Hide the tray icon

[3BM7]

I would love to see an option to hide the tray icon.

[crutkas]

then would you always want it in the task bar? Win10 should let you just put it as one of the non visible systray icons.

No matter what, since the main app itself isn’t a service, we’d want some way to get to it

[3BM7]

Hi, thanks for the replay. I don't hide any icons in the tray. That is because I often use the win + B shortcut to focus on the first icon in the tray. So having a extra icon is not something i want to do. I was thinking of something like run at start , start Minimized and hide when minimized to solve the problem. I am sorry If I am asking for too much. But i like PowerToys so much and my only frustration with it is the tray icon. (icon is beautiful)

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On Sun, Nov 24, 2019 at 6:49 PM Clint Rutkas ***@***.***> wrote: then would you always want it in the task bar? Win10 should let you just put it as one of the non visible systray icons. No matter what, since the main app itself isn’t a service, we’d want some way to get to it — You are receiving this because you authored the thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#765?email_source=notifications&email_token=ALX2GLFE4CPKSOHTRH2AIWTQVKPBDA5CNFSM4JQ7UXHKYY3PNVWWK3TUL52HS4DFVREXG43VMVBW63LNMVXHJKTDN5WW2ZLOORPWSZGOEFAOKCI#issuecomment-557901065>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ALX2GLEXJ4CXONMS2CEUJWTQVKPBDANCNFSM4JQ7UXHA> .

[crutkas]

I could see this being a setting. If you re-run the EXE, force the settings menu to prompt.

can i get a screenshot of your current tray so i can get a visual of how you want it.
here is mine.

[3BM7]

here is when it doesn't have much. (Yes I have my taskbar on the side)

here it is when it is fully used

[crutkas]

Without the systray, then the icon would always show up in taskbar. I don't think it is correct behavior for us to run without an easy way to stop us.

[ghost]

This is very common. Generally speaking, the app runs in the background, with no visible systray or taskbar icon; In order to access the UI (settings menu), one runs the application from the start menu.

[TseuX]

Without the systray, then the icon would always show up in taskbar. I don't think it is correct behavior for us to run without an easy way to stop us.

Powertoys should be installable as a service. If not, just add an option to hide the systray icon (and in the taskbar), and show the main window of the running process when rerun.

I think that powertoys is not a tool, powertoys are missing Windows features.

[PaulCoddington]

I think this is a good idea, because, in practice for many people, once PowerToys is setup it rarely needs to be accessed again, so whether Windows "hides" the icon in the popup or not, it is still unwanted clutter when trying to find other icons in the system tray (or popup of "hidden" icons) at a glance.

So far, I have only used PowerToys to set up zones while building my workstation system image, and now that I have the machine in production it is literally a "set and forget" application with a tray icon that will almost never be accessed ever again. All my apps are now zoned, there are no more zones to create or adjust.

In general, I think it should be a principle of system tray icon use that they need to be justified by a clear need to be frequently accessed (such as the system tray icon that changes gamut profiles on my monitor, which gets used several times a day when switching between tasks, such as watching video, editing photos, web preparation, office work, etc).

The solution, in my opinion, is to have an option to hide the icon, but have the current running process launch the options dialog whenever PowerToys is called from the Start Menu.

[BerkinAKKAYA]

I think Rainmeter is a good example for it. It always runs at background without showing up on taskbar or tray.

[shirkerohit]

Without the systray, then the icon would always show up in taskbar. I don't think it is correct behavior for us to run without an easy way to stop us.

What if, we can have options to search Powertoys settings app that will open current powertoys window? 😅 Also, something like VS code and win ternimal, Open powertoys run and type ctrl+; to open setting.

[ghost]

Without the systray, then the icon would always show up in taskbar. I don't think it is correct behavior for us to run without an easy way to stop us.

What if, we can have options to search Powertoys settings app that will open current powertoys window? 😅 Also, something like VS code and win ternimal, Open powertoys run and type ctrl+; to open setting.

