Recent Posts

1526

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 - if update does not work, try a forced destructive update.

« Last post by IainB on August 27, 2016, 10:33 AM »

After some procrastination - because I knew it was not going to be straightforward - I bit the bullet and sorted the Toshiba laptop which had been having the endlessly looping Win10 update cycle (approx. 30 minutes, every time).
First, I did a lot of backing-up and then donned a pair of brown trousers - just in case - before going to Use Windows 10 Media Creation Tool to Create Installation Media or Upgrade PC and downloaded the MCT onto a USB and then forced the clean install onto said laptop.

Of course, it expunged an awful lot of stuff in addition to the old OS (Win10-64 PRO), especially the Program Files, so I are now in the process of slowly rebuilding/reinstalling a swathe of proggies, not the least of which is MS Office 2016. Good job I keep track of all the necessary licences (well, I hope I have).



Oh, and by the way, it comes free with its own peculiar bug (seems to be common):
(Which is curious, because I'm not on the Insider Program.)




I now have the Win10-64 Home system, and am wondering whether to get the PRO version reinstated on that laptop or swap it to another one. This is apparently possible now if the OS was licenced via one's Outlook account ID.
What an unproductive exercise it has been so far though. I dread having to waste more time on it.

1527

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 All In one Shortcut bar

« Last post by IainB on August 27, 2016, 06:20 AM »

@questorfla: I had wanted something similar to what you were seeking in this post, so am posting this comment just in case you had not seen this about some new functionality in the OneNote browser-based clipping tool:

...
4. To clip a bookmark - "just the title synopsis, thumbnail and link" to the web-based Notebook. This is a new feature in the OneNote browser-based clipping tool, and I have wanted something like it for ages, as it captures all of the relevant meta-data for bookmarks that I had been wanting to be able to capture in CHS (but which can't do that).
_______________________________

-IainB (August 17, 2016, 11:53 AM)

1528

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: How do we stop using folder Documents\DonationCoder\Clipboard Help+Spell

« Last post by IainB on August 26, 2016, 07:18 PM »

I don't know if i would recommend junction points...
_____________________

-mouser (August 25, 2016, 10:43 AM)

Could you explain please? I'd be very interested to learn more.   

1529

General Software Discussion / Re: Desktop tool for programmatically removing URL's from PDF files

« Last post by IainB on August 26, 2016, 10:54 AM »

He explained it very well, I thought.  Sometimes, people link the words http://www.google.com to http://www.malwareRus.com in PDFs.  He wants to strip out the links.
________________________

-wraith808 (August 25, 2016, 10:24 AM)

Duh!
Thankyou, and yes, he does explain it very well.
I should have read his entire post rather than just the end bit and 4wd's response.
My apologies. More haste, less speed...   

1530

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: How do we stop using folder Documents\DonationCoder\Clipboard Help+Spell

« Last post by IainB on August 25, 2016, 10:08 AM »

Not sure whether this helps, but quite a while back I wanted to achieve the same independence and so installed FARR and CHS thusly:
      C:\UTIL\Windows utilities\FindAndRunRobot\Plugins\Clipboard Help+Spell
- where "C:\UTIL\Windows utilities" is actually a Junction Point of a OneDrive folder.
"ConfigDir.ini" was left untouched/unedited.
Seemed to work OK, anyway.

1531

General Software Discussion / Re: Desktop tool for programmatically removing URL's from PDF files

« Last post by IainB on August 25, 2016, 09:50 AM »

Sorry, I have to ask: "But why?"

1532

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft OneNote - limitations of OCR functionality

« Last post by IainB on August 25, 2016, 03:18 AM »

Rather than being a tip about some useful functionality in OneNote, this is a tip about the limitations of OneNote's OCR functionality. Though it can produce very good (relatively error-free) OCR output from a good quality image containing text, it evidently does rather less well with poorer image quality.

1533

Screenshot Captor / Re: Updates to fix screen resolution errors using different res. monitors

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 06:10 AM »

Refer also: Re: Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

- uses workaround for CHS as an example.

1534

Clipboard Help+Spell / Re: CHS is unusable on High DPI Screens - CHS workaround.

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 06:08 AM »

Refer: Re: Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

- uses workaround for CHS as an example.

1535

Living Room / Re: Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 03:57 AM »

Here's a second example of the Slimjet extension Colour Change, using a partial screenshot of this webpage/thread.
I recall someone saying that images posted to this website came up blurry when rendered on some web browsers, so I put the image of the notes through the IrfanView Sharpen function before posting it (don't know if it makes any difference, unless you have one of the browsers that display images a bit blurry).

