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Topics - mouser [ switch to compact view ]

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76
Developer's Corner / Elevator Saga - Programming Game/Challenge
« on: April 08, 2020, 10:17 PM »
This is a very cool programming game/challenge, which deals with the absolutely fascinating problem of optimal elevator scheduling:

http://play.elevatorsaga.com/

es_screenshot.png

77
Mini Newsletter for Mar 24, 2020
"Codename: Coronavirus Lockdown"




1. Newsletter Editorial

Greetings all.  As you know, the entire planet is currently dealing with a serious crisis -- a worldwide virus pandemic that is overloading hospitals and causing severe damage to entire economies.

I'm writing to you from Champaign, Illinois, in the United States, which has only just begun to see cases reported.  We are under a state-wide stay-at-home order, with more of the country expected to follow suit soon.  Many other countries are further along in the trajectory of infection and are struggling to figure out how to handle it.

I have been finding it hard lately to focused on being positive and productive.  I find myself feeling overloaded and anxious.  I don't know if any of you are having the same problem.

I do know that in times like these, there is some value in being able to share our thoughts, encourage each other, and maintain some sense of normality and community.

With that goal in mind, I thought I would send out a short newsletter sooner rather than later.

For the overwhelming majority of you, this email/newsletter will be of no interest to you, and you can safely stop reading now; we're not asking for any money, nor do we have any money to give out.

However, for any of you who have a little room in your life right now, who would benefit from some positive distraction, I'd like to invite you to make yourself at home on our forum and share a bit of your life with us.  We are a friendly bunch.

-jesse (mouser)
 Champaign, IL, USA
 
 
2. Mouser's Software Updates and Discussions

I've released a couple of very minor updates to my software since the last newsletter in January, plus a MAJOR alpha-version update to one of them, and a new small Android app.




3. Feel Good Favorites

I thought this would be a good occasion to highlight some of the longest running, feel good threads on our forum, and invite you to post in them.




4. Other recent threads on our forum

Just a few recent threads on our forum.


78
I know a lot of people are nervous and uncertain.. Fear of losing jobs, health, investments.

Let's have a happy thread where we can share reassuring tips, projects, and mental strategies to stay sane and calm in this crazy time.

No rumors or panic in this thread, just strategies for staying sane and coping with the stress.

79
Clipboard Help+Spell / Remind me of feature requests please
« on: March 12, 2020, 01:07 AM »
I've been working like mad on the new extended clipboard format features for CHS; now would be a good time to remind me of older feature requests I've overlooked.

80
Someone asked me about how FARR could be used to quickly translate words that you might encounter while reading text in any app.
Here's a two step example:

1. Create an alias in FARR to open google translate on the specified text.  Here I've created a new alias in my MyAliases group, that triggers on "tr [word_or_phrase]":
Screenshot - 3_5_2020 , 12_30_45 PM.png

With that you can bring up farr at any time and type something like: tr computer and hit enter, to open google translate showing the translation.
You can add more actions in that alias to allow you to do other things like look up the definition of the word, etc.

2. Now to make it easier to use, create a custom FARR hotkey that when triggered will copy the highlighted text in whatever app you are using and launch FARR with the tr keyword specified, ready to trigger:
Screenshot - 3_5_2020 , 12_33_30 PM.png

Now you can just select the text in any app and hit the hotkey.

Note that if you knew you only wanted one action ever on that hotkey you could save yourself from having to hit enter by adding a \n at the end of the "Text for Search Edit Box".



You might also try $$u1 instead of $$1 if you need the text urlencoded for a web page.

81
Amazon Pay, which we allow people to use to buy commercial licenses for our software from our commercial license page, has decided to block us and refuse to process payments to us.
They have said it is related to us looking like a charity, but won't elaborate or tell us what we could do to fix the problem.
So it goes.  :down:

82
Android Apps / Android App: Crave Negotiator - v1 - Feb 28, 2020
« on: February 28, 2020, 03:31 AM »
"Crave Negotiator" is a bare bones minimalist application to help you resist impulse snacking.   It should run nicely on any screen size.

The Basic Idea: The app tries to get you to accept some small delays in succumbing to cravings for a snack, in hopes that you will be able to overcome a momentary weakness.

  • When you push the button to trigger snack mode, you will then be prompted through a sequence (configurable number) of stages where you must wait a small amount of time (just a few minutes), after which you will need to affirmatively confirm that you wish to keep waiting for your snack time.
  • If at any point you fail to confirm a prompt, OR simply press the cancel button while waiting, the snack will be canceled.
  • Psychologically, the hope is that the countdown and small duration will give you the willpower to accept a very small delay in satisfying a craving for a snack.  And that with this brief window of waiting, the peak moment of intense craving will pass.