That assumes the use of powertoys run, but still, if the above implementation is used, as it is with practically every app which hides the tray icon, then it will work the same way you described.

[shirkerohit]

Yes. In general the setting is searchable in windows search. So even if powerToy Run app Isn't used we still have access to it right?

[TseuX]

For a tool of mine i have recently written this (C#):

• "B" is the main tool, it's a windows application for which i hide the main window. When B starts, it runs a namedpipebinding server (WCF)
• "A" is the launcher, if B is already running so A connect to B (WCF) and says to it "show your main window", else if B is not running, A starts B.

I don't know if it's the good way to do it but it works.

[nicolaskeller]

I would love to see this feature as well, especially because the tray icon does not offer any service except for opening the settings. This could be a setting in the General tab "Hide tray icon" which defaults to "Off".

[Mystic8b]

From a technical basis, implementing the option won't only take few seconds to achieve, because you need a way to reopen the GUI if tools are already running.

Just open the app via start menu. Everybody does it. I have logitech setpoint and taskbarX not displayed in the tray, but if they are needed, I have never encountered a problem to launch them. So, i can't even imagine what could prevent this.
I don't know about the technical difficulties, but the opening problem is clearly far-fetched.

Especially when it comes to the MS company, where even the basic services of the system do not work properly (mail and calendar are not synchronized in the background, to do constantly crashes when opened, etc.).
What I mean is that powertoys is installed by users who will clearly be able to find the ability to open applications.

After all, this is not about completely removing the icon from the tray, but adding such an opportunity.

[ghost]

better ways to interact and notify users.

Please consider the group of users who do not want to interact or receive notifications. This entire thread (and the many linked to it) are about people who largely just want to start the app, to provide an altered UX, and forget the app exists.

you need a way to reopen the GUI if tools are already running.

As mentioned above, the way this is done in practically every systray app is to simply run the app again (as in, doubleclick the shortcut)

[vertigo220]

This is not one of the asks on the list of things to do as it has longer term work items no matter what that we'd want implemented before this would be there. Namely exe's following a certain pattern, much deeper thought on how the improved systray would work (#6751) and how this would impact that.

The thing is, none of that matters if the user wants to get rid of the icon. If you later implement features that make use of the icon being there, i.e. require it, then fine, users can either decide, on their own, to show it again, or they can not use those features. But just because you plan to eventually use it for something doesn't mean the choice for users to hide it should be taken away or, in this case, not given in the first place.

We're also thinking about what are better ways to interact and notify users. This systray was one of those way we were thinking about doing that since notifications tend to be hit or miss since people turn them off.

So you want to be able to push notifications to users even when they turn notifications off? Yup, this is Microsoft alright. Of course, maybe if W10 wasn't so restrictive on how users can customize what notifications show when, just like it restricts so much else of how people can use their own computers, people wouldn't turn them off. For example, I had to disable Focus Assist on schedule because it was hiding important notifications and there was no way to exempt them, since it only allows you to exempt the specific apps MS deems worthy. And I had to manipulate system files just to get the stupid, annoying, constant WD notifications saying it has updates. Crap like this is why people turn off notifications. But I digress. Anyways, are apps required to have a tray icon to display notifications, even if they use their own instead of Windows' built-in system?

[vertigo220]

@Angiin From a technical basis, implementing the option won't only take few seconds to achieve, because you need a way to reopen the GUI if tools are already running.

This has been covered already: Start Menu -> Powertoys -> Enter

Not hard.

[crutkas]

@xcasxcursex / @vertigo220 I get you don't want to be notified, but there is also a group of people that get angry they aren't notified when they aren't alerted to updates but have notifications turned off. We are well aware it is something a group users wants the team to execute on, however it isn't on our list of priorities for the next few releases, namely. getting to a release we view as 'stable' which we list in our roadmap.