1536

Living Room / Re: Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 03:13 AM »

Improving ergonomic readability in the Slimjet browser using the Change Colours (Chrome) extension:

1537

Living Room / Re: Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 02:55 AM »

Improving ergonomic readability in the CHS (Clipboard Help and Spell) clipboard manager.
I actually think I got somewhere useful (for me at least) on this:

1538

Living Room / Improving the ergonomic readability on laptop screen displays - Tips and Tricks.

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 02:54 AM »

I decided it might help to start this discussion thread for those who - like me - may have been having difficulty reading some of the windows displayed by the Windows OS and by some of the programs/apps, on their their laptop screens.
I realised from reading CHS* and SC**-related discussions that some people had apparently been having similar problems to myself, and that suggesting a discovered workaround or fix could be generally helpful/useful.
*   CHS = Clipboard Help and Spell.
** SC = Screenshot Captor
Causes of the problems:

• For me, these problems seemed to surface post-Windows 7, coinciding with the OS and the hardware technologies having undergone changes that led to the high-definition laptop displays performing differently and needing to "homogenize" to some extent to cater for tablet displays and PC/laptop/LCD displays. For example, there are even switches in Win10 (Anniversary update edition) settings that distinguish between and/or enable Tablet versus Desktop modes.
• The colour palette used by the system seems to consist solely of bright "dusty" pastel shades rather than hard bright solid/dense colours - even the colour "black" is affected, for example appearing as dark grey in text. This causes perceptual difficulty and a reduced level of certain and clear distinction/discrimination at the borders between different-coloured objects. The advent of Metro-styles tiles in Win 8 seems to have aggravated this problem. This problem may affect people in different ways - for example, it can be bothersome in the extreme to people who - like me - may have imperfect vision (e.g., require spectacles to read books or their laptop screens.)

So, let's see how it goes...all suggestions/tips welcomed.

1539

Living Room / RV/Campervan construction - take a leaf from portable homes?

« Last post by IainB on August 22, 2016, 12:49 AM »

@Stephen66515: Since you seem to be at the construction planning stage, I thought you might be able to crib some ideas from ATLAS portable homes - see my notes (below) on same:
The notes are from when I recently happened to be reading up on the thermal insulation standards met by conventional domestic homes versus "portable" homes (i.e., homes on a wheeled trailer) in Europe. I came across what seem to be some very well-designed portable units by a company called ATLAS, based in Hull (UK). Their portable homes seem to be essentially a collection of different-sized trailer-vans fitted out with all mod-cons to accommodate 2 or 4 or 6 or 8 berths (usually with + 1 more possible on a common-use couch). Their homes are apparently regularly exported to Europe and New Zealand, and a review of sales of used vans (e.g., see various internet sites and YouTube videos) seems to indicate that they enjoy a decent residual market value in the UK and Europe, when it comes times to sell them. This is usually a good measure of the market's view of the quality and design of the thing being sold.

You drive the van to where you want it situated, then jack it up onto piles at all 4 corners so that the wheels are just off the ground (i.e., not carrying any load). You then connect it up to electric power, water and sewage utilities and you're ready to go. They also may use LPG, where you'd need to have two large LPG cylinders stuck outside, with auto switchover on empty.

Heating/Insulation:

• The vans have options for heating - either electric or non-parasitic balanced flu gas-fired (LPG) systems, and there is full insulation underfloor, in ceilings and in walls. All external pipes are fully lagged. The wall panels are apparently made of a prefab sandwich panel including the insulation as a filling, giving the walls an inherently high thermal insulation value and high torsional rigidity and strength, enabling the vans to be transported without risk of disturbing the components of the assembled unit. (Also preserves weather-tightness.)
• They (I think it's all vans) are fitted with full double-glazing with PVC window and door joinery, with embedded mechanical deadlocks in the door - all standard stuff nowadays.
• There are options in construction where the buyer can request even higher spec insulation ("UltraWarm") in the construction process for vans to be located in normally much colder environments.
• Hot water is via either electric or LPG-fired on-demand/instant HW boiler - i.e., not employing stored HW tanks.
  ___________________________________________
  

One of their models - the 1080-3CL (3-bedrooms) seems to be aimed at the "Export only" market and is designed to meet higher spec EU and other international standards for construction, safety and habitability.

