Task tray application

[sillysod]

Hi There,

Im writing a purchase ordering application for use at my company.

I have put alot of (over)time into writing this app and so far im quite plased with the results and thereforewant to ensure that it is used properly.

One problem i want to address is the user being able to very quickly access the "add order" screen, for when they are halfway through placing an order and realise they havent raised a PO number for it.

So my solution is to have a windows service running on the clients machine. which i want to do three things

- Periodically check for up dated versions of the software, which it will do on a timer interval, if it finds a new version of the software id like a message to pop up, ideally in the bottom right corner like the windows update notifications do.

- Catch when the users presses the "launch purchase order proggy" hotkey combination which is yet to bedecided upon. Which will launch the actual application.

- Show an icon in task tray which the user can right click and bring up a menu, showing things like launch application, options for the check for updates interval etc etc.

Am i going in the right direction with a service? and does anyone have links to example of how to do any of the above?

 

[bclt]

Hmmm...

- As for the "bottom right corner", add a new form and set it to be shown exactly where you want; maybe add a timer so as to decrease slowly the opacity from 100% to 30% for example.

- As for the "Show an icon in task tray" add a notify icon, and add to it a context menu.


If you are a little familiar with these things, those can be done in very short time.