PiP-Tool

Many users like to have videos playing on their screen while working or browsing the web, but these windows can take up a lot of space, especially since you can’t normally remove their title bar or other interface elements.

PiP-Tool is an open-source utility that provides you with a relatively simple way to display videos or other content in picture-in-picture mode. It has its downsides, but it is easy to set up and looks quite promising.

After launching the application, you will first need to click the window where the content is located. A selection box will be brought up, which you can use to define the exact area that you wish to be displayed in PiP mode.

Once you have confirmed the selection, a new window will be created, which remains on top of all other programs. It can be moved and resized, and a toolbar will only be displayed when you place the mouse cursor over the window.

For starters, the program does not work with minimized windows at present. If you try to minimize the application being captured, the PiP window will simply freeze. You can, however, let it run in the background.

Secondly, you cannot actually interact with the application that is being captured from the PiP window. If, for instance, you are viewing a video, you cannot access the playback controls from the new window.

Lastly, it would have been great if it were possible to either disable the PiP window’s toolbar or add a delay so that it is not displayed immediately on hover.

When you have selected an area of a window, the application will store that information in order to speed up future operations. A list of past selections is even displayed in the program’s main toolbar.

PiP-Tool is a useful program that still needs a bit of work. It lets you view any content in PiP mode and is quite easy to set up, but it does have some pretty important limitations.