How to hide an open program in the tray. Hidden program launch in Windows

Preface

It happens that you launch software, it interferes, but there is no way to close it - an important task is being performed. Copying files, for example. Or video conversion. Minimize to taskbar? No, this is not an option - when a lot is open, the confusion will not disappear.

The best way to put it out of sight is to minimize it to the system tray. The small icon next to the clock cannot interfere at all.

RBTray used to help me. The utility was annoying because it had a limitation: to work, you needed a version with a bit depth corresponding to the process. 32-bit was handled by the 32-bit RBTray, and 64-bit by 64-bit. I had to choose which program interferes more - 32-bit Total Commander with data copying running or 64-bit Notepad++ with hundreds of open tabs.

After persistent searching, I came across a software that has existed for many years. The author, apparently, considered it unnecessary to tell the whole world about his creation, so there is practically no chance of finding it by chance.

What Min2Tray can do

The list of features is not full of frills. Min2Tray can:

hide programs in tray at startup;
remove all windows at the press of a key;
enable “Boss Key” mode – hide all windows except favorites;
fastening on top of the others;
work without administrator rights (at the same time, applications running with elevated privileges are not accessible for manipulation).
hide both 32- and 64-bit processes.

There are many utilities that can put running software into the system tray, but they all have drawbacks. This problem was not spared either - there is no support for console applications. So it will not be able to hide the .bat script that is executed when the computer starts.

Where to download Min2Tray

Search on the official website:

To specify which window should be hidden at startup, open the desired software as usual, send it to the tray and right-click on its icon - “Preferences”.

Now the annoying application will disappear on its own. Please note that through the settings you can change the icon and assign a specific key combination to appear.

For fine adjustments For conditions for automatically hiding windows in the tray, see the “EditStartupMinimize list” item in the Min2Tray menu.

A program for hiding programs and windows running on the computer. Allows you to hide any open windows from your computer monitor by pressing predefined keys, and then restore them.

Screenshot gallery

At work, you need to work at the computer... However, often (especially towards the end of the work week) you want to send everything to hell and get a little distracted :).

However, in terms of hiding windows, this program is not as advanced as our highly specialized WinHide.SB. Therefore, I propose to take a closer look at the capabilities of the latter.

Preparing for work

There is also an option with an installer on the developer’s website, but for a number of reasons the portable version is still better.

Firstly, it runs from any media, which allows you to bypass restrictions on software installation.

Secondly, it leaves no traces of its activities in the registry.

Well, thirdly, even if they check the computer, they won’t find anything suspicious, since you will take the program with you on your flash drive, from which you launched it :).

Download the archive with the program, open the folder with its name and run the file WinHide.SB.exe. A language selection window will appear in front of us, in which the default is “Russian”:

Click “Ok” and an information window will appear in front of us, which will inform you that you can manage the program using the tray icon. This concludes the preparation for work and you can move on to the settings.

Program settings

Find the WinHide.SB icon in the tray and call up its context menu with the right mouse button:

Except last point(“Close”), which is highlighted in a separate group, then in the menu we will see that all items are distributed into two groups: the top one is used to control the visibility of windows, and the bottom one is for settings. Let's start with the last ones. To do this, activate the “Program Settings” item or left-click on the tray icon:

The settings window contains 4 tabs with their own parameters in each of them:

“Basic settings” (see screenshot above). Here I advise you to disable “Startup at startup” (if you want to use the program as a portable application running from a flash drive), and also cancel checking for updates.
By default, WinHide.SB stores settings in its own folder, so you don’t need to change anything in the second section. Let's move on to the second tab:

"Hotkeys". On this tab you can change the combinations of keyboard buttons responsible for quickly calling certain program functions.
In principle, everything here by default is configured quite well - the combination “WIN + H” is easy to remember and can be pressed even with one hand ( Windows users 8 will have to customize your shortcuts, since WIN+H is used by default by the system to open the dialog public access to files and folders).
If you plan to run WinHide.SB in full hidden mode, then it would also be useful for you to activate the last function - “Main Menu”, so that if something happens, you will always have access to the settings. Let's move on to the third tab:

"Program disguise". What I liked about WinHide.SB was the ability to visually disguise the tray icon as a harmless-looking icon :). Moreover, you can also add your own tooltip for this icon so that even if someone gets into your PC, they will see a rather harmless picture (for example, an icon Outlook Express with a hint of the same name in the tray :)).
Naturally, if a person clicks on a button disguised in this way, he will see the menu of our program, but for this he still needs to guess and press :). The only sad thing is the lack of ability to choose your own icons. All icons are pre-hardwired into the program and have an outdated look that was used in Windows XP... The last tab remains:

"Task Manager". Here we have only two points that allow you to activate the hiding of processes in the WinHide.SB program itself and windows hidden with its help. And everything would be fine if not for two nuances... First - this function works only on 32-bit systems (the author promises to fix this inconvenience in the next new release).
Second, to work on systems older than Windows XP you will need administrator rights (which we usually don’t have).

