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1126

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: The javascript SDK Fscript now support VBScript, Ruby, Python et Perl.

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 21, 2008, 09:46 AM »

1. Is it possible to stop FARR closing when a result is double-clicked?

What I'm wanting to do is have the ability to further define the search in the edit box by the item clicked on.

2. Can I get information from the found item into the EditBox?

• When I select the item's context menu and select "Jump to directory in EditBox" nothing happens 
• When I drag the item to the EditBox the correct "path" is entered BUT it's prefixed with a "/", which I don't want.

So what's happening is I've entered a search "tz .*" which matches stuff, I'd like to select one of the matches and "search" again with that.

• My Alias String is tz.
• The path for both of #2 items is something like "TZ Pacific/Auckland": I added the Alias String to the path in the hope that I could get that data into the edit box.

1127

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 21, 2008, 09:26 AM »

The displayed copy was compressed wrongly or too hard; the text is a little too hard / difficult to read.

-Curt (June 21, 2008, 05:45 AM)

I thought it was too sharpened? Though I didn't look closely.

I agree: it's getting better and better!!

1128

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 10:58 AM »

Menu is now an unordered list - took me a while to work out how to sort out the correct CSS tags though!

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

Does the trick though: much easier to select.

Pictures in main body text are all now frames

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

Do you think they present better with a frame? I do 

The top of the menu and text are better aligned (though still not perfect).

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

The pages with a heading look perfect to me!

Personally I'd rather look at pictures, find out about the kids and tecahers and their fmilies, hear them singing etc. than read long reports.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

I'd be putting the long reports on a different page, so that people can still read them if they want to.

I have an idea for an article to follow the journey of some friends who delivered minibuses to the school from the UK by driving across Spain, North Africa and the Sahara - it would give a sense of place and I think could be interesting.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

Sounds wonderful! Where can we join up??

I am thinking about how to indicate the current page on the menu - not sure what would be the easiest way. One thought was to put each menu entry into a separate div on the template page and then on each page override the background colour of the div in the stlyesheet by a local page CSS tag. I'll have a play. Anyone got a better solution?

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 10:43 AM)

Thats generally what I do, all depends on the style of page that you're following.

Following on from what you've done so far, I'd make the background something like a darkish grey: so highlight is black and current is a "lighter black".

1129

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Let's Bundle Our Orders For Software995 Toolset

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 10:32 AM »

Received a reply back from Software995:

Thank you for your inquiry.  We appreciate the offer.  However, at this point, we're not going to take you up on this.

Pity 

So, we're right to go then?

1130

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 08:34 AM »

Yes I am aware of the news and links page problems.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 08:10 AM)

Sorry: just thinking out loud...

I agree about the PDF version of the newsletter - unfortunately I am not editing or supplying the content. Hopefully it will get sorted.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 08:10 AM)

Always a problem: do you need to invest in a PDF converter? There is a deal about to happen with Software995??

The email form has validation - not sure what you mean. It only accepts an email address in valid format, and insists compulsory fields are filled.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 08:10 AM)

My mistake then, sorry. I didn't go all the way through it, just typed and exited the field. You have validation on Submit.

I agree about the menu - maybe I will change that altogether. It was done for speed and it needs to be better.

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 08:10 AM)

What you've done is great. It's generally the case, especially with time limits (as you mentioned in your original post), that you need to get the project over the line. Fine tuning can come later...

1131

General Software Discussion / Re: The Fifth Element: back to basic?

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 08:20 AM »

However, so far I am all in all impressed - again... Now, begin testing!

-Curt (June 20, 2008, 06:29 AM)

Be interested in your ongoing thoughts 

1132

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 07:57 AM »

Rats, second attempt...

Looking good Carol!! 

Had the time to leisurely wander through your site, and here's a few thoughts...

• The top of the menu-bar and the main content are not top aligned
• Have you thought of adding a border to your photos? I think it adds a little extra definition (depending on your colour scheme of course)
• Have you considered a colour difference between the "body" of the page and the border (that you don't use)? I think it adds more definition to your content.
• The News page is loooong. Have you considered a wee index at the top, maybe with a teaser?
• I'd suggest offering the newsletter in HTML as well as downloadable PDF. My general rule is that everything on the site should be able to be displayed in the browser.
• The NGO Links is a loooong page too. Sorted alphabetically. Is that best? It depends on what people are looking for: if it's a name then alpha is good, if it's a service, then maybe categorized is better?
• Your Email Form does not have any validation: though I like your tool tips!
• Have you thought about making the menu bar links more blocky? If you made it a DIV rather than a P then the "block" could hight
• Also on the menu bar, there is no visual indication of what page you are on; plus the link to the page you are on is still active.

Sorry if it's too pernickety (it's a fault of mine  ): I think it's looking really good.

Also, Nudone's comment about re-doing the banner when you can is perfect!

1133

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 05:59 AM »

Is the width fixed now Perry? I increased the margin for the content div and reduced its size by a couple of pixels. As I can't see it on my system I don't know if I have done enough!

