Recent Posts

1501

General Software Discussion / Re: Free text/file comparison tool?

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 30, 2007, 01:33 AM »

A couple other compare utilities to consider are p4merge from Perforce and TortoiseMerge by the guys who distribute TortoiseSVN.  Both are free.  For details see this post:

https://www.donation...80.msg57381#msg57381

1502

Living Room / Re: Latest Apple Mac vs PC Commercial: PCs suck because of all the software choices

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 24, 2007, 05:11 PM »

Am I a traitor for thinking these commercials are hilarious?  That little mac guy is such a smug bastard!  I love it!  He reminds me of Dr. Evil's son.  The one where PC needed to have permission from the secret service to talk to the Mac guy was classic.

-superboyac (April 24, 2007, 10:34 AM)

I'm with you 100% - though the one that makes me laugh every time (even now when I'm just thinking of it) is the "How 'bout I calculate how much time we just wasted?" line.

1503

Best File/Folder Compare Tool / Re: Ultra compare

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 12, 2007, 07:43 PM »

You might also want to look at p4merge from Perforce (http://www.perforce....nloads/ntx86_64.html).  It's in the P4V installer.  Note that you don't have install any of the other Perforce stuff if you're not interested in the version control - p4merge works fine stand-alone.  There's no cost - Perforce only charges for user licenses for use of their server-based software (and even then a limited license for up to 2 users is free).

Another contender is TortoiseMerge, an open source comparison utility bundled with TortoiseSVN (http://tortoisesvn.t...g/TortoiseMerge.html).  Again, you don't need to use or install Subversion to use the TortoiseMerge tool.

I use Beyond Compare for folder diffs or diffing files from explorer, but I use p4merge for diffing from my development tools (only because I'm too lazy to reconfig them to use BC2)

1504

General Software Discussion / Re: To cut or not to cut - The lousy MS Office ribbon

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 12, 2007, 02:35 PM »

I haven't even installed any part of Office 2007, but for those of you who want 2007 but long for the old UI, this bit of software may help ($30):

http://www.addintool...nuoffice/default.htm

I got the link from http://www.larkware.com, who's one-liner for this was, "A third-party fix for the Office 2007 UI disaster".

1505

General Software Discussion / Re: Sumatra PDF Viewer is cool, thin, and open-source

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 11, 2007, 01:11 PM »

Just to buck the trend here, I'm still using Adobe Reader (7.0), and I'm pretty happy with it.  I use a small freeware utility called ar-speedup to turn off useless crap that slows down the load time: 

http://www.tnk-bootb...rted&id=7F7290B5

I have no problems with copying data to the clipboard, and I think Adobe Reader's search functionality is great.  I like being able to see a list of matches with a tiny bit of context instead of being forced to jump to each of them.

My only gripe is that it has a habit of changing the zoom on the document when I click on it for no apparent reason that I can figure out.

1506

Living Room / Re: Microsoft is Dead

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 10, 2007, 03:42 PM »

I agree with nudone - there's a big difference between 'dead' and simply no longer being an all-controlling monopoly.  Microsoft can still be a successful company even when it's on a more competitive footing with other companies (which is what Graham's article seems to equate with being 'dead').

Even Graham must know this; he talks about MS inheriting its monopoly from IBM, and IBM is hardly dead.  Calling MS dead is simply sensationalism.

Oh, and I'd probably be leery of investing in a start-up whose principals seem completely unaware of Microsoft's potential for disrupting any market related to personal computing - even if it's 'Web 2.0'.  I'm not saying that they should be scared necessarily, but they should at least be aware.  I'm pretty sure that Google doesn't completely discount Microsoft, even if MS doesn't scare them.

1507

General Software Discussion / Re: Virtual Drive Pro

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 05, 2007, 02:41 PM »

Seems both links are to the Pro version, giving two prices?

-Curt (April 05, 2007, 02:33 PM)

Looks to me like the links are mislabeled. The one that ends with "700" is for the non-pro version, and the one that ends in "800" is the pro version.

Also, the difference that the Pro version adds is "Virtual Hard Drive" capability - essentially a RAM disk for Windows.  I wouldn't think that a RAM disk would have a great deal of use in Windows (maybe on a laptop if it has a *lot* of RAM), so I'd definitely test that out before spending the extra $7 - $10.

1508

General Software Discussion / Re: Virtual Drive Pro

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 04, 2007, 11:01 PM »

As mentioned above, there are several free products that will provide a virtual CD/DVD drive, including:

Microsoft Virtual CD Control Panel: http://download.micr...dcontrolpanel_21.exe
Daemon Tools:  http://www.daemon-tools.cc
Slysoft Virtual CloneDrive: http://www.slysoft.c...tual-clonedrive.html
MagicISO's MagicDisk: http://www.magiciso....gicdisc-overview.htm


However, one thing that none of the above free products do is actually create an image of a CD/DVD.

For non-copy protected disks, most CD/DVD authoring programs (such as Nero, CDBurnerXP or whatever) will create images, no problem.  Nero also includes ImageDrive for mounting disc images.

