Messages

376

Living Room / Re: Scanning photos

« on: November 20, 2011, 05:21 AM »

It's currently on sale for $100 off, or $200.

-Renegade (November 20, 2011, 01:52 AM)

I think I'll stick with what I've done. This was a favour to a friend, not something I do for a living or would feel I could charge for, and there's no way I can afford that sort of thing, especially not this close to Christmas.

(But fractal-based resizing? Sounds like an approach that would stand a chance of having good results. If I ever decide to change career, I'll do it!)

377

Living Room / Re: Scanning photos

« on: November 19, 2011, 09:23 AM »

I'd go for a pretty good scan of the image at 600 DPI, and have that printed on the canvas. The texture of the canvas makes it relatively coarse, so I'd expect the extrapolation not to hurt the quality of the final print.

-Ath (November 19, 2011, 08:42 AM)

Will do. Thanks. Should have occurred to me that the canvas medium would coarsen the result regardless.

I'll probably tweak the colours a bit -- the skintones are very orange, in the print -- and maybe produce a few versions, tweaked in different ways, so they can choose the one they like. (Sagelight's VERY good for that stuff, as good as, if not better than, anything I've ever used.)

378

Living Room / Scanning photos

« on: November 19, 2011, 04:36 AM »

One of my friends has been given a gift of a photo-to-canvas-print offer; she has to provide a digital image on CD and they output it onto a 16x12" canvas and frame it. So far so cheesy.

Thing is, she doesn't  a digital image. She has a photo, made from an original digital image that she's lost. And the photo is only 6"x4".

So she's asked me to scan it for her and blow it up.

I have a nasty feeling this is not going to go well; extrapolation can only go so far. However... has anyone done something like this and had any sort of success and, if so, what did you do and how did you do it?

I have an HP scanner-built-into-a-printer thing and various bits of commercial and freeware image manipulation software: Sagelight, Xara P&G, Serif PhotoPlus, GIMP, all that jazz.

379

Living Room / Re: Moving up to ESET NOD32 v5

« on: November 17, 2011, 02:11 AM »

For what little it's worth... I use NOD32 AV on my desktop machine and I went through a crisis of confidence back at renewal time myself. At the time, I was using MSE on my netbook and it seemed okay, and I spent a while wondering why I was paying money for the desktop and getting acceptable protection on the netbook for free.

I never really got to a definitive answer. However, the "MS is the obvious target for malware" argument has a fair amount of clout so I stuck with NOD32 on the desktop (it's still very quick and seems reliable). The netbook ... well, I picked up a lifetime VIPRE Premium license for a very reasonable sum (like, if I decide I hate it I won't feel I've lost out) and so far I'm happy with it.

But I don't use IE and I keep my machine in a bucket of bleach overnight.  

380

Mouser's Zone / Re: DC and dotNet

« on: November 02, 2011, 06:46 PM »

It might help... YMMV.

-Renegade (November 02, 2011, 06:29 PM)

It might -- thanks! 

I've been struggling with the thing all evening and am getting nowhere fast; the link you posted suggests (from the last page) that if I rip out everything that's not intrinsic to the OS then try installing .Net framework 4 on its own, it might do the trick. I'll give it a go -- but for the time being, as tomorrow's already booked for Christmas shopping  I'll boot it into ubuntu and go back to Microsoft-bashing on Friday. 

381

Mouser's Zone / Re: DC and dotNet

« on: November 02, 2011, 04:23 PM »

I dont know why any of the DC software should stop running -- none of them use dotNet.

-mouser (November 02, 2011, 03:18 PM)

No, I know. But the dotNet security patches are almost always a complete   to install without impacting lots of other stuff. Last time I did them without thinking, lots of stuff -- including DC software -- broke so I just ran a system restore and hid the updates. After the event I discovered Susan Bradley's PatchWatch recommending not doing them for pretty much those reasons... and then I find that she's now saying the October 13 .net4 patches can't really be skipped.

