Messages

176

Living Room / Re: external hard drive backups

« on: July 11, 2017, 08:30 PM »

I am looking at the WD My Passport or a WD My Book.

Or the software that comes with the drive be good enough?

Good drives, I have a few of them. Crappy backup software, though. First thing I do when I get a new Passport drive is delete that software. It's a complete waste of space.

Is cloud storage safe to use?  Are my cloud files at risk of becoming infected if a file becomes infected on my computer? 

Dropbox has file versioning, so even if something does mess up your files stored there, you can always revert to previous good version of them. And the versioning doesn't eat into your allowed storage space.

What I would do is set the Dropbox folder to your Passport drive, then back up your files to the Dropbox folder. (paid accounts offer 1 TB of space)

That way, if something happens to your PC (hardware failure, dead main drive, etc.), you can just plug the Passport drive into another computer and keep moving along. And if something happens to your Passport drive, you can get another one, set Dropbox to sync to the new drive, and keep moving along. And if something happens to both your computer and your passport drive (fire, flood, tornado, etc), you can get another computer, and another Passport drive, then sync from Dropbox onto the new one, and keep moving along.

It is not completely wrong. Besides, what type of data are you backing up and is it possible to get into legal trouble? For example: you work from home and store by accident or as an ad-hoc transfer solution, store your work on your cloud account. In my case, I would get into serious legal trouble, even for the briefest of time that work would be on any server other my own or at the customer. You better make sure something similar doesn't apply to your personal situation when you (accidentally) mix work/private stuff using any cloud solution.

-Shades (July 10, 2017, 09:16 AM)

There are some of us (me) that work from home and absolutely must store work related files in the cloud, and for them to be sharable with customers, in order to perform our jobs. And my employer was mighty glad that I have a Dropbox account with ample storage space when this happened and made it impossible for customers to download their purchases.

177

DC Website Help and Extras / Re: An Idea: Providing some small funding for a yearly (or 6 month) regular coder

« on: July 11, 2017, 04:09 PM »

How about at the end of the year, you enter every DC coder that has done some work on coding snacks, NANY, etc into a drawing, with each app they have released earning 1 entry, with bonus points for quality apps (to discourage anyone from joining and releasing a ton of crap "just to get another entry" type apps)? Those that have done a lot of work would have a better chance of winning than someone that only did a single lesser quality app.

It could be a good use for your prize optimizer.

Or you could just hand the money over to Skwire. 

178

Living Room / Re: Programming/Coder humor

« on: July 04, 2017, 04:56 PM »

179

Living Room / Re: Programming/Coder humor

« on: April 25, 2017, 10:05 PM »

One day, I swallowed my pride and set it to play at Level Zero; and wonder of wonders, I actually began to make winning moves, until; it cheated. True story! Playing it at Level Zero, it lost it's Queen, and as I was about to move in for the kill, it gave itself another Queen, as a freebie. And it's new Queen didn't appear on any of the squares where Pawns normally change into Queens; it's new Queen appeared in a 'winning position' somewhere in the middle of the board. 'I felt the earth move under my feet', as the song goes. I was mentally staggered by the implications. GIGO was toast! The computer cheated on Level Zero! Even to think back on it; I'm not sure I ever completely calmed down, even to this day. A - computer - cheated; at chess. Somewhere within my Boris 2.5 was a hideous cyber-monster. True story. It finally wore out and quit working. Actually, looking back on it, I can see an element of 'humor' in it, if I put myself in the position of laughing--at myself, combined with a 'wake-up' groan, as in 'Welcome to the real world, you pathetic nerd'.

-holt (April 20, 2017, 07:04 PM)

As my dad likes to say, "Computers are polymorphically perverse." 

180

Living Room / Re: Programming/Coder humor

« on: April 22, 2017, 01:10 AM »

181

Living Room / Re: 1986 dial-up bulletin board system has brought the old Web back to life

« on: April 17, 2017, 05:23 PM »

textfiles.com has one of the few traces of my brother that exists on the modern internet, in their historical 80's version BBS list (he died in the mid 90's).

182

Post New Requests Here / Re: Desperate app request - restore window positions after wake from sleep scrambles

« on: April 14, 2017, 10:40 AM »

What causes the monitors to wake? User activity?