If anyone wants to try it:

It will eventually be on google play store.

Screenshot - 2_28_2020 , 3_26_11 AM_ver005.png

83
Clipboard Help+Spell (CHS) is finally getting support for storing extended clipboard data.. This thread is for discussing that feature..

It can now save clips with multiple data formats in the database and restore them properly.  It has a whole set of features and options to support this, so that you can see exactly what's being saved, and have fine or coarse grain control over ignore certain formats, etc.

chsa1.png
chsa2.png
chsa3.png
cha4.png
chsa5.png


DOWNLOAD Alpha Version:
https://www.donation...AndSpellPortable.zip

84
Living Room / Roller Coaster planet of horrors
« on: January 28, 2020, 10:32 AM »
Some creativity on display here..

85
Long article talking about the history of Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser engine.. It's internal design and why it was eventually abandoned in favor of Google's chrome engine.

Starting now, Microsoft will roll out their new Chromium-based Edge browser to their millions of Windows 10 users. And this will also mark the end of an era. The era of the Trident-Engine.


86
Flash Games and 2XL Simulator / Rewriting 2xl simulator in html5
« on: January 26, 2020, 01:45 AM »
It looks like html5 may have enough audio seeking to make moving from flash to html5 native a real possibility.
Anyone interested in working with me to convert the 2xl simulator to html5/javascript?


87
Android Apps / Android intermittent fasting apps
« on: January 23, 2020, 06:06 AM »
So I've written 3 android narrowly focused intermittent fasting apps of different styles..
And yet I'm interested in exploring more experimental interesting ideas.. If anyone is into this sort of thing and can think of any novel ideas for an app, let me know.

88
Automatic Screenshotter / Automatic Screenshotter reviews
« on: January 21, 2020, 07:22 PM »

89
Ars Technica reports that routers running the alternative router firmware Tomato are under attack.
It looks like the attack is just looking for default passwords, so as long as you don't have default/weak passwords I think you will be ok.

Internet routers running Tomato are under attack by notorious crime gang.  The Muhstik botnet has targeted other IoT devices. Now it's attacking Tomato routers.


90
Developer's Corner / Any coders here on patreon?
« on: January 20, 2020, 12:19 AM »
If you're a programmer who hangs out here and you have a patreon account where you are asking people to support your coding, post a link here so those who want to support you can find your account easily.  :Thmbsup:

91
Super-sized Newsletter for Jan 12, 2020
"Codename: Twenty Twenty"




1. Newsletter Editorial

Greetings and welcome to another DonationCoder newsletter.  It's actually been a little over a year since the last newsletter.  In the last newsletter I reported on the results of our 2018 fundraiser, and we were celebrating the new website.  This last year has been a little quieter -- with the new website working great, and no justification for having another fundraiser.  However, I do have the results of our latest NANY event to report, lots of threads on the forum to highlight, and some new DonationCoder applications and updates to talk about.  Let's get started.



2. NANY 2020 - New Apps for the New Year

For the last 12 years on the DonationCoder site we have run a friendly event called "NANY" (New Apps for the New Year), where we invite forum visitors to help us celebrate the new year by releasing a new freeware program on the first day of the new year.  We typically get a variety of entries -- some are genuinely useful tools designed to be shared widely, and some are programming exercises for new users.  There's no winners or losers; all participants receive a free and fancy DonationCoder NANY Mug.  The 2020 entries are in and we've posted a long wrap-up describing them.




3. Mouser's Software Updates and Discussions

I've uploaded some updates to many of my large applications since the last newsletter, and released some new apps as well.




4. Threads about DonationCoder Apps

I've collected here a number of threads discussing questions, problems and feature requests on the forum for many of my applications.




5. Member Projects

We love to keep up with projects that our members are working on, and hearing what our forum members think of software they use.  If you're working on something interesting -- let us know!




6. Fun, Humor, Games, and Interesting Discoveries on the Web

Here's a collection of some interesting web discoveries, humorous videos, and games on the forum.




7. Developer's Corner

This section highlights some discussions that might be relevant for not just coders and developers, but also people interested in entrepreneurial issues.




8. Software Discussions

Just a roundup of some threads on our forum discussion specific programs, or which programs people prefer for performing specific tasks.




9. User-to-user Questions

A collection of threads where people are asking for assistance or advice, or just sharing their thoughts.  I've also thrown in some DonationCoder website related discussions into this section at the end.



92
ghacks reports firefox just pushed out an important Firefox web browser fix:
https://www.ghacks.n...-actively-exploited/

93
You can read about all the entires in NANY 2020 event in the official write-up here:
https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=49324.0

94
N.A.N.Y. 2020 / NANY 2020 Wrap-up
« on: January 01, 2020, 04:18 PM »
Since 2007 we have held an annual event that we call NANY (New Apps for the New Year), where we ask the coders who hang out on DonationCoder to create some new piece of free software and share it with the world on January 1st of the new year.

