About WatchCat

© Vassili Bourdo, Minsk, Belarus

WatchCat is a small system tray applet for hiding application windows. Windows hidden by WatchCat also will disappear from taskbar and Alt+Tab chain. It’s extremely convenient if you need to keep applications such as MS Outlook open all the time but don’t check them often. As for me, sooner or later such applications get in a way in wrong time and get killed by Alt+F4.

Here is a list of most impressive WatchCat features.

•	WatchCat sits in system tray as an icon and doesn't take much of your screen surface. If you think that an icon in system tray is too much - you can remove it and access WatchCat by hot key.

•	WatchCat can minimize windows to system tray.

•	WatchCat can hide the window you're working in by pressing user-defined hot key. Now you can safely play solitaire, chat on IRC, do whatever you want even if your boss is nearby. Pressing this hot key will instantly flush "illegal" program off your screen.

•	WatchCat can hide windows by right-clicking "minimize" button on window's caption

•	WatchCat has increadibly powerful feature - window rules. Using them you can define how WatchCat will handle every window.

•	Hide the window automatically if it wasn't used some period of time.

•	Close the window automatically if it wasn't used some period of time.

•	Make window to minimize to system tray.

•	Protect hidden windows with password.

Window rules is great way to handle windows selectively. You can tell WatchCat that, for example, your E-Mail program should be minimized to tray if it was not accessed for more than two minutes.

•	Using WatchCat it's possible to define menus similar to regular Windows' "Start menu" for any folder on your computer. You can define how you want to access such menus: by hot keys, by icon in system tray or both.

And, of course, all these features are highly configurable and may be independently turned on and off.

How to use WatchCat If you have problem – look there first.

WatchCat Frequently Asked Questions

List of possible actions for keyboard shortcuts

Format of rule expressions

WatchCat Homepage


How to use WatchCat

The one and only purpose of WatchCat is to hide not used windows off the screen and restore them back with minimal efforts. Just because of this there are so menu ways to do that. It’s not necessary to use them all, just try them and choose most convenient ones.

Hiding windows

This is what WatchCat is about. All other WatchCat features are different ways to make work with WatchCat easier.

Method one: Open WatchCat menu by clicking on its icon in system tray. Click on the menu item that represents the window you want to hide.

Method two (faster): Click with right mouse button on «Minimize» icon on window’s caption.

Method three (the fastest): In “WatchCat properties” window assign a hot key to action «Hide current window ». After that you’ll be able to hide the window you’re working in by pressing this hot key.

Hiding windows to tray.

I don’t recommend hiding all windows to tray. I believe Microsoft meant different usage for it. Also, if there are a lot of icons in system tray, it’s too difficult to find necessary one there. I think the best choice for minimizing to tray are windows that you don’t check often but if you need them, they should be restored as fast as possible. Good examples of such windows are help systems like MSDN, or dictionaries.

Method one: Do a «Long» click with right mouse button on «Minimize» icon on window’s caption. For performing «Long» click press mouse button and hold it pressed a little longer than usual and release it.

Method two: In “WatchCat properties” window assign a hot key to action «Hide current window to tray». After that you’ll be able to hide the window you’re working in to tray by pressing this hot key.

Method three: In «WatchCat properties» window on page «Rules» define the rule with action «Hide window to tray» turned on. In this case all operations described in «Hiding windows» section will hide windows to tray.

Some users like to hide most of windows to tray. WatchCat has predefined rule «Minimize all windows to tray». Initially it’s disabled. You can enable it for hiding all windows to tray.

Attention! If window will match any of rule «Hide window to tray», all hiding operations will switch their meaning. Operations meant to simply hide windows will hide them to tray and vice versa.

Hiding and closing windows automatically.

Another powerful feature of WatchCat is the capability to minimize, hide or close windows automatically after they weren’t used some time. It’s very convenient for hiding windows that must be opened all the time and you want to be sure that such window will not be closed accidentally.

On my computer I (the author) assigned for auto hiding my email clients and other Internet programs like mIRC that must be opened all the time but I don’t watch them constantly.

There is predefined rule «Hide E-Mail clients» that will hide Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Outlook Express or Netscape Messenger to tray if they were not used for more than one minute. Also, there is rule «Hide WinAmp» that hides WinAmp to tray if it wasn’t used for more than five seconds. You may ask “Why WinAmp timeout is so short?”. The answer is that WinAmp’s purpose is to play music. Its presence on screen while I’m not working with it is totally redundant. Initially these rules are disabled.

