Recent Posts

2426

Coding Snack Guidelines / Re: Looks like I still dont have a final solution for a custom directory list :(

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 30, 2013, 01:09 PM »

Questorfla, since you didn't say which program you tried, did you try "Karen's Directory Printer" yet? It lets you turn off all info you don't need, saves the output pretty easily to text, and can work on either files with their path or folders.

http://www.karenware...ertools/ptdirprn.asp

I've used it for years and I have created "directory to web" projects myself too. (I like to do the shuffle in Excel with a template to add those extra characters etc.)

2427

General Software Discussion / Re: Raymond.cc compares antivirus memory usage

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 30, 2013, 12:58 PM »

Yeah, I want to see this too. I was never all that worried about the memory usage, but MS Sec Essentials chews through a lot of cpu for me especially when booting.

2428

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 29, 2013, 04:48 AM »

Jeff Foxworthy says:
"If you park your car in a tree, you might be a RedNeck".

http://kptv.images.w...ges/22100451_BG2.jpg

2429

Living Room / Re: Getting Things Done revisited

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 29, 2013, 04:39 AM »

And right in time, comes xkcd with his usual brilliant take!

http://imgs.xkcd.com...t_worth_the_time.png

2430

General Software Discussion / Re: "Contest" - The most difficult Opt Out screens on installs!?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 29, 2013, 04:05 AM »

Any way, here are the screenshots, which the choices were slightly different this time, compared to what I described above, but still just as annoying.

-app103 (April 26, 2013, 05:21 PM)

especially sneaky the way the [cancel] button is greyed out as if it's not an option

-tomos (April 27, 2013, 02:48 PM)

And in honor of Tomos's post, here are my screenshots of the "Trope Starter"!

2431

General Software Discussion / Re: Goodbye OpenOffice, Hello LibreOffice

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 28, 2013, 08:05 PM »

I replaced the default icon on the desktop with the individual icons for Writer, etc. and noticed some speedup.

Then I found this tip for speeding up LibreOffice and noticed a 10 second faster opening of the program.  Tip

-techidave (April 28, 2013, 03:47 AM)

This tip DOES look pretty good. I did most of it except the Quickstarter part, and it does seem faster!   

2432

Post New Requests Here / Re: Remember where I got the Download

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 28, 2013, 07:48 PM »

Just for discussion, I often put "where from" info into my filenames when I save stuff. So "setup.exe" becomes "DC ChrisG FastUnZipSnack Setup.exe".

2433

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Scrubby

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 28, 2013, 11:38 AM »

Scrubby is a utility that sits in your system tray and allows you to remove text formatting (Bold, Italic, Colors, Etc.) and optionally strip HTML tags from text in your Windows clipboard using a hotkey and paste into the current active window. You can also create substitutions and substitute some text for another when pasting. Can come in handy for email templates and such.

I did base it off of a Mac app I saw called TextScrub. I thought that was a great idea so I made a Windows version. :-)

You can download and view more info here -> http://starpunch.blogspot.com/2013/04/scrubby.html

-c.gingerich (April 28, 2013, 10:13 AM)

Hmm. Theoretically that looks kinda neat. However it is 14 day trial with $5.99+tax via Paypal to continue using it!

Slightly drifting topics here, has anyone considered making "trial ware" a per-use trial rather than time limited? There's lots of stuff that I wouldn't buy right away because I'm not sure it would be a "star performer", only later that it does, but then it's expired. Whereas in a numbered trial, the first 4 uses playing with it sit there, then suddenly you get a project say in June where it becomes important enough to register!

2434

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 28, 2013, 10:15 AM »

That looks static App. Am I missing something?

-TaoPhoenix (April 27, 2013, 10:23 AM)

I assumed that that was the joke...

-Ath (April 27, 2013, 10:48 AM)

Yup! 

-app103 (April 27, 2013, 11:22 AM)

Well okay then, well played!

2435

Living Room / Re: The Coffee/Caffeine Thread!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 27, 2013, 10:24 AM »

I just noticed how relevant your signature is to this thread.

-Stephen66515 (April 26, 2013, 09:41 PM)

Yep! 

2436

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 27, 2013, 10:23 AM »

That looks static App. Am I missing something?

2437

Mouser's Zone / Re: Chocolatey

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 27, 2013, 10:21 AM »

I'm confused.
So can I set up a package that theoretically for a future machine packages say Firefox, Pale Moon, my favorite stuff from DC, and my 100 other apps on my comp, so that at some point if I get a new machine, a 1 line install pulls all that in?