NANY is one of the most fun things we do on this site, and it's one of the few times we can all play together.  There are no winners or losers, it's simply a celebration of programming and creating new software and sharing it with the world.  You can target any operating system (desktop or mobile) or even make a web-based tool.  It can be a game, utility, large application, whatever.  DC takes makes no claim on your software, it's just an event to encourage you to share a creation with others.  Best of all, everyone who participates gets a free commemorative coffee mug.

Thank you everyone who participated for a wonderful event!!! We had some really interesting entries this year.  Some of the entries are polished professional caliber apps, and many are just hobby creations not quite ready for public use.  Read on for the full list..



Mousers Media Browser v2 by mouser
There are lots of utilities for browsing collections of images/photos.  Mouser's Media Browser is one such tool, but one with a very unique and cool feature.  In addition to browsing the recursive contents of directories, MMB scans your files and creates a virtual date hierarchy, organized by year, date, and optionally day of the month.  This lets you scan a huge collection of photos and easily explore them by date.  MMB is very flexible in how the images are displayed, and comes with some very easy to use filters based on filename patterns and file ages.  Watch the video for a look at how it works..
NANY_mmb.png
Youtube video: https://youtu.be/eOkTmL8aSAg



DiscussionList (Android App) by mouser
DiscussionList is an android app that allows you to manage and contemplate a large collection of questions to inspire meaningful discussions.  I use it with my wife when we go on walks, to spur conversation and have meaningful discussions.  It comes with a large collection of questions, but you can add your own and download additional sets.  View questions in a distraction-free interface or widget.  Watch the video for a look at how it works..
NANY_dlist.png
Youtube video: https://youtu.be/QmCkyeEghnc


ISMONISM - search Start Menu (or any folder) for 'missing' entries by Winkie
This is a super-clever little utility, which can scan a set of user-configurable folders, looking for executables that do not have an entry in your Windows Start Menu.  It has features to search the web for discovered executables, or even create new shortcuts to them in your own Start Menu sub-folder.  This utility can be extremely useful for creating start menu entries for portable files, for discovering orphaned programs left after an uninstall, or just exploring and discovering unexpected executables that are part of some installation.  Very very cool.
NANY_isonism.png


Systemus by BGM
The author, BGM, describes Systemus as follows: "I wrote this program because I often have to set up computers for other people, or I have to do maintenance or fixes.  It seems I always end up using a whole bunch of programs to do things - a folder full of tools, and I can't remember or find the ones I want, sometimes.  With Systemus, I have a single program that I can use as a launcher.  It also tells me the most basic system information that I want, such as ipaddress and mac address, Windows version and what model of computer I'm working on."
NANY_Systemus.png


Filtration: A Task Manager by camerb
A program which can be used to monitor processes and tasks to see what might be bogging down your system, with some clever filtering abilities. Breaks down the HDD/SSD utilization into four categories: Read/Write, and Operation Count as well as an amount of data Tranferred (Transfer Count). This can help you get a quick understanding of whether or not the pesky culprit process is making lots of little read/write operations, or if the culprit is making one or two large transfers that involve large files.
NANY_filtration-task-mgr-screenshot.png


KeepWatch system monitor by mat2016
KeepWatch displays standard statistics: CPU Busy %, CPU Processes, RAM, Swap Memory, Fixed and Removable Drives, Disk Read/Write. It can be set to monitor your local weather. It also monitors every drive in your system for file read/write/delete activity. If it detects a large number of file changes per minute, it will display a message and optionally send users an email or a text message. If the user is going to be away for a while, they can set the program to Away mode and in additional to sending an email it will shutdown the computer.
NANY_keepwatch.png


1 Key Browsing by mat2016
Allows many common Firefox and Chrome browser functions to be performed with only single letter commands.
NANY_1keybrowse.png


Mass JSON Editor by wraith808
This is a revamp of a NANY 2020 entry, Mass JSON Viewer.  In addition to browsing a directory and loading/validating JSON files that exist there, this one allows you to actually edit the JSON files, and save them as a new file or to the same file.
NANY_MassJSONEditor.png


sDictionary by skwire
Minimalist desktop dictionary lookup app that retrieves definitions from Merriam-Webster online disctionary.
NANY_sdict.png


Ducky (A Simple Dock) by SwanKnight
A simple desktop dock. Drag and drop any executable or shortcut on the main window and it will be added as a button which you can use to launch it later.
NANY_ducky.png


Random Sounds App by publicdomain
Simple desktop application created to play random sounds at an interval (which can even be randomized!) from a specified directory.
NANY_RandomSoundsApp_v0-2-0.png