Thus, we can summarize that you can use WinHide.SB 100% only on Windows XP 32-bit. However, everything is not so sad, considering that on most computers in various offices this system is still one of the most popular :).

In other cases, we can also use the program, but taking into account the fact that it cannot be hidden in the Task Manager, that's all :).

Options for hiding windows

To best understand the principle of hiding windows with WinHide.SB, you need to activate the “Window Management” item in the main context menu:

At first glance, the interface of this window seems confusing, however, in fact, everything is quite logical and compact. The main controls here are concentrated at the bottom of the window (under the blue stripe).

The "Existing Windows (Visible)" list is displayed in the center, showing all open in this moment window. Below it is a similar list for programmatically hidden apps. Any active window will appear in this list if you press a predefined key combination (by default - “WIN + H”).

On the sides we see two more lists:

"Hot List" To the left of the list of running windows is a list in which you can place those programs that should be automatically hidden when you press a keyboard shortcut to hide the active window. This way, you can hide even minimized windows that your bosses don’t want to see :).
“Windows that are constantly hidden.” This list is to the right of the main one. You can also put any program from the list into it, and it will be closed by pressing hot keys. However, the specified applications will also automatically hide immediately after launch! Moreover, the window will be closed only if its title matches the title in the list.

To add a program to any of the lists, simply highlight its title in the central list of visible windows and press the activated button with an arrow in the appropriate direction. You can delete it by highlighting the entry in the side list and clicking the button with the “X” under the corresponding arrow.

In addition, if you select an entry in the side list, a number of parameters are activated in the top panel that can be changed. Firstly, these are the “Form title” and “Path to exe” fields (which can be edited manually to add any not yet open windows and files to the list).

Also, you can pay attention to the three checkboxes below, which allow you to activate Extra options filtering for hiding windows (remember that hiding from the Task Manager only works in XP).

The last thing you need to know about the hide settings window is the location of the button for refreshing the list of open windows. She's on the left top corner and allows you to reformat the list running applications in already open window settings if you do not see the desired heading in it.

Hiding and showing windows using the context menu

So, we already know that you can hide the active window (and windows in the hide lists) by simply pressing the hotkeys assigned by us :). However, how can we get back what we have hidden?

In WinHide.SB, for this we will again have to go to the main menu. There, in the first group of items we have two additional sections: “Hide window” and “Show window”:

The first item opens up a list of all currently open windows (similar to the list from the “Window Management” section). To hide desired application just find its title in the “Hide window” list and click on it.

After this, the second item is activated - “Show window”, with which we can return all hidden programs to their original places (by the way, in Windows XP, as can be seen in the following screenshot, WinHide.SB actually hides entries about hidden windows from the Task Manager !):

Using hotkeys, we can avoid the need to go into the menu every time, calling up small windows with lists of open (ALT+WIN+H by default) and hidden (CTRL+WIN+H) programs. These combinations will also be useful to you if you decide to hide the WinHide.SB icon from the tray and manage the program in hidden mode.

In Windows 7 and 8, the “Fix visibility problems” option may also appear in the main program menu. It contains a list of all hidden windows and allows you to return them to their previous appearance if in a standard way The window cannot be restored.

Advantages and disadvantages of the program

portability;
the ability to hide and disguise the tray icon;
the ability to reassign hot keys;
hiding an unlimited number of windows;
Setting up lists of windows to hide automatically.

Hiding entries in the Task Manager only works on 32-bit systems;
It’s not entirely convenient to add inactive windows to the auto-hide list;
Some full-screen 3D games may not hide correctly.

conclusions

Despite its nondescript and even somewhat outdated appearance, WinHide.SB can give odds to anyone else modern application to hide programs and windows!

Judge for yourself: portability, complete visual hiding (and in Windows XP also hiding from the Task Manager!) of both the program itself and the windows that we want to hide from prying eyes, as well as a unique way to disguise the tray icon, in my opinion, this is already enough.

But WinHide.SB also provides us with the function of auto-hiding a set of programs we have previously defined, and is also not tied to system registry or others Windows components, and even consumes 2-3 megabytes of memory, which is ridiculous by modern standards :). All this together gives us an almost ideal tool for a conspiracy theorist :).

Therefore, I hope that with WinHide.SB you can finally feel comfortable doing nonsense in the workplace :). But don’t relax too much - the boss doesn’t sleep ;).

P.S. Permission granted to freely copy and quote. this article provided that an open active link to the source is indicated and the authorship of Ruslan Tertyshny is preserved.

P.P.S. If you want to get a tool for almost complete control over windows, then I advise you to use the following program:

After starting the program, a small window appears on the taskbar, indicating that the software is working. If you want the program to work hidden, without showing itself in any way, you can use utilities such as NirCmd or Quiet. However, in the Windows 10 operating system, you can perform such a launch using standard tools. To do this, you can use the following tips.

