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Messages - davcom [ switch to compact view ]

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1
Post New Requests Here / Re: Show IP Address from domain name
« on: October 29, 2020, 06:49 AM »
Hey Jesse, Vic had 2 options for sending him something and I used Paypal not DC credits. Wasn't a huge amount but I really do appreciate what's been done and the response from everyone that chipped in with suggestions.

2
Post New Requests Here / Re: Show IP Address from domain name
« on: October 19, 2020, 05:33 PM »
Definitely very tuned :)

3
Post New Requests Here / Re: Show IP Address from domain name
« on: October 18, 2020, 02:38 PM »

I'm on it! :)


Vic, that is awesome ! Thank you.

Downloading from Github now.

4
Post New Requests Here / Re: Show IP Address from domain name
« on: October 16, 2020, 06:18 AM »
Some good idea's here.
I'll try and follow some through.

@KodeZwerg - It seems that my domain name at No-IP is treated as a sub-domain. This is what I get "Can't get nameservers at parent server!<br>I only check domains not subdomains!"

@4wd - I like this approach and if I could parse and return just the IP and wrap the code up behind a GUI - that'd be ideal.

@Stoic Joker - that's not a bad idea to have a webpage showing the IP. The server does respond so I know the routing to it is fine (just that the game instance is only allowing IP not domain name to access the process). Still interested in having a small utility that can be run on a client machine as it is a dynamic IP (so the IP is available outside the server already) and although I have Respond to ICMP turned off on the router (so all actual ping responses will fail), the first line if the servers there does return an IP which can be parsed out if I can figure out how or erm someone can for me :) But I'll look into the other suggestions as well. Thanks.

5
Post New Requests Here / Show IP Address from domain name
« on: October 14, 2020, 09:51 PM »
Before I ask anyone to do any coding, does anyone know of a utility that allows a (list of ?) domain name(s) to be used, and the current IP Addresses that each resolves to ?

The scenario is that a game I play does have Connect by IP (only). It used to allow putting a domain name in and it all worked well, until the ability to connect via a domain name was removed.

Because the game server is behind a dynamic IP, which changes more frequently than I'd like, everyone else that plays on the server needs to open a command prompt and issue a ping request to see what the IP Address may have changed to, so they can enter that in the Connect by IP field. A number of these players haven't even heard of a command prompt nor should I need to teach them the arcane art of pinging something.

I'd like the simplest method possible, to have a portable utility (maybe C# ?) that may only have a single saved domain name, that shows the current IP of that domain name.
I can see that this would be useful for more than 1 domain name but for now, 1's all we need. Probably need a Refresh so that a timed check (every x minutes) can be overridden and have it checked immediately.

I've actually done a bit of hunting on the net and there's any manner of dns and hostname and domain name checkers but even if they work they often have screeds of other bumpf that just isn't relevant.

Anyone got any bright idea's / suggestions ?

6
 :-[ My bad that I didn't even try to type the "s" and change it to https.
Hadn't used the link before on Twitter and they're spitting out the URL as plain old http.
Thanks mouser.

7
DC Website Help and Extras / Securing the DC website with HTTPS
« on: March 26, 2017, 08:23 AM »
Starting with Firefox 51, users were shown a grey padlock with a red strike-through, to indicate that the (DonationCoder) website they were visiting was not secure (passwords are transmitted insecurely and subject to MITM sniffing).
From Firefox 52, there's now a dropdown box on the user login field that shows in plain language that "This connection is not secure. Logins entered here could be compromised."

I understand that there is a little more work to do to set up a site with SSL but in this day and age it is becoming more and more of a concern that the criminal element are getting more pervasive and taking username/password pairs from unprotected sites and using them on the more important sites.
It's also a fact of life that in order to make our (online) lives as simple as possible we tend to reuse that favourite password or login combo on several different sites which increases our chances of one day really getting pwned by some low-life.

I'm prompted to write and ask about this on the very day that Pwned ( https://haveibeenpwned.com/ ) sent me an email advising my login at Evony was pwned in a breach in 2016 (took their time telling me but sometimes that data is not immediately available). Haven't played that game for a number of years and frankly have no idea what password I used but it serves as a reminder not to be too complacent about security.

