Is it possible to have a desktop that is realtime in XP?

[josh6079]

Basically I'm wondering if it is possible to have a camera hooked up somewhere and have the video feed back to the monitor and serve as wallpaper. That way whenever you want to check for something that the camera might be showing you would just have to look at your desktop and have a fullscreen view.

 

[mb]

Well, in Windows XP you have the option of displaying a webpage on your desktop*. I suppose if you can make the video viewable live on the webpage, you could set that webpage as your desktop and that might work.
Other than that, I don't believe there is anything built in XP that will let you do what you are asking... and I don't know of any software that can do it. Others may know, though.

*Open Display properties, select Desktop tab, click button for Customize Desktop, then click the Web tab.

 

[Lonyo]

Possibly yes.
Download VLC (Video Lan Client).
I has options for streams from various sources (TV cards, files on HDD, web etc), I'm not 100% sure about webcams, but I guess maybe.

You then have the option (under the Video menu) to apply the video as wallpaper.
I'm not sure if it will work (it didn't for me, but I run dual monitors, which causes issues with things like hardware overlay which might be why it doesn't display.)
But there is no harm in trying.

 

[mb]

Lonyo: fantastic idea! I just tried it and it works excellent using my Logitech webcam and single monitor.

 

[josh6079]

Sweet!

Thanks for the info. I just thought it would be awesome to have a desktop that is viewing something happening and constantly changing rather than a plain picture.

 

[xtknight]

Changing the background constantly would require quite a bit of power. So, what lots of programs do is they grab a direct video interface to draw right to the desktop itself. ATI Multimedia Center has this ability too.