So if you're dealing with non-protected discs, you should not need to pay anything.  But to create images of copy protected discs, the only free program I'm aware of is the Alcohol 52% Free Edition.

1509

General Software Discussion / Re: Virtual Drive Pro

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 04, 2007, 04:16 PM »

If you're intending to use this for games (or any copy protected software), you should definitely test it with whatever trial they provide, as some are better than others at dealing with protections.

Note that Virtual Drive Pro is currently at version 11 (http://www.farstone....virtualdrive-pro.htm), while the Uniblue site is selling version 10.

Other virtual CD software you might want to look at:

 - Alcohol 52%/120% (http://www.alcohol-soft.com):  Alcohol 52% lets you make and use CD/DVD images, but does not burn physical discs.  To burn physical disks you must get 120%.  There's a free for personal use version of Alcohol 52% here: http://www.free-down...hol_52__Free_Edition

The free edition installs a browser toolbar, but my understanding is that the toolbar can be subsequently uninstalled cleanly via Add/remove Programs.

 - Clone CD: http://www.slysoft.com/en/clonecd.html

1510

General Software Discussion / Re: Virtual registry

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 04, 2007, 01:26 AM »

I think that SandboxIE would come close to doing what you want (http://www.sandboxie.com).

For some technical details see:  http://www.sandboxie...php?SandboxHierarchy

1511

Living Room / Re: how to find out if external HD uses USB 1.x or 2.x?

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 02, 2007, 06:35 PM »

I have the feeling that it should *not* take almost a day to move 50 GB from one external HD to another.

-brotherS (April 02, 2007, 03:12 PM)

I wonder if transferring from one external to another is killing throughput.  If you have space on a local drive to store the data temporarily, it might actually be faster to copy from one external to the local drive then copy from the local to the other external.

Also, if you have either or both of these drives connected via a hub, move it/them to ports on the PC itself.

I wouldn't be surprised if USB drivers/controllers/hubs aren't very good at dealing with  hi-speed throughput to multiple devices concurrently.

Remember to use a good copy utility (robocopy or such) that knows how to do copies with large buffers and overlapped I/O so the device drivers have the best chance of getting things optimized.

However, shoving 50GB of data around will still take some time - I'd guess that an hour is the best possible time you'd get, and that's with all components being top-notch.

1512

General Software Discussion / Re: Advantages and disadvantages of NNTP Newsreaders

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 02, 2007, 01:37 PM »

I just discovered a new program called Omea (there is a free basic version as well as the usual vastly more able pro version) that is very nice. It does both RSS and NNTP, and many more things in the pro version. It is available at http://www.jetbrains.com/ and looks very good too.

-KenR (September 17, 2006, 03:45 PM)

Since December 4, 2006 Omea Pro is free (but you do have to register for a license):  http://www.jetbrains...wnload/download.html

It seems that development on Omea has stopped - there was a hint that Omea Pro would be open-sourced (http://www.larkware....eDailyGrind1031.aspx), but I've seen no evidence that's happening.

FWIW, I tried Omea as an NNTP and RSS reader, but didn't take to it.

1513

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: List of disc catalogers

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 01, 2007, 09:35 PM »

Bits du Jour (http://www.bitsdujou...og2/wordpress/?cat=7) has an upcoming discount on WinCatalog (http://www.wincatalog.com/) -  DC forum search reveals no mention of this cataloger - does anyone have experience with it?

1514

Mouser's Zone / Re: Multi-browser Bookmark Synchronization Tool and Other Multi-Browser Ideas?

« Last post by mwb1100 on April 01, 2007, 03:19 PM »

Has anyone tried SiteBar (http://sitebar.org/features.php)?  It's a combination of a web application and client pieces to integrate with IE, Firefox, Opera, etc.

The idea is that your browser would uses the web application to store bookmarks, so they'd all be in one place, synchronized, and accessible from any Internet connected machine.

They have the web application set up on their server with free basic service and for-pay options for extra service, or since it's open source, I should be able to set it up on my web host and not have to depend on a third party.

1515

Found Deals and Discounts / Free VS 2005 Standard from Microsoft

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 30, 2007, 09:51 AM »

Microsoft is again giving away copies of Visual Studio 2005 Standard to people who complete a couple of 'labcasts'.

Essentially, you download a couple of webcasts about how to use Visual Studio and/or .NET, fill out evaluation forms, and they'll send you a copy of VS 2005 Std (as it's a physical copy, you'll have to pay shipping):

http://www.microsoft...upgrade/default.mspx

1516

General Software Discussion / Re: If you plans to install Visual Studio ...

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 13, 2007, 01:25 PM »

Visual Studio 2005 will install whatever version of the .NET Framework (2.0) it needs if it is not already installed.  The requirement to remove the Framework (and/or other items) is only if you have beta (or other pre-release) versions of those components installed.

To confuse the issue even more, .NET Framework 3.0 is really more or less an add-on to .NET 2.0.  It essentially adds Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Windows Communication Foundation (WCF), and a couple other less important technologies to the 2.0 Framework.  VS 2005 does not need .NET 3.0 to install or run, but if you want to create programs that use those technologies, then you'll need .NET 3.0.