My question is : (not if but) when will DC get an SSL Certificate to encrypt the login information and protect this data ??

Using a site such as Let's Encrypt ( https://letsencrypt.org/ ) which became active April 2016, provides an automated service to obtain free SSL Certificates (and which I can vouch for works well as it's part of our setting up Test environments on various Cloud Servers)

8
Living Room / Re: Goodbye to my father
« on: September 20, 2016, 10:10 PM »
Deo beat me too it in saying what I felt after having read only your first post Mouser, that you could have copied what you posted and read it at your Dad's funeral and it would have been one of the more succinct and eloquent eulogies that would ever have been heard (not that I have a habit of listening to them mind you ! but heard a few).

Lost my Dad in '91 and your words about a quiet, unassuming but very supportive man came through loud and clear for me. Unlike yours though, who seemed fascinated by random acts of kindness as well as the art of being alive, my Dad did have to put a padlock on his workshop until I learned not to leave his best tools outside gathering rust ! His support though, by age 12, had me building entirely on my own (no help from anyone) a 3 storey hut out of old car packing cases, that with corrugated iron and paint ended up waterproofed and SOLID (brick outhouses weren't built any stronger :) so my construction passed Dad's safety inspection with flying colours and remained on our family property until all of us kids had left home and Mum needed the land for something else  (about 20 years ! Wow.)

The way you've written about him I know that to the day you die, he will not be forgotten, so ... despite your heavy heart and sadness at his passing... he too I feel sure would have felt that what you said, you said very well indeed.

While not entirely on-topic (but that's what being a member of DC does - it gives me links that stretch my mind and takes me to all sorts of informational gems), the way you wrote what you did prompts me to offer the following (because for those coders out there attempting or thinking of attempting coding interaction with the English langauge and it's forms of use this may prove insightful) because nearly all of us have some instinctive (some might say subconciously learned) knowledge of what words to use in our sentences but not why we choose the order that we use, and why is important when coding anything.

** As a 7-year-old boy, J.R.R. Tolkien wrote his first story. When his mother read it, she remarked that his reference to a “green great dragon” was a mistake. Instead, she said, he should have written “great green dragon.” Instinctively we agree with Tolkien’s mother. Yet I have to admit that, until reading Mark Forsyth’s “The Elements of Eloquence,” I had never paused to analyze with any precision the way in which we customarily sequence adjectives. Mr. Forsyth explains that, in English, adjectives follow the pattern opinion-size-age-shape-color-origin-material-purpose—“so you can have a lovely little old rectangular green French silver whittling knife. But if you mess with that word order in the slightest you’ll sound like a maniac.” **
Extracted from a review at : http://www.wsj.com/a...k-forsyth-1414713336

Be warned. There are nuggets of information like the above use of adjectives in that book which is written with good light humour but much of it is best left to academians. :) (Academians are academics who've gone nuts :) )

9
Post New Requests Here / IDEA: .Net Unhandled Exception handler
« on: December 12, 2014, 03:25 PM »
At it's simplest I'd like to have a utility that runs as a service (or at least while running as an app if not a service) to be able to intercept the Windows debugging handler when .Net Unhandled Exception errors occur in C# software, store the error title and message in an SQLite db, and forward the capture to the coder.
As the error message will be passed to the coder, the ability to facilitate sending these to a selectable contact on Skype as a file transfer is needed. (While other methods are/may be made available, via Skype is the preferred option.)

Ideally, storing these in an SQLite db with a front-end that allows filtering and review of captured instances, along with system date & time of occurrence, with a screenshot of as much of the screen as necessary (Some people capture too little of the issue in screenshots which makes it difficult to place the error in context of the user action and the date/time the error occurred), and a note field to detail what the user was doing when the error occurred, and a field for the users name (the coder at the other end may get lots of unhandled exceptions and needs to know which ones are from whom) would be a welcome bonus.

