Embedding a program in the desktop (similar to screenmates like eSheep)

[isaiahk9]

Hey, I'm currently working on a screen-mate program (similar to eSheep). Basically, it's an animated icon that runs around your screen and performs various amusing animations.

However, I have one or two questions. I can make the program work completely, except I do not know how to "embed" the character in the desktop: I mean that I cannot make the window disappear, but the character to remain visible. As well, it would be truly neat if I could get the character to interact with objects on the desktop: eSheep can climb up and run on top of windows, not just the bottom of the screen. Does anybody know how to do something like that either?

Thanks.

[rdrake]

What language? .NET for instance has the ability to set a certain colour to transparent. This could be used to make the form's background transparent leaving the character visible. You can of course also change the form type to remove the title bar and all that.

[isaiahk9]

I'm looking for general solutions.
I supposed I could make the program in:
Turing, Visual Basic, Java, Actionscript or C++

A friend of mine is trying to do something similar, and I know for a fact he's coding in Turing.

Thanks for the suggestion, setting the form transparent would work. I just need to find what languages can do that....

Any other suggestions would also be appreciated.

[DtY]

Is this for Windows?

It probably wont be of any use, but if you want to do it for Linux, or anything else using the X Window System, you can create a window that is not square using the XShapes extension, and you can set an attribute on the window to tell the window manager not to add a frame (sorry, I don't know which attribute). I'm pretty sure it's rather trivial to get the list of windows that are direct children of the root window, and their dimensions.

[isaiahk9]

Hmmm... it's not exactly what I'm looking for, but it's an interesting tidbit. Thanks.