Recent Posts

1626

N.A.N.Y. 2014 / Re: NANY 2014 Roundup Prep

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 02, 2014, 04:45 PM »

Ok so it's almost time to prepare the roundup summary of all NANY 2014 entries.. Kyrathaba has been doing all the good NANY management for this year.. I don't know if we can talk him into doing the roundup summary, but we can beg and hope..

To make this easier though, it would be great if authors could make SHORT video screencasts demonstrating their entries, and either uploading to youtube or somewhere, or using some of the free online screencast tools (for example see here, here, here).

-mouser (January 02, 2014, 12:46 PM)

Hmm. I'm of a couple of mixed opinions on what to do with mine. Hence why earlier I joked that they were "components" aka "0.25 of an app each" and not proofed apps. It was too good of a box of tinkertoys to leave hidden forever, but they're unpolished and not really "safe for production". I just decided to unload them now before I forgot them completely! I included (almost) all of the source codes, so what I'd really be thrilled with is if someone adopted them into a "late nany".

Videos would "oversell" them in the stage they are in. For example half the buttons on the "Turbo Processor" don't even work. I got stuck in Proof of Concept before I ran out of dev funds, and that one is definitely a "coding lunch". The modules mostly work, but see my detailed posts; they all have medium serious bugs to sign off.

1627

Living Room / Re: Multiple Mini Reviews

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 02, 2014, 04:35 PM »

^is it that you'd you want to be called a major one?

-tomos (January 02, 2014, 12:49 PM)

Well, we have a whole pantheon of them here at DC!
(Tao runs off to form the Church of DC)

1628

Living Room / Re: Multiple Mini Reviews

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 02, 2014, 04:34 PM »

^is it that you'd you want to be called a major one?

I've been called a major pain, even though I've never been in the military. 

-MilesAhead (January 02, 2014, 01:14 PM)

What about a Modern Major General! 

1629

General Software Discussion / Re: text file editor personalyzable

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 02, 2014, 04:32 PM »

running to try TaoPhoenix

-Contro (December 30, 2013, 06:25 PM)

Hi Contro,

My TurboProcessor does not do what you need yet. I was only saying that the project was designed so that one day a developer could *make it* do that as one example of combining both text editing and special features.

However, I am not a programmer! 

1630

N.A.N.Y. 2014 / Re: NANY 2014 Release: Process Piglet

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 02, 2014, 08:21 AM »

I'd be surprised if the "Firefox Twins" (FF and Pale Moon) really chew up that much memory per se - MS Sec Essentials is usually the one that gets out of hand for me, but it's an AntiVirus so I don't know what I can really do about it except let it do its thing.

Update:
It/They apparently do. Here's Process Piglet at work catching Palemoon jumping up 100 megs:


Update2:
This little tool is growing on me. PaleMoon jumped from 300 megs to 411 megs! No wonder my poor laptop with only 500 megs struggles to run it!

And PaleMoon was supposed to be "optimized" for Windows!

So I guess I'm a little sad that in 2014 it takes 411 megs to render a set of webpages.

1631

Living Room / Re: Multiple Mini Reviews

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on January 01, 2014, 06:36 PM »

IainB is a minor deity!

1632

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... reasonable backup software

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 31, 2013, 11:18 AM »

There's gonna be a whole flood this year of this... but "back forward".

For ex I am basically happy on Win XP (with minor needling of Skwire!), but if MS is about to quit even issuing security updates for it, one of these years I need to move to Win 7.

So then you get the huge issue of "what do you backup" - you can't precisely back up installed programs into an upgrade.

Now I DO have a lot of cruft on my comp and a fresh install may not be all that bad ... if competently done!

So elsewhere I went to that Backup2 program (with the funny spelling!) and copied over my "basic data". So that will get me close and I really only use 20 of the 100 installed practice programs on my comp...

A long time ago I used to use a double config called "Screen" and "Project" - this machine has taken a pounding, but it's not unheard of to go Dual Image and let the C Drive get pulverized with test pipe dreams and D Drive only gets the "real stuff".

1633

Developer's Corner / Re: Somebody actually wrote something in GO!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 31, 2013, 10:49 AM »

On the downside, it's a "btcd, our full-node bitcoin alternative..."!

1634

N.A.N.Y. 2014 / Re: The NANY Retrospective Thread

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 31, 2013, 10:46 AM »

Wheat pennies, hmm. Yep, I could add that. Could also add Susan B. Anthony dollars...

-kyrathaba (December 31, 2013, 07:32 AM)

For me, it's the Wheat Pennies that haunt me. I keep giving back ordinary pennies to sales vendors because as +2 cents, it helps their drawer not to be under hence less chance of them getting yelled at by an uptight boss.

So if anything, I'd want "pennies donated" as a counter!  

But Wheat Pennies ... I know they're worthless, but dang if a penny from WWII doesn't inspire me!
(Hehe put in a text field *where* they are... because they always go "somewhere special" ... and then it moves! So the first four are on the Top Shelf, the next three are Next To The Book Case, etc!)

