auto change/rotate wallpaper without creating a playlist

[bCoOL™]

is there any way to set wallpaper change automatically without having to create a playlist? if not then can this feature be added because for me it seems pointless to create a playlist when i am only downloading the wallpapers i want to use and i want to use them all randomly. even the change wallpaper using the hotkey doesn't work without creating a playlist. also if a desktop context menu can be added for next wallpaper that'd be very helpful. i did find a workaround for that on reddit but having it here directly helps.

thanks

[Tim]

No, the point of playlists is to change your wallpapers automatically, we cannot just randomly start shuffling all installed wallpapers because that's not what 99.99% of users want or expect.

If you want to add all your wallpapers to a playlist, simply hit CTRL + A in the "Installed" tab, then right-click on them and select "Add to playlist". Then you have a huge playlist with absolutely minimal effort and you can configure it to your liking.

You can then set a hotkey for the "Next wallpaper" command in the "General" tab of the Wallpaper Engine settings which is what we recommend.

If you want to create a shortcut on your desktop, you can follow this guide:

https://help.wallpaperengine.io/en/functionality/cli.html#shortcut-example-opening-a-wallpaper-in-a-window

Instead of the "openWallpaper" example, simply use the "nextWallpaper" command:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\wallpaper_engine\wallpaper64.exe" -control nextWallpaper

[bCoOL™]

thanks for the quick reply. just curious to know does it affect wallpaper engine somehow if the random shuffling of all installed wallpaper option without a playlist is added?

[Tim]

We get a lot of seemingly simple user requests like that pretty much every single day but if we implemented them all, the user interface would be extremely cluttered (and in part, it already is because of that).

Selecting all wallpapers with CTRL + A and adding them to the playlist is a "sufficient" solution in our opinion without making the user experience. The absolute vast majority of users do not use all installed wallpapers in a shuffled playlist (or intend to do so). Especially on multi-monitor setups or with custom screensavers, it makes sense having different wallpapers installed that you don't want to be running on all screens in regular intervals.

[TARTrazine]

Originally posted by Tim:

we cannot just randomly start shuffling all installed wallpapers because that's not what 99.99% of users want or expect.

Of course many users want that option! And I'm sorry to hijack the thread, but the problem I run into with using a playlist of all my wallpapers is that I can't figure out how to "find" which wallpaper is currently active because the menu just shows whichever wallpaper was selected manually.

[Biohazard]

Originally posted by Tartrazine:

the problem I run into with using a playlist of all my wallpapers is that I can't figure out how to "find" which wallpaper is currently active because the menu just shows whichever wallpaper was selected manually.

When you open the wallpaper browser it should highlight the active wallpaper, whether it was selected manually before or from the playlist. Is your situation different so that this doesn't help?

[bCoOL™]

windows desktop wallpaper is simple. put all the wallpapers i want in a folder and select it for background slideshow. and if i want to change the current background then simply use the next desktop background from the desktop context menu.

[Biohazard]

Originally posted by bCoOL™:

windows desktop wallpaper is simple. put all the wallpapers i want in a folder and select it for background slideshow. and if i want to change the current background then simply use the next desktop background from the desktop context menu.

...and it doesn't have time of day playlists, multiple equivalent wallpapers of the same type or multiple equivalent wallpapers with different presets or intro wallpapers. We wanted to have these things and they don't work with a completely automated playlist.

We understand your use case absolutely but you can use SHIFT + click to select a range of new wallpapers and add them to the current playlist at once, it's only minimal extra effort and no other feature gets lost. It doesn't make sense to forfeit all these other cool functions completely just to have an "everything-playlist".

[TARTrazine]

Originally posted by Biohazard:

When you open the wallpaper browser it should highlight the active wallpaper

It does, but I have it switching to a random wallpaper every couple of minutes, so it no longer matches. Is there any easy way to force the program to update to the current wallpaper again, other than closing the window and opening it from the taskbar again?

[Biohazard]

Originally posted by Tartrazine:

Is there any easy way to force the program to update to the current wallpaper again, other than closing the window and opening it from the taskbar again?

No that's not possible I'm afraid, it does that on purpose because if it would switch the selected wallpaper in the UI then it could switch right at the same time someone was modifying some settings about it. The UI isn't intended to stay open when you're done setting things up, are you keeping it open to collect game time on Steam perhaps?

[TARTrazine]

Originally posted by Biohazard:

Originally posted by Tartrazine:

Is there any easy way to force the program to update to the current wallpaper again, other than closing the window and opening it from the taskbar again?

No that's not possible I'm afraid, it does that on purpose because if it would switch the selected wallpaper in the UI then it could switch right at the same time someone was modifying some settings about it. The UI isn't intended to stay open when you're done setting things up, are you keeping it open to collect game time on Steam perhaps?

Yes obviously it would be bad to switch to the new wallpaper while someone was modifying it. I was thinking more along the lines of having a button to switch to the current wallpaper, or a separate "now playing" field.

Also is there an easy way to find a wallpaper (especially if it's the current one) within the playlist? Again, because there's no "shuffle all" option I have 300+ wallpapers dumped into my playlist and now I know how to bring it up if I want to unsub from it entirely, but if I just want to remove it from my big playlist... I have to slide through all those tiny thumbnails to look for it? Hopefully there's an easier way, especially when I have multiple wallpapers that look similar?

[Biohazard]

You don't need to find it in the playlist to remove it, you can also remove it by clicking the checkbox on it in the main wallpaper gallery, right clicking and removing it or clicking "remove wallpaper" in the playlist menu at the bottom (while it is selected). Maybe I'm missing something, but I think even if you don't know where it is in your gallery, you could do the latter to get it done without searching.