Given this is a coding forum having something of this nature available might be very appealing to a dev themselves to use but this is aimed at allowing complete non-techies to capture the relevant info as quickly and simply as possible so it can be sent to the coder who needs this info to assist with a fixit for the issue. The situation is ripe for having a variety of additional supporting facilities but the core concept is capture and forward the .Net Unhandled Exception error messages preferably as a Skype file transfer (to avoid the limitation of the number of characters allowed to be typed in any one message)

I have done some research into "invoking the JIT debugger" that occurs at the bottom of each .Net UE, and seen a variety of how to enable it (which I don't need as I'm not the person debugging) and how to disable the JIT but that's not the required outcome because this info should be captured and passed on to assist with the resolution ! Similarly a search on the DC forum shows lots of references to UE's occurring but nothing about capturing and making it available to the coder in the shortest, but still accurate, timeframe and method possible.

I don't have the skills to code something at this level (just a dabbler :) ) so I'm throwing it out there for someone to think about.

10
Been looking a number of years for a decent wireless gaming headset... wonder if my prayers have finally been answered because my knees are extremely worn. Will check this out.

11
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 22, 2012, 02:11 AM »
@Barney !!

CintaNotes already uses a colon by default within the body of a note to make a tag !!  :o  8) Wow.  :up: It looks like _anything_ you type that is suffixed with a colon (no space after the string) and it is treated as a tag. (Be frugal with your tags !!)

Use of the colon is hardcoded by the looks of it so I will make a request to the CintaNote team asking whether they will consider pro's and con's for providing the ability to determine your own "the preceding string is to be treated as a tag" symbol, but for now their use of the colon is RIGHT up my typing street ! (Evernote allows you to set your own "this is a tag" string, not just a symbol that turns a string into a tag).

Observation:
It might be quite a challenge for the developer to allow any symbol or string to have the ability to determine what is, or isn't, re-tagged/re-classified. If I started with a colon then decided later to make it something else, do all the previous tags get altered automatically, how many of them are there ?, does that adversely affect anything and how do you tell over a large number of notes ? (I run several individual Evernotes (one per PC usually) some with several thousand notes). Having a single character only to determine what is tagged does have advantages.

12
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 21, 2012, 05:31 AM »
Barney,
The beauty of the way it's done in Evernote is, that you define every one of your own triggers. It's not up to the developer per se.

Evernote provides a mechanism to store whatever trigger strings you wish, and matches the string list to everything typed and voila... when the notes finished, so is the classifying.

Evernote allowing you to set strings of whatever sequence of characters you want as a trigger can to some be quite a stumbling block because it makes them have to think about their life fully and categorise everything they do, to arrive at an overall schema with a workable number of such strings. (Coders know this sort of thing and to them this might come somewhat easier because they've had to take apart everything about what it is they're trying to achieve before they can code a part of the whole. Either that or the program is never quite what it was intended to be until the first complete rewrite... aka version 2, is released  :P ).

I've arrived at a limited number of either abbreviations, or the full word if always typed in full, that match the lists I use to maintain the activities in my life and suffix those abbrev's/words with a colon to make them unique. I can read the abbrev or word inplace and it makes good sense. Bit like the creation of the modern teenagers TXT message :P

Example...
21/7/2012. Finished repair on <MyCustomersName> PC. Inv: $47.50 total (Parts $37.50, Travel $10). Used MSI 9550 Vid card, 1 x 2nd hand stick of 512Mb DDR400 to increase to 1Gb. Labour Free: as this ones for a friend.

I can copy the above string into an invoice then leave only the salient details once pasted. There are 2 categories automatically assigned to the note and that is Inv: = Invoices (because thats an activity I will need to do at the end of the day) and Free: = "Who have I done some work for and not charged them". (I do work for friends and some community organisations and don't charge them Labour, just Parts or anything that actually costs me, but I should keep a track of the time that it's taking me so I keep an awareness of free work versus chargeable work).

Evernote still allows a search on any string at any time so I don't have to categorise everything, just the most pertinent points that should have an additional method of grouping.

This way I can still use the word "free" (no colon) anywhere else and it makes sense in the note it's used in but will not be added to the category "Free:".

The 2 points to this are that you can use whatever character you like after the ordinary (English in this case) word, it doesn't have to be the colon and 2nd'ly I'm using the words I'd normally type to make the note anyway but adding a twist that helps uniquely categorise it in the process. I use colon because my hands reach those keys ( SHIFT + : ) naturally with little movement away from their standard resting position at the keyboard.

