Recent Posts

226

General Software Discussion / Re: Firefox Extensions: Your favorite or most useful

« Last post by oblivion on April 19, 2013, 04:37 AM »

I have quite a lot of favourite extensions in common with various other suggestions posted here and I'm not going to list all of them because of the yawn factor. However, a couple of less common suggestions that I'd like to +1:

Possibly my favourite Firefox extension is Speed Dial. I don't do bookmarks, I do dials. I can categorise sets of places into dial "groups" and I really like the way this works.

I'm also extraordinarily fond of Newsfox. I've tried all sorts of RSS readers but this one just works for me, and I use it all the time. There are a couple of minor idiosyncrasies -- sorting is slightly counter-intuitive -- but I've stuck with it for some years now and it's yet to disappoint me.

227

Living Room / Re: When you make your 100'th Post

« Last post by oblivion on April 17, 2013, 11:04 AM »

Cor blimey mate, you mean you can't tell?

-pilgrim (April 17, 2013, 10:48 AM)

I am NOT Dick Van Dyke. There's more to English accents than cartoon cockneys, y'know...

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Living Room / Re: When you make your 100'th Post

« Last post by oblivion on April 17, 2013, 11:02 AM »

Yay for Non American accents. So which accent is it?   

-TaoPhoenix (April 17, 2013, 10:38 AM)

It is English. The one that I think sounds completely normal and Americans think sounds either old-fashioned and quaint, or like a criminal mastermind.

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Living Room / Re: When you make your 100'th Post

« Last post by oblivion on April 17, 2013, 10:59 AM »

You mean you was 'oblivious' to it?

-pilgrim (April 17, 2013, 10:36 AM)

My online name has quite a long history. I used to run a FidoNet BBS; I called it "Oblivion and You" after a song called "You And Oblivion" by a musician called Robyn Hitchcock. (The latter's been doing stuff with Peter Buck of REM lately, but he tends to be regarded as obscure, sadly.)

Then I discovered a rollercoaster called Oblivion at a British theme park called Alton Towers. It trumpeted itself as the world's first vertical drop rollercoaster. (100 feet in freefall, effectively, and it holds you over the drop for just long enough for you to wish you'd never got onboard.)

So the BBS gained a subtitle. The world's first vertical drop BBS. Nonsense, of course, but as I never had more than a handful of users, nobody much cared.

When the BBS' hard disk died, I spent a while wondering whether it was worth resurrecting the machine, but reluctantly decided it was more work than it was worth. (I think it was one of the last handful of FidoNet nodes in the UK: it wasn't quite me turning out the lights as I left but I was pretty close).

So the name lives on, sort of. I still miss Fido...

The avatar is a shameless copy of the Oblivion (rollercoaster) logo that I built a small animation with, mostly because I wanted to see if I could. (A close inspection will reveal that my animation skills are not exactly brilliant, but I think it's probably okay for a beginner )

(And modest too.)

My modesty, as you have clearly indicated, is just one of my fine attributes.

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Living Room / Re: When you make your 100'th Post

« Last post by oblivion on April 17, 2013, 10:25 AM »

I just discovered I never noticed my 100th. <sniff>

Still, just to commemorate the fact that I must have written a hundredth post at some point (and, of course, it must have been perfectly crafted, beautifully enunciated and carefully delivered in a non-American accent) I've just updated my avatar.

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General Software Discussion / Re: thunderbird alternative

« Last post by oblivion on April 17, 2013, 05:50 AM »

Needless to say I uninstalled Postbox and haven't used it since.

-J-Mac (April 17, 2013, 05:36 AM)

Can't say I blame you.

I played with it for a while but found some features were either missing until payment was made or just broken. I couldn't find out which, found the lack of contact facilities frustrating and came to the conclusion that I didn't care to persevere. Your experience suggests that I am unlikely to regret giving up.

It does look like a nice implementation of a more stripped-back version of Thunderbird.