Here's the link.

So I bit the bullet. And my teeth now hurt quite a bit, if you see what I mean.

I'd sort of hoped that someone here might have had a similar experience and have some idea of which bit of Windows I can chuck rocks at to make everything work properly again.

I'll let you know if I work out how to fix it. I haven't yet braved the system logs, so that's my next stop.  

...and a quick first look suggests a common problem: ntdll.dll is what Windows says is falling in a heap.

382

Mouser's Zone / DC and dotNet

« on: November 02, 2011, 03:14 PM »

Since installing the recent dotNet security patches, my poor netbook's been beside itself.

First, Windows lost its activation, and I had to redo it.

Next, ALL my DC software stopped working. CHS, FARR and LaunchBar Commander, and even DCUpdate won't run.

I hate Microsoft sometimes.

Anyone have any helpful ideas? (Win7 Starter, patched up to date -- unfortunately!)

383

Found Deals and Discounts / GOG at Hallowe'en

« on: October 29, 2011, 05:36 AM »

Just found an email from the chaps at GOG, promoting some games featuring ghoulies, ghosties and other spooktacular experiences at half price. Until midnight Monday, which I guess makes sense... 

Mostly, this isn't my thing, but I've long wanted to try the Gabriel Knight games and this has tempted me...

There's a round dozen (can a dozen be said to be "round"? Maybe in base 12...) half price games available, anyway.

GOG Halloween

Happy (?) Hallowe'en, anyway. I'm off now to start baking ghost-shaped biscuits. (Yes, really!)  

384

AutoHotkey / Re: Always on top

« on: October 13, 2011, 01:59 PM »

except for the slight timelag caused by the fact that I've put a 2 second delay on it

-oblivion (October 12, 2011, 05:05 PM)

I'm using a loop delay of 0.1 second in WinButtons, and I don't see much cpu load while it's running, but that could be my system, as I'm running it on an i7-860 (quad-core with HT, so 8 virtual CPU's )

-Ath (October 13, 2011, 01:51 PM)

Some people are just showoffs. 

Once I get over myself a bit  I'll see if I can elbow my code into Winbuttons, mostly because I like the idea of a graphic button. 

385

AutoHotkey / Re: Always on top

« on: October 12, 2011, 05:05 PM »

Or grab a copy of WinButtons, that even has a nice configuration editor WinButtonEdit, and can easily be configured to be Always On Top

-Ath (October 04, 2011, 02:13 PM)

I looked quite hard at it. I think if I was starting from the point of wanting a button-based launcher-type thing, I'd have used it. But as it was, I was trying to add functionality to something I'd already written, and after making my own head spin for a while, decided against.

For what it's worth, I'd set up a couple of context-sensitive hotkeys but wanted to replicate the functionality of one of them with something a bit more visible. I created a timer loop that checks to see if two specific applications are running and, if the one of them relevant to the hotkey has focus, puts a small (64x64) button onscreen, with alwaysontop set and the notaskbar attribute too so it's not too obtrusive, and if either of the applications closes, the button's destroyed again.

It works well except for the slight timelag caused by the fact that I've put a 2 second delay on it so as not to take too much cpu when there's little happening. That bit I haven't really experimented with much, to be honest, but as long as it doesn't do anything nasty like leak memory, I'm quite happy with the way it works.

Thanks for both your help, anyway: gave me the focus on the thinking I needed to get what I wanted to happen! 

386

AutoHotkey / Re: Always on top

« on: October 04, 2011, 04:38 PM »

Just add the following to your AHK code (assuming it's the first GUI):

Code: Autohotkey [Select]

1. Gui, +AlwaysOnTop

-skwire (October 04, 2011, 01:59 PM)

Thanks! (I was sure I'd checked all the possibilities for Gui in the help -- I must be getting old.) 

387

AutoHotkey / Always on top

« on: October 04, 2011, 01:56 PM »

Just a quick question -- I hope!

