Use Notify icon in VB.NET

In this article w can discuss about notify icon control in vb.net, basically notify control is used for showing processes that run in the background and don't have their own interface. In Windows Services, we can use these notify icon's to associate various functionality.we can also use this icon in window application for launching another application or other functionality. Notify icon shows in system tray.

For better understanding we can make an application as utility for showing time (clock) that also shows in system tray. The following code example demonstrates using the Notify Icon class to display an icon for an application in the system tray. The example demonstrates setting the Icon,Contextmenu, Text, and Visible properties and handling the DoubleClick event

The zip file contains NotifyIcon_VbDotnet Project.

Add new form Form1 and add notify icon, context menu and timer control.

Figure 1

Add two contextmenu item in contextMenuStrip1

1.Open(for showing application)

2.Exit (for closing application)

Now there is need to set some properties of notify icon like :

ContextMenu: Gets/Sets Context menu for the tray icon
Icon: Gets/Sets current icon
Text: Gets/Sets tooltip text that is displayed when the mouse hovers over the system tray
Visible: Gets/Sets if the icon is visible in the window system tray

On form closing event put this code, this code minimize the form

Private Sub Form1_FormClosing(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.FormClosingEventArgs) Handles MyBase.FormClosing

If Me.WindowState = FormWindowState.Normal Then

e.Cancel = True

Me.Hide()

Me.WindowState = FormWindowState.Minimized

End If

End Sub

And for showing form again we can use MouseDoubleClick event of notify icon control like this:

Private Sub NotifyIcon1_MouseDoubleClick(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.MouseEventArgs) Handles NotifyIcon1.MouseDoubleClick

Me.Show()

Me.WindowState = FormWindowState.Normal

Me.Activate()

Me.Focus()

End Sub

And it will show time on labels

Private Sub Timer1_Tick(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Timer1.Tick

Label1.Text = DateTime.Now.ToLongTimeString()

Label2.Text = DateTime.Now.ToLongDateString()

End Sub

Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load

Timer1.Enabled = True

Label1.Text = DateTime.Now.ToShortTimeString()

Label2.Text = DateTime.Now.ToLongDateString()

End Sub

We can show tooltip on icon like Figure2 with the help of this code:

Private Sub NotifyIcon1_MouseMove(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.MouseEventArgs) Handles NotifyIcon1.MouseMove

NotifyIcon1.Text = DateTime.Now.ToLongTimeString

End Sub

Figure 2

(For full description, see attached file)

Finally application will look like :

Figure 3

Note: 1. Notify Icon class is sealed class so it cannot be inherited.
2. The visible property must be set to true for showing icon
3. You can add balloon tooltip on icon with the help of these properties :
notifyIcon1.BalloonTipTitle = "BalloonTipTitle"
notifyIcon1.BalloonTipText = "BalloonTipText."