One additional thing to be aware of is that Visual Studio 2005 SP1 has been released - if you install it be ready for it to take a long time (like at least 30 minutes - maybe more) and use an enormous amount of disk space (1GB or more).  Google for the gory details.

Also, if you're going to run VS 2005 on Vista, I think that there are some issues that might require hotfixes, especially if you're doing ASP.NET work.  I'm not too sure about this though, as I am not running Vista.  Again, Google is your friend for details on this.

1517

Activation/License/Language Help / Re: Please Answer Me!

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 11, 2007, 01:16 AM »

These guys will get you a key:

http://www.winabilit...purchase/?fgxp+fgpro

1518

Developer's Corner / Re: How to print more than 10000 .ps files

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 07, 2007, 09:23 PM »

I need code examples of it ( C , C++ ) , because I need to build an application myself to do all this... 

-Blaster (March 07, 2007, 05:14 PM)

This should do the trick for your .ps files (as long as the destination printer has PostScript):

http://support.micro...com/kb/138594/EN-US/

For other documents that need to be printed by an application, you should be able to use ShellExecute() or ShellExecuteEx() with the 'print' verb to have whatever application handles the particular file type print it for you.

1519

Developer's Corner / Re: How to print more than 10000 .ps files

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 07, 2007, 09:31 AM »

Assuming that you have a PostScript printer, you can dump the file(s) to the printer since they contain the raw print stream.  Set up a DOS mapping for LPT1: to the printer:

1) make sure the printer has sharing enabled (on the Sharing tab of the printer's properties page)
2) map LPT1: to the printer (using a command something like "net use lpt1: \\ComputerName\PrinterName")
3) copy the .ps files to the new device: "copy *.ps lpt1:"

The above might only work on NT-based Windows versions (NT, 200, XP, Vista) - I'm not sure about Win 9x.

If you don't have a postscript printer, you'll need a program that knows how to interpret .ps files.  I don't have experience with any, but I understand that Adobe Acrobat (not Reader, but the full Acrobat) or GhostScript can do it.

For files that need a program to print them since they are not in a printer-native format (like *.doc or *.pdf), you can usually drag-n-drop them onto a printer icon - that'll cause the system to invoke the program associated with the file (ie., Word or Acrobat) to print the files.

1520

General Software Discussion / Re: TextPad updated to 5.0

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 06, 2007, 08:29 PM »

hoping for the inline spelling error highlighting that i'm so sorely missing in UltraEdit

-mouser (March 06, 2007, 05:47 AM)

Just today, IDM released UltraEdit 13.0 which has inline spell checking as a new feature.

They've also revamped the macro engine so that you can write macros using Javascript instead of a proprietary language.

Looks interesting, but I haven't tried it, yet...

1521

General Software Discussion / Re: GNU Utilities for Win32 dead?

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 04, 2007, 09:14 PM »

Project does seem a bit dead though, haven't been updated for a while.

-f0dder (March 04, 2007, 01:29 PM)

The move seems to have been made just a few days ago.  Maybe some additional activity is ahead.

However, the programs are a pretty mature bunch of tools; I think that accounts for the lack of activity.  As you say, the tools work well enough, so what's to do?

1522

General Software Discussion / Re: GNU Utilities for Win32 dead?

« Last post by mwb1100 on March 04, 2007, 01:21 PM »

It looks like they've moved the downloads to the more standard SourceForge-style download page:

http://sourceforge.n...mp;release_id=490307

1523

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Virtual PC 2007 released - freeware

« Last post by mwb1100 on February 20, 2007, 02:20 PM »

... or retro-gaming.

-Crush (February 20, 2007, 10:39 AM)

The PM for Virtual PC at Microsoft often blogs about his experiences running old games under VPC:

http://blogs.msdn.co...tual+PC/default.aspx

1524

Found Deals and Discounts / Virtual PC 2007 released - freeware

« Last post by mwb1100 on February 20, 2007, 10:02 AM »

Microsoft released Virtual PC 2007.  Probably the most important change is that it supports Vista as a host and a guest OS.  It also has improved support for multi-monitor systems (but the virtual machines still support only a single monitor).

It's free:  http://www.microsoft...rtualpc/default.mspx


[edited to attach picture]

1525

General Software Discussion / Re: Any 'print as printerfriendly page' automatizer?

« Last post by mwb1100 on February 19, 2007, 08:44 PM »

Do you know of any such quick 'print as printerfriendly page' automatizer?

-Curt (February 17, 2007, 03:52 PM)

I don't have experience with either of the tools I'm about to mention, but they might be helpful to you:

1) IE 7 is supposed to be vastly improved over IE 6 in avoiding cutting off the text on the right margin.

2) An IE add-in called 'Printer Friendly' is supposed to do exactly what you want: http://www.antair.co.../content/view/16/44/

Printer Friendly does not support FireFox, but the author stated (on his blog, I think) that he had a FireFox add-in once, but got too much flak for it not being free.   Apparently he has since provided it on an unsupported basis to at least one customer.