If you don't want this to appear, Windows already does allow you do hide icons via settings. (see included screenshots below)

Since the OS has a built in way to hide any systray icon, we are focusing on getting things like a plug-in manager for PT Run and VCM to use a direct show filter and ARM64 support.

[vertigo220]

@crutkas - The issue here isn't that it's not a priority. I realize, as I'm sure most do, that not everything can be done at once. The issue is the attitude about it, giving ridiculous excuse after ridiculous excuse for why it's not even being put on the roadmap and acting like it will take a significant amount of time because it supposedly needs all this deliberation first, when all that needs to be done is to put in the option. And speaking of ridiculous excuses, that incredibly useless, waste of space "option" in W10 doesn't do what you suggest, and the fact you think it does concerns me. All that does is selects which apps are always shown, i.e. to the right of the arrow that shows the hidden icons, and which ones are hidden so they only show when clicking the arrow. In other words, it does the same exact thing as simply dragging the icons into the pop-up, but requires you to go through several additional screens to do so and offers even less functionality than the much simpler drag-and-drop since it doesn't let you choose where the icon goes in there. It absolutely does not truly hide, i.e. remove, it.

The fact is, this is a very basic feature that almost all apps have, it should have existed from the start, it wouldn't take that much from an adept programmer to add it, and it doesn't need a bunch of thought about how to do so first. Just add the option with a warning when activated that the user won't get notifications or be able to use future additions that make use of it. Done. I honestly would be surprised if it took longer than you've spent discussing it here. And yes, I get it, it's open-source, so we can do it ourselves. But, and I hate to break this to you, not everybody that uses software can code it. Instead, people contribute in their own ways, including by suggesting features that would improve the app. But when those suggestions are blown off as unnecessary or unwanted from the devs' perspectives, even though users clearly want it, that just discourages people. If I could do it, I absolutely would, but I only have very limited programming experience and don't know C# or C++.

[enricogior]

@vertigo220

when all that needs to be done is to put in the option.

It's more than that and it's not a ridiculous excuse.
This is the current tray icon context menu (and as we already explained, there will be more items)

If we remove the systray icon, how will the user quit or invoke the Report Bug tool?
It's not that there are no alternatives, for example we can install the Report Bug as a stand alone app that has its own icon in the Start menu (and you have to create the icon for it) so it's work to be done that takes time, and at this stage is not something we have planned to do.
Adding the Report Bug command to the Settings is not an option because it doesn't cover the case when the bug to report is "the Settings app" doesn't open.
For quitting, we may consider adding the quit command to the settings page, but again, it's work to be done, and it's not just 10 minutes of coding, because coding it's just one part of the equation, then you have to test it and make sure things work as expected in all scenarios (we still support 1803 and 1809 that have different Settings app, and you have to support that as well) and you have to write the documentation.

So as you can see, it's always easy to say something when you don't have to do it yourself.
Your estimation in term of time to do it it's off by a significant amount.
My estimate is that it would take at least a full week of work.
Again, it's an open source project, there is need for several things, if you can't code for sure you can at least come up with an icon for the "Report Bug" tool, so please start working on it, and you ca also write all the documentation.

[Mystic8b]

All the community asks to do is to take our wishes into account and, within a reasonable time, try to implement this idea. We are not asking you to do this tomorrow or in a week.
But to say that this is impossible or incredibly difficult is about the same as ignoring users.
This is the way the windows feedback center is now. Personally, there are a lot of reports from me about errors, but they do not have any attention at all. Why?
Engaging with the community and listening to users is one of the most important aspects of creating a quality product.
I will not tire of giving examples from other MS services, as this is also an MS product, forgive me. But there are really huge problems with community engagement. I'm not talking about the icon in the taskbar, I'm talking about everything! My office PC with lots of open programs and virtual machines rebooted on its own over the weekend, it's just crazy, and so on with everything.
I write about problems in wsl, vscode, terminal, but constantly about the same answers - it's difficult, it's impossible, we have no time for that.
I needed to speak, I don't know what the community needs to do to start listening to us.

