Messages

251

Living Room / Re: Anyone else using Ramdisk in Windows 7?

« on: August 26, 2011, 06:33 AM »

A pagefiles is where the files go when Windows decides they're not needed in RAM or when your ram is full and things need to be swapped out. Putting them back in ram is working against the OS and surely will mean the right information won't go in RAM making your computer slower? Ah I'm too slow.

http://lifehacker.co...-shouldnt-disable-it

252

Living Room / Re: Firefox fixes the version number problem

« on: August 25, 2011, 03:44 AM »

I have been searching for things like "chrome tab auto recover crash" and "chrome tab auto reload" but I can't find any other experiences either way that explain what's going on. So all I can tell you is that I suspect it's an extension you might have installed that periodically checks/reloads tabs, if it isn't crashing. Because I haven't seen tabs appearing to refresh itself and I use chrome for about 3 hours every day.

253

General Software Discussion / Re: Rightnote, commercial alternative to abandonware Keynote

« on: August 23, 2011, 10:04 AM »

Tried ResophNotes? I like it a lot.

254

Living Room / Re: Firefox fixes the version number problem

« on: August 22, 2011, 12:18 PM »

I've never seen this, only a prompt that asks me to restart chrome because its been a while and theres an update waiting to be installed.

255

DonationCoder.com Newsletters / Re: --> Newsletter for August 21st, 2011 - "What's New With You?!"

« on: August 22, 2011, 09:46 AM »

Didn't see the name of the author in the email, I had to click through here to find out it was you Stephen! Don't be shy! Nice job.

256

Coding Snacks / Desktop Background focus/unfocus tsr

« on: August 22, 2011, 09:23 AM »

Silly request (or is it?). I like to keep my pc distraction free but I also love interesting backgrounds. When focusing on the app I prefer not to be distracted by a detailed background so I took a nice background and blurred it a bit. You can download the original and blurry version. I'm very very happy with the result, so I was wondering if there is a tool that uses the gpu to blur the background when the desktop is not active, but fades the background into focus when there is no windows in the way. Too much for autohotkey I'm afraid so I can't do it. Apparently the effect on the windows theme is called Aero Blur.

Would make a nice NANY app or donationware tool?

257

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Windows management script

« on: August 18, 2011, 06:19 AM »

change

#Q::Run,shutdown -s -t 5

to

#Q::
{
Run,shutdown -s -t 30
Msgbox, 1,,Computer is shutting down in 30 seconds. Press cancel to abort.,30
IfMsgBox, Cancel
  Run,shutdown -a
}

258

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Windows management script

« on: August 18, 2011, 03:30 AM »

Change the shutdown line to:

#Q::Shutdown, 8

That will definitely work because I lifted it straight from the AHK help file

259

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Windows management script

« on: August 17, 2011, 08:16 AM »

Also you can find better shutdown / hibernate code here, than what I used (just found out):
http://www.autohotke...ommands/Shutdown.htm

260

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Windows management script

« on: August 17, 2011, 08:10 AM »

If you can find out a windows 7 commandline sleep command that will help, there is a lot of discussion but I found no answers, apart from using a third party tool. Maybe someone else can bolt on right click title bar for you.

Few pointers:
To do the Minimize other windows you have to WinGet the pid of the active window,  then WinMinimizeAll, then WinRestore the current window. If you don't like that your current window minimizes then restores when you do this, you could Loop all visible windows and minimize all except the active one - however I've never been able to write code to list all current windows. Instead I had to log all windows as they became active, which means this route won't minimize windows that have not been active since the script started.

261

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Windows management script

« on: August 17, 2011, 07:10 AM »

This is a start. Untested code follows:

Code: Autohotkey [Select]

1. #NoEnv
2. SendMode Input
3. SetWorkingDir %A_ScriptDir%
4. <^>!^F10::WinMinimize, A
5. <^>!^F11::WinRestore, A
6. <^>!^F12::WinMaximize, A
7. ^Q::WinClose, A
8. #Q::Run,shutdown -s -t 5
9. #H::Run,rundll32 powrprof.dll`,SetSuspendState Hibernate

Can't find a working command for sleep. Also, note I have an AltGR key instead of a right alt key. Not sure if this makes a difference, but AutoHotkey help seems to think it's important to make the distinction.

262

General Software Discussion / Re: Implement features that are known to be loved in other programs, on your own

« on: August 17, 2011, 04:28 AM »

Should the OS not implement smooth scroll instead of the application? Perhaps it's not up to the app dev to provide functionality that's the OS'es to fix. Same goes for shortcuts.

263

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... a way to kill tabs

« on: August 17, 2011, 04:25 AM »

#1
Replace <php? echo $note ?>
with
<?php echo $note; ?>

#2
if you replace it with <?php echo "";?> are the tabs still there?

264

Living Room / Firefox fixes the version number problem

« on: August 16, 2011, 07:51 AM »

Firefox is working hard to just have one version, the current one. Firefox 9 or 10 will move the version number from the about window to Help > Troubleshoot.

When a user opens the About window for Firefox, the window should say something like "Firefox checked for updates 20 minutes ago, you are running the latest release."

It is important to say when the last check happened and ideally to do the check when the dialog is launched so that time is very near and to drop the version and simply tell them they're on the latest or not.

from mozilla.dev.usability

You will probably not agree but I think this is a good change. It will help supporting Firefox because there will just be two versions that matter: the up to date version, and the old version (which is any older version).
This simplifies any solution and troubleshooting, it either works in the current version, or Firefox will update - if it's connected to the internet. Which means eventually, Firefox is always up to date and there will no old versions and therefore no issues.