Sometimes it could be desirable to temporarily disable auto hiding. You can do it by clicking «Timer operations» menu item in WatchCat menu.

I strongly discourage you from wide using of «Auto Close». It may cause data loss. But if you dare to use it, it’s better to assign large timeouts for this operation.

Protecting windows with password.

If you want to lock access to some or all hidden and minimized to tray windows, you need to define rules that have option «Protect window with password» enabled.

Also, It’s necessary to enter password on page «Miscellaneous»

For people who want to protect all windows with password, there is predefined rule «Protect All windows with password». Initially it’s disabled.


WatchCat Frequently Asked Questions

Q	WatchCat fails to start and reports that something is wrong with file MFC42.DLL
A	Starting from version 1.5 WatchCat uses tis DLL. Because distribution package of this DLL is pretty large (1.4Mb), and most likely correct version of it should be already installed on your computer, I don’t distribute it with WatchCat.  You can download updated version of this DLL for Microsoft Web site. • For Windows 95 • For Windows NT
Q	When I’m trying to open «Properties» window, WatchCat recommends me to install Internet Explorer 4.01
A	You have old version of COMCTRL32.DLL. This is standard DLL that should be installed on every computer running Windows 95/98 or Windows NT.  You can download updated version of this DLL from Microsoft web site. http://www.microsoft.com/msdownload/ieplatform/ie/comctrl.asp
Q	Where WatchCat stores its settings ?
A	In registry under the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\FREEWARE\WatchCat.
Q	I cannot activate screensaver by hotkey or WatchCat menu.
A	WatchCat uses global screensaver settings. You can configure it using the icon «Display» in Windows «Control Panel». Chack that you have configured screensaver correctly there.
Q	Is WatchCat unauthorized access protection tool ?
A	No, No and NO!!! WatchCat can’t reliably protect your computer. Of course you may use it for hiding particular windows from your boss or mother. You even may assign password for restoring windows. It will work pretty well against newbies or people that ocassionally ran into your computer. But more or less experienced programmer will break WatchCat protection scheme in ten minutes. In other words: If you plan to use WatchCat as a protection tool – you’re at least careless. I don’t guarantee that some smart ass will sneak behind your «protection». Oh, have you read the license ? I don’t guarantee anything at all :-)
Q	I cannot hide «Quake», «Doom», etc while it runs in fullscreen mode
A	Nothing can be done about it. I cannot quarantee that WatchCat will handle fullscreen applications so sophisticated as games usually are. Either run your games in windowed mode (well, I know - windowed mode is slo-o-o-ow) or make sure that your boss, isn’t here.
Q	I accidently disabled WatchCat icon in system tray. Now I’m unable to access WatchCat properties window.
A	I warned you…  Use registry editor REGEDIT.EXE. Look for WatchCat settings (see the registry key name above). Set parameter «EnableIcon» to «1» Restart the computer


Format of rule expressions

Here is the format of expresions for WatchCat rules. Optional parameters enclosed in square braces.

[parameter type]/string/[string type][modifier]

parameter type – it defines what will be compared with the string enclosed in slashes.

w 	(window) window name – this is the text that you see in window caption.

c 	(class) window class – this is invisible system parameter that defines basic properties of the window. It’s interesting for us because usually it’s unique for every window type

e 	(exe) - the mame of the program that opened the window. I recommend not to use this parameter type widely because its retrieval is pretty slow task. If you will notice that WatchCat uses too much processor time it’s better to disable it.

If you don't specyfy parameter type, the window name (w) is assumed.

string type – it determines how the string enclosed in slashes will be interpreted.

s	(substring) It matches any substring in parameter string. Example: expression w/atch/s will match windows with names «WatchCat» and «MatchBox»

c	(complete) full string match. It matches full parameter string. Example: expression w/WatchCat/c will match only window with name «WatchCat» and nothing else.

r	(regular expression) The string in slashes is regular expression. See format of regular expressions below.

If string type is not specified it’s assumed thai this is substring (s)

modifier – In mean time there is only one modifier.

i	(case insensitive) match strings without respect to character case.

If modifer «i» is not specified it’s assumed the match is be case sensitive

Expressions described above can be parts of logical expressions. Here is the list of supported logical operators:

|	Logical OR. Returns true if any of expressions returns true. Example: the expression w/Microsoft/ | w/Netscape/ matches window names that contain either word «Microsoft» or «Netscape».

