Recent Posts

2801

Unfinished Requests / Re: IDEA: OCR & paste

« Last post by rjbull on July 12, 2006, 03:36 AM »

I've tried Screen Desktop OCR... it seems like a Kleptomania clone to me.  There are about 3-4 programs that claim to do the same thing and do it almost exactly the same way!  (Even down to the program icon...

-kfitting (July 11, 2006, 08:20 PM)

I was astonished to see the same icon.  Dog should not eat dog.

I like ABBYY's claim to be able to use a digital camera as a scanner, that's awesome... but the price tag is, needless to say, pricey! 

Eye-watering   

Going to take up kimmchi's offer to see if ABBYY will read a typical image?

<later edit>        TopOCR: yes, you're right, with "camera as scanner" apparently the main purpose of the program.

Digital Camera OCR

Can your camera or smartphone replace a scanner for document capture with OCR? The answer is a resounding YES! TopSoft, Ltd, a leading developer of OCR and image processing software has created an application specifically for OCR data capture with digital cameras and smartphones called TopOCR.

I notice both Kleptomania and ScreenOCR are about 400Kb to download.  TopOCR is ten times that, about 5.4Mb.  "Shareware" in that it only runs ten times rather than {x number of days} before needing registration.

However, I have less personal need of image-reading than of things like extracing bits of Outlook message headings lists, and I imagine Kleptomania and ScreenOCR would do that adequately.

2802

Unfinished Requests / Re: IDEA: OCR & paste

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 10:46 AM »

ABBYY screenshot reader can capture everything.

-kimmchii (July 11, 2006, 08:53 AM)

Does "scrape text" from othewise difficult things, like OCRing text in images?

Do you have a URL?

2803

Site/Forum Features / Re: Formatted lists

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 10:44 AM »

I was looking at it with Firefox, too...

I take it the (code)(/code) tags force literal rendering?  (looks like it from here)

2804

Site/Forum Features / Re: Formatted lists

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 06:20 AM »

• OK.
• Thanks Mouser
• Thanks CarolHaynes!

Looks like the "dot-dash" button method doesn't work on it's own, and probably it can't because it can't know how many items there are in the list?  You have to bracket each line with (li) and (/li) to get bullets (using round brackets instead of square ones so it doesn't think that's a list as well).

I see you can get two-tier bullets too, but I think I'll have to read the manual for that.

2805

Site/Forum Features / Formatted lists

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 05:04 AM »

Please, how do I make formatted lists?

Is there an area, or a separate how-to file, that lists how to use features like [color=, [url=, etc.?

Thanks...

2806

Unfinished Requests / Re: IDEA: OCR & paste

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 04:57 AM »

Problem is Kleptomania (and every other software I saw to do this type of thing) cannot OCR a picture displayed on screen.

-kfitting (September 07, 2005, 07:05 PM)

kfitting,

I just googled Screen Desktop OCR.  The features list includes the following - note particularly the section in parentheses in the first claim, BMP and JPG images:

Recognizes text in any type of document (HTML, Word, Notepad, PDF, BMP or JPG image) or in any part of the screen and saves it to clipboard.

Grabs texts that cannot be saved or printed

Recognizes texts in any language that cannot be saved or printed

Works with all American and European character sets, including the Central-European and Cyrillic

Captures "hidden" text ignoring blocking scripts on Internet pages

Sanity check: I have not tried it myself.  $29.95 shareware.

2807

Best E-mail Client / Re: opera deserves a real try

« Last post by rjbull on July 11, 2006, 04:22 AM »

rjbull: No Opera uses its own file format (.adr) BUT you can use this online tool to convert from adr to csv.

-Ampa (July 10, 2006, 05:39 PM)

Thanks, noted for reference.

Or for a more comprehensive tool, you might try Dawn which seems like a nice freeware / donationware utility.

I'd forgotten Dawn, though I had looked at it once for convering my CompuServe access software's address books.  It wouldn't do that, I think because my WinCIM is too old.  Oh, well, if I will keep using Win 3.1 software from 1995...   

2808

Best E-mail Client / Re: opera deserves a real try

« Last post by rjbull on July 10, 2006, 08:01 AM »

Opera stores its mail in standard mbox format

-Ampa (July 10, 2006, 07:39 AM)

How about its address books?  Can it do CSV files?

2809

Screenshot Captor / Re: A noobee's questions

« Last post by rjbull on July 10, 2006, 06:03 AM »

the best tool at text scraping.  the best tool i know for this is: Kleptomania

-mouser (June 28, 2006, 04:33 PM)

Mouser,

Do you have a second best recommendation for text scraping?  Kleptmomania is $29.95 to register for private use, but it's a steep $49.95 for commercial use.  And I would need this most at work   

2810

Mouser's Zone / Re: IDEA - Webpage archiving

« Last post by rjbull on July 10, 2006, 05:46 AM »

I do have NetSnippets and Surfulator (don't really know why I bought both as they do similar jobs).

-Carol Haynes (June 04, 2006, 04:22 PM)

CarolHaynes,

Now you have or have looked at NetSnippets, Surfulator and Evernote, how about a mini-comparison? 

2811

General Software Discussion / Re: Toying with TheBat! - any plugin suggestions?

« Last post by rjbull on July 10, 2006, 05:38 AM »

CarolHaynes,

Take a look at these DC threads:
Geminisoft Pimmy  and related to it  Downloading your Gmail account  also Opera deserves a real try

Allen appears to be DC's resident email client expert    These mostly mention Pimmy, The Bat!, and Opera M2.

There are clients, such as PocoMail.  It seems to be fashionable to dismiss Pegasus, which is a pity; but Pegasus could make it easier to work out how to set up multiple email accounts.

