Cursor Pops

A lightweight utility that displays customizable pop-up text near your cursor. Perfect for visual feedback, notifications, or creating engaging UI effects. Currently implemented for Windows, with potential for other platforms in the future.

Features

• Display text near the cursor with customizable duration
• Static or cursor-following text
• Smooth fade-out effects
• Text outline/shadow effects
• Custom text and outline colors
• Velocity-based text movement
• Non-blocking operation by default
• Easy integration with other applications through simple command-line interface
• Minimal dependencies for straightforward embedding

Usage

cursor-pops [options] <text>

Options

• -h, --help: Show help message
• -t, --text <text>: Text to display
• -f, --follow: Follow cursor (default: static)
• -b, --block: Run in blocking mode
• -d, --duration <sec>: Display duration in seconds (default: 3)
• -e, --ease <seconds>: Enable fade out effect (optional duration, default: 1s)
• -o, --outline <color>: Add outline effect (optional color)
• -c, --color <color>: Set text color (default: white)
• -v, --velocity <x,y>: Movement velocity in pixels/second (can be single number for vertical movement only)

Color Formats

Colors for -o and -c can be specified in these formats:

• Hex: #RRGGBB
• RGB integers: R,G,B (0-255)
• RGB floats: R.R,G.G,B.B (0.0-1.0)

Note: #FF00FF (magenta) will be adjusted slightly as it's used for transparency.

Examples

# Simple text display
cursor-pops "Hello World"

# Rising text with blue color
cursor-pops -v 20 -c "#0000FF" "Rising"

# Moving text with custom duration and fade
cursor-pops -v 50,0 -d 0.5 -e 2 "Moving"

# Floating text with outline
cursor-pops -t "Float" -v 0,-2 -o "#000000" -c "#FFFFFF"

Building

The project requires:

• Windows OS
• C++ 17 compiler
• Windows SDK

Integration

Cursor Pops is designed to be easily integrated into other applications:

// C++ example using CreateProcess
STARTUPINFOW si = { sizeof(si) };
PROCESS_INFORMATION pi;
CreateProcessW(NULL, L"cursor-pops \"Your Text\" -c #FF0000", NULL, NULL, FALSE, 0, NULL, NULL, &si, &pi);

// Remember to close handles if you need to track the process
CloseHandle(pi.hProcess);
CloseHandle(pi.hThread);

# Python example
import subprocess
subprocess.Popen(['cursor-pops', 'Your Text', '-c', '#FF0000'])

// Node.js example
const { spawn } = require('child_process');
spawn('cursor-pops', ['Your Text', '-c', '#FF0000']);

Technical Details

• Uses Windows API for lightweight window management
• Supports transparency and layered windows
• Monitor refresh rate aware for smooth animations
• Efficient memory usage with minimal dependencies