&	Logical AND. Returns true if both expressions return true. Example: the expression w/Microsoft/ & w/Netscape/ matches window name that contain both words «Microsoft» and «Netscape».

!	Logical NOT. Returns true if expression returns false. Example: the expression !w/Microsoft/ matches all window names that don’t contain word «Microsoft».

()	Braces. Increase expression priority.The expression enclosed in braces will be evaluated before expression witout braces.

Operators «|» è «&» have equal priority. Operator «!» has higher priority, and, respectively, gets eveluated before operators «|» è «&».

Format of regular expressions

^	Matches start of line	«^WatchCat» will match string «WatchCat it’s cool» but will not match «cool program WatchCat»
$	Matches end of line	«WatchCat$» will match «cool program WatchCat» but will not match string «WatchCat it’s cool»
.	Matches any single character.	«W….Cat» will match both «WatchCat» and «W1234Cat»
+	Matches one or more characters it follows (greedy)	«WatchCat+» will match both «WatchCat» and «WatchCattttt»
#	Matches one or more characters it follows (not greedy)
*	Matches zero or more characters it follows (greedy)	«WatchCat*» will match both «WatchCa» and «WatchCattttt»
@	Matches zero or more characters it follows (not greedy)
\t	Matches tab character	No comments
\n	Matches new line character	No comments
()	Grouping	See comment for «?» symbol
[]	Range – matches any characters listed in braces	«[Ww][Aa][Tt][Cc][Hh][Cc][Aa][Tt]» matches the word «WatchCat» in any case. «[\t ]*» matches optional whitespace
?	Optional character or subexperssion	«W(atch)?Cat» matches both «WatchCat» and «WCat»
\	Escape symbol – allows to mask any reserved char listed above	«WatchCat?» matches strings «WatchCat» and «WatchCa», but «WatchCat\?» matches string «WatchCat?»
\s	Matches whitespace (i.e. space, tab, line feed)
\S	Matches anything but whitespace.
\w	Matches word chars.
\W	Matches anything but word chars
\d	Matches digits.
\D	Matches anything but digits .
\U	Matches capital letters.
\L	Matches anything but capital letters.
\C	Match case sensitively from here on
\c	Match case ingnore from here on


WatchCat hot key actions

Show menu

Opens WatchCat menu. It’s useful for restoring already hidden windows.

Hide current window

Hides the window you’re working in. This is extremely convenient for hiding away "illegal" applications (such as mIRC or Solitaire) when your boss comes in .

Minimize current window

Minimizes current window

Hide current window to tray

It’s almost the same as «hide current window», but the icon of this window will appear in system tray.

Hide all windows

Hides all windows

Show all windows

Restores all hidden windows

Toggle desktop icons

Shows or hides desktop icons

Toggle taskbar

Shows or hides taskbar

Hide everything

This action makes your desktop completely clean. Everything – desktop icons, taskbar and all windows will be hidden.

Show everything

This action restores all windows, desktop icons and taskbar hidden by «Hide everything».

Activate Screensaver

This action will activate current screensaver. This option is provided as a way to lock Windows 95 computer while you’re away. It’s better to have screensaver to be password-protected. Screensaver password can be set using «Control Panel»

Open «Start/Run» dialog

Opens the same «Run» dialog as in start menu. This option has little use  except for assigning to hot key.

Current Directory

Opens menu that lists all files in the current directory of the application you’re working in

Also, there are little known hot keys provided by Windows itself. Here is its list:

Hot key	Action
Application key or SHIFT+F10	Display pop-up menu for active window.
Windows logo key (WIN) alone	Display Start menu.
WIN+F1	Start Windows help.
WIN+TAB	Cycle through taskbar buttons.
WIN+E	Start Windows Explorer.
WIN+F	Find files or folders.
WIN+CTRL+F	Find computer.
WIN+M	Minimize All.
SHIFT+WIN+M	Undo Minimize All.
WIN+R	Display Run dialog box.
WIN+BREAK	Display System Properties dialog box.
WIN+number	Reserved. Check them, maybe you have something useful assigned.


File mask format.

