How to keep custom drawbot ui visible in comp window even if applied effect is not selected?

Question

Hey guys!
Time for another noob question.
I'm trying to keep my custom ui visible in the comp viewer window even if the user has deselected the effect with the ui overlay.
My experimental effect plugin is based on the CCU example project.  I modified the DrawHandles function in CCU_UI.cpp to do my test drawing.
Its working fine, but anytime I deselect the effect, AE stops drawing it on the comp.  I tried modifying DrawEvent() to skip the event_extraP->contextH->w_type check, but the ui still goes away.   I tried just calling the DrawHandles() function in CCU's Render() function, but this causes AE to crash.  I think its exploding when DrawHandles() is trying to get a surface context, but this is just a guess from the error it reports on crash:
                    ERR(suites.DrawbotSuiteCurrent()->GetSurface(drawing_ref, &surface_ref));
Any tips?
Perhaps I could do my ui drawing in the Render function and burn it into the render buffer, but I would need to check to make sure NOT to draw the UI if AE is actually rendering the comp (preview or output to disk).  I don't have any idea what object would tell me that. 
thanks and happy friday!
-Andy

Answer 1

Thanks for your help Shachar.
I've made some progress on this, but I've hit a wall. :\
In my effect's globalSetup() I check the itemID for the parent comp that the effect's layer lives in.  I store this in the effects' global data.
In my effect's Render() method, I check to see if the active item's ID is the same as the one stored in the global data.
This works interactively, ie: the ui burnins happen if the comp with the effect is active, and if the comp is not active, or a nested comp, the burnins do not occur.
However, during ram preview & rendering, checking the active item's ID doesn't seem to return the proper ID, so the burnins still happen.  
I wonder, during ram preview/render, is the comp no longer active?  (I'm guessing this is whats happening)
If this is the case, is there some other object that I can look at to know specifically which comp is getting rendered/ram previewed, so I can use that information as a trigger instead of:
ERR(suites.ItemSuite6()->AEGP_GetActiveItem(&active_itemH));
I assume some object getting passed along to my Render() method can at least tell me which (parent) comp AE is trying to render? 
thanks!
-Andy
Thanks!