I've taken my courage firmly in both hands and installed The Bat! I'm not going to let it do any encryption and I'll be very careful before I let it start to build up local message stores. At the moment, it feels like coming home after being away for months.

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General Software Discussion / Re: thunderbird alternative

« Last post by oblivion on April 11, 2013, 10:20 AM »

As long as so many developers (and users) can't seem to understand that a PIM, a newsreader, and an e-mail client are intrinsically separate things (at least IMO) we'll continue to live with flaky poorly integrated 'features' and bloat.

-40hz (April 11, 2013, 08:48 AM)

I blame Outlook Pro -- pretty sure nobody had tried bolting more than an addressbook onto an email client before then. I'd argue, though, that meeting scheduling managed through an email-ish approach isn't a bad thing, and it's sort of inevitable that you're then going to want a reasonably well-featured addressbook rather than something basic. It's the "let's add presentation graphics and coffee-machine-management" thinking that's responsible for most of the problems, though, as you say.

And what I find most amazing is how few have built-in provisions for backing up their own message stores.

...and, in the case of The Bat (Voyager version) at the point I gave up with it, even when there IS backup, it isn't always reliable. Grumble grumble grumble...

So be it. I've pretty much given up. Claws Mail comes close enough for me. It'll do.

Well, I'm currently playing with the 30 day trial of PostBox, and Claws I'll take a look at too, in due course. Recommendations are usually a good start, anyway -- thanks!

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General Software Discussion / Re: thunderbird alternative

« Last post by oblivion on April 11, 2013, 04:22 AM »

What is it about The Bat that so many people are willing to make excuses for it and its dev team, while at the same time leveling criticisms for the exact same things on its competitors?

I just don't get that part.  

-40hz (April 09, 2013, 09:27 AM)

Where The Bat really gets things right, it gets them very right indeed. The "Sorting Office" is brilliant -- you need something like the Nostalgy addon to even get close with Thunderbird.

I don't actually know that The Bat was written by people who started out in FidoNet (where my first serious exposure to proper electronic messaging happened) but it feels like it. FidoNet, because the transport and storage costs were borne by ordinary home users with modems, took an economical approach to messages that Internet email never bothered to learn -- because somebody else was paying the bill. So emails quote everything the last guy wrote and everything you wrote to him the time before and so on and nobody cares because moving a 200k email costs the same as moving a 5k email.

[Yes, the old fart's grumbling again. Nothing to see here, move along.]

Er, anyway, The Bat supports proper quoting and makes selective editing of quotes (and their reformatting) simple and straightforward, which leads to a conversational view of emails that makes sense of the concept in a way that the current fad for "call every email with the same subject and between the same two people a conversation" doesn't -- in the sense that the former leads to communication where the latter requires research and time and re-reading irrelevances to get to the important bits.

It's a losing battle: for one thing, both sides of the conversation have to cooperate and work the same way, and people are lazy. But I can't make Thunderbird do proper quoting, Outlook has never really supported it, anything that has its roots in *nix doesn't quite get it either (the likes of Mulberry, say) I haven't worked out whether PostBox will (only, I suspect, if an old and no-longer-compatible Thunderbird addon is available for it) and I can only carry on promoting the Cause Of Economical And Communicative Email if I can swallow my concerns and go back to The Bat!

If I'm honest, I think there's never EVER really been a good email client. While databases are at the core of most if not all client email solutions, and while database management systems remain non-bulletproof, there probably never will be.

234

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Copernic Desktop Search Pro Version on Bits Today, 18 July 2012

« Last post by oblivion on April 10, 2013, 10:04 AM »

---9 months later the same question.

-Curt (April 09, 2013, 10:07 AM)

I used to use the free version, before it became so restricted compared to the commercial one that I decided I was being bullied and quit. (I may be misremembering, but I think they may also have ditched support for .DBF tables, which was my main reason for using it.) But it IS very good, if you want to pay the money and if you're interested in searching the contents of your files. (If all you care about is filenames, I'd go with Everything, Locate32 or the new version of Listary.)