I want to make a GUI button that I can float over another application, but I can't work out if I can create a GUI with an always-on-top type of attribute.

If I can't, can anyone suggest something I could bolt on that would have a similar effect?

388

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: GOG giving away Broken Sword-Shadow of the Templars thru 10/1/11

« on: October 01, 2011, 05:56 AM »

I've lost track of just how long I've owned this game -- on CD, no less -- but the Director's Cut version, an additional chapter and free too? Well, I never DID finish the game, maybe this will give me an excuse to have another go! Thanks! 

389

Found Deals and Discounts / A new Humble Bundle

« on: September 28, 2011, 01:15 PM »

There's a new Humble Bundle

Frozen Synapse is a turn-based strategy game which, if you pay "above the average" for, also gives you access to 3-5 more games.

It's only around for two weeks, apparently. The last bundle was excellent -- not sure that this one's my speed but I'm sure it'll appeal to some of you 

390

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: boxed Defrag: $9.95

« on: September 22, 2011, 01:13 PM »

Maybe with the boxed version of UD3 you can get the previous builds ?  In that case I would also recommend this offer.

-MerleOne (September 11, 2011, 09:37 AM)

As the box contains a license number, I'd be surprised if you couldn't download one of the earlier builds from the site and apply it.

I like it, but I've emailed their support guys about a (bug? Issue?) and haven't had so much as an acknowledgement. Configuration is less than intuitive too, but the box has a printed manual so I guess I should RTFM before I complain about that 

391

General Software Discussion / Re: Software Hall of Fame

« on: September 16, 2011, 06:07 AM »

Another irrelevant thought...

A BBC producer I used to know once told me that WordStar was often used by programme makers, not because they particularly preferred it (Macs were mostly used by the creative types) but because it had a "clean screen" mode that could be used to "mock up" pretty much any character-based computer screen you might want to appear on TV... 

392

General Software Discussion / Re: Software Hall of Fame

« on: September 16, 2011, 03:54 AM »

Hey, I kind of enjoyed using WordStar ... but, then, I've been accused of having a masochistic streak  .

-barney (September 15, 2011, 07:51 PM)

Nothing masochistic about WordStar. The command sequences were considered arcane by many but had a certain amount of logic -- like WordPerfect (and, indeed, Word) it was just important to take the time to learn what you needed all the time and remember where to find the stuff you didn't want or need to learn.

But far and away the most important thing about WordStar was the fact that you could do everything without moving your hands away from the home keys. (There were function keys and menus if you wanted them, but everything had a touch-typist-friendly shortcut.) A decent touch-typist using WordStar could therefore outperform a similarly-skilled person using absolutely any of the competition.

^PB-- bests, Tim ^PB ^KX

393

General Software Discussion / Re: Realtime backups

« on: September 04, 2011, 12:52 PM »

@joiwind: the junctions thread just stirred a bit more mud into the puddle. And the filters... well, apankrat explained on a thread here that exclusions are a bit of a conceptual issue...

@InstantFundas: thanks, that looks worth a look too!

394

General Software Discussion / Re: Realtime backups

« on: September 04, 2011, 06:15 AM »

The 12ghosts stuff looks very good but I'm struggling to find anything relating to things like OS support, updates and so forth. There are links to reviews that no longer exist, support fora don't seem to exist either... it looks like the program hasn't been updated since 2008. But I could be wrong...

Bvckup hasn't done anything else to annoy me, I'm pleased to say, but I was sort of hoping that apankrat might explain the issue with junctions...  

395

General Software Discussion / Re: Realtime backups

« on: September 03, 2011, 05:43 AM »

@oblivion - it's not "delta backups", it's "delta copying"

-apankrat (September 02, 2011, 01:21 PM)

  I am enlightened -- thanks!