IrfanView Panorama (IVP) by lanux128
A front end for the image viewer IrfanView's 'Create Panorama image' feature to allow the user to add, sort or remove the image files that the user wants to stitch together before invoking the feature.
NANY_IrfanViewPanorama.png


Xaya Name Utility by Renegade
Facilitates transferring and registering Xaya Names in a Xaya wallet in bulk, removing much of the tedium of the process.
NANY_xaya.png


Portable Application Updater by hamradio
A utility that let's you check for updates to portable software, so that you can invoke update checks and have the new versions downloaded and installed.
NANY_portableupdate.png


Solar Date Calculator by dmytron
Simple proof-of-concept utility that reports the number of days between two dates, as experienced on different planets.
NANY_solardate.png


Simple Budget by relipse
This is a simple web app based upon Dr. Darryl Sturghill's idea of keeping track of a monthly budget using different categories, allotments, and amount spent.  It is a mobile first web application that allows a user to create expenses and add them to the Spent category, to allow the user to easily see what is Left Over at the end of the month, at which time the remainder can be carried over to the next month.
NANY_Ninject Budget.png


Polyglot Zobrist Key Generator by shinkarom
This is a web application with a singular purpose - to allow the user to encode a Zobrist hash from a FEN chess opening position.  This might be useful if writing a chess engine.
NANY_PolyglotZobrist.png


Chat LAN Client by KodeZwerg
A proof-of-concept desktop application that allows you to chat with others on your LAN.
NANY_chat.png


Apps You Forgot by anandcoral
Apps (Programs) You Forgot, shows you the program (exe) files which are in your program folder but are NOT in your start menu (similar to ISMONISM above). It also shows programs which you are not using for a long time i.e. you forgot about them
NANY_appsforgot.png


quick generator peek by Tuxman
Chrome extension. Some software, like certain HTML editors and weblog software like WordPress, adds an information to your site's source code that says which software was used to generate it. This Chrome extension will read this information and display it as a pop-up.


Unping all the links by Tuxman
Chrome extension that removes hyperlink trackers right from the HTML code.


birdcries by Tuxman
Web service. Replace twitter.com in any Twitter status link by birdcries.net to get a less shitty read-only view of the tweet which is faster and will respect your privacy.


scss-loop-template-processor by Ath
Commandline tool for developers using css preprocessor; Process a template with a set of numeric-postfixed constants to replace @for loops by @each loops intended as scss preprocessing, to reduce the number of generated css classes.

95
Official Announcements / DonationCoder financial summary year 2019
« on: January 01, 2020, 12:13 PM »
In case folks are interested, here are some details from 2019, posted without comment:

Total incoming money in 2019: $13,644 (includes donations and commercial licenses, and money sent to specific members)
Server hosting costs for 2019: $4,800

Not included: Smaller miscellaneous costs of probably somewhere in the $1k-$2k range (paid extensions for joomla/wordpress, nany mugs, code signing certificate, domain registrations, donations made to open source software we use, money cashed out by members or sent to dc volunteers, etc.).

Not posting to get any comments, it is what it is, just thought I'd share for those that are curious.

96
Living Room / Happy New Year 2020 -- Soon!
« on: December 31, 2019, 05:09 PM »
It's New Years Eve here.. Wishing everyone an exciting and happy new year!  :-* :-* :-*

97
Android Apps / DiscussionList for android
« on: December 30, 2019, 05:28 PM »
This app was created as part of NANY 2020; for now you can find the discussion thread in that section of the forum here:
https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=48838.0

dlist.png

Or more information and download from the official web page: https://www.donation...-apps/discussionlist

Watch a video overview:

98
Spent a day last week playing around with python, networkx (python lib), and graphviz (language neutral), for drawing and laying out graphs.

My boardgaming buddy and I are huge fans of the pandemic series of board games.  We played recently Rising Tide, a spinoff with a very confusing looking board.  I decided to see if a more traditional node-edge graph would help make sense of the layout, and thought it was a good excuse to get some familiarity with writing code to visualize graphs, etc.

Here's the original board:
rtidereal.png

Here's the graph:
rtidesmall.png

Fun stuff.. Anyone else played with graphviz or networkx?

ps1.
There is a nice windows build of Python3 which is completely portable -- WinPython.  I had good luck with that.
ps2.
I'm not a big fan of Rising Tide, I think the other spinoffs are much better.

99
Official Announcements / Upgrading forum Dec 28, 2019
« on: December 28, 2019, 02:24 PM »
I'm upgrading the forum.. expect some oddities while I do..

100
Living Room / Merry Christmas to All
« on: December 25, 2019, 05:07 AM »
Merry Christmas to all who share their time with us here.  :Thmbsup:

CodyXmas2.png



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