Process Lasso Version 4 Beta RC1 build 83000

[Warrior]

This is a masive evolution of Process Lasso. As always, Bitsum is taking it to the next level *without* increasing bloat. In fact, we've even substantially decreased virtual memory usage by the GUI in this version by optimizing the way we store process icons in virtual memory. Below is a list of major additions and improvements, followed by a more detailed list.

Version 4

New Process Watchdog feature (restart, terminate, or change affinity if process if exceeds X CPU or VM usage)

Improved integration with Vista and Windows 7 - start with highest rights *without* any UAC elevation prompt

Better support for multi-user environments

Better GUI support for systems with up to 32 CPUs

Reduced virtual memory usage by the GUI even further

Ability to override hard-coded ProBalance exclusions

Even more intelligent and efficient core engine

X64 build improved efficiency with latest VC compiler optimizations

Substantially improved system tray balloon tips with event grouping and more (disabled by default)

New process restraint history (and current status) column in GUI

New inter-process communication framework handles all communication between instance(s) of the core engine and GUI

Even MORE multi-threaded than before

New, simpler licensing system using activation codes

No more timed nag screen (single screen, click Skip)

All revisions:

Addition.Core: Added option to restart or terminate a livelocked process (restart/terminate process if consuming X% CPU for Y time)

Addition.Core: Added option to restart or terminate a memory leaking process (restart/terminate process if consuming X% of VM for Y time)

Addition.Core: Added feature to disable ProBalance after system has been idle X minutes

Addition.Core: Added log entry indicating if restoration of a ProBalance process occurred to due maximum restraint time reached

Addition.Core: Added core ability to disable log completely

Addition.Core: Created new config group for the optional and seldom recomended foreground boosting options (should migrate old config just fine)

Addition.Core: Added option to run ProcessLasso and ProcessGovernor at less than their default priorities (useful in certain environments)

Addition.Core: Added affinity change watchdog toggle to divide CPU threshold by number of system cores

Addition.InstallHelper: No more UAC prompts or Windows Defender issues when auto-starting Process Lasso at login with elevated/highest rights (for Windows Vista/7 and later)

Change.InstallHelper: Now defults to run with elevated rights in Vista and Windows 7 (multi-user support is still perfectly retained even in this mode)

Addition.GUI: Added ability to completely disable log

Addition.GUI: Added ability for user to override hard-coded ProBalance exclusions (simply uncheck 'Excluded from..' to unexclude)

Addition.GUI: Added facilitating ProBalanace settings for new feature to disable ProBalance when PC idle

Addition.GUI: Added facilitating settings for overloaded (livelock or memory leak) process handling

Addition.GUI: Added tooltips to highlighted ProBalance events on the main graph. Roll over highlighted portions to reveal what happened during that time period.

Addition.GUI: Added menu option to Reset ENTIRE configuration

Addition.GUI: Added an exception handler to allow users the option to continue or restart Process Lasso after an exception (in some locations)

Addition.GUI: Added greeting message the first time you 'close' the GUI to the system tray, informing that the GUI is down there sleeping

Addition.GUI: Enabled watchdog features on virtual memory

Addition.GUI: Polish watchdog config dialog and fix broken things

Addition.GUI: 'Remove all' buttons now remove multiple selections in many config dialogs

Addition.GUI: Added new top level exception handler for polite automatic restart if a crash were to occur

Addition.GUI: New 'Exclude from' process context menu item

Addition.GUI: New process context menu items for Watchdog capabilities

Addition.GUI: Finished watchdog auto-terminate context menu items and overall code

Addition.GUI: Added more critical system processes for user confirmations and special handling

Addition.GUI: Show current power scheme on graph

Addition.GUI: Added special Pro bitmap to About box after activation

Addition.GUI: Added registered user name to About box after activation

Addition.GUI: Added Finnish translation

Addition.GUI: Per-process CPU history now drawn on graph also in Active Processes tab

Addition.GUI: CTRL-A now also works in 'Active processes' tab to select all processes

Addition.GUI: Added support for Finnish translation

Addition.GUI: Added Indonesian language by Ivan Chin

Addition.GUI: Added Serbian (latin char set) by Dražen Milovanović - Note Serbian Cyrillic is already avaialable and kept up to date by the diligent Ozzii

Addition.GUI: Added context menu item for new CPU affinity change of specific processes on demand

Addition.Installer: Added new Start Menu shortcut to launch Process Lasso in a 'restart' mode to recovery any lost system tray icon

Addition.Core/GUI: Wrote new inter-process communication framework that is more robust and efficient - allowing feature additions coming in subsequent builds. It also allows for much better inter-process communication when running the governor as a service and/or in multi-user environments.

