message or just click through it and manage the windows behind.