🖥️ Screen Popup

A lightweight Windows desktop startup application built with Python and PySide6 that displays an animated popup in the top-right corner of the screen when Windows starts.

The popup smoothly appears from the top of the screen, displays a personalized greeting inside a speech bubble, waits for a few seconds, and then disappears automatically.

---

✨ Features

• 🖥️ Animated desktop popup
• 📍 Appears in the top-right corner of the screen
• 🪟 Transparent, frameless overlay
• 💬 Speech bubble with personalized text
• 🎨 Custom fonts and styling
• ⬇️ Smooth entrance animation
• 💨 Fade-in/fade-out effects
• ⬆️ Smooth exit animation
• 🚀 Automatically launches when Windows starts
• ❌ Automatically closes after the animation
• 📦 Can be packaged as a standalone .exe
• 💾 Does not continuously run in the background

---

🛠️ Technologies Used

• Python
• PySide6
• Qt Animations
• PyInstaller
• Windows Task Scheduler

---

📁 Project Structure

ScreenPopup/
│
├── assets/
│   ├── popup_image.jpg
│   └── second_popup_image.png
│
├── config.py
├── main.py
├── ui/
    └── overlay.py
├── resources.py
│
├── build/
├── dist/
│   └── main.exe
│
├── main.spec
└── README.md

---

🎬 How It Works

When Windows starts and the user logs in, Windows Task Scheduler launches the application.

The animation follows this sequence:

Windows Login
      ↓
Task Scheduler launches application
      ↓
Popup slides down from the top
      ↓
Speech bubble fades in
      ↓
Personalized greeting is displayed
      ↓
Waits for a few seconds
      ↓
Speech bubble fades out
      ↓
Popup slides back up
      ↓
Application closes

---

🖥️ Desktop Overlay

The application uses a transparent and frameless PySide6 window.

This allows the popup to appear directly over the desktop without displaying a traditional application window.

The overlay uses:

Qt.FramelessWindowHint

and:

Qt.WindowStaysOnTopHint

to keep the popup above other windows.

---

🎞️ Animation

The popup uses Qt's property animation system:

QPropertyAnimation

to smoothly move the overlay onto and off the screen.

Easing curves are used to make the movement feel smoother:

QEasingCurve.OutCubic

and:

QEasingCurve.InCubic

The speech bubble uses:

QGraphicsOpacityEffect

to create fade-in and fade-out effects.

---

💬 Personalized Greeting

The text displayed inside the popup can easily be customized.

For example:

self.greeting = QLabel(
    "What's up,\nUser!",
    self.bubble
)

The greeting can be changed to any custom message.

---

📦 Run the Project

1. Install Python

Check whether Python is installed:

python --version

2. Install PySide6

pip install PySide6

3. Run the application

From the project directory:

python main.py

---

📦 Building the EXE

Install PyInstaller:

pip install pyinstaller

Build the application:

pyinstaller --onefile --windowed --add-data "assets;assets" main.py

The executable will be created inside:

dist/main.exe

---

🔧 Resource Handling

The project uses a resource helper to correctly locate assets when running both from Python and from a PyInstaller executable.

Example:

from resources import resource_path

Assets can then be loaded using:

QPixmap(
    resource_path("assets/popup_image.jpg")
)

This ensures that images continue to work after packaging the application as an .exe.

---

🚀 Windows Startup

The application uses Windows Task Scheduler to launch automatically when the user logs into Windows.

Task Configuration

Task Name: ScreenPopup

Trigger: At log on

Action: Start main.exe

Run: Only when user is logged on

This allows the popup to appear automatically without manually running the program.

---

🧹 Application Lifetime

The application is designed to run only for the duration of the popup animation.

After the animation finishes, the application closes:

self.upAnimation.finished.connect(self.close)

Therefore, it does not continuously run in the background.

Windows Login
      ↓
Application starts
      ↓
Popup animation
      ↓
Application closes
      ↓
No background process

The Task Scheduler entry remains registered so the application can run again at the next login.

---

💾 Performance

The application is designed to have minimal impact on system performance.

It:

Uses minimal CPU while the animation is running Uses a small amount of RAM Does not continuously run in the background Automatically exits after the animation Uses lightweight image assets

The application only consumes resources for a short period during startup.

---

🔮 Future Improvements

Possible future additions:

• 🔊 Startup sound effects
• 🎲 Randomized greetings
• ⏰ Time-based greetings
• 🎨 Multiple popup themes
• ⚙️ Configuration file
• 🔧 Settings menu
• 🖥️ Multi-monitor support
• 🎭 Multiple animation styles
• 🔔 Different startup notifications

👨‍💻 Developed by - @Arijit2175