Yep, yer right.  Establishing that convention (for the developer) might be a bit tricky.  It'd need to be easily typed, and not [often] misinterpreted.  As an example, I use the ` symbol in ShortKeys (a text expander) as a trigger for the abbreviations.  But that character is a part of some languages, so it wouldn't work for everyone.  Language and keyboard constraints make that assigning a trigger symbol a problematic thing.
However, when you have several tags already selected, those tags automagically appear in the tag window for the new note.  Not the best solution, I'll grant, but it tends to work well for my needs.  Thing is, I tend to work within the limitations of the software I'm using - that's why I'll never be a good beta tester  :P - so a lot of potential improvements never occur to me  :( ;) :P.
I'd love to see an app built to your requirements, though ... suspect that would be mucho grande.
Edit for clarification - see strikethrough.

13
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 21, 2012, 12:41 AM »
Thx Jimdoria,
I've been steering clear of OneNote because of experiences in the past. Others may disagree but I've found it bloated, like much of M$ software, however at some later stage I might investigate it because there are some features (online/offline lists sync'ing for eg) that other systems don't or might not implement as well, but can say that at this stage am liking much of what I find in CintaNotes and like the look of what they have on their development horizon.

@Barney - I think the "on-the-fly" tagging in CintaNotes has its uses but to be the most effective needs to be automatically picked from what is typed in the body of the note rather than retyped into a separate field. If a separate field or fields were to be used for classification then tickboxes might be a quicker option and are less prone to a typo when entering as a keyword. A technique of mine I use in Evernote and will look to use in CintaNotes if supported is to use a word or abbreviation followed immediately (no space) by a colon ( : ) which in ordinary typing is usually unique (except when storing coding snacks of course !) and within a single "sentence" of typing will auto-classify it immediately. No extra typing needed. That way "spam:" (sans quotes) is auto-classified but "spam" is seen as an ordinary word not a classification. That said - Evernote for eg still indexes every single word so either spam or spam: will still get you all notes with that string that might otherwise fall through the cracks and all without the need to click on the folder that references those notes. Covers the field both ways.

OneNote does something very similar (I think) to what you want. <snip>

14
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 18, 2012, 07:19 AM »
Deciding not to leave any stone unturned, here's links to the sync'ing software mentioned by Barney - for those that may follow in our footsteps :)

Syncless - http://code.google.com/p/big5sync/   (Open Source)
Beyond Sync - http://www.beyondsync.com/      (Payware - $29.95 - 2012/07/19)

<snip> ...  As for replicating across multiple boxes, either Syncless or Beyond Sync (sorry, no links) should resolve that issue - at least it does for me.

15
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 17, 2012, 05:23 PM »
Barney, on looking at CintaNotes it's advising that it can sync across multiple PC's using Dropbox or SugarSync, both of which I run already (and I've just starting using the free FTPbox http://ftpbox.org/ so theres another option yet again).
Looking at how CintaNotes (and Evernote too for that matter) have the single continuous note system it might pay me to revise my expectations and consider using filters within CintaNote to provide the "Action Lists" I'm after. My main concern is that I might lose something in the great mass of info where on separate lists I'd be more focused for that lists specific activity.
Remains to be seen how simple the capture of a note in CintaNotes is. Will provide some feedback here after I've played round with it for a few days. Thanks !

I do much of what you describe - not all, by any means - with CintaNotes.  <snip>  As for replicating across multiple boxes, either Syncless or Beyond Sync (sorry, no links) should resolve that issue - at least it does for me.
<snip>

16
General Software Discussion / Re: Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 17, 2012, 05:10 PM »
Thanks Barney, will check those options out. I may have to bite the bullet and find a coder that can do it "just right" eventually but if I can cobble something together that approximates what I'm after and it's stable without needing constant tweaks then will give it a go. That was a shame about Evernote. Still a neat program but they've munted the simplicity of operation that was its immediate appeal for such a deceptively powerful program and I can see it falling by the wayside for many which is a shame.

I do much of what you describe - not all, by any means - with CintaNotes.  Mind, I don't aspire to your degree of preliminaries, but the ability to set/define multiple tags on the fly works well for me.  As for replicating across multiple boxes, either Syncless or Beyond Sync (sorry, no links) should resolve that issue - at least it does for me.

Not an ideal solution for your dilemma, but at least a possible start.