[enricogior]

Hiding the tray icon is not in our list of priorities because it's not adding any new functionality.
But we never said we don't want to do it, and since this is an open source project, nothing prevents the community to contribute.
Let's put a stop to this drama 😂 with an action plan, and the community will have to take ownership of it at least for the part that is not "coding", less talk and more action 😉

Constrains

• This option will be merged after the Stability Release https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/wiki/Roadmap
• It will be merged after we drop support for the old settings app Increase minimum OS version to 1903 and remove old settings #9417 to reduce the amount of documentation/coding/testing.

Steps

Removing the tray icon requires a set of steps that can be implemented ahead of adding the actual option to hide the icon.

UI elements

• create a new icon for the bug report tool

Documentation

• functional specification for the changes affecting the bug report tool
• user documentation for the changes affecting the bug report tool
• functional specification for the change affecting the Exit command
• user documentation for the change affecting the Exit command
• functional specification for the changes affecting future tray icon context menu items (to start modules such Color Picker and PT Run)
• functional documentation for the settings option to hide the tray icon

Implementation

• implement the functional specification for the changes affecting the bug report tool (e.g. add bug report tool to installer)
• implement the functional specification for the change affecting the Exit command
• implement the settings option to hide the tray icon

[vertigo220]

It's more than that and it's not a ridiculous excuse.

But it has been a bunch of ridiculous excuses. Because then how would the player access it? Start Menu. Because notifications. Some people don't want them. Because future additions. Doesn't matter, should be user choice. Choose which apps to show. Does nothing. Your reasons you just gave are the first halfway decent ones offered so far, but they still have their problems. First, how do you report bugs if the bug is with the tray icon? Second, why was this even built on top of the Windows Settings UI, making it dependent on that, instead of just using its own? That seems to have made a lot more work for you, since now you have to deal with the fact that MS can't ever just leave things be (except to make them worse).

As @Mystic8b pointed out, MS has a habit of ignoring their users/customers. I personally find it insulting that they waste our time asking for feedback when it's clearly meant to give people the perception they're being heard when MS doesn't listen. I even recently reported that I found a bug that causes all explorer (file manager) windows to crash, consistently and on multiple computers, and that I knew exactly what's causing it, but nothing. Crickets. Hell, they even often ignore security flaws that are reported to them until forced to fix them when the person that reported it goes public after being ignored. So when we come here and experience much of the same, or at least that's how it feels (at least you guys do respond, and perhaps it's just miscommunication), that's incredibly frustrating. I'm sure you don't like your time being wasted, but neither do we, and that's exactly how we feel every time we report feedback to MS and are blown off. Despite what @Mystic8b sadly still seems to believe, MS does not care about what users think or have to say. I may be wrong, but I believe PowerToys is more of a side project by some MS employees than an official one, and so I hate to lump you into all of that, but it's hard not to. W10 has killed what little hope and respect I might have had left for the company.

My office PC with lots of open programs and virtual machines rebooted on its own over the weekend, it's just crazy, and so on with everything.

The only way around this is maybe to set it to not reboot after updates via Group Policy or Regedit. Since that still may not be enough due to MS's overbearing insistence on controlling what happens on users' computers, and since just stopping it from auto-updating doesn't help a ton if it installs an update that requires a reboot, since then it will just pester you incessantly to reboot, I take the extra step of completely disabling updates, again through Group Policy or Regedit. It's sad MS forces users to choose between security and losing their work, but that's how it is. And they continue to make the situation worse, recently (sometime in the past year, I believe) removed the ability to do it through the settings app, hence the need to use Group Policy, which limits the ability to do it to the Pro version, or Regedit, which I'm unclear whether that's limited to Pro as well. Who knows how long until they remove it completely. If/when that happens, I will be moving to Linux, because this crap is just getting ridiculous. Anyways, if you need help, let me know. This probably isn't the place to do it, though, and there's no private messaging feature, so I'm not sure the best way.