Addition.Core: Added new throttle level 'High'

Addition.Core: Added new ability to change the CPU affinity of specific processes when they exceed a specified CPU usage threshold

Addition.Core: Tweaked handling of certain system processes

Addition.InstallHelper: Integrates with Task Scheduler 2 on Vista/7 to set up Process Lasso and/or core engine startup tasks

Addition.TestLasso: Added '-m' switch to eat memory indefinitely (for testing watchdog)

Addition.CPUEater: Added new affinity selection, to test CPU Eater or specific CPUs

Addition.CPUEater: Added new total processes and threads in status bar

Change.CPUEater: Re-arranged dialog

Change.CPUEater: Allow specification of maximum threads and CPU affinity

Change.CPUEater: Tweaks to default aggressiveness (was unnecessarily aggressive on single CPU systems)

Change.CPUEater: Added status bar

Change.CPUEater: Added total system process and thread count to status bar

Change.All: Licensing and authentication system improved

Change.GUI: Re-arranged configuration dialogs to cause less confusion with pressing 'OK' without adding the process to the list first

Change.GUI: Remove UAC shield from 'manage processes of all users', as it hid check state

Change.GUI: Removed PL logo from ProBalance settings to make room for new options

Change.GUI: Tweaks to single and multiple process selection context menus

Change.GUI: Added menu options for quickly setting 'disable ProBalance while user away' feature

Change.GUI: Added total system thread count to status bar (with existing total process count)

Change.GUI: Set keyboard focus to active process listview on initial open or switch (accessibility improvement)

Change.GUI: Fixed some typos/misspellings

Removal.GUI: Removed 'beep when' settings from the ProBalance configuration dialog to make space for new, more important features

Change.Core: Made governor the first process to shutdown when shutdown is requested, as opposed to the last (previous setup)

Change.Core: Change to default ProBalance settings of Server Edition

Change.Core: Changed default value of 'maximum log lines' to 1000 for a server

Change.Core: Tweaked process suspension and throttling code

Change.Core: Added a hard-coded exclusion for Symantec Endpoint Security since ProBalance on it was triggering tampering warnings

Change.Core: Tweaked Server Edition ProBalance defaults

Change.Core: Minor continued code optimizations, in the never ending pursuit to save another CPY cycle

Change.Core: Several additions of third-party applications to hard coded exclusions, to reduce need for user configuration

Change.InstallHelper: Added back ProBalance default settings check to let Server users know of tweaks to default/recommended values

Change.Installer: Updated to NSIS 2.46 unicode build

Change.GUI: Allow deletion of multiple selected list entries at once on some config dialogs

Change.GUI.Watchdog: Show/hide extra options when user selects watch/monitor type (CPU or memory at present)

Change.Core: Added duration to watchdog action log entries

Change.CPUEater: Continued cosmetic improvements

Change.GUI: Removed 'total VM size' from available watchdog memory metrics, as it is not likely to be needed

Change.GUI: Made 'commit charge' default virtual memroy metric for watchdog memory entries

Change.All: Consolidated all inter-process communication into single mechanism for maximum efficiency

Change.GUI: Added Finnish translation

Change.GUI: Re-arranged process context menu items a little, moving the hard CPU throttling to 'seldom used' features

Change.GUI: Allow 1% increments in CPU settings for ProBalance config and Watchdog config dialogs

Change.GUI: System tray balloons now use consolidated inter-process communication

Change.GUI: System tray balloons have been reformatted and improved

Change.GUI: Further optimized multi-threaded efficiency on multi-core systems

Change.GUI: Allow proper translation of 'Add', 'Low', and 'CPU' - all words not handled right due to their small size

Change.GUI: Expanded more control widths to better fit more languages/translations without modifications

Change.GUI: Changed ProBalance parameters default setting change message to something more understandable (hoepfully)

Change.GUI: Behavioral changes and new warnings in relation to elevation vs. managing the processes of other users

Change.GUI: Further differentiated UAC elevation from 'Manage processes of all users'. You can now run elevated, but still manage only the current user processes

Change.GUI: Improved efficiency of graph painting

Change.rcTools: Many improvements to help translators

Change.Updater: Made update check message box application modal, not system modal (so it doesn't interfere with a full screen game, for instance)

Addition.InstallHelper: Considerably expanded Task Scheduler 2 code to allow better enumeration/detection of existing sttings (unfinished)

Change.InstallHelper: Expanded height of Highest Rights control on startup config dialog 2

Change.GUI: Renamed the 'Manage processes of all users' to 'Manage processes of other users too' (feature unfinished)

Change.GUI: Added new 'Elevate now' option, since it is now independent from the 'Manage processes of all users' option (feature unfinished)

Addition.GUI: Added Spanish translation by Valentin Sanz Gonzalez (in first test stage)

Change.InstallHelper: Rewrote the security portion of config dialog #2 (multi-user options)

Change.InstallHelper: Change high rights warning, shown now only when high rights and 'manage processes of all users' are both selected

Change.Core: Rewrote large parts of the guts of the new watchdog feature

Change.Core: Improved handling of multiple watchdog entries on the same process

Change.Core: Further optimized primary thread, especially when system tray balloon notifications are on

Change.All: Other improvements not indicated here

Change.Installer: Sped up installer, removing long deprecated things

Change.Installer: Attempts to mitigate strange stall bug seen with NSIS unicode ExecWait function

