Topics

1

Found Deals and Discounts / Free course on Hugo, a static site generator written in Go

« on: January 23, 2015, 11:21 AM »

I jumped on the static site generator bandwagon a little less than a year ago. As with most things, I spent quite a bit of time researching a load of options to find the "best" one. I really liked Hugo and its speed, and have used it to run the new site I created ever since. I hit a lot of snags when I was initially setting up the site, and I felt like that might keep others from using Hugo.

I'd also wanted to create a course on Udemy, so I created a course on Hugo. As a sort of beta test, it's free with a discount link until the end of the month.

Here's the link to sign up for the free course (It will be valid until 31 Jan 2015 at the stroke of midnight)

Feedback or questions would be much appreciated. It's easy to forget things that make sense now, but didn't when I first started using it.

And even if you don't choose Hugo but you start using another static site generator, I think you'll like the workflow. I really enjoy writing my content in Markdown and being able to git push to publish.

2

Screenshot Captor / Index error in Screenshot Captor

« on: August 18, 2012, 05:25 PM »

It all started when I saw the jagged-edged screenshot on ImgBurn.com and tried to create something similar with Screenshot Captor.  I browsed through the frames and masks, then saw the Clipart button and took a peek.  I got a few index errors, then when I closed SC it said there had been two crashes.

I downloaded a new portable version of SC and ran it to see if my .ini was causing it.  At first I didn't see the problem, so I copied the default .ini file to my portable installation and not only did I get the error, but afterwards SC wouldn't close, even with several Process Explorer and Task Manager kill attempts.  It was using very little CPU, but my machine was acting really slow.  I discovered it was doing around 3MB/second of disk usage (I may have hit the Rescan Dirs button at some point) at which point I restarted Windows.

I believe the default window size forces the toolbar into 2 columns, and I have only seen the error when the window is a large enough for a single column toolbar.

Returning to my original question, I think the imgburn.com image was made with TechSmith's Snagit, but if there was a similar frame or mask then it could be used with SC, apart from the drop shadow that goes along with the jagged edge.

Here's a recording so you can see exactly what I did to get the error.

And here are the two problem signatures in case they're of any help in diagnosing the problem.

Problem signature:
  Problem Event Name:   APPCRASH
  Application Name:   ScreenshotCaptor.exe
  Application Version:   3.8.1.0
  Application Timestamp:   00000000
  Fault Module Name:   KERNELBASE.dll
  Fault Module Version:   6.1.7601.17651
  Fault Module Timestamp:   4e211319
  Exception Code:   0eedfade
  Exception Offset:   0000b9bc
  OS Version:   6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.1
  Locale ID:   1033
  Additional Information 1:   484f
  Additional Information 2:   484fb9ba634ff62fede72d42ab55c6c5
  Additional Information 3:   659b
  Additional Information 4:   659b7a69a8c020859e9a4dae6f16b562

Problem signature:
  Problem Event Name:   APPCRASH
  Application Name:   ScreenshotCaptor.exe
  Application Version:   3.8.1.0
  Application Timestamp:   00000000
  Fault Module Name:   KERNELBASE.dll
  Fault Module Version:   6.1.7601.17651
  Fault Module Timestamp:   4e211319
  Exception Code:   0eedfade
  Exception Offset:   0000b9bc
  OS Version:   6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.1
  Locale ID:   1033
  Additional Information 1:   4271
  Additional Information 2:   4271ab875c504b21b9ee5d8f7b9a875d
  Additional Information 3:   dd5e
  Additional Information 4:   dd5e7a41eed66906f89d0051dddfee79

3

Screenshot Captor / Main window seemingly wouldn't appear

« on: August 06, 2012, 12:21 PM »

I use a portable installation of ScreenshotCaptor in Dropbox so the same settings are used across all of my computers.  At work I have two large monitors and at home I have a smaller one.  Last night I could not see the main window of Screenshot Captor and I couldn't figure out why.  Screenshots appeared in the screenshots dir as usual, but no amount of cajoling would make the window appear.  This morning I ran it at work and the main window was on the second screen.  I then realized the saved position was off screen at home, and confirmed it by manually changing UserMainLeft and UserMainTop.