How long do they take to wake after keyboard/mouse activity?

Set the time to wakeup time + 5 seconds before running the restore.

That way, if you move the mouse or tap any key on the keyboard, it will then wait long enough for your monitors to wake, before running the restore.

183

Post New Requests Here / Re: Desperate app request - restore window positions after wake from sleep scrambles

« on: April 14, 2017, 10:08 AM »

Now if I can just get one of the ahk coders here to add the other 5% I'll be golden.

-mouser (April 14, 2017, 09:50 AM)

Would this work for about 2.5%?

https://www.donation...60.msg34720#msg34720

In other words, launching the AHK script after a set length of user idle time, but a shorter than when your monitors would go to sleep (almost like a screensaver)?

Then all you'd need is something to run it to restore, after a set length of time after user activity is detected, just slightly longer than it takes for your monitors to fully wake up.

This does what you need: https://www.donation...60.msg34720#msg34720

Can be used to set the timeout to run the ahk script after a set length of user idle time, and then run to restore the windows after keyboard/mouse activity detected. It does both, so now you have your 100%.

184

General Software Discussion / Re: Looking for a new browser

« on: April 11, 2017, 07:37 PM »

Pale Moon users should probably install FEBE 8.3.1, CLEO 6.0.2, and OPIE 5.0.2.1, just in case, so they don't ever end up in a situation where they lose access to installing their favorite add-ons, after the Firefox change.

-app103 (April 06, 2017, 04:06 PM)

Thanks, app103, for these suggestions.  Can they be installed only when/if I find I need them, or do they have to be installed before they're needed?

-cyberdiva (April 08, 2017, 08:34 PM)

You need to install them and run them to make a backup of your current everything, before you need it, not after you lose everything. Then keep the files in a safe place, so you don't lose them should your hard drive die. Because it would be rather pointless to make a backup and then lose both your current Pale Moon and your backups to the same mishap.

185

General Software Discussion / Re: Looking for a new browser

« on: April 06, 2017, 04:06 PM »

Pale Moon users should probably install FEBE 8.3.1, CLEO 6.0.2, and OPIE 5.0.2.1, just in case, so they don't ever end up in a situation where they lose access to installing their favorite add-ons, after the Firefox change.

186

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows moving around after monitors wake up

« on: April 06, 2017, 03:52 PM »

1. Code that detects when monitors are about to be put to sleep and saves last state (position, size maximization, etc.) of current windows (or alternatively simply saves them regularly).
2. Code that detects when monitors come out of sleep, and restores these positions/sizes/etc. after they FULLY wake up.

-mouser (February 08, 2017, 09:16 AM)

Or code that can detect user idle time and automatically save/restore state based on that, so that if you stop using PC for any specified length of time it will autosave, not dependent on the state of your monitors, kicking in before they sleep. Then restoring last state on any user activity (with a delay, if necessary).

187

General Software Discussion / Re: Unknown packet

« on: April 06, 2017, 03:24 PM »

It could possibly be related to a browser security add-on.

https://support.avg....d=906b0000000DPSPAA4

188

General Software Discussion / Re: Unknown packet

« on: April 06, 2017, 03:08 PM »

Yup, he's right...AVG.

From a handy little FF add-on that I use for tracing customer IP addresses, at work.

189

Non-Windows Software / Ubuntu will be switching back to GNOME for Ubuntu 18.04 LTS

« on: April 06, 2017, 12:10 PM »

We are wrapping up an excellent quarter and an excellent year for the company, with performance in many teams and products that we can be proud of. As we head into the new fiscal year, it’s appropriate to reassess each of our initiatives. I’m writing to let you know that we will end our investment in Unity8, the phone and convergence shell. We will shift our default Ubuntu desktop back to GNOME for Ubuntu 18.04 LTS.

https://insights.ubu...one-and-convergence/

190

Living Room / Re: File Encryption - now effectively outlawed in the US?

« on: April 03, 2017, 11:33 AM »

(aka a cereal killer)

-app103 (April 03, 2017, 09:10 AM)

Are you trying to take cranioscopical's place?