1635

General Software Discussion / Re: text file editor personalyzable

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 30, 2013, 06:16 PM »

to my limited knowledge no text editor can do that,
but any rich text editor can do it.

In SoftMaker TextMaker 2012 it is called (mark/select text) > Format > Paragraph > Shading > Background > (select colour)
-but no batch that I know of; you will have to do it manually.

-Curt (December 30, 2013, 04:45 PM)

... Not yet.

But see my "components for NANY", it's a modular text editor that *could* do this. Because the programming for it is a snap. Any ten of you could do it. But we feel trapped that "no one HAS done it".

It's just supply and demand.

-TaoPhoenix (December 30, 2013, 05:38 PM)

Please put the link.
 

-Contro (December 30, 2013, 05:55 PM)

It's this one Contro.

https://www.donation....msg344650#msg344650

"...The idea in action:

1. I commissioned "modules" from third tier outsource programmers on simple stuff "that didn't matter if it had an obscure bug".

2. I gave the modules to my project design lead programmer to merge into this processor shell as a feature module. He had the leeway to clean up the initial module codes etc. "

I ran out of development money but I proved the concept ... that you can build a custom text editor to do lots of stuff. Maybe at the end it signs off and exports the file for something else to final process, but all these kinds of NANY utilities this year, can certainly be all mashed into one "framework to rule them all".

1636

General Software Discussion / Re: text file editor personalyzable

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 30, 2013, 05:38 PM »

to my limited knowledge no text editor can do that,
but any rich text editor can do it.

In SoftMaker TextMaker 2012 it is called (mark/select text) > Format > Paragraph > Shading > Background > (select colour)
-but no batch that I know of; you will have to do it manually.

-Curt (December 30, 2013, 04:45 PM)

... Not yet.

But see my "components for NANY", it's a modular text editor that *could* do this. Because the programming for it is a snap. Any ten of you could do it. But we feel trapped that "no one HAS done it".

It's just supply and demand.

1637

DC Website Help and Extras / Re: AdBlock and DC Forum

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 29, 2013, 08:12 AM »

Works fine here:
 (see attachment in previous post)

-4wd (December 27, 2013, 07:01 PM)

And it's back for me too, though this is far from the first time I've seen these glitches. I'll have to poke at this for a while.

1638

Living Room / Re: Facebook D.O.A.

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 29, 2013, 08:06 AM »

Facebook 'dead and buried'
“What we’ve learned from working with 16-18 year olds in the UK is that Facebook is not just on the slide, it is basically dead and buried.”

Gee, does that mean all the 'like us on Facebook' pop-ups will finally start to go away?

-bit (December 29, 2013, 05:36 AM)

Some interesting points:

- "Teenagers are ... switching to simpler social networks and messaging apps, new research has found. "  So simple texting related apps are Back to Basics. Maybe it's a pity ICQ couldn't have found a way to reclaim their glory. Whatsapp is basically non-SMS texting.

- "even the teenagers that took part in the study admitted that Facebook is technically better than its rivals. ... It is more integrated, ... and more effective for observing people’s relationships."

Who observes their own relationships?! "Observing" is just the fancy word for surveillance!

1639

General Software Discussion / Re: Sandboxie lifetime license discontinued

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 29, 2013, 07:57 AM »

Heh there's room for a satire fiction story:
"Lifetime License!!"

(Cue dramatic music)
Punchline: The company hires assassins to kill the customers! 

1640

General Software Discussion / Re: Mind mapping software

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 29, 2013, 07:54 AM »

The one use I would have wanted a map program (but couldn't find one ultra simple enough - coding snack!?) was just to capture all the web pages I visit and auto produce a tree with some nodes being annotations in between. It's fun to see the linkages when you go web surfing.

Fun tip - watch episodes of MacGyver with today's web resources. So then your tree would capture stuff like this:

Oil well fires/Needs High Explosives/create a shockwave/pushes fuel & oxygen away
Started by Myron M. Kinley/ Red Adair became most famous/
Uses of Water:
     gas turbine blast water mist at the fire/still used to clean turbines
     High-powered water sprays/Keep the fighters safely below critical temps
Recent advances in tech/Purple K dry Chemical/

1641

General Software Discussion / Re: Mind mapping software

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 29, 2013, 07:52 AM »

...Doing it that way you're back to the old flat sheet of paper constraints and the result isn't a lot better than a list or outline.

-Vurbal (December 29, 2013, 02:24 AM)

I just peeked at this stuff a couple of weeks ago. Vurbal your note here is a lot like what I took away.

As far as "Mapping" goes, I came into the discussion comparing it to my tog dog entry, the Tree Databases and one in partuicular.

The maps are rather pretty visually to be sure. But it looked like they broke down after more than some 50 items. A lot of space was wasted trying to find space for the circles not to overlap, and contain a readable label.

For the "knowledge sets" I do, it's all about the dependent nodes, much like the old comments about Subroutines and maybe one "goto" that you bought from Vannah White (US Game Show Wheel of Fortune joke) that's like an emergency bail out.