Change.Installer: Other changes and rewrites to improve general install process

Removal.Installer: Removed helper executable plp.exe, which facilitated launch with highest rights prior to Windows Task Scheduler integration

Change.Licensing: Removed delay in startup nag (well, set it at 1 second) [beta only]

Change.Languages: Several languages updated

Change.GUI: Extended CPU affinity support in configuration dialogs to 32 CPUs (config file and core engine support infinite)

Change.GUI: CPU affinity of all CPUs is now sometimes represented as 'all' instead of a long sequence of CPU indexes

Change.All: Continued enhancements and fixes as the march to v4 continues

Change.GUI: Language and string changes in places

Change.Installer: Added uninstall web page

Removal.InstallHelper: /Rights parameter removed, merged with /*_start_type

Addition.InstallHelper: Modified command lines to support new Task Scheduler compatibility (added optional elevation setting to start type parameters) - applies to silent install

Addition.GUI: Implemented first stage of icon memory usage optimization to decrease GUI memory use when process icons are enabled (second stage optimization is pending, and will reduce usage even more)

Change.GUI: Switched to singular edition - the free build can now be Activated and turned into Process Lasso Pro via an activation code

Change.All: Misc undocumented changes advancing alpha

Change.GUI: Switching languages is now done by picking your new language, then restarting Process Lasso (instead of wiping out old pick and restarting Process Lasso)

Change.GUI: Switched icon code to alternate method for faster performance and less overhead

Change.GUI: Reduced virtual memory usage even further when process icons enabled

Change.GUI: Removed 'Exclude from ...' process context menu and put its two entries into the main menu.. less traversal for these common actions

Change.GUI: Improved behavior when single instance of governor manages entire multi-user system with more than one GUI instance running

Change.GUI: Improved communication with GUI when core engine is running as a service (for informative tooltips)

Change.GUI: Eliminated process listview flickering seen when sorting by highly dynamic fields

Change.GUI: Made watchdog dialog and default priority dialog drop down lists non-editable type, as there is no reason to allow user to edit

Change.Core: Improved logging subsystem to help ensure any pending writes get flushed out at shutdown

Change.Core: Logging subsystem improvements

Change.Core: Optimized a few places

Fix.GUI: Fixed some typos and mispellings

Fix.GUI: Fix licensing anomaly with multi-selection process instance limit set on some editions

Fix.Core: Fixed issue where user disabling ProBalance while processes are under restraint may cause restrained processes not to be restored to original priority and affinity settings

Fix.Core: Automatically create directory if found missing for global log and/or config path overrides

Change.Build: Migrated to Visual Studio 2010

MUCH MORE (we are still sorting changes for publication)....

v4.00.05:

Fix.GUI: (beta fix) Fixed watchdog change affinity would immediately revert in some cases

Fix.GUI: (beta fix) Fixed watchdog terminate could fail in some cases

Fix.GUI: Tweaked inter-process communication to hopefully fix cases of 'lost' events (fixes process showing restrained even after restraint stopped)

Change.GUI: Default control for password box is password edit box (for both get and set password dialogs)

Change.GUI: Cosmetic fixes and adjustments

Change.GUI: Removed solicitation dialog until user has used product X days (still no timed nag, ever - and only happens at first start after a long period of use)

Fix.GUI: Fixed affinity selection in Watchdog dialog when uninitialized, resulting in random value

Fix.Core: Fixed circumstance where processes of other users were being ignored, regardless of configuration (even if you set it to manage all users)

Fix.GUI: Fixed problems with possibly blank process listview under some configurations in Windows 2000 or XP

Fix.Installer: Fixed annoying default of Chinese on installer under some circumstances

v4.00.06:

Change.GUI: Reorganized Main menu

Change.GUI: Removed duplicated menu items I had created for ease of access

Fix.GUI: Fixed restart required prompt so that it operates more like you'd expect

v4.00.07:

Fix.GUI: Fix for cases of system tray icon not appearing after reboot

Fix.GUI: Fixed new system tray recovery ability (ironically now that it hopefully isn't necessary anymore)

Fix.GUI: Fixed issue where main window is shown at login

Fix.Core: Fixed inappropriate 'new process' log entry for 'System' process at startup under some circumstances

Fix.InstallHelper: Fixed issue where GUI and Core Engine would be stopped by Vista+ Task Scheudler when switched to battery power (due to settings bug in task scheduler entry) - Who would think that would be the default for a new task? *sigh*

v4.00.08:

Fix.GUI: Fixed issue where main window is shown at login

Fix.GUI: Fixed inability to unelevate via Main options menu once you've elevated the rights of Process Lasso (beta2beta)

Fix.GUI: Manual selection of affinity for new watchdog entry via process context menu may have initialized CPU selection dialog to a seemingly random value (beta2beta)

Change.x64: X64 build now built with VC10 platform toolset for better operation. The 32-bit build remains FULLY Windows 2000 and XP pre-SP2 compatible, and can even run on x64 editions of those OSes. However, the x64 build is limited to XP SP2+.

[Marik]

Thanks for the update :)

Frontpaging.