[Mystic8b]

Sorry for the offtopic, you will probably delete this message, but I must answer the dear @vertigo220
Immediately after that, I turned off automatic updates in group policies. I can write an entire book on what's wrong with Win10, but the main problem is MS's lack of user interaction. I do not hope that after what we write here, something will change, but this is the only official place where you can write something and someone will read it.

Over the past six months, I have submitted 23 issue reports and 8 suggestions through the Feedback Hub. And I got no answer almost anywhere. And these are critical problems, my cursor lags when connecting via rdp via a modern app, my defender does not disconnect via gpedit (after opening it, the policy returns to its default value), the mail and calendar application does not sync, formatting problems in the mail application many complex messages and pictures take a very long time to load. Not to mention the problems with the interface, of which there are an incredible number.

I installed a fresh system a week ago and this is how my people app icon looks like.

In a literal sense, some services just don't work. And we don't see any messages about this, while apple even responds to criticism of the notification icon in the new macos.

I really hoped that with the arrival of the new head of the division, something would improve, but so far it does not seem like that. And this makes me very sad, because seemingly insignificant problems (of which an incredible number have accumulated) make a potential best system almost a laughing stock.

And all that remains for users is to endure.

[crutkas]

@vertigo220 the entire project is user feedback. We're a super small team and have to focus. Our roadmap and what we plan to work on is in the open. We have 360+ enhancement requests, 280+ new utility requests and trying to stabilize extremely complex existing utilities that have to interact with things we have zero control over yet have it be seamless.

Here is our next release. https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/projects/17 which has about 100 items we hope to accomplish as well as knocking out 3 massive new features.

We are being transparent. Sorry that the item you want isn't being prioritized. @enricogior listed out some scenarios like "How does someone quit PT without the systray" that needs to be addressed for something like this to be enabled.

[Mystic8b]

Thank you for attention! In addition to the strange arguments at the beginning, we also have a terrible experience of interacting with MS and with Windows itself, sometimes patience is no longer enough, although objectively I (we) understand that you have absolutely nothing to do with it.
However, despite the roadmap, I still believe that the elimination of "nuances" that don't suit some users is a priority than adding new functions.
Thanks anyway for what you are doing. Good luck.

[enricogior]

Closing this issue in favor of #9526

[vertigo220]

I'll ask this here even though it's closed instead of the new issue since I don't want to clutter that up and I feel we should leave the baggage of the discussion so far here (though while making an issue for actually doing it vs this one that's just a feature request seems like progress, I do hope the loss of all the +1s as a result doesn't diminish its perceived importance).

Seeing as the devs, or at least, I assume, most of them, work for MS, do you guys have any pull at all in the design of various aspects of W10, whether it be everything or limited to specific parts like the tray, notifications, start menu, etc? As I'm sure you've gathered, there are many users with many issues, and it would be great to actually have those issues addressed, or at least considered, vs just sending "feedback" into some empty void. For example, this whole issue would be a moot point if the tray were simply better designed.

[crutkas]

@vertigo220 things are complex when you have to build a tool for a billion people, work with applications designed for OS's 20+ years old and users of different confidence levels.

We're trying to only scope the repo to what PowerToys can help execute on and we look like part of the OS. We try to make our apps look like they belong to WinUI so when we flip to WinUI 3, it should be 'seamless'

[ghost]

If we remove the systray icon, how will the user quit or invoke the Report Bug tool?

As above: Run the app from the start menu or other shortcut to make the app (and that menu, obviously) visible, like basically every systray app around.

Steps

An action plan is a good call but it will require some decisions made by the developer, to make that plan.

I think it's been made pretty clear that's not going to happen any time soon. Devs have said that feature requests are addressed in order of how many thumbs up they have. We should just leave a thumbs up and be done with it.