2438

General Software Discussion / Re: "Contest" - The most difficult Opt Out screens on installs!?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 26, 2013, 09:10 PM »

Yeah, it's a tough call so far! My experience was along these lines this morning!
Maybe when I get some energy I can do the whole Uninstall for Screenshots routine.

Edit: A Shout Out to App for also being on oDesk! : )

That's where I've had a couple things commissioned.

2439

General Software Discussion / "Contest" - The most difficult Opt Out screens on installs!?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 26, 2013, 09:22 AM »

This thread was inspired generally by the growing obfuscation of Opt Out measures in harder and harder to find places. Specifically, I went looking for a free CD player program.

Specifically it was inspired by the program "Media Player Classic". I am guessing the original is probably on Sourceforge somewhere. However, the version I got hold of from Cnet had FIVE opt-outs, *alternating* between pre-checked boxes "with this box checked you agree to install an add-on", and then alternating with "by clicking accept you agree to install ___" and forcing you to be clever enough to click "Decline!"

This is an abuse variant of a well known psychological concept where after learning to click the "green button" the correct way out of the install of the aware is alternating between two methods, whereas clicking "all the green buttons like you just learned" installs everything!

So I invite you to submit your candidates for the worst opt-out methods!

Rules: They should (hopefully!) work! Disallowed are cases where the opt-out is simply ignored.

There was one other one from some program elsewhere, but I don't recall what it is now. That one made you uncheck *multiple boxes* per screen placed all over the place!

So my opening entry is five!
From this program/version:
Media Player Classic - *CNet Version* - seems to have more than even usual Cnet nonsense. Someone dumped it into a wrapper.
http://download.cnet...2139_4-10518778.html

2440

Living Room / Re: Internet freedoms restrained - SOPA/PIPA/OPEN/ACTA/CETA/PrECISE-related updates

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 26, 2013, 08:16 AM »

Hmm. Well everything needs to be taken with salt, it seems like maybe the Senate has a little more sense than the House on the "abuse-privacy" front.


CISPA may already be dead in the Senate
http://www.dailydot....ecurity-bill-failed/

"Experts and sources with knowledge of the situation say the most controversial Internet bill of the year, the Cyber Information Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), is already dead in the water.
...
But though CISPA resoundingly passed the House of Representatives April 18, "it is extremely unlikely for the Senate" to vote on the bill," the ACLU's Michelle Richardson told the Daily Dot."

However, as predicted, they then are "...senators are "drafting separate bills" to include some CISPA provisions."

So then instead of all the Nasties being chunked into one bill, they will wander into smaller little bills that wear down our ability to protest them!

THAT is the fundamental new advantage emerging against regular citizen process now! Citizens have no measure to permanently stop "with prejudice" or something, whatever Congress feels like passing. So we have *AGAIN* apparently stopped a Big Name bill, (and look how many there are!), only to be explicitly informed that they are apparently learning they can't smash all of the evil rules into one bill, so now they will make little bitty "hot-pepper" bills that will be easier to slip by one by one.

2441

Living Room / Re: Micro-Fundraiser for the Official DonationCoder CodyMobile!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 25, 2013, 11:56 PM »

Should this be moved to the Basement?

2442

General Software Discussion / Re: Goodbye OpenOffice, Hello LibreOffice

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 25, 2013, 01:49 PM »

apparently SoftmakerOffice,2008 is obsolete. They have a new version out.

-TaoPhoenix (April 25, 2013, 06:06 AM)

I think it's more correct to say it's an older version rather than obsolete when it comes to Linux. Most Linux apps don't much care which kernal or flavor of GNU/Linux they run under. At least not from my experience.
 

-40hz (April 25, 2013, 06:28 AM)

Heh well 40hz, this is like my joke about not using the language the same way with people...

The original download link was:
http://www.softmakeroffice.com/
But it has a small page on it that says:

SoftMaker Office 2008 for Windows and Linux
SoftMaker Office 2008 is no longer offered as a free download.
But don't worry! We have a successor: SoftMaker FreeOffice for Windows and Linux.
Download SoftMaker FreeOffice
http://www.freeoffice.com/en/

So what part of having a successor doesn't make the first one obsolete?
I'm confused! Maybe I'm stuck on the difference between older versions and obsolete!?

 

2443

Living Room / Re: Tip of the Day: How to make your zip files less annoying

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 25, 2013, 01:42 PM »

When you zip up files with the intention of giving, selling, emailing to others, please do not include the following files and folders:

• _MACOSX
• .DS_Store
• Thumbs.db

Nobody wants this crap! 

Besides, leaving it out makes smaller zip files, which means faster up/downloads, takes up less space on your server, uses less bandwidth.

