Big Mouse Pointer Copyright (C) Moose O'Malley, ----------------- September 2007. +===========================================================+ | T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S | +===========================================================+ | * Introduction | * Why I Wrote this Program | * Know Issues / Problems | * The Future | * Freeware Information | * Warranty | * Amendment History | * Contacting the Program's Author +===========================================================+ Introduction : -------------- Big Mouse Pointer for Windows 95, 98, NT, 2000, ME, etc. This program is free software. Anyone - any person, any company, or any business - can use this program for free. No fees or payment is required. See "Freeware Information" below. Big Mouse Pointer is a program that simply enables you to use a BIG arrow (of just about any size and color) as the mouse pointer. Big Mouse Pointer enables you to specify a mouse pointer of just about any size from : - None (Standard Windows Mouse Pointer only). - Miniscule (2-3 times the size of the standard Windows mouse pointer) - Tiny - Small - Medium - Large - Huge - Mammoth - Gigantic - Don't be Stupid !!! (which fills up half of the screen). The smaller pointers do work better, and the larger pointers are mainly for novelty value. The size of the mouse pointers are all resolution independent. So, if you choose "Large" on a VGA 640x480 screen, then the mouse pointer will be roughly the same size as if you used the program with a "Large" pointer on a 1600x1200 SVGA or 100x100 LCD screen. When you run this program, it resides in the Windows Traybar (in the tray area with the clock, etc). If you want to change the size and/or colour of the mouse pointer, simply click on the program's icon in the Windows Tray Bar, and, when the main program window appears, select the new size or colour. The menu options on the main window enable you to : - Auto-Run the Program when Windows Starts Up. - Restore Factory Defaults Developed using 32-bit Delphi. This program will **NOT** run under Windows 3.x (even with Win32 installed) !! Why I Wrote this Program : -------------------------- I do a lot of presentations and lecturers (at the moment, I am working as a full time lecturer at a university in Australia), and one thing that people sometimes comment on is that they find it hard to see the standard Windows mouse cursor on the massive wall screen projection, which can result in two things : 1. People lose time trying to find the mouse pointer so they know which part of a presentation slide I am currently commenting on. 2. And, this means that they can miss out on key facts and discussion during the presentation. Also, when you work on computers *alot* (as I do - at home and work - my whole life is basically my computers, which I tend to eat, sleep, and breathe), it can get a little hard towards the end of a long day to find the mouse pointer. If you need to hunt for it, then you can lose your train of thought, and lose momentum in your work. Also, on Laptop / LCD screens, it can be next to impossible to find the mouse cursor, especially in bright light conditions. Finally, when you work at very high resolutions (1600 x 1200, or even 1280 x 1100), then the standard Windows Mouse pointer is almost microscopic, and can be very hard to see / find. To prevent these problems / issues, I needed a program to provide me with a decent sized mouse pointer, that would work with monitors of any resolution - even 1 billion pixels x 1 billion pixels. Since I love programming, then I simply sat down one weekend and thought about this topic, and ended up writing this program. Know Issues / Problems : ------------------------ This program is great, but it is not perfect, and it has several limitations, as follows : 1. When you have a big mouse pointer, and hold the mouse cursor over a button or icon that has tooltips, then the tooltips can be obscured or covered up by the big mouse pointer. 2. In addition, when I used Big Mouse Pointer with some programs, and selected text with the mouse (i.e. I clicked and dragged with the mouse to highlight text) in the program, then artifact pointers appeared on the screen until I released the mouse button. (i.e. stopped dragging). The artifacts were only very temporary and caused absolutely no harm at all - they just look wierd ... As soon as the mouse button was released, the artifacts dissapeared. N.B. The standard Windows mouse pointer does this as well, but it is a lot more noticeable when you have a big mouse pointer ! 3. When the screen saver is on, the mouse pointer remains visible. 4. When you select the biggest mouse pointer, which takes up most of the screen and isn't really meant to be taken seriously anyway, then when you move it, it can be a little flickery / jerky depending on the speed of your video card and cpu. 5. When your PC is busy and you move the mouse, then artifact pointers may temporarily appear on the screen until your PC has had a chance to refresh its display. These issues may be looked at / fixed / improved in the future. The Future : ------------ In the future, many improvements could be made to this program, such as : - Other mouse pointer shapes. - Flashing mouse pointer arrow. - Colour cycling mouse pointer arrow. - Look at / fix / improve some of the above "Know Issues / Problems". (Particularly the screen saver one). - Hide the real mouse cursor - maybe ? (I this being available though as it helps you understand context when you hold the mouse over a button or an edit box or other windows controls. e.g. can you enter data into an edit box, can you drag and drop files, is a control available, etc. - Anything else ? If you would like any improvements, or would like to suggest any improvements, please email me and let me know. As with all of my shareware programs, how much more work I do on this program depends entirely on what support I get, how many people use the program, etc. Freeware Information : ----------------------- This is free software. Anyone - any person, any company, or any business - can use this program for free. No fees or payment is required. However, if you find the program useful, then please consider making a PayPal donation to support my efforts. (To make a donation, please run the program and select the "About" option under the Help menu, and then click the PayPal link on the "About" screen). Warranty : ---------- This software and the accompanying files are provided "as is" and without warranties as to performance or merchantability or any other warranties whether expressed or implied. The user assumes the entire risk of using this software. If you do find any faults with this program, email me and let me know. Amendment History : -------------------- Vers Date Description 1.0 6-Apr-2001 First Public Release. (9,090 lines of code / comments.) 1.1 13-Nov-2001 Remove some experimental code that I was working on to test if the screen saver is currently active, and turning off the Big Mouse pointer if it was. This was making the Big Mouse pointer invisible always on some systems. Special thanks to Christine T for reporting this problem to me earlier on today. Bring the program up to date with my latest code libraries. Brand New About Screen and associated functionality. Add in support for the Maximise icon in the top right corner of the program's main window. (10,035 lines of code / comments.) 1.2 13-Nov-2001 Add in a new massive size of mouse pointer called jokingly "Don't be Stupid !!!" because it's so ridiculously big. Fix an error where the mouse pointer was not restored if you chose "No Mouse Pointer" and then selected another mouse pointer. (10,083 lines of code / comments.) 1.3 5-Feb-2002 Bring the program up to date with my latest code libraries. Introduce yet more Anti-Hacker / Anti-Cracker measures. (11,288 lines of code / comments.) 1.4 14-June-2002 Bring the program up to date with my latest code libraries. Add in a 0.5 second delay when you change the mouse pointer size to give the program and windows time to adjust to the new form size. Prior to adding this delay, you could go bezerk, and click on many changes in size a second, and this could cause problems when the mouse pointer didn't have time to redraw and resize between the size changes. The delay solves this problem. (20,409 lines of code / comments.) 1.4b 20-Nov-2002 Bring the program up to date with my latest code libraries. Registered Users - please contact me via email. (35,034 lines of code / comments.) 1.4f 3-Sep-2007 This program is now FREEWARE - see "Freeware Information" above. If this program was not downloaded from my Home Page, then it is most likely an old version. The latest version of this program is available from my Home page and its mirrors. Mike "Moose" O'Malley ____________________________________________________ Moose's Software Valley - Established July, 1996. WEB: http://move.to/moose ____________________________________________________