Recent Posts

1226

General Software Discussion / HotKeyP updated to 4.6, 2011-07-30: first update since 2008

« Last post by rjbull on August 14, 2011, 10:55 AM »

The hotkey program HotKeyP has been updated to 4.6, first update since 2008:

HotKeyP
-------
4.6 (2011-07-30)
- command "Desktop resolution" has optional parameter monitor number
- command "Control panel" without parameters opens the control panels folder
- command "Macro" can have parameters \media_select, \launch_app1, \launch_app2
- option to use hook only for special system shortcuts (e.g. Win+E, Win+D, Ctrl+Esc, Alt+Tab, ...)

fixed bugs:
- multimedia keys on some keyboards did not work (e.g. Genius USB keyboards)
- shift sometimes remained pressed after the macro
- if launched application required admin. rights, its exe file name was passed as the first parameter

1227

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

« Last post by rjbull on August 14, 2011, 10:42 AM »

You might enjoy working with Creative BASIC

-mrainey (August 11, 2011, 08:06 PM)

@mrainey: do you have any comments on Creative BASIC versus FreeBASIC (free, Windows, Linux & DOS) and PureBasic (79 euros, but that covers all future updates and Amiga, Linux Windows and MacOS X)?

1228

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

« Last post by rjbull on August 14, 2011, 10:28 AM »

@rjbull: Thanks for the link to Dan Jones' comment on the historical relevance of "The peasants' revolt of 1381".  [...]
Despite all the technological trimmings we surround ourselves with, the thin veneer of civilisation is still just that - a thin veneer. Tear it off, and it's not a very pretty sight.

-IainB (August 12, 2011, 04:30 PM)

I just remembered Lord of the Flies, a famous fictional account of that very thing.

I thought Dan Jones' remark about "disenfranchised young people who have never known discipline" was telling: kids failed both by their parents and by the rich and powerful who run the UK.

1229

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA (Concept Follow through): Small program that Show/Hides Desktop Stuff +

« Last post by rjbull on August 12, 2011, 04:34 PM »

Hide and Show Desktop Icons are functions built into the hotkey program HotKeyz, but I don't think it solves the Menu Bar problem.

1230

General Software Discussion / Re: File system monitoring utilities?

« Last post by rjbull on August 12, 2011, 03:44 PM »

superboyac,

Did you get an acceptable solution for this?

Watch 4 Folder looks like it will do your monitoring, but I'm not sure it will make a new log file each day.  If I read the doc right, it puts everything into a single log.

1231

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

« Last post by rjbull on August 12, 2011, 03:16 PM »

1780's?  Newbies.  Try reading Summer of blood: The peasants' revolt of 1381 by Dan Jones.

-rjbull (August 10, 2011, 04:08 PM)

Sounds like an interesting read

-tomos (August 11, 2011, 05:03 AM)

Well, well.  I was going to try and draw a few parallels, but the author himself has done it for me 

• A new peasants' revolt, with BlackBerry in hand, by Dan Jones, 11 Aug 2011
• Dan Jones' Summer of Blood Web site

Interesting remarks on the constancy down the centuries of the nature of grievance-inspired riots and how they devolve into anarchic violent robbery.

I haven't liked the riots, but also dislike the spectacle of MPs lining up to condemn them.  It looks too much like the rich and powerful looking after themselves.  The basic salary for entry-level back-bench lobby-fodder (who "always vote at their party's call, and never think of thinking for themselves at all") is £65,000, which is well into the fat-cat zone, plus the most feather-bedded pension scheme in Britain.  They've been happy to cut everything and put thousands, perhaps millions, out of work, but haven't reduced what they pay themselves out of our pockets by one iota.  And as soon as Cameron came to power on a "cut everything to balance the budget" ticket, he started a new war front in Libya before we're even shot of the old one in Afghanistan.

Government - make jobs, not war...

1232

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Edit Text Anywhere with Your Favorite Editor [Freeware]

« Last post by rjbull on August 11, 2011, 03:10 PM »

What keeps me from using a full fledged editor with spell check and yadda yadda is the word wrap.  If I put in carriage returns it's going to be messed up in the board post.  Better to use something designed for forum posting like BBCEditor. It's suprising how few(or maybe I just haven't sampled enough apps) free editors have spell check and easy to enable/disable word wrap, not to mention forum tags.

-MilesAhead (August 09, 2011, 06:39 PM)

The underrated Crimson Editor has both spell check and essy word-wrap, plus a column mode, multiple level backup/redo and lots of other features, though not forum tags.  Most people nowadays will go for something else, but someone in the old Yahoo! Group said that he put a copy of Crimson Editor on every client machine so that he would have an at least competent editor any time he came back to use that machine.

There exist other options for free spell checking - e.g. tinySpell or mouser's own Clipboard Help+Spell.

[Edit 2011-08-11, 21:41] Come to think of it, you could put in forum tags with, say, a template as a Permanent Clip in ArsClip, or by using templates in Konrad Papala's Ka Type In, both of them free.  You won't get to see the results without pressing Preview in DC, but you can at least put the tags in conveniently. [/Edit]

1233

Living Room / Re: In search of ... a lost note app

« Last post by rjbull on August 11, 2011, 02:38 PM »

Found a bug in QuickNote, and reported it.