Could you make sure UserMainLeft and UserMainTop are within the current screen resolution?

As a stopgap solution I added a new entry to my AutoHotKey Window movement shortcuts:

Code: Autohotkey [Select]

1. ; Move the active window to 0,0 in case it's off the screen with Alt+Windows+Home
2. !#Home::
3.    winmove, A,,0,0
4.    return

4

General Software Discussion / Screenshot Captor "best in class" on FreewareGenius

« on: February 06, 2012, 01:40 PM »

http://www.freewareg...ght-just-be-the-one/

I echo Samer's findings.  Screenshot Captor is the best screenshot software out there.  Thanks Mouser (and congratulations for the well-deserved praise).

5

General Software Discussion / 7 Freeware Windows Explorer Alternatives / File Managers compared

« on: June 06, 2011, 02:34 AM »

An interesting review of some good options (only freeware) that might be of interest.  I was disappointed with the treatment of FreeCommander, a program I enjoy using almost too much.

http://www.freewareg...omparative-analysis/

There are several freeware file managers that address this gap in Windows’ file management functionality. We looked at 15 of these and found 7 had many of the advanced features we were looking for. This post will compare the following program across several criteria: FreeCommander, Master Commander, Nexus File, Q-Dir, SE-Explorer, UltraExplorer, and Xplorer2 Lite.

The primary criteria used for the comparison were user interface, file operations and additional features.  I will say Nexus File looks fantastic (sexy even), but I downloaded the latest version and spent a 1/2 hour playing around with it and I just don't see it coming close to replacing the firmly entrenched FreeCommander for my day-to-day needs.

6

Living Room / US rolls out Internet Identity Plan

« on: April 15, 2011, 12:23 PM »

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/04/with-passwords-broken-us-rolls-out-internet-identity-plan.ars

Just saw this post on ARS.  This is a big issue and their solution has merit, though it's not bulletproof.  If this goes mainstream I'm sure it will be exploited, but it seems better than our current solution with hundreds of passwords.

The final version of NSTIC tries to address two problems: the fact that passwords are "broken" and the fact that it's almost impossible to prove your identity on the Internet. The future belongs to smart cards, cell phones, USB security sticks, and similar solutions—when the Department of Defense moved away from passwords to a smartcard security solution, it saw network intrusions drop by 46 percent.

7

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Custom keyword searches and bookmarks from almost any browser/OS

« on: January 31, 2011, 04:22 PM »

I used to use XMarks to sync bookmarks across browsers, but it didn't sync custom search engines and it didn't support all the browsers and OSes I used.  superboyac convinced me to use Linkman for all my regular bookmarks (the free license through DonationCoder helped too), leaving only the custom searches that wouldn't sync.  I looked for a service like yubnub.org that could be personalized, but never found one.  My temporary solution became more and more useful so I decided to start making it into a real service.



It's called Shortmarks (Shortcuts + Bookmarks) and is aimed at someone using bookmark shortcuts and search engines on multiple browsers or machines.  You set Shortmarks as the default search engine in your browser(s), then add your shortcuts/search engines in Shortmarks.  You can then use those shortcuts from any browser that supports custom search engines (Firefox/IE/Chrome/Opera) on any machine/OS, and if you're not on one of your machines you can use the site directly.  It authenticates against your Google Account (I plan to add more account types in the future) and comes with a default set of searches that you can customize once you're logged in.

You can use a single keyword for both a direct link and a search, so you if you typed 'gp' it would go to Google Maps, but if you typed 'gp los angeles, ca' it would perform a search for los angeles, ca on Google Maps.  Another feature is the ability to search for one phrase on multiple sites.  After typing the phrase in the field at the top of the page, hit "Update search queries" to puts the phrase into each search engine link, so you can open several in tabs.  It just occurred to me as I was writing this that I could use FARR to launch Shortmarks searches too.  I'll have to look into that.

Anyway, the site is: http://shortmarks.com/s.php and I've written up some basic instructions to add it to your browser (with screenshots from ScreenshotCaptor of course)

I feel that the main barrier is ease of use.  If I were to set it up for someone, I think they would see its value, but it's not too easy to get started.  My goal is to make it easy enough for less technical folks to use it without assistance.

