Recent Posts

15176

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 16, 2010, 08:22 AM »

ok let me give the new version a test 

15177

Find And Run Robot / Re: Links to Review and Comments - Add yours!

« Last post by mouser on November 16, 2010, 08:13 AM »

 

Thanks for pointing that out alias, it's a review that really gave me a nice feeling.  


http://www.freewareg...-task-management-app

The verdict: this is one post where I will start with the verdict, which I usually reserve until the end. There are two things I want say about this program to sum it up:

(1) If you are unfamiliar with search-box style launchers like FARR and Launchy, you’re in for a treat. Once you try these, they will literally transform the way you use your computer. Just imagine: instead of hunting in your start menu or other locations for a shortcut, all you need to do is start typing the first few letters of the program name, and it will popup. (Very useful if you have a large folder full of portable programs, like I do, that never make it to the start menu).

(2) FARR is likely the best program of it’s kind. It has come a long way since I first saw it many years ago; for one thing, it has undergone a face ift that brought about the “wow” factor which Launchy had from the start.

15178

Find And Run Robot / Re: Settings not being saved

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 08:03 PM »

hmmmm

on win7 it should be trying to save in your DOcuments and Settings\AppData\etc

if you copied over your configdir.ini file to your new directory you might try editing that
make sure its not overriding the config directory, OR try manually setting that to some directory you have write access to.

let me know if that helps!

15179

Living Room / Re: Is "Quick Format" safe?

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 01:47 PM »

Ok I see i should have done a search myself before posting.

Here's what the MS page says:

When you choose to run a regular format on a volume, files are removed from the volume that you are formatting and the hard disk is scanned for bad sectors. The scan for bad sectors is responsible for the majority of the time that it takes to format a volume.

If you choose the Quick format option, format removes files from the partition, but does *NOT* scan the disk for bad sectors.

Only use this option if your hard disk has been previously formatted and you are sure that your hard disk is not damaged.

Bottom line for me then is: Never use Quick Format.

15180

Living Room / Is "Quick Format" safe?

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 01:45 PM »

When you format a drive in windows, there is an option to do a "Quick Format" -- is this safe to do?

My old understanding was that formatting finds and marks bad sectors..  Does the "Quick Format" option bypass this and so can be dangerous? Is it important not to do a Quick Format on a brand new drive but ok otherwise?

What's the real scoop?

15181

Screenshot Captor / Re: Screenshot Captor Auto Tool Configurations

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 11:49 AM »

Thanks for sharing!

15182

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 11:12 AM »

It's interesting to see a few things re-ordered, like "Run Sandboxes" which is near top in Cautomaton.

15183

Living Room / Re: Hold on!! Superboy badge?!

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 10:01 AM »

Yep it was the list numberer, so you were pretty quick.
Also in all fairness you weren't very hard to please with the List Numberer, so i'm not sure Skwire really deserves the badge..

15184

Living Room / Re: Hold on!! Superboy badge?!

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 09:38 AM »

hehehehe 

it wasn't meant as any insult to you, was just a fun little joke and skwire and i wanted to see how long it took you to notice it  

15185

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 15, 2010, 09:04 AM »

As I was testing worstje's implementation I realized that the way he built it, it actually has a totally different use from the one I originally envisioned when i posted the idea.

The original idea, which is to let you (or more likely another program) invoke one of the commands on the right-click menu programatically without direct user interaction.  This use still stands and I think will have some very cool uses.

But when worstje implemented it, he also added a feature that basically just pops up the right-click menu for a file at the cursor location.  That seems to me to be useful in and of itself.  It means that if you are writing a utility that shows a file list, you can now let the user bring up the right click context menu (either the 32bit or 64bit) from your utility, by invoking the Cautomaton executable from your utility, using the /p commandline argument, without having to write your own code for showing a file's right-click context menu (which i think is pretty hairy unless someone can correct me).

15186

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 11:31 PM »

Bugs fixed, and icons are perfect now.. NICE!!! 

