To Customise ATM With 3rd Party Software

This section outlines software written by other people, that you can use (normally free), to alter the way ATM behaves.

You may not need any of these, or in fact you might want to use different software to that listed below. That's fine. In fact if you have any other suggestions or alternatives, we'd appreciate hearing about them.

We have no affiliation with any of the companies that offer the software, we probably can't help you if anything goes wrong with them, and perhaps we aren't even using the software ourselves.
 

To get ATM to run as a Windows service

A program running as a Windows service has the ability to automatically re-start itself if ever it or the computer crashes. That's why you may want to run ATM as a Windows service.

FireDaemon Pro can turn any program into a Windows service. It costs US$39 (last time we checked)

Troupware's Control Running Programs (CRP) does something similar, in that it ensures another program is always running. This one's free. [Had some problems connecting to the website though, but still available for download from freeware sites].

XYNTService looks like a good option if you're a bit more technically-savvy. It's free and open-source. It has a (separate) GUI interface, and also a version made specifically for Vista and above.

Watchdog (free) might also work. As might Keep-Alive ($39.99, and be warned of a very Geocities-style website).
 

To have ATM do things as soon as it starts

It's no good to just have ATM start itself again after a crash - presumably you would also want ATM to resume whatever it was doing.

AutoHotKey (AHK) is a free program that you can use to then click the buttons you want clicked - just as if you were doing the clicking yourself. Basically you record a macro. Running the macro then repeats whatever you did (mouse clicks, mouse movements, key strokes, etc) while you were recording the macro.

So a combination of FireDaemon Pro, plus AutoHotKey, lets you setup ATM to recover from crashes all without the need for you to do anything.

DoOver is maybe a simpler alternative. It was actually made using AHK, but you don't need to know anything about AHK to use it.

Sikuli is a recent new alternative which you might find easier than AHK. Instead of recording a macro and maybe editing the macro script it creates, you take screenshots of what you want clicked.
 

To have ATM minimise to the system tray

There are a bunch of free applications that we know of that can make any program minimise to the system tray:

Minime lets you minimise any software to the one icon in the system tray.

TrayIt!, PowerMenu, Trayconizer.
 
See also:

• Automating ATM