Probably the biggest obstacle to getting everyone to keep autoupdate on is the bundling of crap with installers, as we discussed before.

265

Developer's Corner / Re: Next step up from Autohotkey

« on: August 12, 2011, 04:06 AM »

Thanks for all the comments so far. Will look at all suggestions, was interested to try out AutoIt to see how it compares, and also python as it will be useful for both desktop clients and web. 

The thing I don't understand about .NET is though (and I had the same trying to wrap my head around asp.net) How does anyone remember all the .net imports,  when to use them, and what libraries are required when you want to achieve certain functionality. Say you want to do x (run a command line program and capture its output or whatever trivial thing), how do you go about finding the required imports etc.. There's too many of them.

266

Developer's Corner / Next step up from Autohotkey

« on: August 11, 2011, 05:30 AM »

I like a practical approach of autohotkey, but once I started doing more advanced things such as robust gui apps, I noticed that the community code is a bit underdocumented and fragile. Quickly it seems, one has to deal with DLLCalls, com objects and resort to code such as:

Code: Text [Select]

1. VarSetCapacity( HexClr,14,0 ), SClr := DllCall( "GetSysColor", UInt,DisplayElement )
2. A_Index & 1 ? ( _ := A_LoopField ) : ( %_% := A_LoopField )
3. DllCall( NumGet( NumGet( _ppunk+0 )+4*0 ), UInt,_ppunk, UInt,_pIWEB, UIntP,_ppwb )

.. that to me seems like coding against the limits of the language. However I like the fact that a lot of functionality comes with the language and that you are not dealing with putting dozens of lines of code in place just in order to put a notification up for example.

What do people recommend as the natural next step up from AHK without sacrificing too much of the 'high level programming' attitutde? Or is there nothing out there that is an intermediate step between this and .net for example.

267

N.A.N.Y. 2012 / Re: N.A.N.Y. 2012 Brainstorming, Suggestions, General Discussion

« on: August 11, 2011, 04:28 AM »

yeah and instead of z: you can use * and it will pick the last available drive letter.

268

Living Room / Re: UK Riots: Have you been affected?

« on: August 10, 2011, 09:41 AM »

http://photoshoplooter.tumblr.com/

269

N.A.N.Y. 2012 / Re: N.A.N.Y. 2012 Brainstorming, Suggestions, General Discussion

« on: August 10, 2011, 08:14 AM »

Had another idea/need for a tool, wonder what you guys think of this:

Every time your computer reboots, it searches for the mapped shared folders. This will slow down the boot process enormously, especially if the other computers are turned off. However, manually mounting shares is a pain. You are able to prevent this delay using my nany program. It will remember a list of network shares that get mapped to drive letters when  the program is started, with an option to start this program at boot.

edit: I've just been told Windows 7 startup is not delayed anymore because of this.

270

Living Room / Re: UK Riots: Have you been affected?

« on: August 09, 2011, 05:52 PM »

Loads of talk here if you interested:
http://www.nuskoolbr...hp?f=14&t=149940

271

Developer's Corner / Re: Executing Remote Program

« on: August 09, 2011, 09:31 AM »

You don't need a program, you need SSH it already exists.

272

N.A.N.Y. 2012 / Re: N.A.N.Y. 2012 Brainstorming, Suggestions, General Discussion

« on: August 08, 2011, 08:05 AM »

Anyone interested in a program that would mark documents/files as templates then easily allow you to create new documents from these templates? It's more a interface gimmick than anything, but I noticed I never use the context menu > new menu and I also never reuse documents (always start from scratch) but it would be much more productive if I could base files off other files and have a nice list of templates to choose from.

Example:
New "Timesheet"
New "todo list"
New "meeting report"

etc.

273

Living Room / How to Build a 'Paywall' That Doesn't Break the Web

« on: August 04, 2011, 06:10 AM »

Thought it would be interesting to people on this forum that one of the directions publishing seems to try out is 'DonationPublishing':

Sharing will turn off the nag wall for 1 year, or until you clear your browser cache, view the article in a different browser or on a different computer. Donating some money lets you register an account - if you're logged in, the nag wall never appears. You also get some extra features on the site if you have an account.
Like the New York Times paywall, people who poke around in the source code should be able to figure out how to turn it off without interacting with it at all. For the adventurous, there are also a couple of easter eggs that defeat the paywall in amusing ways (but I'm not giving them away here).
By doing all this, we turn the paywall into a game instead of an obligation, because what we're really after is engagement, not your money.

Example story with paywall
Link: The Atlantic, via Hacker News

274

Post New Requests Here / Work Estimating Tool

« on: August 04, 2011, 04:17 AM »

I'm looking for a webservice or free utility to make time estimates for software development. My typical estimate consists of a series of tasks (each with a description, units, hours per unit) grouped (with subtotals in hours) + buffer option in percentage, resulting in a total hours + effective time (total hours spread over a schedule, for example 6 hours per day 3 days per week). Not sure if this breakdown is common.

Image explains more than a thousand words..


I do not need any billing functionality. Might make a good coding snack, or there might be something out there that's more tailed than Excel and save me time. Optional features:  it could possibly collect all the estimates I've made in the past grouped by client and if they could be signed off via email then it would be completely perfect.

275

Living Room / Re: Why My Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone

« on: August 02, 2011, 10:07 AM »