15187

Living Room / Re: 101 Great Computer Programming Quotes

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 09:42 PM »

can someone collect 101 or more public domain old hires computer images and we can combine the quotes and images into a screensaver.. Using my Multi Photo Quotes Screensaver Builder of course

15188

Developer's Corner / Re: Are You Doing Mobile Development?

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 09:14 PM »

A mobile NANY app would be nice please.

15189

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 07:30 PM »

Be warned this isnt a tool for everyone and the beta is still a bit rough -- it's not clear how to use it unless you are talking to worstje in a chat window

But here's what you would do,

First run it on a file with /a parameter, like:

Cautomaton32.exe /a "C:\Readme.txt"

It will show the popup right click menu, and you should select some item on the menu.

It will then perform the action AND also show you a recommended way to invoke it automatically.

So i my case if i choose to perform an ESET scan on the file i see output:
Recommended Cautomaton parameters: /m "Scan with ESET Smart Security"

So then if i want to simulate that I would run:
Cautomaton32.exe /m "Scan with ESET Smart Security" "C:\Readme.txt"
OR just
Cautomaton32.exe /m "$Scan with ESET" "C:\Readme.txt"

You can see why such a utility would be useful running from batch files, shortcuts, or with a batch processor like D+D Robot.

15190

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 07:10 PM »

I think ill make a custom version of Drag+Drop robot made specifically to work with Cautomaton, preconfigured to use it.

15191

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 07:09 PM »

This works wonderfully with my Drag and Drop Robot, to provide easy batch execution of a right-click command on a list of files:



You can see from this screenshot that D+D Robot is just invoking Cautomaton with the /m command and a $pattern, meaning text to match a substring of the context menu.
In my sample screenshot i put "Scan with" as the pattern, which matches against my context menu entry for scanning a file with Eset.


For those who don't know, Drag and Drop Robot is meant to help you perform commandline actions on large batches of files/folders.

It works great with Cautomaton, EXCEPT the only thing I never anticipated with Drag and Drop Robot is that it won't let you specify DELAYS between calls on files.  Because Cautomaton doesn't block while the process launches, you would get all processes running at the same time.  I'll add a delay option, and maybe worstje can see if he can add an option that says "don't exit until launched process exits" which would be even better.

15192

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011: Cautomaton

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 06:38 PM »

I am *extremely* excited about this.. i was unsure how feasible it would be and i'm delighted to test it!

After figuring out how to use it (readme could use some simpler intro), i have to say it is working!!! WOW! GREAT WORK and CONGRATULATIONS!
 

Really really cool that you figured out how to do this.

15193

ProcessTamer / Re: Consider Affinity?

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 12:16 PM »

Welcome to the site..

Yes, i will be adding processor affinity settings.  Will post an update when i do.

15194

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANI 2011 : Help ecaradec decide which app to code

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 12:14 PM »

I think I should have a look at an updatable fscript, before starting something else.

go go gadget ecaradec!!
like i said i'd love to include it by default in all FARR releases and put it under default FARR update control, so that everyone always has the latest fscript/fsubscript dll and so we can eliminate all of these incompatibilities.. then all plugins can share the same fscript dll if its in farr app main directory.

15195

Programmer Libs / JrDebugLogger - Sample

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 10:46 AM »

Thought it might be useful to paste a complete sample of using JrDebugLogger in code.  I really don't use advanced functions so this is almost exactly what i use:

Code: C++ [Select]

1. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. // System includes for std::cout usage below
3. #include <iostream>
4. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------
5.  
6. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------
7. // Include the Debugging Library file (only our main should include this
8. //  file, additional .cpp files should include "jrdebug.h"
9. //  alternatively, you could add this cpp to your project or makefile.
10. #include <jrdebug_main.cpp>
11. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------
12.  
13.  
14. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------
15. int main(int argc, char *argv[])
16. {
17.         // set our own commandline options as one big string, not using actual comline args
18.         JrDebugParseCommandlineArgString("-dbo text;debugout.txt;info",NULL,NULL);
19.  
20.         // a debug logging output line
21.         debugout << "This is a debugging message (argc="<<argc<<")";
22.  
23.         // return success
24.         std::cout << "Program finished."<<std::endl;
25.         return 0;
26. }
27. //---------------------------------------------------------------------------

