Messages

76

FARR Plugins and Aliases / farrfox without ff?

« on: February 28, 2008, 08:41 PM »

I may have smoked too much farr lately, but I have this idea to get my ff bookmarks to show up into the normal farr results list (i.e., have the bookmarks show up just like aliases, or files in the search directories, without having to type ff).

77

Find And Run Robot / 2 launches: task manager, DOS prompt with directory

« on: February 28, 2008, 08:36 PM »

Subject says it all, I just can't find either of them.  I can get DOS launched with an alias set to "cmd", but I'd like it to open in a different directory (not farr's).

78

Find And Run Robot / Re: how to un-minimize FireFox for URL's?

« on: February 28, 2008, 08:01 PM »

That was it!  Sorry tomos, I didn't know about "ff profiles" and figured the complete wipe and uninstall would clear everything.  A new profile, and now for a new pair of shoes.

Thanks for all the help-

79

Find And Run Robot / Re: sync across machines?

« on: February 28, 2008, 07:29 PM »

Thanks for the suggestions.  I have so much creeping onto my USB, I just have to say "no"!   And that's what I use to syn across machines, so I'll figure out which files I need and rig up some kind of sync just for them.

Thanks-

80

Find And Run Robot / sync across machines?

« on: February 28, 2008, 02:42 PM »

I have FARR installed at home, work, and on the laptop.  Any suggestions or tips for getting them sychronized (just the aliases would be great, but hotkeys, settings, plugins, the works if possible).

Minimally, is there a way to get FARR to load an alias file from an arbitrary directory?  I have a directory with all my data in it that's already synchronized across the machines.  Reading from there, and I'd be all set.

Mike

81

Find And Run Robot / Re: how to un-minimize FireFox for URL's?

« on: February 28, 2008, 02:18 PM »

I do have it working correctly on a new computer with nothing but XP Pro SP 2 installed (and ff and farr).  But on my home, office, and laptop machines (also XP Pro SP2), I just can't get farr to un-minimize ff.  I uninstalled every ff add-on one at a time, and then finally wiped the ff directory and reinstalled ff.  With no ff add-ons installed, I then removed app after app from the Task Manager, startup apps, and anything that was not running on the other (working) XP machine.  Does anyone see anything else worth killing off?


Bummer of a birthmark, Hal.  A huge time drain, but a nice payoff in the balance.  Apologies for the delayed reply to those trying to help, I really had to get back to work for a couple of days.

Mike

82

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: Farr Alias: Window Management

« on: February 22, 2008, 10:16 PM »

Got it!  Thanks for the suggestion Mouser.  I tried Alt-capsLock, but it leaves my capsLock'ed, so I'm using Alt-BackQuote (the key above tab).

Awesome!

83

Find And Run Robot / Re: how to un-minimize FireFox for URL's?

« on: February 22, 2008, 11:45 AM »

I am very grateful for these efforts.  Thank you.

With SelectToSurf, I get the same behavior (select a URL in notepad, hit ctrl-space, the new URL loads into FF, but FF stays minimized).

In FF I have both "Web Browser Links" and "External Links" set to open in the current tab.  But setting either or both to "New Tab" does not help.  The URLs do open in new tabs, but FF still stays minimized.

I tried setting the "Custom Browser" to FF.  The first time only, with Firefox already running, I tried to launch a URL from farr and got a dialog that said: "Close Firefox: Firefox is already running, but is not responding.  To open a new window, you must first close the existing Firefox process, or restart your system."  But after closing and re-opening FF, it now works the same with or without the "Custom Browser" (it loads, but stays minimized).

Rebooted.  That's been a while.  No change.

Reinstalled FF.  Again, no change.  Admittedly, did not uninstall first.  Tried disabling FF add-on "TabBrowser Preferences" (including exit/restart FF), still no change.

Maybe something with one of the other app launchers I was looking at?  Killed everything off but farr and still no change.

Can try it on another machine I have at home....

84

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: Farr Alias: Window Management

« on: February 22, 2008, 09:13 AM »

Moved it from the Scripts directory to the AliasGroups/Installed directory and everything is so sweet!

I'm not sure how I picked "Scripts", I spent some time looking for instructions and only sorted out that it probably *wasn't* a plugin since it did not have dll(s) like the other plugins.

Thanks for all the help-

85

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: Farr Alias: Window Management

« on: February 22, 2008, 08:54 AM »

Hotkey.  So I'm in (whatever, MS-Word, Firefox, Win Explorer, have tried many windows), I hit the farr hotkey and start typing "minimize", it's the top match, I hit enter and farr disappears and I go back to the original (non-minimized) window.

I opened a related thread yesterday: when I launch a URL from farr, it loads into the current tab in firefox just fine, but if FF is minimized, it doesn't restore, it just stays minimized.  I got a reply from Mouser saying FF should be coming to the foreground.  Haven't got a fix for that yet, but maybe they're related.

I do use FarrAltTab just fine, it brings any window I select to the foreground.  Not sure what it does differently from WinManagement or simple URLs.

