This maybe of interest to developers mainly. Parallels, is it possible to implememt an API where windows application would be able to communicate with the OS X side of things and vice versa? This is probably already implemented internally at Parallels to make time synchronization, clipboard sync etc.. work. I know a full blown API would raise security issues, but I guess it could be done via plug-ins. Developers would write such plugins and the apps that handle them on Windows and OS X. Users would have to manually activate those plugins to reduce security risks. This for example would allow someone to see battery status in Windows in full screen mode as mentioned in a previous post; or what I am interested in, a contextual menu plugin on OSX that will allow one to launch a file directly in parallels without the clicking and switching. The possible applications are endless and it is unreasonable to ask parallels to implemet every idea. Comments anyone?
I really like the idea. This would also be big plus compared to VMWare should that ever arrive for Mac. Think off all the little useless things you could do with it, like for example remote controlling your MacOS ITunes from Windows (to keep using your big Library of music), being notified, when you're in fullscreen but new Mail arrives, "Lauch site in InternetExplorer" if you're dowing Web development under MacOSX. "Launch site in Safari" when doing the same in Windows. I think the possibilities are endless. People would love it
I don't think a special API is needed to communicate between OS X and a Windows VM. You can use the networking API for that.
Previously discussed here: http://forums.parallels.com/thread1104.html The summary is they were thinking about it and should be in a post 1.0 release sometime, hopefully.
Dashboard It seems to me that some of what you want while running Windows in full screen can be accomplished via Dashboard. Battery status, for instance, I get from a tiny widget called iStat Nano. There are also widgets to control iTunes, or even launch apps, and Dashboard is pretty easy to program for if you want to do something unique (I recommend Danny Goodman's "Mac OS X Technology Guide to Dashboard").
That is true. But it would be nice to be able to get environment variables such as the windows ip number [ie get windows ip from OS X side], the screen resolution, whether parallels is running in full screen mode, whether shared folders are enabled, etc... Mike
This is definitely a nice idea, and we will consider it to be available in version 3 branch of our app.