So basically here is what we have:

• First, we include in the the jrdebug code with #include <jrdebug_main.cpp>.  Now actually the cleaner standard way is to add jrdebug_main.cpp to your project file, and then #include <jrdebug.h> in your files.  
• Second, we have an initialization function for JrDebugLogger, which simulates some commandline options; there are a few helper functions depending on whether argc+argv are how you want to pass in commandline options, if at all.  Don't get scared by this, it's basically a really simple way to both set options and/or let the user set debug options via commandline.  In this case, i'm just setting some options manually and ignoring any user specified commandline options: JrDebugParseCommandlineArgString("-dbo text;debugout.txt;info",NULL,NULL);
• This option string tells JrDebugLogger to log debug messages in text format, to the file debugout.txt, which will be in application directory if permissions allow, and display extra info about where the file was created.  If you also wanted to display debug messages to the console you could use "-dbo text;debugout.txt;stdout;info" instead.
• Lastly, we send a debug message using stream syntax: debugout << "This is a debugging message (argc="<<argc<<")"; there is also a printf style debug output function alternative.

The generated debugout.txt file contents look like this:
Sat Nov 13 20:11:31 2010 -> Message: This is a debugging message (argc=1)


Of course there are tons of advanced extra things you can do, but that's the basics.

And again, the absolutely *KEY* feature of JrDebugLogger, and what makes it special and a bit tricky under the hood, is that when you build in Release mode, by default all debug code is made to completely compile out and have 0 impact on size and cpu of application.

15196

Programmer Libs / Re: JrDebugLogger -- issue with default writing to app dir on vista/win7

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 10:26 AM »

This has now been implemented in v1.11.01 (Nov 13, 2010).

15197

Programmer Libs / Re: JrDebugLogger - LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v1.11.01 - Nov 13, 2010

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 10:19 AM »

I'm happy to help anyone who has any troubles, just post.

15198

Programmer Libs / Re: JrDebugLogger - LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - v1.11.01 - Nov 13, 2010

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 10:11 AM »

So i'm not sure anyone uses this besides me, but i've uploaded a new version that attempts to solve a problem where default creation of a debug output file would normally go into the program file folder of the application, which didn't work quite right under vista/win7.

This will now be detected and output send to Users\AppData\JrDebug\AppName\ or something like that.

This can be VERY helpful if you are sending someone a debug version of a program to run so you can gather debug info, and they will be running it in the normal application folder where they normally dont have access permission to create files.  Prior to this version the result would be a MS shadowed file that they would have an insanely difficult time locating.

I've tried to update the documentation a little too, but as always the sample source code is best way to see how to use it.

ps.
i've tested this in a few compilers as always, it should compile fine on *nix as well as windows, but i'd love to hear reports of any troubles and any bugfixes from *nix users or other compiler reports.

15199

Find And Run Robot / Re: FARR and history

« Last post by mouser on November 14, 2010, 07:54 AM »

not currently, though i could consider it if it's something people wanted.

15200

Find And Run Robot / Re: FARR and history

« Last post by mouser on November 13, 2010, 07:06 PM »

yes its easy to do.

here's ONE way to do it:

First, you make an alias and put your favorite apps in the alias.
This is easier than you might think, you can do it from the Aliases/Groups option tab OR even easier, just search for a file you want, right click it and say "Add to Group Alias"

Ok now that you have your favorite items in an alias, test it by typing the alias name and confirm they show up in the list.
(ps. later you can go customize the text labels for this list!)

OK so step 2 is to tell FARR that when the search edit is blank, to show the contents of this alias.
You do that from Options-> History Options tab, and under "Blank search shows files from launch history" leave it checked and type in the name of your alias.

Let me know if it works for you!

ps:
you can also set different hotkeys to bring up farr and show different lists.