Hi all, first post (and I searched before posting!)
We’re having a strange issue where if someone has Spark open, and they click on the X to close the Window, the user is only able to relaunch from the System Tray. This is on all machines in our testing enviornment (and I’ve tried creating new profiles by nenaming the Spark folder under appdata/roaming) and is really more of a nuisance than a problem. We’re hoping to roll Spark out company wide here shortly, so I want to figure out if there’s a setting that I’m missing that will allow the program to be re-opened from elsewhere (like the start menu or the taskbar - mainly the taskbar), or if this is just the way the program is designed and to make sure I explain to our users how to properly reopen it. We’re also coming from Lync, so I was also wondering if it’s possible to force Spark to not allow being closed unless exited (if so, this would be a solution to the first problem). I assumed this may be something I’d have to do through a custom build, and I looked into doing that, but it’s a bit more advanced than I am.
Thanks!
it’s by design. When you click the X, it’s not closing the program, it’s “backgrounding” it to your taskbar. If you try to run Spark again, Spark is smart enough to not try to have 2 copies running. So, to re-open the window, you must click the task tray icon.
to be clear, the X in the top right corner is not exiting the program. it simply is telling Spark you don’t want it’s window open at the moment, so instead it should run in the background (in your task tray). This way, Spark can still receive messages even if you do not have the main Spark window open.
most programs i’ve used that “background” to the task bar operate this way.
Thanks figured it was by design and what you said makes sense. Do you know if there is a way to make closing the window disabled, or perhaps hitting the X only minimizes the program? Or is that custom build territory?
Thanks again
Well, there is the Spark --> Always On Top checkbox from the Spark dropdown menu… this will make Spark float on top of all other windows. User will still be able to click the X and background Spark…
I don’t think there’s a way to fully stop closing of the window without source code modification… but it’s not difficult, and you have the option to customize more things, and even brand it so it looks more “native” for your company (add your logos, etc).
https://github.com/igniterealtime/Spark/blob/master/src/java/org/jivesoftware/re source/default.properties
the default.properties file has a lot of customization potential. One of the options is DISABLE_EXIT. This won’t stop users from closing the window (and it minimizing to the task tray), but it will prevent users from exiting the program. To fully disable closing the window, you will need to modify the MainWindow in source to disable the setDefaultCloseOperation() method to do nothing instead of closing.
There are many guides in this forum on how to compile and customize Spark.
If you are on windows vista, 7 or 8, and the problem is Spark backgrounds and the icon is in the popup menu next to the clock with the up arrow… you can just click that up arrow, and drag the Spark icon to the actual task tray so that it sits next to the flag, network icon, and sound icon. Maybe it’s more visible that way?