I used X1 for a while, too. Their viewer library (the Stellent one, I think) is still occasionally very useful, but its the only bit of the free version of X1 I kept. Can't remember anymore why I went off it...

235

General Software Discussion / Re: (poll) Six free security tools from Microsoft

« Last post by oblivion on April 10, 2013, 09:44 AM »

I have always had a slightly ambivalent relationship with AV tools.

My main desktop machine is more used by my wife (who routinely hits the "temporarily allow everything on this webpage" option in NoScript, sadly) so I have a paid AV package on there (eSet NOD32).

This year, they offered me an almost free update to the full Internet Security offering. I resisted: I have yet to see one of those that doesn't cause more problems than it solves.

My netbook has had MSE for the last two years but, amidst odd reports of it being less secure than it was (because it's become a big enough target, I guess) I've just replaced it with NOD32 too (the second license was reasonably cheap).

Interestingly, dcupdate works a heck of a lot faster now MSE's gone.

So I still use the Malicious Software Removal Tool, even though it's never found anything and makes Patch Tuesday more of a chore than I'd like and Defender's on both systems -- NOD32 replicates quite a lot of its functionality, I think, but they seem to coexist happily.

MSE did find something, once, on my netbook: an infected JPG on some webpage or other, if memory serves. NOD32 seems a decent-enough product, the support is at least reasonably responsive, the program's very configurable, not very obtrusive and seems effective.

I hadn't even heard of the offline version of Defender before reading Fred Langa's article yesterday. Nice to know it exists, I guess. Ditto the Safety Scanner.

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General Software Discussion / Re: thunderbird alternative

« Last post by oblivion on April 09, 2013, 08:56 AM »

Well, I still own a license for the current version of The Bat!, perhaps I should try again.

Coincidentally, though, I just saw a thing on TechRepublic that mentioned a client I haven't previously heard of: i.Scribe. Anyone tried it?

[edit to add]

The free version is limited, the commercial version is $10, adds support for multiple identities/accounts... but the author's spelling is worrying

237

General Software Discussion / Video conferencing

« Last post by oblivion on April 08, 2013, 11:17 AM »

I've used an old PC at work to set up an internal chat server. (I used ejabberd, running under ubuntu, in case that means anything to you.) It's been through a couple of incarnations -- in fact, its first existence was based on Openfire, but the latter doesn't seem to want to play ball with me when it comes to updates and nobody cared when I said they'd need to set up their accounts again -- but it seems uncontroversial, it works reliably on a relatively ancient PC that was headed for the junkpile, and it doesn't use any valuable Windows licenses.

Which is all very fine and pleasant but a couple of people are now pushing me to add videoconferencing facilities to it -- the point being that they don't want to install Skype when we might be able to do something internally.

So suddenly I need either one or two things and I'm either googling badly or what I want isn't available without paying some third party to provide it. I need a chat client that can also handle voice and video, and if ejabberd can't handle the binary streams without help, I need some sort of plugin for it.

I started researching this on the assumption that it wasn't going to be rocket science and that I'd find a solution really easily.

Guess what? I haven't got any sort of handle on what to do. There have been suggestions that I need a SIP server (which looks complicated and possibly far more than is actually required) but I have yet to find anything that looks like a simple recipe for what I want to do.

Anybody here done anything like this? Or can point me at an online resource I can go and bang my forehead against for a while, before deciding I'm out of my depth? (I pretend to understand a bit about ubuntu but if I'm honest, I'm happiest with a gui, these days!)

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General Software Discussion / Re: thunderbird alternative

« Last post by oblivion on April 08, 2013, 10:41 AM »

IMAP support is amazing. Even compared to Thunderbird.

-Tuxman (April 04, 2013, 06:13 AM)

Agreed - The Bat remains the best IMAP client, despite the slow development (I've been waiting a long time for something as basic as the option of a two-line message list, but still use it for its unparalleled IMAP support).