The floor-plans for the ATLAS 2016 Prima-5 range are at http://www.atlasleis.../#section/floorplans  - the 1080-3CL floorplan is the last one on that page.
You can view all the specs for the entire ATLAS 2016 Collection: http://www.atlasleis...ges/2016-collection/

1540

General Software Discussion / Re: Interesting compression ratio difference between file compression tools.

« Last post by IainB on August 19, 2016, 10:08 AM »

Updated comparison. The 7-ZIP algorithm looks to be the best by a mile.

1541

General Software Discussion / Re: Was Firefox 47.0.1 the end of the line for you as well?

« Last post by IainB on August 18, 2016, 03:55 AM »

@Curt: You're a bit late, but welcome to the party. Go to http://www.slimjet.com/

1542

Living Room / Re: External 5.25 floppy usb drive or another way?

« Last post by IainB on August 18, 2016, 03:42 AM »

RetroFloppy folks responded to an email right away, and will try to read both of my disks and make contents available for me to download for $20.  Very fair.  I'm sending my disks to them. 
______________________

-mouser (August 17, 2016, 03:25 PM)

Make a photocopy of them first, b4 u send them - just in case.

1543

General Software Discussion / Re: Interesting compression ratio difference between file compression tools.

« Last post by IainB on August 18, 2016, 03:39 AM »

No. I hadn't. I had thought that was what archive compression tools were for. Maybe I was mistuken.
I had not wanted lossy compression.

1544

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft OneNote - some experiential Tips & Tricks

« Last post by IainB on August 17, 2016, 11:53 AM »

It appears you (still) can't save clips to desktop Onenote (windows). ...
____________________

-yosemite (August 11, 2016, 01:14 AM)

Well, yes you can, actually.
I have my default Quick Notes location set as the Quick Notes section in my default web-based Notebook.
However, I always operate on the client-based cached copy of that web-based Notebook. I rarely - hardly ever - operate on the web-based Notebook itself via a web browser when online.
The client-based cached Notebook looks and feels like, and behaves like, a client-based Notebook, though it is constantly syncing with and updating changes as I am making them, onto the web-based Notebook. If I am not online, then the changes are synced when next I go online.
Thus, to all intents and purposes, I am working on a client-based Notebook.

Under these circumstances, I have rarely needed to clip stuff to the Quick Notes section, using the browser-based OneNote clipping tool, so that tool has effectively been surplus to requirements as far as I was concerned.

However, the browser-based OneNote clipping tool has just been updated so that its functionality currently enables it to be used:

• To to send a screenshot capture of an entire scrolling web page to the web-based Notebook - and those screenshots are at least as good as, if not better than, the scrolling screenshots you can get using SC (ScreenshotCaptor), but I rarely need to do that.
• To capture sections of a web page as a screenshot, but I never need to do that as I use the client-based clipping tool for that.
• To capture just the article text on the web page, "in an easy-to read format", but I I rarely need to do that, but if I did I would use the client-based clipping tool or, more likely,  CHS (Clipboard Help and Spell) - though it seems that CHS does not also capture the URL (meta-data), except in Firefox.
• To clip a bookmark - "just the title synopsis, thumbnail and link" to the web-based Notebook. This is a new feature in the OneNote browser-based clipping tool, and I have wanted something like it for ages, as it captures all of the relevant meta-data for bookmarks that I had been wanting to be able to capture in CHS (but which can't do that).

But look at this:


That Clip Images and Selections (and edit them) is rather nifty (shades of the FF add-on Scrapbook, though not as comprehensively useful).
The Automatic Video Selection is also rather nifty, and I had accidentally discovered a couple of days ago that this had been enabled for the direct pasting into a client-based Notebook/cache - this was before I saw the above announcement in my SlimJet (Chrome) browser.

1545

Screenshot Captor / Re: The large amount of memory

« Last post by IainB on August 17, 2016, 04:33 AM »

It probably sounds a bit kludgy, but I have in the past used OneNote to build a larger image out of smaller component parts, using SC (ScreenshotCaptor) for the trimming of the parts, where necessary. The user can move the images around either in the same container, or in separate and discrete containers, and abut or overlap them, as necessary, so you can't see where the edges meet. Then capture and copy the composite as a whole in one Copy command and save it as an image in (say) irfanview, or something. A bit fiddly though, and. from memory, it's easier to abut images placed one above the other, than one to either left or right of the other - the latter probably need to be overlaid in separate containers.

I'd suggest a suck-it-and-see approach as a trial, using OneNote. I think you might be able to effectively have an infinitely large - or very large - page, if you want.

