PowerGuard v1.3

PowerGuard monitors the battery status of your Microsoft Windows Mobile/Windows CE powered Pocket PC or smartphone.

It monitors several attributes, such as battery current, voltage, and temperature. PowerGuard represents these attributes textually as well as graphically.

Next to monitoring battery current, PowerGuard can also give a notification when a user-configurable current threshold is exceeded. This is especially useful when you want to know what processes are eating up your battery.

How does it work?

The main application has four tabs:
1. Text : A textual representation of actual battery properties.
2. Graphics : A graphical representation of actual and past battery properties.
3. Control : Via this tab, the user can configure the behaviour of PowerGuard, such as update frequency.
4. About : Information about PowerGuard, such as version number, and link to the PowerGuard website.

Please note that when the battery is charging, the current has a positive sign. Conversely, a negative current indicates that energy is drained from the battery. The screenshot of the graphics tab below shows this behaviour. First, it is charging at roughly 300[mAh]. Then, it stops charging, and the device consumes 50-100[mA]. Then, again, the battery starts charging again. The text tab shows similar behaviour: battery current is positive when the battery is charging.


Released v1.3
Finished
1. Show estimated remaining battery time (feature for registered users)
2. Write measurements to comma-separated log file (feature for registered users)
3. Manual scale adjustment of graph vertical axis; postponed
4. Run minimised at the top/bottom of the screen where it can be seen at all times; postponed
5. Fix uninstaller to remove .lnk file
6. Implement registration mechanism

Released v1.2
Finished
1. Log to file and read logging from file to user interface (graph); thanks Julian for suggesting. Logging is done to a binary file in the PowerGuard installation directory.
2. Show sample value when pushing it with stylus in graph; thanks Rob for suggesting; looking into feasibility.
Result: main reason for asking for this feature is the mismatch in value range between e.g. temperature and current. This makes the temperature line flat. I solved this by adding a second Y-axis. In the control panel, one can select two properties to visualize graphically. I consider this issue solved . I discussed this with Rob; he is also pleased with this solution.
3. Transparent PowerGuard icon
4. Replace session time display from < h > [h] < m > [m] < s > [s] to hh:mm:ss [hh:mm:ss]
5. Resume current session time after soft reset. After a (soft) reset, upon restart of PowerGuard, a message box is displayed, asking the user whether or not to restore the data associated with the previous session.
6. Invest use of thinner lines; implemented, will be in v1.2

Released v1.1
Finished
1. Current threshold warning
2. Program icon
3. Persist user settings
4. Log to file and read logging from file to user interface (graph); thanks Julian for suggesting: postponed to v1.2
5. Swap sign capability (option to either use a positive or a negative sign for battery current while (dis)charging); thanks Julian for suggesting
6. Show sample value when pushing it with stylus in graph; thanks Rob for suggesting; postponed, looking into feasibility
7. Session time. Textual representation; thanks Julian for suggesting


PowerGuard