P.S.
I quit EverNote when it went cloud  :o >:( ;).

17
General Software Discussion / Fast Network Notetaking...
« on: July 16, 2012, 10:26 PM »
I often find myself wanting to just jot a very quick note down, sometimes with a "classification" (ie to what the note refers in terms of where, how, who, etc it applies) but there's not a system out there that I am currently aware of that does what I need. I want to be able to make each note by using a single or maybe dual hotkey to bring a single small window into focus on any of my 9 PC's around the house/workshop (so it MUST be networked at least on a LAN to start with), and likely tick a few 'classification" boxes (unclassified, ToDo/bring up today, 7 days, Need to invoice, Need to assign this to a client, Add to Business Contacts, Add to Personal Contacts, Add to "one of my XYZ clubs" Contact Lists, Assign to XYZ person or company, and so on). Complete action may take 15-30-45 seconds tops to get the thought into the system so it's not lost and can be actioned when time permits.

The idea is that it is VERY quick and simple to at least capture an initial thought of an action required or action taken so it is not lost nor breaks the workflow, and at a quieter moment can be inspected and further classifications added, from any station on the network. I feel it would be vital to have an auto-classification system based on keywords typed. It MUST also have "filter and show results AS YOU TYPE" method of searching exactly as Evernote does it. This would be a separate "list" used to locate any item of information in whatever list(s) the note(s) you're after currently resides in (including note maintenance to get rid of dupes, orphans, merge notes, etc)

I noted that several others are still on the hunt for the "right" notetaking system that suits them and was particularly interested in "urlwolfs" comment a few posts ago in another thread that capture and classification are separate and should not disturb the workflow". I tend to agree but further qualify his statement by suggesting that possibly some minimal tickboxes and/OR (more likely) the words used in writing the note can be used to automatically classify which list a note is shown on when sitting down to manage notes many times during the day. That way the note is made and classified simply by the choice of words used, initially. Remember that this is for "bullet point" style of notes, not a complete dissertation on the history and likely future events that may surround the reason for the note).

It is quite possible that such a system could be standalone, maybe use an SQLite db ? but with an API that allows it to be treated as a front end to other information software ?

I have been a big fan of Evernote for a long time, and still am but a bit disappointed with its increasing bloat and cluttered navigation, but Evernote does not have a single small(ish) text window available immediately (as it used to) with absolutely minimum clutter PLUS allow you to set some preliminary note classifications (within a 10 to 15 second window of activity to specify classifications)
I like the idea of Evernotes assigning a classification to a note as that does allow you to have multiple categories/folders watching/assigned to a single note depending on the way you are retrieving info, but even that method of selecting categories is too slow (and yes I have done many auto-categorisations in Evernote based on keywords) Last decent version of Evernote was their v2.1.327, then it went online. (Evernote as my Contact List beats any other system on the planet for finding a contacts multiple details FAST, including ancillary notes.)

I am trialling (free) Sticky Notes (www.sticky-notes.org which is a redirect from http://sticky-notes.net) and while I like the hotkey to call up or hide every note simultaneously (which I am treating as lists that I add to or transfer to a Done list (with a date when actioned)) am finding it unstable with (hotkey) showing or hiding every window if the program does not have focus, and standard text formatting keys (CTRL-I, B, U for eg) are dysfunctional and often have to use highlight with mouse then rightclick for italic/bold/underline which is very clunky (slow!). Notes shared over the LAN are not interactive notes either. While this Sticky-Notes shows a great deal of promise, again, it's not quite right (and yes I know I'm using it as (short) lists instead of an individual note per box.)

I use Lists for all completed actions (Done), plus individual lists for Personal, Now (Clients only as Personal is for my private actions), Later, Friends, Invoicing and some others.

Would like to be able to enter a QUICK note and use the appropriate words to have it appear on the relevant list(s) (as per Evernote an action may be seen from more than one perspective so I might see something for writing out a client invoice appear on both the "Invoicing" and Now (Client Actions) lists. Lists should not appear when a note is entered - the lists need to be called separately by global hotkey. Drag and drop notes between lists once made. Right click a note on a list and select Done (auto date/time as it transfers over to the Done list. Personally I don't like seeing actioned items (with strikethrough) on a list of things yet to be done but do agree for the need to confirm that something was actioned ! Some people like seeing strikethrough notes of completed actions on the same list as items to be actioned but AFAIC that clutters things up.)