-johnk (April 05, 2013, 04:04 PM)

There's a lot about The Bat! that I miss, but I am still looking for something reliable and am sticking with Thunderbird until I find it. (I bought The Bat Pro so I could use Voyager. Voyager, three times yet, stomped on my messagebases and because the internal repair routines just aren't very good and the encryption is excellent, I lost a lot of important email.)

Thunderbird did something like that to me too, not all that long ago. (A bug that corrupted email being moved from an IMAP to a local folder.) But Mozilla noticed the problem and fixed it -- something Ritlabs never did, despite my repeated bug reports.

But I miss: proper quoting; the marvellous rules; not having to put up with Thunderbird's idiosyncratic HTML support; the scheduler; so many things... it's just a shame that Ritlabs give every impression of not giving a flying damn about their customers.

239

General Software Discussion / Re: anyone else using Vipre2013 antivirus?

« Last post by oblivion on April 08, 2013, 10:26 AM »

my preliminary research showed Vipre to be a pretty darn good piece of software... but now I am not so sure.

Anyone else have any thing to say on this?

-techidave (April 06, 2013, 08:06 AM)

I bought a lifetime license for Vipre at the end of 2011, for my netbook. Again, my research found lots of good things said about it.

My own experience wasn't so good. I gave up with it after about a month of bad experiences and frustrations (like XYPlorer having to be whitelisted before its update could be run and the XYPlorer website being listed as a source of malware (which it isn't.)

I keep thinking about trying it again, to see if it's learned better behaviour in the last year or so -- but it sounds like it hasn't. Probably a bit late to ask for a refund, though...

Currently running eSet's (rather underrated) NOD32 AV on the netbook and we seem happy with each other thus far

240

Screenshot Captor / Re: LATEST VERSION INFO THREAD - ScreenshotCaptor - v4.0 - March 26, 2013

« Last post by oblivion on April 04, 2013, 04:49 AM »

Just spotted this (as a result of recommending the program to a colleague) on the main ScreenshotCaptor page:

Ability to embed textual comments in files or add attractiv captions to images and printouts.

Oddly, the missing 'e' attracted my attention, so maybe it's an attractive misspelling in more ways than one

241

Multi Photo Quotes / Re: Latest Multi Photo Quotes Release v2.00.01 - March 25, 2013

« Last post by oblivion on April 02, 2013, 05:08 PM »

Awesome! 

-mouser (April 02, 2013, 02:22 PM)

I thought so. I don't always agree with Samer, but he's one of the -- apparently, anyway -- genuinely independent commentators whose opinion is always worthy of consideration. And a thumbs-up from him is a definite bonus

242

Multi Photo Quotes / Re: Latest Multi Photo Quotes Release v2.00.01 - March 25, 2013

« Last post by oblivion on April 02, 2013, 10:56 AM »

Have you seen:


this?

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General Software Discussion / Re: Recycling hardware

« Last post by oblivion on February 26, 2013, 12:54 AM »

Windows 7's virtual XP mode might be a way round that.

-oblivion (February 25, 2013, 11:30 AM)

Does it allow software to pass an OS version check by lying when you install something, reporting that you are attempting to install it on XP and not Win7?

-app103 (February 25, 2013, 05:56 PM)

Yes. XP doesn't know it's running virtually. Version checks only report XP, from inside the VM.

I'm currently experimenting (at work) with a piece of software that requires the presence of a 16-bit NetBIOS stack to run. XP has it, 7 doesn't (and can't be given it.) The software works in XP mode and, once the application's been "published" to the Win7 host, appears to be running directly on the Win7 desktop. It's VERY cool. (I never EVER thought I'd say that about a Microsoft product!) The only downside is that it takes a long time to start up, the first time it's used after rebooting -- effectively because you're not just loading a program, you're booting a machine and THEN starting a program.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Recycling hardware

« Last post by oblivion on February 25, 2013, 11:30 AM »

This means that once I move beyond XP, my old Jornada may be completely useless.

-app103 (February 25, 2013, 11:03 AM)

Windows 7's virtual XP mode might be a way round that. At least, it seems to be a full, honest-to-goodness virtual machine with enough ability to talk to USB and optical drives that things that don't work any other way, can.