Method number 1. Run via command line

In earlier versions of the operating system, as well as in Windows 10, you can run the program in hidden mode using command line:

To do this, press “Win + R” and enter “powershell”.

The console will open. Enter the command “Start-Process -WindowStyle hidden “C:/ProgramFiles(x86)/Opera/opera.exe””, where “C:/ProgramFiles(x86)/Opera/opera.exe” is the path to the program file that you want to run in stealth mode.
The software will start, but there will be no window on the taskbar.

Method number 2. Launch using the VBSscript script

To run the program in hidden mode, just open notepad and write the script:

Dim WShell
Set WShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
WShell.Run "Opera.exe", 0
Set WShell = Nothing

Where "Opera.exe" is a program that needs to be run in stealth mode.

Save the file with the extension .vbs and any name.

Let's run the file. The program will launch in hidden mode. Its operation can only be tracked in the task manager.

Is there any way to remove a program from the list of installed programs in the Programs and Features section?

You can hide a program from the program list different ways. I'll tell you about everything I know. The methods discussed in this article apply to all versions of the operating system. Windows systems: from Windows XP to Windows 10.

Why hide programs from the program list?

Sometimes when alone shared computer Multiple users may need to hide programs. There may be various reasons for this. I think that those who read this article themselves know why they need this.

By the way, for those who are new to us, here are a couple of similar useful articles. Here we told you how. And in the article “” - how to quickly hide a folder on the desktop. This is not the most reliable method. If you need something more reliable, I can recommend the method discussed in the article “”. Find everything else yourself using the site search form.

How to hide a program from the program list

Let's assume that we need to hide the Notepad++ program. As you can see, it is displayed in the list of programs.

In order to hide an entry about a program, you need to tinker a little in the registry. So, launch the “Run” window using the Win+R key combination.

Enter “regedit.exe” and click OK.

Then we find the Uninstall folder in the registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

In my case the application is 32-bit, and operating system 64-bit. In such a severe case, you should look for the application in this thread:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

This section is responsible for generating a list of installed programs that the user sees in the Control Panel in the “Programs and Features” menu.

Now we find the program branch that needs to be hidden (in my particular case, the name of the branch is the same as the name of the application - Notepad++).

After this, we create a DWORD parameter. This is done like this: right-click somewhere in an empty space and select “Create” and “DWORD Value”.

By right-clicking on it and selecting “Rename”, let’s name it “SystemComponent”.

Now let's click on it right click mouse and select “Change”.

Then change its value from “0” to “1”, and then click “OK”.

Well, now the best part is, go to the “Programs and Features” section and use the F5 key to update the list of programs. If everything was done correctly, then the program should be hidden.

Hide installed program in Windows you can alternative way. To do this, you need to change the key name “DisplayName” to “QuietDisplayName” in the same branch.

This method may not work, so use the first method, which always works without critical days and never fails.

How to disable hiding programs

To return everything as it was before, i.e. To disable the hiding mode for a particular program, you need to delete the “SystemComponent” parameter we created in the program branch. And if you hid the program using the second method, then you need to rename the “DisplayName” parameter back, removing the word “Quiet”.

Using hidden programs

You can work with hidden programs as before. And if you need to hide a program within a script, then you can use this command:

REG ADD "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Notepad++" /v SystemComponent /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f

Click if we cannot copy the command text.

In this article, I clearly showed how to hide a program from the list of installed programs. If you know of any other way to hide installed Windows program, write about it in the comments.

In the future, in a continuation of this article, I will tell you how to hide a program service. Therefore, if you have not yet subscribed to us on social networks, I highly recommend doing so now. That's all. Good luck friends!

In order to secretly run a program installed on a computer under Windows control, so that neither its window nor its icon on the taskbar or tray is visible, you can use JavaScript. Scripts written in this programming language allow you to launch an application whose window will not be an eyesore to the user. Also, the application launch will not show up in the taskbar or tray. The only way to understand that the application was running is to view the processes in Task Manager. And I won’t make you wait long and will immediately show you special commands with which you can launch the program covertly:

var WSHShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell");
WSHShell.Run("notepad",0);

There is no need to change the first line. The only place where you should make changes is the name of the program being launched. IN in this case the quick launch command for the Notepad application was used - notepad. You can also use others to launch Windows applications, or specify the full path to the application file to be launched that is not from the Windows family.

Creating a JavaScript Script File to Run a Program Hiddenly

To create a file JavaScript script with the provided code for hidden launch specific program, just use Notepad. The steps to create a JavaScript script file are very similar to those in command line software. Windows strings. You must enter the above text into the new one Text Document and save this document specifying the extension .js and file type All files. After that, all that remains is to run the created script, after which the program you specified will be launched hidden.