How to Automatically Restore Preferences any Time a Window/Program Opens

Some programs automatically restore the size and position of their window from the previous session, but many don’t. Even the ones that do, don’t always get it right – especially when running on Vista or Windows 7, or if you’ve got multiple monitors. You can fix this behavior using PTFB Pro as follows:

  1. Get your chosen program running and position its window exactly how you like it.

  2. Open up PTFB Pro’s main window

  3. Click on “New Macro…” and choose “Window Restore”

  4. Select the window in the resulting list, or if you prefer hit “Choose by Mouse” and click on the window with the hand-shaped mouse cursor. Click Next.

  5. Since the title is a key feature that PTFB Pro uses to recognize your window, take a moment to review the options on the next screen. When you’re happy with your choices, hit Next.

  6. Now tell PTFB Pro what actions to take on the window. You can choose to restore its current size and position, center it on the screen, maximize, minimize or restore it, and/or set it to stay on top of other windows. Hit Next when you’re done.

  7. Pick a title for your new macro and choose whether the actions should be carried out once when the window opens, or applied & reapplied repeatedly to prevent the window from moving or changing state.

You may wish to tweak your new macro’s settings after you’ve created it. For example, you might find that the restorative actions occur too quickly after the window has first appeared. If so, you can introduce a longer initial delay to give the window a little time to “settle” before it is resize/repositioned by PTFB Pro.

Find out more about boosting your productivity with autoclicks and macros.
CLICK HERE to download a free 30 day trial, no strings attached. If you aren’t entirely happy simply uninstall!

How to Keep one Window/Program on top of others

Sometimes it’s useful to stop one program’s window from being hidden by others as you switch from one program to another in the cours eof your work. Some programs have an inbuilt facility for this, there are many more that don’t.

Here’s how to set a window to stay on top of others using PTFB Pro:

  1. Right-click on PTFB Pro’s tray icon and select “Stay on Top” from the resulting popup menu, OR hit the Options button in PTFB Pro’s main window and again select “Stay on Top” from the resulting popup menu.
  2. When you select “Stay on Top” a sub menu will open up. Just select your chosen window in that sub menu.
  3. The “stay on top” setting is toggled, so just repeat the process if you want to turn it off again.

Note that this version of Stay on Top is not maintained between sessions. In other words, if you close then re-open the window in question it will not have Stay on Top set. If you want to have Stay on Top active for a particular program/window all the time, you should use a Window Restore macro instead.

Find out more about boosting your productivity with autoclicks and macros.
CLICK HERE to download a free 30 day trial, no strings attached. If you aren’t entirely happy simply uninstall!

How to recover an off-screen window with PTFB’s Window Restore Macro

If you’ve got a multi-monitor system you might find that some programs do the job of saving and restoring their own window positions almost too well. Disconnect your second monitor and you might suddenly find that your favorite program is marooned off-screen, with no obvious way of getting it back on to your main monitor. Fortunately PTFB Pro’s Window Restore macro can help in these situations:

  1. Create a new Window Restore item
  2. On the first page of the resulting Wizard, select the errant window in the list and hit Next
  3. In most cases you can probably skip past the title matching options by hitting Next again
  4. Now you’re on the Actions page, and this is where you get to force the window back on screen! Tick “Restore Position” and set both the X & Y coords to zero. Optionally you can also resize the window and/or set it to be maximized on your main monitor. Click Next when you’re done, and Finish on the final page.

Now all you have to do is hit Start Watching and suddenly your missing window will forced back on screen. If you’re confident that the program in question has now stored its new position, you can disable or even delete the Window Restore item you just created. Job done!

Find out more about automating your workflow with Macros.
CLICK HERE to download a free 30 day trial, no strings attached. If you aren’t entirely happy simply uninstall!

Automatically resize/reposition a window

Starting with version 4, PTFB Pro supports the creation of items that automatically adjust windows to your preferred size, position and state when they appear. These items are intended primarily for programs that either don’t remember their most recent screen position, or fail to restore it correctly from one session to the next. For example, it’s not uncommon to see an older and otherwise fully functional program that doesn’t cope very well with the extra thick window borders used by Microsoft’s “Aero” interface. With a bit of help from PTFB Pro, such programs will once again occupy the correct position on screen, time after time.

For this example, I’ll use a program called Noise Ninja 2, which removes the noise (unsightly grain) from digital photographs. Noise Ninja 2 was written before the new look themes of Vista and Windows 7, and though it makes an attempt at restoring its size & position from the previous session, it doesn’t quite get it right. It cuts off the top of the window slightly when it starts up.  It’s a minor thing, but it bugs me, so I use one of PTFB Pro’s Window Restore Macros to fix it.

Here’s how:

1) Start up Noise Ninja (or the program of your choice)

2) Open up PTFB Pro’s main screen, hit New Macro and choose Window Restore

PTFB Choose Macro

3) Select the target program’s window in the list, and hit Next

Winrestore - NoiseNinja

4) On the next page, I need to make a few tweaks to help PTFB Pro recognize the Noise Ninja window, because Noise Ninja includes the name of the currently open file in its title (many other programs do the same). I select the “Match the following partial title option” and cut out the name of the current document:

NoiseNinja - identifying the title

5) On the Action page, I just tick the “Maximize” option and move on

6) On the final page I just supply a more meaningful title, like “Noise Ninja – Maximize”, and hit Finish

That creates the Window Restore macro, and as soon as I hit “Start Watching” PTFB Pro fixes Noise Ninja’s window, and keeps fixing it automatically whenever I start up Noise Ninja in the future. That’s one less irritating distraction when I’m editing my photos!

Find out more about boosting your productivity with autoclicks and macros.
CLICK HERE to download a free 30 day trial, no strings attached. If you aren’t entirely happy simply uninstall!