It's still in development but I've been using it for a few months and I love not having to sync anymore, and being able to open any browser on any machine (even my iPod) and having all the same shortcuts and search engines.

I'm curious to hear feedback.  If I'm the only one who finds it useful, I'd rather know that before I devote a lot of time to it.

Thanks in advance.

8

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Windows countdown timer

« on: August 12, 2010, 03:33 PM »

Before I knew about Donation Coder I posted a Windows Countdown Timer Showdown on my blog that was mentioned here (let me say one more time I had no intention of disparaging App's Instant Boss, it just didn't fit what I was looking for).  I thought I'd found what I wanted with Marxio Timer, but now that it's gone I decided to write a timer that would satisfy my requirements.

SnapTimer is the result.

9

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Simple MD5 comparison utility

« on: May 30, 2010, 01:41 AM »

I wrote this mainly for me, but in case someone wants it for the same reason I wrote it, here's brief overview.  The reason I wrote it is because I couldn't find any MD5 sum apps that did exactly what I wanted: Accept a file as a command-line parameter and compare the resulting MD5 sum with the text in the clipboard.  I use it with FreeCommander and I assume it could be used with Total Commander as well.  It closes with the Escape button, so it takes one keystroke to run it, and another one to close it.

Comments are welcome.

10

Find And Run Robot / Exclude subdirectories not working on Win7 x64

« on: March 29, 2010, 01:20 PM »

I'm migrating to a Win7 x64 machine from WinXP SP3.  I believe I have the same settings on both, but the subdirectory filtering in FARR isn't working on Win7 for the Dropbox directory.  See attached screenshots to illustrate what I'm seeing.  On Windows 7 there are two results for Keepass (one from the Backups directory) even when the Backups directory is in the exclude list.

Is there another setting that could affect this behavior?  I've gone through all the preferences but I may have missed something.

11

DcUpdater / Crash on XP Pro SP3

« on: March 09, 2010, 05:09 PM »

DcUpdater has been crashing recently.  I can get it to happen when I run it manually every 1 out of 3-5 times I run it.

The attached screenshot shows the threads view in ProcExp after it crashed and I suspended it, in case that's any help in debugging this.

Here's what the crash dialog had to say.  Although the version says 1.0.0.0 here, the about dialog says I'm running the latest version (1.26.01)

AppName: dcuppdater.exe    AppVer: 1.0.0.0    ModName: libcurl.dll
ModVer: 7.19.7.0    Offset: 000102d4

Code: Text [Select]