So for example if I were to index authors from issues of a magazine, you can index the stories by author name, and (use the goto) for a second sort by issue date when printed. But beyond that the point don't intersect much.

Same with tax law studies; I made a tree with the forms *in the order of the dependent information* - so for example doing returns on paper, it doesn't help you to try to finish the Capital Gains Tax worksheet that only kicks in on the back of the return, if you're still debating your small business points of interest on the front page. Using the "Goto", of course it's useful to also have the list of forms in form order number.

And that's it.

There isn't a wild spaghetti pasta mesh of lines all around the data. And instead of little circles, the node labels are just text.

1642

DC Gamer Club / Re: The Internet Archive presents ....

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 28, 2013, 10:15 PM »

Okay, I'm going to put this here not so much because it's on this topic per se, but because you got me started on it with this topic.

I came up a generation or two from the original consoles to the Sega Genesis emulator and scared up a copy of the Sonic the Hedgehog ROM ... Which is stuck in demo mode. How the hell do I get the thing to start the game?!? I've been basically palming the keyboard for the last half an hour.

-Stoic Joker (December 28, 2013, 03:02 PM)

For me on the "Gens" emulator, try doing stuff with the Enter key. I know, sounds simple, but it seems to be working for the moment. But I almost remember it not working ... so then try the way I found it first, Control-Enter!

1643

General Software Discussion / Re: Sandboxie lifetime license discontinued

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 28, 2013, 09:51 PM »

I hope they honor the existing lifetime licenses. I have my guess as to how that will go; only time will tell.

-mwb1100 (December 28, 2013, 02:23 PM)

That's why it's a fascinating thing, the "lifetime license". A "lifetime" is a long time - usually the "life of the product" is the limiting factor, but don't rule out weasel moves years later.

1644

Living Room / Re: CDC (Control Data Corporation) - historical notes, CDC 6600 architecture + PLATO

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 06:01 PM »

I've grown away from this stuff in my doddering age, but chops from afar!

1645

Living Room / Re: Kickstarter for Boardgamers

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 02:04 PM »

That's a decent start, and they seem to have a legit concept. Some thoughts:

1. Chess. When you start to get into the larger tournament sets, chess pieces can get cumulatively rather large. So one of the designs with an "even" number of boxes might work - pawns then pieces X 2 colors is 4, or pawns x 2 and pieces x 2 times 2 colors = 8.

2. Magic the Gathering
I retired a decade ago, but Back In The Day, I'd have between three and ten decks built with up to twenty idea fragments all in progress. So the "disparaged" rubber bands was how I did it. For this box you'd need a ton of dividers then work out the spacing what "deck + sideboard + the cards you might throw in at the last minute in the car". Then even smaller slots for "half built ideas". Their design would do it, I just haven't calculated the cost of the dividers because you'd need a LOT.

(Heh - back in the day I did it with Harry & David Christmas Fruit boxes, labeled by category with a marker!)
   

1646

DC Website Help and Extras / AdBlock and DC Forum

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 01:50 PM »

While I don't recall the other sites, more and more often I'm noticing AdBlock simply "refusing" to kick in to block images.

For example on Giampy's post in the Humor Section:



But when I force a View Image,



I can do it.

Any tips?

This is already "a fork" - AdBlock Edge.

Is there any "2nd fork" that's even more aggressive and will simply nuke an image?

1647

Adventures of Baby Cody / Baby Cody 2014!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 01:47 PM »

Where did Baby Cody spend Christmas? Will he be in a New Year's Party?

Inquiring minds want to know!

Maybe in a few weeks when I get some money I can host him in NY City!?

1648

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Tray Management Utilities Mini-Review

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 01:41 PM »

Some random comments:

... I use Dopus, so maybe most of the time I'm not even aware that Explorer has crashed. I'll try Restart Explorer and see if things improve.

I kind of like what PS Tray Factory does and wish I could use that instead but unfortunately it does not work 100% on my Win7, 64-bit machine. Certain icons would just persist in the tray, even when I select them off, or there would be duplicates of some, with no way to deselect them. Plus some other glitches, which make me reluctant to shell out money for it.

-dr_andus (December 27, 2013, 04:21 AM)

Usually on my (WinXP) box in Explorer crashes, usually it takes everything with it into a system hang! So fortunately it's not that often! (Note to self one of these years I have to optimize MS Sec Essentials upon reboot!)

But as for the tray, I have 15 icons there but 11 of them I care about. So I guess I'm not in the market for these but I can see you hotshot types with 27 icons might want one! : )

1649

N.A.N.Y. 2014 / Re: NANY 2014 Release - Engine Displacement Calculator

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 27, 2013, 01:29 PM »

Badass.      I love stuff like this.

-skwire (December 27, 2013, 11:52 AM)

I believe the acronym is BAMF!

(Does the "I'm Not Worthy" bow)

1650

Coding Snacks / Re: re-map capslock function

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on December 26, 2013, 07:45 PM »

Just a random comment - I just disabled mine. Most of my shifts tend to be pinky on right shift. So I'm happy to have a mis-hit of Caps Lock simply do nothing at all.