-wraith808 (April 03, 2017, 11:14 AM)

Impossible! Nobody can do that. Not even worth trying. Besides, I don't want a rotten turkey sandwich on my profile.

191

Living Room / Re: File Encryption - now effectively outlawed in the US?

« on: April 03, 2017, 09:10 AM »

Not only that, but it seems the FBI can arrest and charge you for hacking even if you never hacked anybody:

http://www.thedailyb...o-hacked-no-one.html

-Deozaan (April 02, 2017, 11:25 AM)

That is as ridiculous as holding the CEO of the Post cereal company responsible, if someone goes out and buys a box of Grape Nuts cereal, pours it into a sock, and beats someone to death with it. (aka a cereal killer)

192

Developer's Corner / Re: Do you use a good office chair when programming?

« on: March 31, 2017, 10:47 AM »

I've never actually done standing at a desk myself, but the knee method sounds interesting.

-tomos (March 31, 2017, 10:39 AM)

It was out of necessity, since standing for 10+ hours was killing my feet. I am just lucky the length of my legs (from knee to floor) was perfect for that folding chair.

193

Developer's Corner / Re: Do you use a good office chair when programming?

« on: March 31, 2017, 09:51 AM »

Oups -- just now, I see it's described as 'standing support'

-tomos (March 27, 2017, 06:19 AM)

What exactly does that term mean? When I read that, I conjured an image in my mind of how I used to use a standing desk at one of the places I used to work, resting one knee on a folding chair of the perfect height, keeping one foot off the floor, switching about once per hour to give the other foot a rest. I suppose having something of adjustable height, without a back, and a firm padded seat (like that "chair"), would probably have been more comfortable than the folding chair I used.

194

Living Room / Re: Programming/Coder humor

« on: March 31, 2017, 09:35 AM »

Free drinks for coders.

195

General Software Discussion / Re: How to make a local copy of an ancient Web forum?

« on: March 18, 2017, 09:44 PM »

I think that's ruddy useful of them to make that available.

-IainB (March 16, 2017, 12:00 PM)

Only partially useful in the case of shareware, since for any apps that are no longer available on the current software market (in any version), you probably wouldn't be able to purchase a license to keep using it. And in some cases for software that phones home as part of the installing process, you can't even install it to get the free 30 day trial. I know this from experience, since  have a folder containing about 5G of setup files, downloaded directly from Tucows, back in 1999, a gift from my father, included on a computer that he gave me in 2000 (I still don't even know what most of them do!)

196

General Software Discussion / Re: XYplorer is not responding.

« on: March 18, 2017, 09:01 PM »

Just an FYI - in the new version, only on my surface (though I have the same definitions as on my desktop), contextmenu64 is being detected as a trojan by windows Defender.  I did submit that to microsoft.

-wraith808 (March 18, 2017, 01:38 PM)

I was going to suggest, before I read your post, to try disabling your anti-virus, temporarily, to see if that solves the problem with XYplorer locking up.

I do recall that some anti-viruses tend to disable access to files until they have been checked, regardless of whether you are opening/running them or not, which used to cause big issues on one of my older machines, due to shortcuts to apps containing servers on my taskbar (things like TightVNC, various P2P apps, chat servers, etc.). The entire taskbar would lock up for the longest time, as their icons were loaded. Also caused problems in Explorer, whenever I opened a folder containing a .rar file. When I temporarily disabled my anti-virus, the problems stopped. So, my solution was to ditch McAfee and install a lighter anti-virus, which at that time was AVG. It was a lot less aggressive, only checking files when I tried to actually access them, rather than how McAfee was checking every file shown in an Explorer window, regardless of whether I was attempting to open/run them or not.

If your machine is a little slow or your anti-virus a bit too aggressive, it could very well be causing a lockup situation when XYplorer accesses a large number of files, so it can display their information to you. The accessing of them does take a little time, to begin with, which could then end up immensely magnified by the anti-virus temporarily denying access while it checks both XYplorer and those files for malware, first.

So, try disabling your anti-virus and see if it helps.

197

Developer's Corner / Re: Do you use a good office chair when programming?

« on: March 18, 2017, 12:33 AM »

Now that this thread has been resurrected, I should probably offer an update on my chair situation.