-kyrathaba (August 11, 2011, 09:19 AM)

And they responded very quickly!

1234

Living Room / Re: xkcd - password truth

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 04:19 PM »

I used to use the registration letters+numbers of cars I used to own, but own no longer, concatenated together as necessary.

1235

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Edit Text Anywhere with Your Favorite Editor [Freeware]

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 04:13 PM »

I wasn't arguing against TEA, I was merely saying that I didn't feel any need for it, since I was content using the input mechanism available in each forum or blog.

-cyberdiva (August 10, 2011, 03:57 PM)

I wasn't, so that's the difference 

I'd rather just use a FF add-on, rather than install yet another program. 

-cyberdiva (August 10, 2011, 03:57 PM)

You might like to know that TEA can be portable, which might occasionally be helpful.

1236

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

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 04:08 PM »

History repeats itself (no surprise there, humans are pretty dumb after all), this article sums things up quite well: http://neweconomics....1780s-all-over-again

Talk about rebels without a cause.

-nudone (August 10, 2011, 10:23 AM)

1780's?  Newbies.  Try reading Summer of blood: The peasants' revolt of 1381 by Dan Jones.

1237

Living Room / Re: Opera wand. Does it work well? Enough to abandon lastpass?

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 04:04 PM »

I upgraded, [...] he was willing to help.

-Josh (August 09, 2011, 03:50 PM)

Thanks - I dimly remember this from another thread.  I presume you still had to pay?  At present I'm not too excercised, but I may have to think harder if ever I do upgrade Firefox, or use a recent version of Opera more often.

BTW, I see PC Magazine now offers Password Profiler 3: Automate Log-Ons and Fill Forms Faster.  Partial feature list:

• Logs into Web sites automatically
• Fills long registration and checkout forms quickly and easily
• Saves logins to your favorite sites
• Shares logins between IE and Firefox
• Maintains multiple profiles allowing you to fill forms based on your needs, like whether you want to use personal or business information
 Password Profiler 3 adds several enhancements. The new version features:
• Support for IE 6, 7, 8, and 9
• Support for FireFox 3.6, 4, and 5
• Additional fields for the User form for a profile
• A new form for information about your automobile
• An "Edit site data" menu item from Password Profiler's browser context menu allowing you to easily edit a site's data
• Portable – carry Password Profiler on a flash drive
• AutoSync between locally installed version and flash drive
• Roboform import

I haven't tried it, but it's only $7.97 or included in their $19.97 annual utilities subscription.

1238

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Edit Text Anywhere with Your Favorite Editor [Freeware]

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 03:42 PM »

I tend not to use my text editor for most messages that I write with a browser.  Mostly what I write in Firefox are forum posts, responses to blogs, etc.  I don't tend to need macros, etc. for that.  I'm usually content with whatever input mechanism the forum or blog provides, which often includes things I can't do with my favorite text editor, UltraEdit, such as use colors, bold, etc. 

-cyberdiva (August 09, 2011, 06:02 PM)

Originally, I think (maybe Channing will correct this) TEA was expected to be used for exactly that.  I use Notetab Pro as my editor, and have macros (what it calls the clipbook) to help posting the code into DC.  I grant I can't see the effect as one could in e.g. BBCEdit, but I know it's there.  When I want to put in a URL, for example, it will pop up a little form asking for the URL itself and then the text, which makes it easy.  I'm sure you could do the same with UltraEdit...

So I guess what I'm saying is that for me, the Lazarus add-on provides the one thing I really need: backup in case my message goes poof.

-cyberdiva (August 09, 2011, 06:02 PM)

That's very valuable, but TEA does it as well.  As all its temporary files go into a single directory, I periodically archive them up, though that's probably an excess of zeal.

Text Editor Anywhere - Edit Text Anywhere with Your Favorite Editor

1239

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlining software recommendations?

« Last post by rjbull on August 10, 2011, 03:26 PM »

Actually, it is portable.

-urlwolf (August 10, 2011, 02:15 PM)

Thanks - that makes it more appealing.

I think you can safely ignore all the 'values' stuff, and still get what I think is the best todo/organizer that I've tried.

-urlwolf (August 10, 2011, 02:15 PM)

In reality, if I was truly going to get organised, I'd have done it years ago...

1240

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlining software recommendations?

« Last post by rjbull on August 09, 2011, 03:52 PM »

Looks promising. I wonder if there'd be enough interest for a discount?

-urlwolf (August 08, 2011, 04:16 PM)

I certainly wouldn't buy it at full price, but the other thing that bothers me is the assumption that you're going to run almost your whole life by this single piece of software.  I'm not sure anything is quite convincing enough for that, the more so if it isn't portable.  Most of us can cover the same areas with things we have already and which we're too used to to be keen to change.