There's an example here where the work to be done was rather tricky and a high degree of precision was required, so as to result in what had to look like apparently plain print, which could then be passed through an OCR scan with minimal errors in the output: Align image sections - 2 half-page image clips of a page of a document;then OCR.
There are quite a lot of other instances in that discussion thread, where the fiddling about with images would not be apparent to the reader. To a great extent, OneNote helps to minimise the fiddling about and can be a real timesaver. SC can be an invaluable aid in that process.

1546

General Software Discussion / Re: Interesting compression ratio difference between file compression tools.

« Last post by IainB on August 16, 2016, 07:59 AM »

^^That may well be the case, but it's only PDF files that I want to zip up!   

1547

General Software Discussion / Re: Interesting compression ratio difference between file compression tools.

« Last post by IainB on August 16, 2016, 04:19 AM »

@Shades and @xtabber: Thanks for the interesting comments. I hadn't considered that 7-ZIP might be able to make significantly smaller ZIP files, so I tried it out with the same set of documents and it produced a .ZIP file size 61.0MB, which is only slightly smaller than the 61.1MB that the standard system ZIP created.
So then I tried the "ultra" ZIP compression setting in 7-ZIP and it output 60.6MB - again, not a big difference.
One could probably play around with this all day, but I suspect that at the end of it one would be unlikely to have made a particularly significant dent in it.

Come to think of it, I are now confuzzled as I do not see how the same ZIP standard algorithm is being used if the compressed sizes of the same files would differ as significantly as is being suggested (above), merely from using one ZIP tool or another ZIP tool, so I must be missing something there. I thought that was why there are several different compression tools, each using their own peculiar algorithms for different standards of compression.
However, even if one might be able to make a significantly smaller .ZIP file of the documents, could WDS still open and read/index the contents? I'd have to test that to be sure.

1548

General Software Discussion / Anti-Virus in Win10 - MSE/Defender and MBAM?

« Last post by IainB on August 15, 2016, 11:04 PM »

What’s the Best Antivirus for Windows 10? (Is Windows Defender Good Enough?)
An article that recommends Malwarebytes. Who here doesn't like it?
__________________________________

-Arizona Hot (August 15, 2016, 07:53 PM)

The Windows OS now comes bundled with the built-in "Defender" - which seems to comprise 3 integrated but separate components:

• UAC (User Access Control)
• a firewall
• an AV (Anti-Virus) app.

The AV is/was an apparently highly-regarded  commercial Microsoft product previously released under the name of MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials) for $FREE, for domestic and (if I recall correctly) SMBs (Small-to-Medium Businesses).
The engine in MSE is/was used by businesses and banks because it was apparently very good - or so I was told by a network systems engineer in a Kiwi bank. I wrote a review of MSE on the DC forum, starting after MSE was first released for $FREE, and following it up in ad-hoc fashion as the product evolved. It was and continues to be an excellent product, actively developed and supported by Microsoft, and has clearly become an integral part of their Windows OS today.

The McAfee/Norton/Symantec/whatever branded virus tools that come bundled as "FREE" apps with Windows on new OEM PCs seem to be largely targeted at the domestic/single-user market, and typically seem to start nagging for annual subscription payments after the first year, or something. Most consumers likely regard them as useful/necessary, not realising that they are actually redundant at the outset.
I noticed (and I think I have commented elsewhere about this on this forum) that Norton/Symantec aggressively even inhibited the start-up and/or installation of Defender (virus checker) and Malwarebytes in Win8/10, and so had to be expunged with prejudice before one could install/run them cleanly. I consider this cuckoo-like behaviour against competitive products on the customer's own ruddy PC to be a predatory and unethical commercial practice, and I would argue that such AV vendors should be shunned for engaging in such sharp practice.

I have also written a review of MBAM (Malwarebytes Anti-Malware) on DC forum and followed it up in ad-hoc fashion as the product evolved. For the reasons given in the review thread, MBAM seems to be an excellent product - but that is for the $PAID version.

What I would point out is that:

• (a) MSE ($FREE in Defender) is a very good AV app (QED) and
• (b) MBAM ($PAID) as a very good AM (Anti-Malware) app, and
• (c) that the two things do not perform the same function, though they can at times seem to overlap in functionality - e.g., when it comes to detecting some PUPs (Potentially Unwanted Programs).

So, what this would seem to indicate is that the Windows OS has an excellent $FREE AV app (or at least, the cost is included in the OS cost) within Defender, and thus making use of other AV apps as an alternative could possibly be a WOT (Waste Of Time) - as they could be inferior, not necessarily any better, and certainly redundant and also would probably be NOT $FREE. So most informed users would probably not need to consider using them, except perhaps as (say) an academic exercise or a suck-it-and-see trial (as I tend to do).