Has anyone heard of any software that may do this cleanly (I detest cluttered UI's) or has any coder had any thoughts along these lines for a new project ?

18
I am just starting to dabble with Tversity.  http://tversity.com/

Not sure that it meets exactly what you're after but it is manually configurable for a wide range of different "set top boxes" for streaming media.
Not aware (yet) if it has the interface building capability that you're after.




19
@ewemoa - that Thunderbird tweak for opening just the addressbook portion is good. I'll add it to the list of things I do for my clients.

20
@ewemoa   that -addressbook option for T'bird looks promising and I will give that a try but theres still the "search on all pertinent fields at once" option that I'd like to see implemented.....

Must dash... back in a few hours.

21
I currently use Thunderbird & its address book.

My point is two-fold.

1. Hotkey to launch the address book
2. Search field as first action to type a few characters that shortlist below the search field all available matches. As FARR does for finding programs spread out through your PC I want to find contacts within an addressbook.

Without both those it's no more than launching any old address book. T'bird for eg wants you to specify whether you're searching on the name fields or the number fields etc (last time I looked). It's not a search on ALL pertinent fields simultaneously (usually done through concatenating the relevant fields into a single large field for search/indexing purposes).

I either want to put in part of a name and see the number(s) I need to call them (Home, Work, Mobile) or part of a number and see the person associated with that number, or part of an address, etc.

22
I don't know if anyone else struggles with this but I always feel like I'm jumping through hoops (multiple clicks/menu's) to use any software in the world (or on my mobile but thats a separate matter) to _quickly_ find someones phone number or contact details.

Is it possible to build a program that no matter what else I'm running I can push a single (definable?) hotkey to start or bring into focus an address book ?

Requirements are :
 that it must be a single key (ok maybe a 2 key combo if nec)
 that it is a 'shortlist as you type" search field on combined name, address, any phone number
 that it can be called from anywhere (you could be knee deep in Excel, or Latex, or some Python coding, but you can still call up your AB at the drop of a hat)

The ramifications of linking to anyone elses AddressBook system I really don't want to go near. Far too convoluted to build an API to handle whoever has what. However, any approach that allows other systems to access the data in the AddressBook system suggested here would probably be of interest to many (even if it's a capability for manual import into any other AddressBook such as Outlook/Express, Windows (Live) Mail, T'bird, etc)

To be functional it must be QUICK and straightforward. Straightforward does not mean simple, it will likely be quite sophisticated, but the aim is to very quickly find someones appropriate phone number(s) to contact them, send a fax, or know the address to send an email to (capability to auto-call default email program if addy clicked or go to website if URL clicked ?). Possibility of dated notes regarding contact detail changes (phone number or address changes but you can still search on the older information to see correlations with other contacts ? ie. Maintain a history of previous contact details per person or business ?)

At the risk of seeming ignorant (with 30 years in the IT industry) there may be something around that does it the way I'm suggesting, but to my mind (so far) every AddressBook supplier seems to have focused on what information is required not how people actually need it to work to be efficient ? Here's a thought.. imagine Outlook with a single hotkey approach (from anywhere in your PC) to bringing up your Contact List !? Productivity may well soar ! (I know my stress levels would reduce but I prefer T'bird any day)

At present my preference is to use Evernote because of the free-format approach (to add notes to the contact data, and I do have a structure within each note that is applied) and Evernotes very powerful search & shortlist approach plus its ability to call programs from email addresses and URL's within the note.

Anyone else struggle with QUICK access to their addressbook ?

23
N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011 Teaser Update: ContactFX 0.0.2.0
« on: January 24, 2011, 07:18 PM »
Perry,
I've been looking for a functionally well-designed Contact List for years and sad to say there are none, although many are well-coded for what they do. I include the bloated Outlook through to much more humble offerings. I shall be following your development with this as often as I can. Just a few comments that perhaps may find a good home with you and your coding.

Bottom-line question as always is "what and how do you want to use the info contained in your <contacts> list".