The chair I mentioned in my previous post bit the dust back in 2008, and I had to buy a new one, because it was killing my back and cutting off the circulation to my legs. It was beyond repair and too bent up to straighten out.

I ended up buying a high back Sealy Posturepedic chair, like this one, for about $200:



The differences between mine and the one pictured there, is that on mine, the fabric is brown. Yes, fabric, because I still can't stand sitting on leather, vinyl, or plastic.

At the time that I purchased the chair, my back was killing me so bad I could barely walk.

I did show mouser the chair I was considering buying, but at the time he thought it was way overpriced and that I could get a "decent" chair for much less. While I did understand his concern at the time, because I was going through some financial difficulties, I am glad I didn't listen to him and bought the chair, any way.

My thoughts on it, which justified the price, is that one spends 6-8 hours per night sleeping in their bed, and would not think twice about spending $600+ on their mattress & box spring, for the purposes of comfort and avoiding a bad backache, so why not spend some extra on a chair that I spend far more time in, than my bed?

If I could have afforded a $600+ chair at the time, I would have bought one, but my budget at that time was around $200*, max. And that was the best $200, fabric covered, high back chair with arm rests that I could find, that was made by a company with a reputation for producing mattresses that offered good back support.

When the chair arrived, my back was in such bad shape that I could barely stand up. My husband brought the box upstairs, and I assembled the chair while sitting down, on my old chair. Then it was a matter of just pushing the old chair our of the way and sitting my butt in the new one. Within 24 hours, I noticed a real difference, and instead of my back getting worse, it actually started to heal, and within a few days I was good as new.

And the chair has served me well enough over the past 8 years, that I'd even consider tossing away all 4 of my oak kitchen chairs (that have seen better days), and replace them all with something similar to this desk chair, if I could get ones in leather, without arm rests. As much as I hate leather to sit on, it's much more practical for use in a kitchen, where chairs would need to be able to be easily wiped clean and not absorb spills directly into the cushions. And the adjustable height would make them perfect for my kitchen table, which is unusually high, too high for standard height kitchen chairs. And that also would mean that when using my laptop, I could have the same comfort as sitting at my desk, without having to drag my desk chair into my kitchen. And having wheels, nobody would ever have to hear that horrific sound of a wooden kitchen chair sliding across a textured floor, ever again.

But that dream will have to wait, since I have better things to do with my money, at the moment, than spending $800+ on new kitchen chairs. And before anyone gets the wrong idea, no, I am not requesting or accepting donations to help cover the costs, because the wooden chairs I have are still quite usable and replacing them can wait as long as I need. A trip to Home Depot to buy the appropriate drill bits & screws, to finish reinforcing the chairs, along with a good set of the right type of steel glides, would cost far less and make those wooden chairs last a another 20 years, at least.




_{*Thank you again, to everyone that has used my software and donated to support further development, during 2006-2008. I wouldn't have been able to afford the new desk chair without your help.}

198

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 - Collection of Hacks, Tweaks, Improvements

« on: February 03, 2017, 02:59 PM »

I am pleased to inform that 7+ Taskbar Tweaker has been updated for Windows 10.

-Curt (January 13, 2017, 05:05 PM)

Just discovered this one, myself. Loving it! No more thumbnails on hover and buttons completely ungrouped.

Now if it could only tweak the toolbar padding, I'd be completely content. (I am not referring to pinned items padding, which does nothing for me, because I don't pin items)

199

Non-Windows Software / Re: Android book reader (thinking Moon+)

« on: January 19, 2017, 10:44 AM »

I don't know anything about Moon+. I went with the free version of FBReader.

On Google Play: https://play.google.....zlibrary.ui.android
Homepage: http://fbreader.org

200

N.A.N.Y. 2017 / Re: NANY 2017: MMAHW! (Make My Active Hours Work!) - Cancelled

« on: January 06, 2017, 06:07 AM »

Right now I have it so it doesn't reboot, and a few times I've either not been able to install something, or had strange effects because I haven't rebooted yet.

-wraith808 (January 05, 2017, 06:58 AM)

That's an effect I had not considered, mainly because I have not experienced that, myself.