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 04:16 AM)

  Not at work any more Carol, so I can't reproduce it: it's fine in FF and IEtab here 

Would you like my opinion on your banner text? I'd go back and redo it if it was me: it'd be the first thing I saw on the site each time I visited 

1134

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 20, 2008, 05:49 AM »

That's odd - which browser are you using. Here is what it looks like in two browsers on my system with the windows dragged really narrow:

Firefox:   (see attachment in previous post)   Internet Explorer:    (see attachment in previous post)

Unfortunately I can't access from the domain at the moment as the server seems to be down (I can't access any of my domains)

-Carol Haynes (June 20, 2008, 03:38 AM)

I agree it aint width: IE6 was the only browser they give us at work 

1135

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: First website for a client

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 19, 2008, 10:06 PM »

You must have fixed mouser's #1 as it's fine on my machine, but the width is causing an issue (my resolution [at work] is 1280x1024):

1136

Living Room / Re: Finally: Converting Units Sensibly

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 19, 2008, 09:52 PM »

I wonder how 1 female lion equals 10 mircowaves?
 (see attachment in previous post)

-Perry Mowbray (June 19, 2008, 09:30 PM)

Or this (unit is square inches)

-cranioscopical (June 19, 2008, 09:39 PM)

The paper I can figure out...  but their CDs are HUGE!

1137

Living Room / Re: Finally: Converting Units Sensibly

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 19, 2008, 09:30 PM »

I wonder how 1 female lion equals 10 mircowaves?

1138

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Let's Bundle Our Orders For Software995 Toolset

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 19, 2008, 11:47 AM »

@Perry: If you could inquire, please do so. I am very busy and would appreciate the assistance.

-tinjaw (June 19, 2008, 10:30 AM)

OK: Done... lets see what they say 

1139

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Let's Bundle Our Orders For Software995 Toolset

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 19, 2008, 10:29 AM »

(Besides, I also have had the Cute PDF driver installed for a while - very nice free PDF creator!)

-J-Mac (June 17, 2008, 12:54 PM)

We use Cute at work: and it's pretty bullet proof.

Nice suggestion mouser: will you tinjaw, or I don't mind?

1140

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Let's Bundle Our Orders For Software995 Toolset

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 17, 2008, 09:56 AM »

Either way, with all the "tools" you get, I mostly just used the PDF creator.

-J-Mac (May 11, 2008, 02:09 AM)

Not interested in jumping in Jim? With the multiple licence discount you'd be getting the whole shebang for the price of the PDF-Suite? 

1141

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Let's Bundle Our Orders For Software995 Toolset

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 17, 2008, 09:49 AM »

Me too tinjaw 

1142

General Software Discussion / Re: How do incremental backup programs work?

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 17, 2008, 06:19 AM »

I'll answer this one...

Sorry, just another question: I know some backup programs (that do incremental backup) allow you to see the files you've backed up. How does that work? Do they come up on Windows Explorer (as a virtual drive or something) or do they use a sort of "Backup Explorer", a proprietary application that works similarly to WE but can only be used for backups?

-jgpaiva (June 17, 2008, 05:47 AM)

It depends on how the actual software stores the backup.

For example, Backup4All gives you the option of zipping the files or not. You can browse the backups using the file system, though if you are keeping versions it can get a little confusing (better to use B4A). From memory SyncBack is similar.

FirstDefense though stores it's data in an archive file of some description that I've never tried to access through the filesystem.

Just to reinforce Justice's explanation:
Incremental refers to the Backup as a whole, not the individual files being backed up.

An incremental backup is a backup method where multiple backups are kept (not just the last one). These backups will be incremental if each original piece of backed up information is stored only once, and then successive backups only contain the information that changed since a previous backup.

-WikiPedia

1143

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: New Script FARR Plugin: Clock

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 17, 2008, 04:04 AM »

I think basically all FARR plugins have been released as open source -- though maybe not "formally" with a license.  it's a good idea to include a clear license in them saying so.  we should choose a default license and include it with all the samples, then others will follow suit.

-mouser (June 15, 2008, 09:54 AM)

Cool, sounds like it should be 

How about hosting the file? At the moment it's on GoGoGadetScott's site

FARR Plugin: Clock is now officially released using GPLv3. Do as you wish with it 

-gogogadgetscott (June 15, 2008, 10:49 AM)

I've just about finished adding TaiChiMaster's request for World Time Zones.

I was having an issue with RegEx's in the JavaScript though: they don't seem to be working. Is that FScript.dll or FARR?

1144

Living Room / Re: Father's Day Memory of Fathers and Computers.. Your stories?

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 16, 2008, 04:11 AM »

Our first computer was an Amiga 500 that came with a selection of Stuff (tm). I was retraining in technical college at the time so it was meant to serve my assignment's needs. It was also used by my kids.

The Amiga was a Floppy Disk based system (I did get a hard drive later, but not initially). One of the things the kids loved doing was painting with Deluxe Paint and making music with DMCS.

One day one of the kids said that Deluxe Paint had stopped working. After a little bit of investigation I discovered that my clever kids had managed of write enable the programme disk and overwrite the executable with an image file: clicking past the warnings  with "Of course I want to overwrite the file"!

