[2008] Displaying Text on Home Screen

[cmkessell]

Is there a way to programmatically display a simple line of text anywhere on the Today/home screen (in WM5 or WM6)? I'm working on a small program that needs to run in the background and display some status info, updating this once a second or so.

I've seen programs that achieve this effect by adding a plug-in to the home screen, but is this the only solution?

[petevick]

Hi,
sorry - plug in is your only way, and updating once a second is going to have a detrimental effect on battery life

There is an old article here (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms839442.aspx) by Jim Wilson that may help.

[cmkessell]

Thanks for the info - that article on plug-ins looks ideal.

Re. your comment on battery life, does updating the display cause the screen to turn on then? If so I assume it's possible for a program to detect when the screen has gone into standby and so avoid doing any updates?

[petevick]

Updating the screen shouldn't do when the screen is off, but you are going to have a process running, constantly updating something - just something to keep an eye on