However, MBAM has a lot going for it on its own - as an AM app to augment the defense of the system security, regardless of whichever AV app one uses. MBAM can mitigate risks that might not necessarily be caught/treated by the AV app, and can also be used (by design) to clean up PC's hard drives that have already been infected with a PUP/Hijack/virus or general malware, and it (the $PAID version) also has a very handy and effective real-time monitoring tool of user web-browsing activity. For most users, web-browsing, file downloads and reading of online email could potentially provide the most likely channels for a PC to become infected with a virus or other malware. MBAM can fill an important security gap here, and this could make MBAM valuable - if not essential - for that reason, in these malware-abundant times.
For example, having used MBAM with a vengeance and having experienced some of its capabilities whilst cleaning up other people's malware-infested PCs, I reckon my children's online browsing and game-playing is certainly that much more secure because of MBAM.
The reason why I use MSE and MBAM together is that they complement each other, overlap to a limited extent, and both have a precautionary approach - better-safe-than-sorry. Using them both together, nothing seems to have fallen between the cracks so far, over several years and several PCs.

1549

General Software Discussion / Interesting compression ratio difference between file compression tools.

« Last post by IainB on August 15, 2016, 09:18 AM »

(The text from the image below has been copied into the spoiler below the image.)

Spoiler

Notes on compression ratio difference between ZIP and 7-ZIP.
I tend to use the standard Windows ZIP (using the built-in Windows compression tool) to compress old documents into an archive state, but where I still need to have those documents indexed/searchable.  I use an iFilter to enable WDS (Windows Desktop Search) to search within .ZIP files.
Otherwise I tend to use 7-ZIP, which generally has much better file compression.
The HP Support utilities program for the new (refurbished) HP Pavilion I am currently setting up uses several directories of information.  One is a folder holding the User Guides (C:\Program Files\HP\Documentation\platform_guides\ug).
The guides are all PDF documents.
There were 38 PDF files (one file for each of the 38 different languages catered for), each typically of about 2.2MB in size (with some occasional variation).
Wherever possible, I try to avoid littering a PC's hard drive with document files that are not required, because:
a.  They take up client device space on a finite volume - space that could probably be better left empty for something more useful.
b.  They can add to backup process CPU resources and duration and backup storage requirements.
c.  They take up client CPU time - as I have WDS set to index document files (including PDF files).

I initially considered deleting them, but then decided against it.  I reckoned that, if they were all in a single compressed file, then they would not take up too much space and would require less resources as a single file on backup (multiple file handling also takes more time).  So I decided to compress them into a single file.

I only needed the English version - which was a 2.1MB file named 824463-001.pdf (the suffix -001 is apparently the language ID code used by HP for discriminating between languages (I am not familiar with whatever codification method they use for this ID).So, I selected the 37 "unwanted" (non-English) PDF files in the directory, and xplorer² showed me that they were 85.3MB in total volume.

Using Send To, I intended to send them to a 7-ZIP (7z) compressed file - i.e., rather than ZIP, as I didn't need WDS to search/index the documents) - but I was       `a little preoccupied with my 6y/o son.  who wanted me to help him with something and, by mistake, I sent them as a selected group to a ZIP archive.
That resulted in a compressed ZIP file of 61.1MB.
The compression saving was ((85.3-61.1)/85.3)*100=28.3705% I then realised my mistake and at the same time I observed that that compression didn't look like a very significant compression ratio (85.3:61.1).
Curious to see the comparison, I then sent the same files to a 7-ZIP (7z) compressed file.
That resulted in a compressed 7z file of 26.4MB.  The compression saving was ((85.3-26.4)/85.3)*100=69.0504% So, 7-ZIP's compression was 69.1-28.4=40.7% greater for the same set of documents.

This was a timely reminder to me of how significantly more efficient a compression algorithm 7-ZIP had than that of the standard ZIP.
Obviously compression rates could vary depending on the types of file being compressed, but I had forgotten that the differential between ZIP and 7-ZIP could       be that significant!

1550

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Vopt 9 defragger free

« Last post by IainB on August 15, 2016, 08:58 AM »

By the way, whilst Vopt seemed to work OK, I have also recently downloaded, installed and tried out UltraDefrag, but I uninstalled it due to its persistent hanging/freezing permanently. Bit of a disappointment, that. I had thought it looked like it might have had quite a good potential.