1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-16"?>
2. <DATABASE>
3. <EXE NAME="DcUppdater.exe" FILTER="GRABMI_FILTER_PRIVACY">
4.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="CloseApp2.dll" SIZE="53248" CHECKSUM="0xDFDA42F4" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0xD5EE" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" LINK_DATE="06/10/2007 20:11:19" UPTO_LINK_DATE="06/10/2007 20:11:19" />
5.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="DcUppdater.exe" SIZE="2898432" CHECKSUM="0x51EE18B8" BIN_FILE_VERSION="1.0.0.0" BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="1.0.0.0" PRODUCT_VERSION="1.0.0.0" FILE_DESCRIPTION="DonationCoder.com DcUppdater Tool" COMPANY_NAME="DonationCoder" PRODUCT_NAME="DcUppdater" FILE_VERSION="1.0.0.0" ORIGINAL_FILENAME="" INTERNAL_NAME="" LEGAL_COPYRIGHT="" VERFILEDATEHI="0x0" VERFILEDATELO="0x0" VERFILEOS="0x4" VERFILETYPE="0x1" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0x0" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" UPTO_BIN_FILE_VERSION="1.0.0.0" UPTO_BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="1.0.0.0" LINK_DATE="01/06/2010 12:22:27" UPTO_LINK_DATE="01/06/2010 12:22:27" VER_LANGUAGE="English (United States) [0x409]" />
6.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="libcurl.dll" SIZE="249856" CHECKSUM="0xBBF0F289" BIN_FILE_VERSION="7.19.7.0" BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7.0" PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7" FILE_DESCRIPTION="libcurl Shared Library" COMPANY_NAME="The cURL library, http://curl.haxx.se/" PRODUCT_NAME="The cURL library" FILE_VERSION="7.19.7" ORIGINAL_FILENAME="libcurl.dll" INTERNAL_NAME="libcurl" LEGAL_COPYRIGHT="© 1996 - 2009 Daniel Stenberg, &lt;[email protected]&gt;." VERFILEDATEHI="0x0" VERFILEDATELO="0x0" VERFILEOS="0x4" VERFILETYPE="0x2" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0x0" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" UPTO_BIN_FILE_VERSION="7.19.7.0" UPTO_BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7.0" LINK_DATE="12/29/2009 21:33:06" UPTO_LINK_DATE="12/29/2009 21:33:06" VER_LANGUAGE="English (United States) [0x409]" />
7.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="unins000.exe" SIZE="691467" CHECKSUM="0x9B3AE545" BIN_FILE_VERSION="51.49.0.0" BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="51.49.0.0" PRODUCT_VERSION="0.0.0.0" FILE_DESCRIPTION="Setup/Uninstall" COMPANY_NAME="" PRODUCT_NAME="" FILE_VERSION="51.49.0.0" ORIGINAL_FILENAME="" INTERNAL_NAME="" LEGAL_COPYRIGHT="" VERFILEDATEHI="0x0" VERFILEDATELO="0x0" VERFILEOS="0x4" VERFILETYPE="0x1" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0x0" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" UPTO_BIN_FILE_VERSION="51.49.0.0" UPTO_BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="51.49.0.0" LINK_DATE="06/19/1992 22:22:17" UPTO_LINK_DATE="06/19/1992 22:22:17" VER_LANGUAGE="English (United States) [0x409]" />
8.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="unzipinstall.exe" SIZE="212992" CHECKSUM="0xF5D3442F" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0x41088" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" LINK_DATE="08/20/2007 11:17:15" UPTO_LINK_DATE="08/20/2007 11:17:15" />
9. </EXE>
10. <EXE NAME="LIBCURL.DLL" FILTER="GRABMI_FILTER_THISFILEONLY">
11.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="libcurl.dll" SIZE="249856" CHECKSUM="0xBBF0F289" BIN_FILE_VERSION="7.19.7.0" BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7.0" PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7" FILE_DESCRIPTION="libcurl Shared Library" COMPANY_NAME="The cURL library, http://curl.haxx.se/" PRODUCT_NAME="The cURL library" FILE_VERSION="7.19.7" ORIGINAL_FILENAME="libcurl.dll" INTERNAL_NAME="libcurl" LEGAL_COPYRIGHT="© 1996 - 2009 Daniel Stenberg, &lt;[email protected]&gt;." VERFILEDATEHI="0x0" VERFILEDATELO="0x0" VERFILEOS="0x4" VERFILETYPE="0x2" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0x0" LINKER_VERSION="0x0" UPTO_BIN_FILE_VERSION="7.19.7.0" UPTO_BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="7.19.7.0" LINK_DATE="12/29/2009 21:33:06" UPTO_LINK_DATE="12/29/2009 21:33:06" VER_LANGUAGE="English (United States) [0x409]" />
12. </EXE>
13. <EXE NAME="kernel32.dll" FILTER="GRABMI_FILTER_THISFILEONLY">
14.     <MATCHING_FILE NAME="kernel32.dll" SIZE="989696" CHECKSUM="0x2D998938" BIN_FILE_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781" BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781" PRODUCT_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781" FILE_DESCRIPTION="Windows NT BASE API Client DLL" COMPANY_NAME="Microsoft Corporation" PRODUCT_NAME="Microsoft® Windows® Operating System" FILE_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781 (xpsp_sp3_gdr.090321-1317)" ORIGINAL_FILENAME="kernel32" INTERNAL_NAME="kernel32" LEGAL_COPYRIGHT="© Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved." VERFILEDATEHI="0x0" VERFILEDATELO="0x0" VERFILEOS="0x40004" VERFILETYPE="0x2" MODULE_TYPE="WIN32" PE_CHECKSUM="0xFE572" LINKER_VERSION="0x50001" UPTO_BIN_FILE_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781" UPTO_BIN_PRODUCT_VERSION="5.1.2600.5781" LINK_DATE="03/21/2009 14:06:58" UPTO_LINK_DATE="03/21/2009 14:06:58" VER_LANGUAGE="English (United States) [0x409]" />
15. </EXE>
16. </DATABASE>

Let me know if there's any more information you need, or if there's something I can do to fix it on my end (reinstalling?)