Character	Matches itself
[chars]	Matches any character enclosed in braces.
[^chars] or [!chars]	Matches any character except characters enclosed in braces.
* (asterisk)	Matches any string including empty string.
?	Matches any single character.
Space	Space delimits file masks
!	If exlamation sign is specified as a firct char of file mask, The files that match such filemask will be excluded.
\	Escape char. It masks special meaning of special chars described above.
Examples:

*	Selects all files. Notice how it differs from good old «*.*»
*.*	Matches all files that has any extension.
*.exe	Matches all files with.extension .EXE
* !*.dll !*.ocx	Selects all files except those with extension .OCX è .DLL
* !Recycle\ Bin	Selects all files except «Recycle bin». Please notice a backslash before space.


Choose the language for WatchCat user interface.

Unfortunately, this feature does not work under Windows 95. You will see user interface in default language configured in for your computer. But it’s still possible to change language settings from Control panel.


Click this button if you want to change WatchCat icon in system tray.


If you don’t want to see WatchCat icon in system tray, uncheck this checkbox.

Be very careful – without WatchCat icon you will be able to access WatchCat menu and, respectively, hidden windows, only using keyboard – by hot key that you can configure below.


If you want WatchCat to start at system startup, check this checkbox.


If you check this checkbox, all windows hidden by WatchCat will be restored at WatchCat exit. Otherwise, they windows will stay hidden after WatchCat exit.

When you will run WatchCat again, it will recognize that there are hidden windows and will show them properly in menu.


If you check this checkbox, WatchCat will try to compact memory belong to the application whose window just has been hidden. It’s supposed to free some memory and sometimes actually does.

If you experience any problems, leave this checkbox unchecked.

This function works only on Windows NT. It’s ignored on Windows 95.


If you check this checkbox, WatchCat will show only main application windows in menu. If you leave it unchecked, pop-up windows also will be shown in menu.

This option is useful if you use applications, which open many top-level windows (such as Borland Delphi or Borland C++ Builder). In this case check this checkbox, so you will see only one icon representing such application.


Check it if you want to see window icons in WatchCat menu. If you think that window icons there are redundant, you may turn them off.


Sometimes window names are too long. This option allows you to limit length of window names in WatchCat menu. If you specify zero, window names will not be truncated at all.


If you want menu items for hidden windows were marked with small labels, turn this option on.


If you want windows to be grouped by its state (i.e. visible, hidden windowsm hidden to tray), turn this option on


Choose the key combination to be pressed with mouse click.


This option allows you to specify what to do by click on WatchCat icon in system tray. Select the type of mouse action here and select suitable action in next list box


Choose what to do according mouse action chosen.


Choose the key combination to be pressed with mouse click.


This option allows you to specify what to do by click on the icon of the window hidden to system tray. Select the type of mouse action here and select suitable action in next list box


Choose what to do according mouse action chosen.


Choose the action you’re going to assign the hot key for. Hot keys defined here will always do what you’ve assigned, even if other windows use them for different purpose.

See also List of possible actions


Choose hot key that will carry out the action you have chosen in previous list and press «Save» button.

Be careful – this hot key will be used for the action you have chosen even if some other window uses it for different purpose. For example, if you selected «Ctrl+S» hot key for some action, then you will be unable to save files in other applications using keyboard shortcut because  «Ctrl+S» is common shortcut key for saving files.


Click this button to save selected hot key


Check this checkbox if you want to titles of desktop icons to be transparent.


Choose the color of desktop icon titles here.


Enter the password that will be asked when you’ re trying to restore hidden or minimized to tray window. The password is case sensitive.

Attention!. Remeber the password or write it down on paper and store it in safe place. If you’ll forget this password, you’ll be unable to access hidden window and WatchCat properties window.

If you’ll leave the password empty, the option «Protect windows with password» will not work.


Enter the password again for verification.


Enter password timeout in seconds here.

Password timeout specifies how long WatchCat remebers entered password. If the operation that assumes entering password will be performed before last password was expired, WatchCat will not ask for password.


Check this checkbox if you want to password-protect WatchCat menu.


Check this checkbox if you want WatchCat to be completely invisible. It will not show up in the task list that show up by pressing «Ctr+Alt+Del»

This option will take effect only after WatchCat will be restarted.

Note: this option is available only on Windows 95/98.


WatchCat will eject your CD drive upon computer shutdown if this checkbox is checked.

Attention: CD drive will be ejected only if there is a CD iside. Otherwise it won’t. Also, if your computer is running Windows’95/98 and has no CD drive this option may cause undesirable delays during computer shutdown.


