System Tray & Taskbar Overlay

LocalTelemetry features a Win32 taskbar integration mechanism that embeds real-time hardware telemetry directly into the Windows taskbar.

The Taskbar Overlay

The taskbar overlay is a borderless, transparent window docked directly into the Windows Shell taskbar window (Shell_TrayWnd).

Figure 1: Real-time telemetry overlay running inside the Windows taskbar.

Key Capabilities

• Native Taskbar Integration: Attaches to the Windows taskbar and auto-calculates its size from the configured metrics.
• Automatic Multi-Line Rendering: Metrics are laid out in a compact grid. With a single metric the widget renders one line; with two or more metrics it renders a 2-row layout automatically.
• High DPI Awareness: Scales crisply on 100%, 125%, 150%, 200%+ display scaling settings.

System Tray Controls

Right-click the LocalTelemetry icon in your Windows System Tray (near the clock) to access quick controls:

Figure 2: System tray right-click context menu.

• Show Overlay / Hide Overlay: Instantly toggle overlay visibility (synced with the Overlay page toggle).
• Open Settings: Opens the Svelte 5 settings panel.
• Quit: Completely closes LocalTelemetry.

Overlay Settings

In Settings -> Overlay:

• Show Overlay: Enable/disable the widget on the taskbar.
• Double-click action: Choose what happens when you double-click the overlay (None, Task Manager, Settings).
• Position in taskbar: Place the widget at the Left or Right of the taskbar.
• Offset from Edge: Shift the widget horizontally from the chosen position.
• Opacity: Adjust overlay opacity (0-100%).
• Scale: Adjust overlay scale percentage.

Multi-Monitor Support

The overlay attaches to the primary taskbar (Shell_TrayWnd). It does not mirror onto secondary taskbars.

Windows Explorer Restart Handling

If Windows Explorer crashes or restarts (explorer.exe), LocalTelemetry automatically detects the TaskbarCreated Win32 message and re-attaches the overlay without requiring an application restart.

If the overlay does not reappear automatically, right-click the tray icon and select Show Overlay.