Implemented on the relevant system last night. Seems to have done its thing as it should: looks good. My only gripe so far is that it produced three all-but-incomprehensible errors, each of which seem to relate to a failure to find a file in a folder that's actually a junction (on my Vista machine, user\documents\my pictures points to user\pictures, and there are two others, created automatically at user install time I think, for videos and music.)

It's early days, but this just MIGHT be the one.

Now, if Bvckup2 supports versioning, so I can keep the last three versions, say...

396

General Software Discussion / Re: Realtime backups

« on: September 02, 2011, 03:34 AM »

Just adding a couple of real-time choices, even though you say you've given up on them; Bvckup and AutoVer.

-Jibz (September 02, 2011, 01:22 AM)

Thanks!

Bvckup looks good (I'm always impressed by small yet functional  ) from the website, and because I don't have anything in realtime I can probably try it without backtracking, which is good news. Delta backups is interesting but has the potential for forcing detailed and careful testing of the restore process (as opposed to "normal" backup/synch restores which can be tested more easily and potentially without the program that ran the backup having to be available...) The website is SO minimal, though, that it's hard to be sure how much configuration will be required before I can unleash it. AutoVer also looks very capable so I'll try that if Bvckup doesn't cut it 

397

General Software Discussion / Re: Realtime backups

« on: September 01, 2011, 06:14 PM »

AJC ... I didn't get on with.

I like the concept. But when you're not just using it to back up *.doc in your Documents tree, life gets a little complicated.

I found that I didn't like the fact that although if it reports an error backing up a file and lets you remove it from the list to be processed, it doesn't allow you to "learn" not to bother with that file unless you explicitly go and specify it.

When you DO go and specify it, you have to take the program offline. When you do THAT, it doesn't revert to online after you click the OK button, and when you put it back online, it has to run a full sync again because it hasn't been watching things for a couple of minutes.

I gave up.

I've -- temporarily, at least -- given up with the realtime thing. I found a notification that the EaseUS backup program had some decent features and was now available in a free version, and it's the first program I've used that does what it's asked without bothering me. I've told it to run an incremental backup every day at 3am, to make the first backup of the week a full one, and I haven't seen so much of a squeak of an error message.

Of course, the test restore may still break it, and it's a way from where I started (with wanting realtime and trouble-free file synch to a backup space). But it's still a way better than where I was before -- if it works. I'll leave it be for a few days and try a restore.

If not, there's still several untried options!

398

General Software Discussion / Re: InfoQube & TreeSheets: Information managers of the future

« on: August 25, 2011, 07:11 AM »

All My Notes Organizer Pro looks like it's getting there.  But, Web clipping isn't yet streamlined, and the "Mind-Map view" is due to be implemented soon, i.e., it isn't in the full release yet...

-rjbull (August 24, 2011, 03:44 PM)

Looks good, though, and clearly under active development. (And there's a 35% discount on the full version right now, it appears.) I'm going to give it a try, so thanks for pointing it out!

399

Found Deals and Discounts / PowerTools Lite 2011

« on: August 23, 2011, 02:11 PM »

...now released as freeware.

http://www.macecraft...com/download/ptlite/

Not as capable as its (commercial) big brother -- jv16 PowerTools -- and also not quite as geared to the power user, this is still a halfway decent product (for those of us who don't condemn all registry cleaners as unnecessary junk, anyway  )

400

General Software Discussion / Re: InfoQube & TreeSheets: Information managers of the future

« on: August 21, 2011, 12:31 PM »

I have Treesheets and I love the look of it; I think it would be helpful for some things I need to do. But I have not had the time to just "play" with it, as suggested by Treesheets itself!

-J-Mac (August 21, 2011, 12:34 AM)

Very much where I am with it. It's difficult -- I play with PIMs in the hope of finding something that "just fits" and wind up with information gobbets all over the place and my first task is remembering where I stored the thing I just KNOW I made a note of.

Treesheets looks like a good way to build a knowledgebase, less of a good way to keep the odd bits of info that we know we'll want later. For that stuff, I think I rate CintaNotes about the best of the freebies out there.