It must be QUICK and show me within low seconds all records that contain the numbers and addresses associated with the search string entered AS YOU TYPE.
Search data could be any characters from any field apart from perhaps a Notes field unless you can index it well enough (as Evernote does) not to lose any speed despite data amounts increasing.

Apart from sitting at the keyboard to perform maintenance, all my queries need to be answered in seconds for things like :

A. Whose number is this that I have in my hand,
B. Who else is at this number I have.
C. What is xyz's mobile, or work, or fax number, or street address, or postal address, (allow flexibility in fields/columns shown when shortlisting search string results found)
D. What group or category does this contact belong to. (I have 1300 contacts across both business, leisure and multiple club activities (with booking contacts within the club activities))

For me that means the default view should be a List View (even if that needs to be 2-line per record with NO pretty lines separating the 2nd line), not a Form View. Leave Form View for maintenance, or an ability to quickly flick to it for adding notes possibly ?

1. Must have a (preferably single) hotkey (like FARR does) to open the running program. MUST be able to be brought up very quickly and simply. Loses major usefulness if it does not.
2. MUST have as-you-type shortlisting for all or any fields in every record in the database
3. One-click to open window when in systray (as Evernote does)
4. Single toggle button to switch Form/List View (preferably a hotkey within the program once its window has the focus rather than moving a mouse to click a button)

Examples of the functionality and responsiveness required can be found in software such as Evernote and Everything.
I use List Views much more often to aid in data maintenance too, rather than Form View.

24
General Software Discussion / Re: Username & Password Logging Program
« on: October 23, 2010, 01:32 AM »
Thanks for the responses.

For now, I've installed LastPass and created an account there. Will give it time and see how it works out.

Interesting to note that LastPass by default 'removes' (intercepts ?) the IE, FF & Chrome password managers in favour of its own manager and an encrypted database
(only found that out because I always check out the Custom install options for any software being installed and that option was ticked by default).

f0dder : Have used Evernote for many years (and encrypted the pswds and such) but I'd like to look at more automated systems that manage logins rather than note taking s/w. Thanks all the same *cough*. (I never progressed beyond Evernote v2.1.327 which was the very last version that ran only on ones own PC. I participated in a beta that included trialling mobile phone connections but never fully liked the idea of all my passwords being offsite. Now I've signed up for LastPass... go figure !)

Cheers.

25
General Software Discussion / Username & Password Logging Program
« on: October 22, 2010, 06:22 PM »
Does anyone know of a cheap or free Username & Password Logging program at all ?

Not the sort that (necessarily) logs all attempts to access any system but something that would help me keep a track of all the forums, mailing lists, newsgroups, online subscriptions, any usernames/passwords used in any browser. POP3, FTP, etc etc - you get the picture.

I've done several hours looking at network snooping and at keylogger programs, some of which will even use your laptops webcam to take snapshots of who's using it but they are way overkill for the concept in mind.

The idea is NOT to record any part of any conversation or multiple _failed_ attempts to log in, just those specific fields that relate to when I had to put in the Username and Password and possibly associated fields such as security question fields (but not Captcha) that were VALID. To have software maintain a neat and tidy listing of my unique and valid access codes would be a godsend. (I have and still continue to use KeePass but are there any more automated systems out there ?) Browsers for instance will ask if you wish to store usernames/passwords but how about a system that looks across all your access codes for all your software ?

The possibility for abuse of this by installing on someone elses system is high but looking at it from the usefulness point of view to run only on my machines I'd be QUITE happy to have some secure software to monitor and manage EVERY access code I need to get into the heaps of systems I've somehow managed to sign myself up for, or have contracts to access for maintenance. How many times have you had to use the "Did you forget your password" option for any given website ? (You know you have it 'somewhere' but where ? OR, as is quite common, because it does take a discipline to always write down your access codes and in the SAME system/software/electronic or physical notepad, did you either forget to write it down because "you'll remember" or you just didn't have the time to jot it down ? How about getting into your own websites ?

Just throwing this into DC because I have read acres of fantastic threads and very concise threads too, on software thats available for other tasks. In fact I can't think  of any other site that does software comparisons as good as DC (or comes up with so many good alternatives to investigate).

I'm very busy with my work so please don't expect responses too often but I will check in from time to time and see what everyones been able to come up with that might give some leads.

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