Frankly I'm growing tired of +1's and "but how will we -insert question that's been answered already-?" notifications and since the devs have clearly communicated that this isn't coming, I'm going to just unsub and unstar and revisit this app in a year or so.

[Blazein]

You should know, the PowerToy devs take as much consideration from user feedback as the rest of Microsoft does.

Better off forking this and forgetting about it.

I remember the days of the original Power Toys which actually gave users options to tailor their UX the way they want. It seems this project should be named something else.

[perigozin]

Let's be honest, this is A BUG and the developers rather waste time arguing for more than 2 years than correct a simple thing that would take seconds. F***** ridiculous. EDIT: found a dirty solution using an AHK script https://superuser.com/questions/1707389/hide-some-system-tray-icons-uncollapsed

[Spuner]

@vertigo220

когда все, что нужно сделать, это добавить опцию.

Это нечто большее, и это не смешное оправдание. Это текущее контекстное меню значка в трее (и, как мы уже объясняли, пунктов будет больше)

Если мы удалим значок на панели задач, как пользователь выйдет или вызовет Report Bugинструмент? Дело не в том, что нет альтернатив, например, мы можем установить Report Bugкак отдельное приложение, имеющее собственный значок в меню «Пуск» (и вы должны создать для него значок), так что это работа, которая требует времени, и на данном этапе это не то, что мы планировали делать. Добавление Report BugКоманда настроек не является вариантом, поскольку она не охватывает случай, когда ошибка, о которой нужно сообщить, заключается в том, что «приложение настроек» не открывается. Для выхода мы можем рассмотреть возможность добавления команды quit на страницу настроек, но опять же, это работа, которую нужно проделать, и это не просто 10 минут кодирования, потому что кодирование — это только одна часть уравнения, затем вы должны протестировать его и убедитесь, что все работает должным образом во всех сценариях (мы по-прежнему поддерживаем 1803 и 1809 с другим приложением настроек, и вы также должны поддерживать это), и вы должны написать документацию.

Как видите, всегда легко что-то сказать, когда не нужно делать это самому. Ваша оценка времени, необходимого для этого, сильно отличается. По моим оценкам, это займет как минимум целую неделю работы. Опять же, это проект с открытым исходным кодом, есть необходимость в нескольких вещах, если вы не можете кодировать, вы можете, по крайней мере, придумать значок для инструмента «Сообщить об ошибке», поэтому, пожалуйста, начните работать над ним, и вы можете также написать всю документацию.

No one is saying delete it and that's it. You just need to add the ability to hide the icon in the settings and that's it. Whoever needs it - will hide it, and whoever doesn't need it - will leave it as it is. Have you thought about that?

[Railander]

I would very much like to have a way to completely hide the icon since the base app is just a manager for the actual tools, which generally you set and forget and never have to open again.

The default behavior for these is generally to just launch from the start menu once in a blue moon if you do need it.
I'd be fine if the app is still running in the background at all times even without a tray icon, reopening the app window would be done by relaunching from the start menu.

Regarding notifications, some users don't want these, so it would be their call to forego receiving notifications and possibly certain features by hiding the tray icon. It's also fine to have the tray icon on by default and requiring the user to manually turn it off after install.

I understand this is not exactly high priority as it's simply a QoL change, but I also understand that this wouldn't take too much work to achieve and it is concerning that it does not seem to be receiving any dev time attention considering the community interest.

[ghost]

Devs have said that feature requests are addressed in order of how many thumbs up they have. We should just leave a thumbs up and be done with it.

[ghost]

Closing this issue in favor of #9526

[batesonben]

I thought I remember back in the deep dark good ol days (maybe even Win95...??), Power Toys used to stick an entry into the Control Panel? That way you could always get to them, even if hiding the System Tray access. I too, Show All System Tray Icons, but always get rid of unnecessary icons, in this case, I think the Power Toys icon is a little unnecessary, if you could access the Power Toys controls from the Control Panel.