Check menu items you want ot be visible in WatchCat menu.


Click this button for adding new folder menu.


Click this button for selecting new folder for current folder menu.


Click this button for deleting selected folder menu.


Click this button to save selected hot key.


Move selected folder menu down.


Move selected folder menu up.


If this checkbix is checked, shortcuts to folders will be expanded as submenus


If this checkbix is checked, folders that reside on removable media (floppy disks, CD-ROMS) will be expanded.

Expanding folders on removable media may cause performance problems because usually this madia type is rqather slow.


Show subforlders (they show up as submenus) on top of the menu. If this checkbox is not checked, subfolders and regular files will be sorted alphabetically.


Define the hot key that will pop up this folder menu.


Here are listed all folder menus you have defined. All of them will show up under «Shell» submenu in WatchCat menu.

Folder menus are somewhat similar to regular Windows «Start menu» with one exception: you can define folder menu for any folder you want.

The first item in this list named «Current Directory» allows to configure menu for «Current directory» keyboard action.


Enter the name for the menu here. This name will be used as menu item name in «Shell» submenu and as a tooltip of tray icon if you have checked checkbox «Show in Tray»


If you want to see hidden files in menu, check this checkbox.


Press this button if you want to see how the menu you’re configuring will look like.


Enter space-delimited list of file masks here. Only files that match file masks you have entered will show up in folder menu.

See file mask format for more info.


Specify how many levels of pop-up menus can be created.


Check this checkbox if you want menu items to be sorted by file type instead of file name


If you want to display separate icon in system tray for this menu, check this checkbox.


Press this button to create new rule. Choose the window you’re goung to create the rule for from the meun that wull pop up.


Press this button to delete selected rule


Press this button to edit selected rule.


Press this button to move selected rule down. Rules will be evaluated in the same order as the go in this window.


Press this button to move selected rule up. Rules will be evaluated in the same order as the go in this window.


Press this button to see how rules will affect windows currently opened.


Rules – it’s the way to handle windows selectively. Using rules, you can tell WatchCat that, for example, your E-Mail program should be minimized to tray if it was not accessed for more than two minutes.

If the expression, you specified for it matches the window actions you specified for this rule will be taken on the window.

Here is the list of available actions.

Ignore window. WatchCat will ignore window. It will disable all WatchCat operations with this window. It’s suitable for preventing the window from being hidden.

Minimize window automatically. Îêíî áóäåò ñâåðíóòî ïîñëå òîãî êàê îíî íå áûëî àêòèâíûì çàäàííûé ïðîìåæóòîê âðåìåíè.

Hide window automatically. Automatically hide the window after time you specified will up.

Close window automatically. Automatically close the window after time you specified will up. It will not close the window if it pops up dialog like «Save data?» at exit. However, this action is great for closing various utility windows you may forget to close in time. It’s recommended to set up large timeouts more than 15 minutes for this action. Use it very cautiously!

Hide window to system tray. It will cause window always to be hidden to system tray regardless how it was hidden.

Protect window with password. WatchCat will ask passwod when hidden window is being restored.

All actions in the rule have switch «Yes, do it/No, don’t do it». If the switch is in «Yes, do it» position, the rule works as described above. If it’s in position « No, don’t do it», then the action will be disabled for windows that match the rule expression even if other rules that say «Yes, do it».

Actions «Minimize, Hide, and Close» are working only for not active windows. I.e. the window you’re working in cannot be minimized, hidden or closed automatically. But if you need to hide or close active window automatically, check the checkbox «[minimize, hide, close] active»

If menu item «Timer operations» is switched off rules «Auto hide» and «Auto Close» don’t work.


Click this menu item to activate the screensaver.


Click this menu item for showing all windows hidden by WatchCat.


Click this menu item if you want to hide all windzows off the screen


This will show or hide desktop icons. In addition, it will disable right-click menu on the desktop


This will show or hide taskbar. Be very careful using this option because once hidden you will not be able to access system tray and, respectively, WatchCat menu where you can restore taskbar.


Enable or disable timer operations. By default, timer operations are on and this setting does not stored in configuration. If you disable timer, it will turn off «Auto hide» and «Auto Close» rules.


This will show you WatchCat properties window where you can configure WatchCat


This is visible window. If you click it, this window will become hidden and move below the line dividing hidden and visible windows


This is hidden window. If you click it, this window will become visible and move above the line dividing hidden and visible windows.