1241

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: CLIPBOARD HELP+SPELL LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v2.23.01 - Nov 22, 2013

« Last post by rjbull on August 09, 2011, 03:46 PM »

I've pushed a new version which solves rjbull's problem

-mouser (August 09, 2011, 11:09 AM)

I confirm that it now works as expected, provided you edit the config to be portable 

Thanks, mouser.

[Edit 2011-08-10, 22:22] As mouser suggested above, he's also changed main menu item Presets to Layouts in the latest version, which does make sense. [/Edit]

1242

Living Room / Re: Opera wand. Does it work well? Enough to abandon lastpass?

« Last post by rjbull on August 09, 2011, 03:44 PM »

http://www.roboform....forms/browsers/opera

Works very well!

-Josh (August 08, 2011, 06:25 PM)

Thanks!  I'm still trying to avoid shelling out for an update to RoboForm, but if I ever upgrade Firefox...  it's nice to have Opera as well now.

1243

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Edit Text Anywhere with Your Favorite Editor [Freeware]

« Last post by rjbull on August 09, 2011, 03:39 PM »

I never have to think about summoning up my text editor to be sure I don't lose what I'm writing--if something goes wrong, I just retrieve the missing text from Lazarus.

-cyberdiva (August 09, 2011, 09:04 AM)

It's not just crash proofing.  One of the great things about TEA is that you conveniently get your favourite editor to edit your posts with, so you can use macros, shorthands, whatever.

1244

General Software Discussion / Re: Software Hall of Fame

« Last post by rjbull on August 08, 2011, 04:20 PM »

I didn't intend to offend anybody - except for people who still believe writing large parts of their applications in assembly is a good idea.

-f0dder (August 08, 2011, 10:04 AM)

There was a time when it was, though.  The leading DOS shareware word processor PC-Write was written in about equal numbers of lines of Pascal (I think) and assembler, the latter for speed.  My favourite DOS editor, VDE, was assembler, and so were Horst Schaeffer's batch file enhancers.  All these were vital tools for me.  Now, I suppose, some authors are so used to assembler that anything else seems "wrong."

1245

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlining software recommendations?

« Last post by rjbull on August 08, 2011, 04:13 PM »

Try watership planner.

-urlwolf (August 08, 2011, 08:55 AM)

Expensive.  Is this the "new Ecco?"

1246

Living Room / Re: Opera wand. Does it work well? Enough to abandon lastpass?

« Last post by rjbull on August 08, 2011, 04:10 PM »

There's a RoboForm adapter now for Opera?

1247

Living Room / Re: Your favorite quotes: 2011 edition

« Last post by rjbull on August 08, 2011, 03:59 PM »

Are obituaries OK?

Two from John Hillaby's book Journey through Britain:

---

Him as was
Has gone from we;
Us as is
Must go to he.

---

A rather weary degree of respect:

Here lies the body of Mary Arnott
Born a virgin, died a harlot.
Until age fifteen she kept her virginity,
Which is a record in this vicinity.

---

Two obituaries written by the men themselves.
First, from Lord Berners, a minor British intellectual and composer of the early Twentieth Century:

Here lies Berners,
One of the learners.
His love of learning
May earn him a burning,
But thanks to the Lord!
He seldom was bored.

There's a shortened version on the Wikipedia page.

---

And a barbed one by the author Kyril Bonfiglioli:

Loved and respected by all who knew him slightly.

It's worth looking at the onward link to Kyril Bonfiglioli's Wikiquotes page.

1248

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: CLIPBOARD HELP+SPELL LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v2.23.01 - Nov 22, 2013

« Last post by rjbull on August 08, 2011, 04:34 AM »

Ah that sounds like a flaw... i'll look into it. 
It should be saving them into the program configdir\PresetViews

-mouser (August 07, 2011, 03:23 PM)

I just tried moving the three preset files from user account\Documents into program  configdir\PresetViews before starting CHS, but it still doesn't show my new preset in the menu.

1249

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: CLIPBOARD HELP+SPELL LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v2.23.01 - Nov 22, 2013

« Last post by rjbull on August 07, 2011, 03:16 PM »

you just select an item in that menu to load it.

-mouser (August 07, 2011, 11:19 AM)

Do you mean that saved layouts should appear as entries in that menu?  Because mine doesn't.  I have a saved layout, with three files, .grid, .dock and .preset, but the only menu entries are Standard, NewClips, Last, ColumnCustomizer, and Save As.

Does it matter where they're saved?  I didn't run the installer as such, but unzipped it into its own directory.  However, it wanted to save the layout files into
user account\Documents.

1250

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: CLIPBOARD HELP+SPELL LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v2.23.01 - Nov 22, 2013

« Last post by rjbull on August 07, 2011, 11:13 AM »

All under the "Presets" menu -- I should rename that to "Layouts".

-mouser (August 07, 2011, 10:57 AM)

Thanks!  Renaming it would be good, especially as there's another Presets menu for a different purpose under Modify Format/Case for an individual clip.

OK, I can now Save my layout as a named file, and revert to the Last layout, but how do I load a named layout?  The Presets menu has a Save As item but not an Open item.