Wallpaper - Grafitti

Wallpaper

Some of my wallpapers are just color themed, or relaxing, funny, or have a kind of special meaning. And sometimes I just want to enjoy the urban jungle... (This is a bit low-res and may require WallX or similar.)

Wallpaper - Lady of Pain

Wallpaper + Planescape

Four different wallpapers, all based on Sigil's Lady of Pain.

If you haven't played D&D, you haven't lived. If you haven't played Planescape, you haven't died and gone to the great wheel 🤔 Yet 😁

Personal Windows 11 Setup

Windows

How I set up my machine...

(This note is pretty much for myself, and I think it actually has some mistakes in it as well...)

Wallpaper - Dual Monitor - Sweetwater Coastline

Wallpaper

I suppose this is a very large lake, somewhere (that doesn't look like a saltwater coastline to me)... but it's the forever compelling combination of land, see, and water... Add a bit of reddish color, and it's hard to pay attention to anything but that mesmerizing desktop background 😏

Wallpaper - Fitness Protection Program

Wallpaper

I have absolutely no idea where I found this...

(Click on image to enlarge)

You may need something like WallX to make this usable.

More Wallpapers...

Wallpaper - Who is going to save Humanity? (Part II)

Wallpaper

I can't imagine you haven't seen it, but if you did not then go and watch Person of Interest. This is the counterpart to last month's wallpaper.

I use WallX to keep the upsized background from hurting my eyes...

Sharing Touch Portal settings between two PCs

Datatalk + Touch Portal

Though Touch Portal has its own backup mechanism and you can use that to share settings it does take a few clicks and a bit of attention. When you quickly want to share stuff that's not what you want.

I created a few batch files and two buttons to speed things up. Here's my approach.

Wallpaper - Dual Monitor - Galactica

Wallpaper

Symbology aside (right) the BattleStar Galactica wallpaper is a great 2h wallpaper.

(Click on the image to enlarge.)

Wallpaper - Can't Fit In

Wallpaper

I never could.

I know as a wallpaper this one's excessively small. WallX makes it barely acceptable using either fade, or dots+blur. The point here, however, is the message: not everyone fits in. (Click image to enlarge.)

More wallpapers...

Launch applications from Touch Portal (or any other launcher) and force them to the front

Datatalk + Touch Portal

No matter how hard you try, sometimes Windows 11 doesn't let you push a window to the front. It can drive me nuts!

Why doesn't Windows have a, per application, setting to allow that specific application to be brought to the front by other apps and itself? It would save a lot of headaches.

Wallpaper - Xbox

Wallpaper

Okay, I'm a Sony PlayStation guy (in spite of also owning an Xbox One S) but this is a great wallpaper. (Click image to enlarge.)

I couldn't find a high-resolution version, but that doesn't bother me at all. In fact, I deliberately use dots and blur effects in WallX to make the background fuzzier so the wallpapers won't distract me from the job at hand. WallX parameters: dots blur round distort 15 expand 150 keep resident

WallX and WaitWindow updates

Datatalk

Updated versions of WallX and WaitWindow, and now also WaitFile (included with WaitWindow).

Home Server / WallX / TouchPortal / Power Saving Kludge

Datatalk + Windows

Upfront: this is a bit of a kludge, and I'll be looking for a better option, as soon as I can find one. But it taught me things...

Anyway, with the ever-increasing price of electricity, I was wondering if I could not simply switch off my home server upon command. In the past, I used a timed-out, which worked fine, but there are other users in my household, and they're not always computer-savvy.

Wallpaper - Angels

Wallpaper

2 for 1... Angels are mostly girly stuff, but hey! I have a few in my wallpaper collection as well. Read on...

SpaceDesk - Multi Monitor 'on the cheap' using SpaceDesk

Datatalk + Multi Monitor

Multi-monitor setups are fun 😁 

Use an old laptop or tablet an additional monitor? Not a problem, and with SpaceDesk you can mix and match iOS, Android, and Windows devices (!).

And best of it all: it is (still) free.

An introduction to WallX - by video

Datatalk + WallX

To show what this little tool does I decided to create a little video. Which was a little more complicated than expected, and I got distracted along the way 😁

So I learned OBS (to grab the screen), Magic Window (tracking the mouse pointer in OBS), looked at Stream Decks but opted for Touch Portal, added some features to WallX to simplify the handling and creation of icons, then had to learn how to edit videos in HitFilm Express.

TouchPortal - Quickly converting icons for Touch Portal

Datatalk + Touch Portal

I like Touch Portal but found the conversion of .ico to something Touch Portal can understand a pain, so I modified WallX a bit to make the process easier.

WallX v2.42 versus Touch Portal v2.3... A case of AND or OR?

Datatalk + WallX

Well, nothing's ever completely done but WallX now runs smoothly and hasn't crashed on me yet. I've worked on importing files / exporting graphics, faster response to user action, and added some fail safe handling when writing files. Either Windows or some virus scanner was blocking my write access now and again. Also removed a bunch of smaller and larger bugs.

But... what has that to do with Touch Portal?

WallX v2.22 'Newfangled'

Datatalk + WallX

Another day, another update.

But I think it's a good one... No, a great one 😁

WallX is no longer merely a wallpaper manager, it's now also a mini launcher. Why? Well, 'because'... Seriously though, the new version included a systray icon, and I thought it a handy place to store my own custom shortcuts. Which, actually, works. More information or  download it here.

WaitWindow - checking for open and closed windows from a batchfile

Datatalk + Waitwindow

This is a little command line tool I wrote to help me check from a batch file for windows which are open or closed. It can also launch other programs if a specific condition is met.

I couldn't find what I needed, and so I wrote it myself... You can download waitwindow.exe and waitfile.exe here.

(Searching for wallpapers may have brought you to this page. If so, try this link for a selection from the wallpapers that I collected.)