What I'm not sure about is if Win8 has anything similar.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Recycling hardware

« Last post by oblivion on February 25, 2013, 08:26 AM »

So the question is: what should I do with the thing?

-oblivion (February 25, 2013, 06:35 AM)

I'm keeping them to donate to a museum in a few years.

-Renegade (February 25, 2013, 06:51 AM)

I think my ex-wife still has an Intertec Superbrain (twin Z80 processors, ran CP/M off two vertically-mounted hard-sectored 5 1/4" floppy disks) sat in her attic, waiting for me to find a good use for it. One day I'll retrieve it and find a museum for it, I keep telling myself.

I remember the days when they looked futuristic. (I also remember learning Z80 assembler on one of the things. Now there were some futureproof skills. )

(Oh, and a perfectly excellent operating system whose size could be measured in kilobytes!)

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General Software Discussion / Recycling hardware

« Last post by oblivion on February 25, 2013, 06:35 AM »

(Yes, I know this area's for software. Bear with me!)

I have an old Dell Axim X30. It was an attempt to find a better way to do PDAish things than my old Psion 5mx, which kept needing its screen cable replacing but which had functionality oozing from every pore.

The X30 didn't cut the mustard. It'd synch with Outlook (but I didn't care whether it could or not) and I couldn't find any good ways to make it do things I felt useful. So it got shoved to the back of a drawer and forgotten about.

I found it again recently. Of course, Dell quit supporting them long ago, and I don't expect a 624MHz cpu is quite as exciting a prospect these days as it was when it was new.

So the question is: what should I do with the thing? I'm pretty sure its SD handling doesn't extend beyond 2Gb (ie not SDHC) and a bit of a play online hasn't suggested anything to me along the lines of "this hack will enable you to resurrect your Axim as a shiny and capable linux device." But I'm ever so averse to throwing something away that is still functional. Should I reinstall ActiveSync on my PC and see if it leads me to anything I didn't think of a few years back, shove it back in the drawer, or Something Else?

Here's the software bit: does anyone know if there's a way to get a usable linux onto it without requiring that I study Complicated Things for several years first?

247

General Software Discussion / Re: Removing dual-boots

« Last post by oblivion on February 04, 2013, 05:01 AM »

I'm sure it's a coincidence, but techsupportalert.com have published this helpful article today.

It includes links to legitimate downloads of Win 7 ISOs.

Oh, and as a final addendum to the previous note, the partition resizing went perfectly too.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Removing dual-boots

« Last post by oblivion on February 02, 2013, 04:14 PM »

Just resizing partitions now but it all looks good. One note: it was "bootrec /fixmbr" as the first step and the second step was scary - it claimed that it could see 0 Windows partitions. I rebooted anyway and it all worked perfectly :-)

Thanks to everyone for all your help!

-- Tim

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General Software Discussion / Re: Removing dual-boots

« Last post by oblivion on February 02, 2013, 01:47 PM »

Addendum:

I just noticed the link to get the recovery disks charges $20 for a copy - supposedly because of "licensing requirements." That sounds like a crock to me.

-40hz (February 02, 2013, 11:58 AM)

You're probably right.

Anybody you know with a copy of Windows 7 can create a boot/recovery disk for you - as you probably can yourself.

If I borrow an optical dvd writer from somewhere, yes, I can.

I've got a note of Carol's instructions (thanks, Carol!) I have a full image of the system and bootable recovery media (that will enable me to restore the backup) and I still have the recovery partition on the hard disk that will give me a factory restore, from which I can reinstall Paragon and recover again -- albeit replacing my dual-boot system with the same dual-boot system -- so I think I have my belt, braces and a parachute all in place.

Wish me luck: I'm goin' in.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Removing dual-boots

« Last post by oblivion on February 02, 2013, 10:34 AM »

Perfect - thanks!

I shall be sorry to leave too -- I've enjoyed watching ubuntu evolve, but I'll probably make some space on my desktop machine for it instead.