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On-demand Magnify / Zoom

By vierlex

Setup and bind the Magnify Tool which comes with most Windows versions.

NO DOWNLOAD REQUIRED.

(this guide is written with windows 7 in mind, but works for the others too i guess)

Award

Created by

vierlex
Offline

Category: Modding or Configuration, Secrets

Languages: English

Posted

Updated

10 Jun, 2015 @ 4:51pm

26 Nov, 2015 @ 3:54pm

918	Unique Visitors
26	Current Favorites

Guide Index

Overview

Simple Solution (recommended)

Advanced

sources

Comments

Simple Solution (recommended)

This solution is quickly set up and does its job for 99% of its users :)

Open up your Startmenue and type in magnify, press enter and play around :)
The settings you configure here are saved between restarts!
I recommend using Fullscreen (needs Aero Desktop to be activated) and 200 % but depends of course on your monitor/distance.
Bind this application to one of your buttons with "Custom Shortcut.."
The path is usually
C:\Windows\System32\Magnify.exe
Bind Windows+ESC with "Keyboard" - "Combo Key ..." to one of your buttons to close the Magnifier. This way, it doesnt matter which window currently has focus, it will always close the Magnifier thanks clever commentator :)
(saving / restarting controller companion might be needed)

Advanced

Hiding the Window/Magnify Icon

If you, like me, don't like that Icon popup everytime then a batch file workaround can help. Sadly, Controller Companion doesn't support arguments (yet?) or else this would not be needed.

Open notepad (open the Start Menue and type in 'notepad', press enter)
paste this code
@echo off start "" Magnify /min
Save the File as "magnify_hidden.bat" (the important bit is the .bat at the end)
Bind this .bat File via "Custom shortcut..." to one of your buttons

One Button Toggle

!!! WARNING !!!

For this to work, you need Admin Rights!
To automate this, you will have to Right-Click the .bat File and go to "Properties" - "Compatibility" - on the bottom check "Execute as Admin"

If this option is grayed out, your only option, which i dont recommend at all!, is to turn off UAC (User Account Control) to its lowest setting, to make this work.

You will have to restart your computer to have it take effect.

With that out of the way...

create a Textfile and open it
paste the following text into the file. Save it. Close it.
tasklist /fi "ImageName eq Magnify.exe" | find /i "Magnify.exe" && taskkill /fi "ImageName eq Magnify.exe" || start Magnify /min
Rename the Textfile to "togglezoom.bat" (the .bat part is important)
Bind this .bat via "Custom shortcut..." to a button.

Explaination

You just created a Batch-Script which you can execute on doubleclicking it. It will try looking for a process called Magnify.exe. If it exists, it will be killed (so will all process named Magnify.exe). If it doesn´t exist, Magnify will be started minimized.

With this you have to use only this one button to start and stop the application at the cost of potential security risk, be aware!

A possible solution to get rid of needing Admin Rights might be sending the Keystrokes Windows+Esc like in the Simple Solution. Sadly, neither Batch nor VBScript can't emulate a Windows-Key press so it needs some more advanced magic to make it work.

A native solution from the dev might be a good way with dealing with this.

sources

http://superuser.com/questions/567562/need-a-batch-toggle-that-will-launch-kill-applications-when-run
Zoom by Scott Lewis from the Noun Project
Helpful Comments :)

14 Comments

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11Cent 28 Feb, 2020 @ 1:34am

you are the perfect person. thank you very much.

vierlex [author] 27 Nov, 2015 @ 11:11am

lets say i extended on that idea with additional security realted information and how to get it actually working because of it. if you look closely, it isnt the exact code either but cleaner and improved.

like you extended on the idea with using taskkill which i had in my guide at one point.

i really do think its not really helpful to have a second guide which nearly does the same thing and using the same tools, not to mention that you actually claim to support all the languages and even favorite your own guide which makes it seem a bit desperate for attention.

also i do give credit -> look at the sources

t2d | no.SkiLLz @ CachyOS 27 Nov, 2015 @ 4:06am

Oh, i see that you just ripped the one button solution from my guide.

t2d | no.SkiLLz @ CachyOS 27 Nov, 2015 @ 4:00am

As I am a coder, I really thought about creating a small application to send keystrokes to the Magnify.exe (so you can trigger the most functions, eg. inverted colors) and toggle it on / off, if needed. But I feel a bit bad to share some .exe in Steam.

Maybe I will do that later..
But maybe we will get native support by CC someday.. this would not be too hard to implement.

vierlex [author] 26 Nov, 2015 @ 1:55pm

you are right, i just tried it, might come in handy if you could toggle that somehow via batchscripts, ill look into that!

KEEPER 26 Nov, 2015 @ 1:36pm

i just found a cool feature. often i dont like reading black letters on a bright white screen. it tends to hurt my eyes after some time. well within the options of the magnifyer there is a view everytrhing in the negative turning the words white and the background to black. i think steam had the right idea for their set up.

vierlex [author] 26 Nov, 2015 @ 9:43am

thanks!

ah your version has a batch file which uses taskkill, thought there might be some way to shell-code that :)

fixed the quote thing as best as i could (as i want since i cant figure it out and i am lazy :)

t2d | no.SkiLLz @ CachyOS 26 Nov, 2015 @ 2:48am

Some nice information here. ;)

The "depracted, but still usefull for some maybe" seems empty for me and there is an "[/quote]" block in point 6. Maybe you want to fix that one.

I created a quick toggle for the magnification tool, which require only one button.
Maybe you want to check it out too:

http://sp.zhabite.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=562562592

vierlex [author] 17 Nov, 2015 @ 3:56pm

you actually can, play around with the settings, once it is set it will remember it for the next time

KEEPER 17 Nov, 2015 @ 2:57pm

it would be great if it could be set to 150% becuse 200% is a bit to much for me.

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