removing start bar in windows

removing start bar in windows

William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Hi,

I'm using window 10 with allegro 5.0.10 and I set the display flags to ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN to get a fullscreen display.

The thing I don't know how to do is how to hide or remove the start bar at the bottom
of the screen with the start menu button, the search box and the quick launch shortcuts, etc...

Is there something I can do?

Bob Keane

Member #7,342

June 2006

Try right clicking the task bar, then click lock the task bar to unlock. Go into task bar settings and turn the automatically hide the task bar setting to on.

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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Thanks a lot. So there's no way to remove it with code (if the person running the program
hasn't got autohide set on there machine) ?

Bob Keane

Member #7,342

June 2006

I don't know. You can try this.

William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Many thanks Bob. Page saved for later as very busy at the moment.

Bob Keane

Member #7,342

June 2006

If it works, show your code. I could probably use it.

Chris Katko

Member #1,881

January 2002

this doesn't sound right. are you saying it's fullscreen, and still showing the taskbar?

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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Yes.

Bob Keane

Member #7,342

June 2006

I believe this is what the OP is posting about:

{"name":"612803","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/4\/8\/4853b777703bd68f4980a2e750921400.png","w":1366,"h":768,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/4\/8\/4853b777703bd68f4980a2e750921400"}

Autohide does not help, there is still a space where the taskbar should go:

{"name":"612802","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/2\/f\/2f31f64fb0e2b4e131bdede583dd1fe3.png","w":1366,"h":768,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/2\/f\/2f31f64fb0e2b4e131bdede583dd1fe3"}

I'd like to find a fix myself.

Elias

Member #358

May 2000

Almost sounds like a bug with ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN in Windows - I feel it should hide the task bar. Does it also happen with ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN_WINDOW (which will give the window the wrong size so not always an alternative of course)?

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torhu

Member #2,727

September 2002

I don't think there is any way it can be real fullscreen mode if the taskbar is showing, the Windows desktop is not an overlay. I've seen glitches where the game hangs and you just get the desktop back partially, but not quite the same thing. If it's actually "fullscreen window", then it sounds like an Allegro bug. It's quite common for games today to use this mode, SC2 is the first one I remember using it. I'm playing Far Cry 5 now, which defaults to it.

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Bob Keane

Member #7,342

June 2006

I thought it might be a Microsoft thing but when I use retroarch full screen the taskbar and space for it is not there. Probably a bug, but I will check my code later to see if I used full screen or full screen windowed.

William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

It does happen with ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN_WINDOW.

Dizzy Egg

Member #10,824

March 2009

You can run this code to hide the start bar...

static HWND hShellWnd = ::FindWindow("Shell_TrayWnd", NULL);
ShowWindow(hShellWnd, SW_HIDE);

BUT be sure to run this before you exit, otherwise you won't get it back!!

hShellWnd = ::FindWindow("Shell_TrayWnd", NULL);
ShowWindow(hShellWnd, SW_SHOW);

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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Great. Will that work in both cases ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN and ALLEGRO_FULLSCREEN_WINDOWED? Had to ask.

Dizzy Egg

Member #10,824

March 2009

Yeah that'll hide it regardless of window/fullscreen.

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torhu

Member #2,727

September 2002

Hiding the taskbar programmatically seems like a bad idea. What happens if the user switches back to the desktop without exiting the game first, or if the game crashes?

---
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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Is it possible to switch back to the desktop in fullscreen mode if the taskbar is hidden (except by triggering a close display event)?

torhu

Member #2,727

September 2002

Yeah, press the Windows key, Alt-Tab or Ctrl+Alt+Del

I don't think I have a functional Allegro installation any longer, otherwise I could have done some tests...

---
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Dizzy Egg

Member #10,824

March 2009

It is a bad idea to do it in code!

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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

I'm quite prone to having bad ideas. Nice to have all the info.
Don't professional (AAA say or quite expensive) games hide the taskbar?
Just seems naf.

bamccaig

Member #7,536

July 2006

You shouldn't need to hide the taskbar in fullscreen mode.

If possible I think positioning your window above the taskbar to cover it would be ideal to hiding the taskbar. If your game crashes or any other unexpected event happens then the taskbar could remain hidden and cripple the user's computer until a reboot (or at least explorer.exe is killed and restarted).

I wonder if the Windows key would still make it appear if you used code to "hide" it. :-/

Append:

The only way to make this work nicely by hiding the taskbar would be to handle the event when your window loses focus and showing the taskbar again. Hopefully before the user notices anything is amiss. But that may still be flaky. AAA studios have the resources to call Microsoft up and get this information directly from the source with full support. You and I cannot.

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torhu

Member #2,727

September 2002

Raymond Chen says the taskbar should hide automatically:
https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20050505-04/?p=35703

You could check if fullscreen windows work properly in other apps, like F11 in web browsers. If not, you could try restarting Windows (or just Windows Explorer), or maybe updating your graphics driver?

---
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William Labbett

Member #4,486

March 2004

Thanks all. I've gone off the idea but for the record I've tried F11 (on a browser). All as it should be. I tried rebooting and running my app, all as before (taskbar present).
Haven't tried updating graphics driver. Can I with no GFX card?

Might switch to another machine which is better and try with that. Thanks again.

May take some time to try the last thing.

bamccaig

Member #7,536

July 2006

Integrated graphics still require drivers. But I doubt a driver update is going to fix this.

Maybe you should try developing a short program that you can share that demonstrates this problem. Then we can compile it and run it ourselves and report back our results, which can help to rule out your environment and might also help us spot the problem.

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