-app103 (April 24, 2013, 09:23 PM)

Hi App,
can you explain what happens when you select a bunch of stuff and hit "send-to-zipped folder"? That's all I do to create zips out of something. So if that somehow creates a thumbs.db file, can you advise what I should be doing instead?

2444

Living Room / Re: Tip of the Day: How to make your zip files less annoying

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 25, 2013, 01:40 PM »

Krishean mentioned to me how much fun it is to look inside those Thumbs.db files with file recovery tools and find thumbnails that the original owner probably had no idea that they were sharing with the world. 

So, for windows users, including those Thumbs.db files in a zip could be a privacy/security issue, too.

-app103 (April 25, 2013, 09:29 AM)

 

Could someone post some suggestions on how to do this? I never really understood the scope of Thumbs.db files (they're sorta magically something Windows does right?) Is there a simple viewer program that can look at them?

2445

General Software Discussion / Re: compare LibreOffice with SoftmakerOffice,2008?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 25, 2013, 06:06 AM »

Overall, it appears that LibreOffice has OpenOffice beat. However, can somebody please compare LibreOffice with SoftmakerOffice,2008? Thank you.

-tosim (March 28, 2012, 09:49 AM)

Well, first of all apparently SoftmakerOffice,2008 is obsolete. They have a new version out. You'll be redirected to it.

I'll poke around and try to do a small comparison. I've been using Open/Libre office off and on for a fair while now, mostly with basic documents. Somehow, (what is now) LibreOffice has this strange feel to it, compared to Excel. Its sort of like the feel when someone with English as a Second Language doesn't have the vernacular down. (Skipping the humor examples!) So you get the point, but only after your brain throws a "syntax caution" note in your head.

I'm a bit of a fan of simple programs for simple uses, so it will be interesting to see what SoftMaker looks like. In the game of Find a Replacement for Excel, LibreOffice has been the only serious contender non-web for a while now. (I tried Gnumeric some time back, but I ran into problems.)

2446

Living Room / Re: The Coffee/Caffeine Thread!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 24, 2013, 02:25 PM »

There's been some grumbling lately in the science community about these types of studies. I don't think they are funded FOR the purpose of raising Y, I think X study comes out for its own reasons, then someone has a Business Lunch and looks at the study and then sets about making money.

These studies are in a weird category of "the truth but not the whole truth".  So they're "not wrong" (skipping the scam ones!) when they say things like "it is good for you because it lowers blood pressure" and "it is bad for you because it messes up your sleep" are not wrong - but they are never *merged*.

2447

Screenshot Captor / Re: Auto Email Screenshot

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 24, 2013, 02:03 PM »

That's a fascinating feature (idea)!

2448

Living Room / Re: Google forbids resale or lending of Glass

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 24, 2013, 04:05 AM »

I'm gonna go sideways and say this is a classic case where the chinese knockoffs might come into play here. I have thought of stuff off and on like "Set Theory". So the set of "Glasses that See and Record and Upload and more" is a new emerging consumer category. Google has Name Brand so they keep inserting themselves into the media. But what is really going on here is a concept I have quietly followed for some 8 years - "Video Glasses". So let Google play games with their servers.

I saw at a trade show a few weeks ago a pair of Video Recording Glasses. While not quite perfectly intentionally, I have worn Heavy Glasses for years now - so if people see me in new ones, they would say "oh hai, new glasses, kewl kthx bye".

So all they have to do is record data and send it to a local unit such as a smartphone, running an app to post it to a private web server. It's a Category. All that's been missing for a few years is a bit of incremental tech, but it's coming. Anyone can record you anywhere, ever. I chose "Glasses" because yes I grew up with Matrix and Johnny Mnemonic, and also that form factor gives the Tech Industry one more generation - that you can hide some stuff into a heavy pair of glasses that's currently hard to do elsewhere, such as Contacts etc.

2449

Living Room / Re: The 21 worst tech habits [PCWORLD]

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 23, 2013, 10:34 AM »

I dunno, I kinda disagree with the Printing thing. I print a series of the most important emails with detailed info going on especially to use as checklists and bringing with me to meetings. (See the GTD thread - the unmentioned half of my Notebook of Doom) is email threads which quite often end up stapled into a series with other items such as matching return receipt green postal slips etc.

So that one is more of a "cut down" thing for me, rather than "why on earth would you ever" from the article.

2450

Living Room / Re: Google forbids resale or lending of Glass

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on April 22, 2013, 02:14 PM »

Did they find a way around the First Sale clause? "You can sell your hardware but we'll turn off the service and service isn't sold etc etc"?