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VVVV : Alt+Right click node with window resets window position

vvvv beta feature
#1

Heya!

A feature request back in VVVV land…
Often Renderers are off somewhere, far away on screen number 5 or whatever. And sometimes they’re in the wrong place.

If they’re in the wrong place, then the solution is something like:

  1. Hide all other fullscreen renderers (because your window might be behind that one.
  2. Try and mouse over to the window and drag it back home (generally i’d use TeamViewer to do this because seeing the renderers output isn’t always practical).

Or more commonly:

  1. Delete the Renderer
  2. Make a new Renderer and start again

What i’d suggest is that we expand the function of Alt-RightClick feature.
If you alt-rightclick on the node, then it resets all the properties of the node. But it doesn’t reset the window position. It would be great if it could that too!

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#2

you might want to give Window Handler a try.

also at some point nodes like SetWindowBounds (Windows) and (Windows ClientArea) snuck into the native node list

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#3

Just looking for a solution for this. Ironically I already have a Window Handler patch which does all sorts of cool stuff, but now my window handler patch window is somewhere in the screen nirvana and I can’t get it back. Now I have to build another window handler patch to get back the old one.

There HAS to be a way to somehow reset all window positions to be on the main screen. Otherwise using more than one computer with the same patch becomes impossible. We are syncing with GIT but the second monitor on one computer has a different resolution and so on.

Using Alt-right-click or something would be a pretty good solution in my opinion.

edit: I guess I can edit the .v4p file itself and reset bounds left and top to 0. I might write a script to do that for all .v4p files in a folder. It could also set the componentmode of all patches to hidden, so I can finally start my patch with only a renderer showing and avoiding to always have to go through all subpatches and close each window, save, close parent, save, etc. I always assumed that if I have all windows closed and select “Save all & layout” it would just save everything as it is at that moment, but apparently that’s not the case… Next time I start up I still have windows that are open. I guess I need a REAL “save all” meaning it saves all subpatches and not just those marked as having changes.

#4

After some tests with PatchAlias and SetPatch it seems impossible to get files to be marked as changed unless they are open.

I guess a GetPatchMode and SetPatchMode with Patch input would be nice. And also a way to get Patch children with a specified depth. That way I can put something in my root which handles window states, but excludes the root itself. If I change PatchMode of a patch it should be marked as Layout changed, right?

#5

I think i’ve spent more than 0.1% of my life doing that very thing :)
I hope for a better solution someday…

#6

+1 for a reset function. Really sad this has no dev priority obviously.
This might be not a big thing with single monitor casual patching but is a constant hassle when you work on a project collaboratively. Basically everything what seltzdesign said…
I also wouldn´t mind if vvvv would at least place it´s individual windows in the taskbar, available! to be manged by the os with its taskviews and monitor switching shortcuts.

#7

I only can quote vux, saying that there is more stress to remove that functionality, from winforms window class…

#8

I guess this goes along the same lines. Why can’t vvvv show me a proper preview of at least one of the windows, but instead is shown as a single white pixel when switching programs?

vvvv_preview
vvvv_preview1101×375 55 KB

I guess the frustration lies with the contradictory situation that apparently vvvv uses standard windows window management tools, yet behaves unlike any other windows software in a lot of aspects to do with window handling.

Any other software will always start on the main screen, even if it was last open on an external monitor that is now disconnected. I get that for some people its nicer they have their windows opened in the same place as before and for some they’d rather have it appear in some sort of default location. What I can’t imagine anybody wants is for a window to be opened in some non-existent digital nirvana space that is inaccessible. What I see is a) a setting to say if you want windows to be reset during startup or not, at least as a startup command, b) at least a middle click menu function called “reset all windows” or c) for it to be more clever about whether a window would appear on or off screen and move it accordingly.

#9

Just gave it a little spin to see how other software does it. Take Firefox for example. It will always open in the same position and size as you last had it before closing. But if you move it for example to the right so half the window is off screen and you restart it, the window remains the same size as before but is now moved from the right edge so the whole window is on screen.

That’s not removing any functionality of winforms - that’s adding a check during startup and moving the window accordingly. I don’t understand why that would be “more stress”? It’s adding functionality sure, but its just something we can’t reliably solve with vvvv code itself. So the dev’s take on a little bit of work to code such a functionality saving the end user stress every time they don’t have to go to the forum, find an article that explains why they might not see their window, learn about windowhandlers or how to edit .v4p files and where the position is saved, etc. I’m not saying its a bad thing to learn about those things, but that’s just the basics of usability. Sure, user of vvvv probably have some of the highest tolerances for those things, but in the end vvvv is still a product used by people and any reduction of frustration is surely a good thing…

#10

What i understand from antokhio´s post is that it is stress to remove all the standard window behaviour. In other words you have to put much effort to make an application behave like vvvv behaves right now. If you would not, it would act and look like any other windows program that sticks to the winforms defaults.

#11

since i’d rather see it as a feature that ALT+rightclick does not change the window bounds, i’ve implemented this as ALT+CTRL+rightclick. and also it keeps the windows size (ie. only resets its position) since i think this is the more sensitive approach. available in latest alphas.

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#12
#13

on second thought…it is probably better to decouple it from ALT+rightclick since you may want to get to the window also without resetting the node…

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#14

i’ve now removed “reset windows position” again from “reset node” and gave it its own shortcut:
as of a83.2 “reset window position” is now: CTRL+Rightclick.

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#16

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