12

Find And Run Robot / [Bug report] Farr freezing on XP for a few minute, then comes back

« on: June 15, 2008, 02:51 PM »

After upgrading to 2.07.01, FARR regularly (several times a day) hangs just after I launch an application, or when I'm closing the options dialog.  I'd estimate it's once every 5-10 times.  There's still activity going on when it's unresponsive - both disk I/O and CPU, but they're minimal.

My machine is an Athlon 64 3800+ with 2GB of RAM running XP professional SP3.  I had Comodo Firewall so after reading the other thread where that seemed to be causing the problem I disabled it, but I'm still seeing this issue.

I installed ThreatFire recently.  That may be causing problems so I've disabled it for the moment to see if the issues with FARR clear up.

Any other information I can provide to help track down the issue?

Here's a thread dump from procexp that I grabbed while it was unresponsive, if that's of any help.

ntkrnlpa.exe!KiUnexpectedInterrupt+0x121
ntkrnlpa.exe!ZwYieldExecution+0x1c8e
ntkrnlpa.exe!ZwYieldExecution+0x2570
TfFsMon.sys+0x6694
TfFsMon.sys+0x6d03
TfFsMon.sys+0x6e92
ntkrnlpa.exe!IoBuildPartialMdl+0xed
fltmgr.sys+0x10754
ntkrnlpa.exe!IoBuildPartialMdl+0xed
ntkrnlpa.exe!NtMakePermanentObject+0x11b2
ntkrnlpa.exe!ObOpenObjectByName+0xea
ntkrnlpa.exe!IoCreateDevice+0x745
ntkrnlpa.exe!IoCreateFile+0x8e
ntkrnlpa.exe!NtCreateFile+0x30
cmdguard.sys+0x28fd
ntkrnlpa.exe!KeReleaseInStackQueuedSpinLockFromDpcLevel+0xb74
ntdll.dll!KiFastSystemCallRet
kernel32.dll!CreatePipe+0xa75
kernel32.dll!CreatePipe+0xa47
kernel32.dll!WritePrivateProfileStringA+0x26
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x13ac8a
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x13a2ba
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x70031
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x6db2b
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x7be42
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x7ba2a
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xcf14b
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xecb88
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xcaff4
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xec2af
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x135daa
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x6d
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x14f
USER32.dll!DefWindowProcW+0x180
USER32.dll!DefWindowProcW+0x1cc
ntdll.dll!KiUserCallbackDispatcher+0x13
USER32.dll!DefWindowProcA+0xaa
uxtheme.dll!DrawThemeText+0xbca
uxtheme.dll!GetThemeAppProperties+0x595
uxtheme.dll+0x1ac7
uxtheme.dll!GetThemeAppProperties+0x50
USER32.dll!SendInput+0x1c
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x6d
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x14f
USER32.dll!IsWindowUnicode+0xa1
USER32.dll!CallWindowProcA+0x1b
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xecc84
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xce16e
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xecb88
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xcaff4
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xec2af
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x135daa
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x6d
USER32.dll!UserLpkPSMTextOut+0x1cc
USER32.dll!DefWindowProcW+0x180
USER32.dll!DefWindowProcW+0x1cc
ntdll.dll!KiUserCallbackDispatcher+0x13
USER32.dll!SendMessageW+0x49
uxtheme.dll!Ordinal61+0x958e
uxtheme.dll+0x1ac7
uxtheme.dll!GetThemeAppProperties+0x50
USER32.dll!SendInput+0x1c
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x6d
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x14f
USER32.dll!IsWindowUnicode+0xa1
USER32.dll!CallWindowProcA+0x1b
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xecc84
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xecb88
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xcaff4
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xec2af
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0x135daa
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x6d
USER32.dll!GetDC+0x14f
USER32.dll!GetWindowLongW+0x127
USER32.dll!DispatchMessageA+0xf
FindAndRunRobot.exe+0xd3095