The Amiga also introduced me to programming too: One of the AmigaBasic programmes in the package was a spelling programme that had been hacked by someone (at the shop I think). It would start up by speaking a welcome after you typed in your name. In those early days you had to tune your ears to the computer voice and it took weeks before we finally figured out that the computer responded to the name that was typed in: "Tiffany, what a nice name!" So, the first job was to edit the programme so that it responded to the name that was typed in!

1145

General Software Discussion / Re: Do we need a Linux and/or Mac child board?

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 15, 2008, 09:01 AM »

Not that I've visited any Linux or Mac forums (no need), but attracting and widening the DC userbase could produce greater integration and a greater diversity of thoughts, what would be detrimental is separate child boards where there was no cross fertilising. OS arguments would be super detrimental.

Adding DC's distinct flavour to multi-OS discussions would be great, and probably unique and maybe a draw card for new members.

This is definitely something to give a lot of thought to before going ahead and doing it.

-app103 (June 15, 2008, 06:01 AM)

too right!

1146

General Software Discussion / Re: Do we need a Linux and/or Mac child board?

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 15, 2008, 08:10 AM »

  Can we have both?

I'd think the general software discussions, Reviews, etc. would remain as is: i.e. mixed.

OS specific, such as Software/Coding Snacks, could be in their own area: i.e. separate.

That way, we can allow it to grow as it needs...

1147

Post New Requests Here / Re: Insert future or past date as text

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 15, 2008, 06:37 AM »

Also, FARR has a new Clock Plugin, which was pretty easy to add the ability to use some past or future time. Clock is not my plugin though, but I presume we can change our own copies?

Anyway, it's a nice FARR Plugin which means it's quite versatile.

1148

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Another Bits du Jour version

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 14, 2008, 09:04 AM »

Hm... is it just me, or is that pretty lame? Why wouldn't you just go to BitsDuJour? I hate the whole idea of "resellers" >_<

-f0dder (June 14, 2008, 08:16 AM)

Not dissimilar to showing the headlines of some News Site on your site though? Why wouldn't you go straight to the news site?

As jgpaiva said: it's all about greater audiences. It's putting the baited hook in front of people who may buy because they see it (rather than searching for it because they want it): and obviously the more people that see it, the more may bite!

1149

FARR Plugins and Aliases / Re: New Script FARR Plugin: Clock

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 14, 2008, 08:50 AM »

I just installed this plugin and it's quite neat, but thought that adding the ability to display future or past dates would be beneficial too.

Being javascript it's easy to change the plugin, so I added the following before the script formats the date:

Code: Javascript [Select]

1. var NewDate = new Date()            // Get current Date
2.  
3.   if (querynokeyword != "") {
4.     // Why is querynokeyword always just the first word??
5.     var arrayOfQuery = queryraw.split(" ");
6.        
7.     for (var i=1; i < arrayOfQuery.length; i++) {
8.       if (IsNumeric(arrayOfQuery[i]) == true ) {
9.         var ip = i + 1;
10.         if (ip < arrayOfQuery.length ) {
11.           switch(arrayOfQuery[ip].toLowerCase()) {
12.             case "year":
13.             case "yyyy": {// year
14.             NewDate.setFullYear(NewDate.getFullYear() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
15.             break;
16.             }
17.             case "quarter":
18.             case "q": { // quarter
19.             NewDate.setMonth(NewDate.getMonth() + (parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i])*3));
20.             break;
21.             }
22.             case "month":
23.             case "m": { // month
24.             NewDate.setMonth(NewDate.getMonth() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
25.             break;
26.             }
27.             case "day":
28.             case "y": // day of year
29.             case "d": // day
30.             case "w": { // weekday
31.             NewDate.setDate(NewDate.getDate() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
32.             break;
33.             }
34.             case "week":
35.             case "ww": { // week of year
36.             NewDate.setDate(NewDate.getDate() + (parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i])*7));
37.             break;
38.             }
39.             case "hour":
40.             case "h": { // hour
41.             NewDate.setHours(NewDate.getHours() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
42.             break;
43.             }
44.             case "minute":
45.             case "n": { // minute
46.             NewDate.setMinutes(NewDate.getMinutes() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
47.             break;
48.             }
49.             case "second":
50.             case "s": { // second
51.             NewDate.setSeconds(NewDate.getSeconds() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
52.             break;
53.             }
54.             case "milliseconds":
55.             case "ms": { // second
56.             NewDate.setMilliseconds(NewDate.getMilliseconds() + parseFloat( arrayOfQuery[i]));
57.             break;
58.             }            
59.           }
60.         }
61.       }
62.     }
63.   }

Works fine, but it raised some questions about Licensing: There was not a Licence defined in the file or on his website, so I'm not sure if I should have done that or not?

I wonder if we:

• Should ensure that all Plugins have some sort of Licence attached to them?
• Should have an area for Open Source plugins, especially the FScript variety, as they are so easy to change?

  What do people think?

1150

General Software Discussion / Re: Harvest the Web with OutWit (Firefox)

« Last post by Perry Mowbray on June 13, 2008, 07:57 AM »

Thanks Curt: this looks interesting. Are you using it?

I'm having a play/try at the moment...