86

Find And Run Robot / Re: how to un-minimize FireFox for URL's?

« on: February 22, 2008, 08:24 AM »

That's what I thought, but no luck here.  FF 2.0.0.12, with a few add-ons, but nothing jumping out as a possible culprit of "retain minimized despite new URL".  Will keep an eye out.  Open to suggestions.

87

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: Farr Alias: Window Management

« on: February 22, 2008, 08:16 AM »

Any tips?  I extracted the zip into the "Scripts" directory, and now I see "WinManagement", "Minimize", "Maximize", etc. all as new farr keywords, but when I select and run any of them from farr, nothing happens to the window I was in before launching farr.

Thanks for any help-

88

Find And Run Robot / Re: change "start in directory" plus command-line arg?

« on: February 21, 2008, 09:00 PM »

Perfect!  Just needed to set the regular expression field for the alias.  And I copied javaw.exe to the directory I needed (my bad for not trying that in the first place, I never thought it would run with all the other Java binaries back in the install  directory).

Solved!

Also, at least in this case, farr definitely sets the working directory to the one I'm running the exe in.

Thanks for the complete reply, and the confirmation about not passing args to .lnk's.

89

Find And Run Robot / change an existing Windows Explorer's location?

« on: February 21, 2008, 06:21 PM »

When I FARR-browse to a folder, it always opens in a new Windows Explorer.  Is there a way to get it to find an existing Windows Explorer and point to the new folder? 

If not, does that functionality work with any of the replacement explorers?

And regardless, Mouser, is there a Windows Explorer replacement that you endorse?

90

Find And Run Robot / how to un-minimize FireFox for URL's?

« on: February 21, 2008, 06:16 PM »

I like to keep most of my running apps minimized, with only the one or two I'm using restored (not maximized, just regular-sized).  So my URL FARR targets usually land in a minimized FireFox.  Is there a way to send them over there and get FireFox to unminimize?  I tried appending a /MAXIMIZE onto the end of one of the aliases, but no luck (probably would have worked if FireFox had not been running, but I didn't really want it maximized, just regular-ized).

Thanks for any help-

Mike

91

Find And Run Robot / change "start in directory" plus command-line arg?

« on: February 21, 2008, 06:12 PM »

Basically, I'm trying to launch an executable that takes two command-line arguments, but the executable is in one location, and I need it to run with the current directory (or "Start In" directory) pointing to a different location.  The first command-line argument never changes, the second is passed through from the user/FARR.

In concrete terms, it's a Java Phone Book app that takes a command-line argument (the name or number of the person to lookup).  So it launches like this:
pathA\javaw.exe arg1 arg2
Where arg1 is the name of my app and arg2 is the Name/PhoneNumber I'm searching for.  Trying to follow the 'wiki' and 'maps' examples, I've got the "Results" section of the "Edit Group Alias" dailog set as shown, but with 2 problems:
C:\Program Files\Java\j2sdk1.4.2_01\bin\javaw MyApp $$1

First problem is setting the directory it actually runs from.  Any ideas?  (and if you know Java, it's not enough to just add to the classpath.  The app actually uses the directory it's launched from).  I've tried making a batch file, but I'd rather not open a cmd window and then the Java GUI, too.  I've also made a .lnk shortcut that launches ok, but I can't figure out how to get arg2 passed in from the command line.

Second problem is me not understanding the $$1 parameter.  I have this Alias named "phone".  As I start typing it into FARR, everything starts as expected and I see "phone" up at the top of the list coming from myaliases.alias.  All good until I get to the "e" in phone.  Right then, the drop-down list changes to a smaller font and maybe 20 results instead of 9.  By the time I've typed "phone mike", the list has filtered down to no entries and won't launch anything (much less launch my app with "mike" as an arg).

Thanks for any help, and apologies for my density.

92

Find And Run Robot / Re: add launcher "keywords" to farr?

« on: February 21, 2008, 01:33 PM »

I have *painstakingly* evaluated SlickRun, KeyBreeze, Launchy, Executor, Dash, Skylight, and FARR over the last week or so.  I would like to reiterate: painstakingly.  Maybe 10-15 hours of installs, testing, help text, and forums.

As near as I can tell, none of them come anywhere close to FARR.  Except maybe in marketing, and entry-level ease of use/discovery.

What a delight to have discovered this gem.

The replies in this thread have more than answered my question.  I'll open new threads for the other questions I have uncovered.

Thanks all around-

93

Find And Run Robot / add launcher "keywords" to farr?

« on: February 20, 2008, 03:04 PM »

Apologies if this is spelled out somewhere and I missed it, but is there a way to create launcher-style keywords in FARR?  (like in keybreeze, launchy, slickrun, etc.).  I discovered FARR looking for a way to add folder searching to either Slickrun or Keybreeze, without creating a "keyword" for every file.  But FARR simply kicks ass, and just gets better with each time I pick up a new trick.  I'd like to ditch SlickRun and just use FARR for both searching and launching if there's a way to do it.

Thanks for any suggestions.  And for this awesome app.

Mike