2812

General Software Discussion / Re: SiteAdvisor - or do YOU like spam, spyware, & safety threats?

« Last post by rjbull on July 07, 2006, 03:58 AM »

I had recently noticed that SiteAdvisor has been aquired by McAfee. I was concerned they might drop the free version until I read this:

[...]

I noticed no promise to keep it free forever, but nobody can promise that.

-clif_notes (April 23, 2006, 03:35 PM)

If you click on the "Do sites pay to be rated?" button, the message includes this text:

The basic version of our software is free of charge. In the future, we will offer paid versions with additional premium features.

2813

Living Room / Re: Is Moffsoft alive?

« Last post by rjbull on July 06, 2006, 06:21 AM »

My absolute favorite was QuickCalc, which was abandoned soon after it was released. QuickCalc calculated as you typed

-zridling (April 13, 2006, 03:37 AM)

zridling,

The folks at wjjsoft - the MyBase people - offer WJJSoft Calculator, freeware.  Again you don't even have to press Enter, though it puts the result in an edit box, thus;

2814

General Software Discussion / Re: General brainstorming for Note-taking software

« Last post by rjbull on July 06, 2006, 04:49 AM »

Add various OCR options and the data gets very usable.

-pmowbray (July 06, 2006, 04:32 AM)

The for-pay version of Evernote has OCR built in.  They say it's for handwriting recognition, and support various pen input devices; no immediately obvious mention of scanners.

I'm keen to see the final output!! Is it something that will be developed into a working brief to be developed (here)???

2815

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Keepass Password Safe mini-review

« Last post by rjbull on July 04, 2006, 09:28 AM »

Passwords on the move! [...] BUT, this way you won't have access to them when you aren't on your computer.

So, i think it misses a fSekrit + uploader kind of thing. There should be a way to upload all your passwords (or only some selected ones) to an internet server, in an encrypted way, but such that won't need any special program to access it, which means... fSekrit!!

-jgpaiva (June 18, 2006, 06:28 PM)

Only just thought of this: KeePass doesn't need to be installed, just unzip and run.  So...  how about making a self-extracting archive of KeePass itself and uploading it to your server, along with the current *.kdb files?  Then you could download and run it from anywhere.

2816

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Keepass Password Safe mini-review

« Last post by rjbull on July 04, 2006, 05:47 AM »

I use keepass in conjunction with roboform, updating the other when I add a login to one. That way, I will always have two sources for stored passwords for redundancy.

-Josh (July 03, 2006, 10:51 PM)

Rather than just backing up the KeePass files?

CTRL+V to auto-type.

I've had occasional glitches where KeePass wouldn't AutoType, but I think it's usually just been a Windows wobbly.  Exiting one or both programs, then reloading, or in extremis rebooting, has usually cured the problem.  But, I've had the odd occasion where Ctrl-V didn't work but Alt-E, T  - i.e. the same thing but done by menu - did work.  I wondered, does Alt-E, T paste at a slower speed, and would that be why it worked better than Ctrl-V?

2817

General Software Discussion / Re: desktop search guide page

« Last post by rjbull on June 30, 2006, 05:46 AM »

It's more feature rich than YDS and every bit as quick.

-Darwin (June 28, 2006, 11:37 AM)

X1 is a 12 Mb download.  By my standards, that's BIG.  Subjectively, how quickly does it load?

2818

General Software Discussion / Re: Do you use any GTD/calendar system to get organized?

« Last post by rjbull on June 30, 2006, 05:36 AM »

the shareware sticky notes program Magic Notes

-rjbull (June 30, 2006, 04:13 AM)

I'm not sure, but it think that Stickies is similar to magic notes, and it's freeware

-jgpaiva (June 30, 2006, 04:33 AM)

They're similar, but I think Magic Notes has better reminder features.  I can only say "I think" because I didn't actually try Stickies reminders, but from what the rest of you were saying, it pops up everything.  Magic Notes only pops up the one you want.  However, neither is really a calendar program with a calendar view.

Just found another two in my archives;

Event Manager (freeware) is a light weight reminder program. Program to help you remember your appointments. It supports many options for repeatable alarms and allows the user to specify a .wav file as audio notification. Event Manager is very simple to use unlike other bloat-ware reminders... just unzip and run.  http://www.rotebetas...om/EventManager.html

Kirby Alarm & Task Scheduler
http://www.kirbyfooty.com/
"Kirby Alarm is an alarm clock and task scheduler that will pop up a
note, or run a program, or play a sound, or send an email at user
defined intervals. Various options are available to set alarms (or
programs) to run every few minutes, hours, days, months, years, or the
last Friday in the month, or the last day in the month. Plus lots
more!! "

This one has both free and (recently) shareware versions.

2819

General Software Discussion / Re: Do you use any GTD/calendar system to get organized?

« Last post by rjbull on June 30, 2006, 04:13 AM »

looking for a program that has an interface that will prevent me from being surprised by my entered tasks.  For example if I have a dental appointment I obviously need to know in advance that I have to get myself to the dentist by a certain time.  In my opinion the best interface would be one that shows the current day's tasks & maybe the tasks for the next 7 days with a "# days to go until dental appointment" style entry.  What program is closest to this type of format?

-skywalka (June 29, 2006, 11:17 PM)

Take a look at Horst Schaeffer's tiny freeware Date Reminder or the shareware sticky notes program Magic Notes or maybe the donationware UK's Calendar (Kalendar) by Ulrich Krebs.

2820

Living Room / Re: OfficePoltergeist - prank on your office mates

« Last post by rjbull on June 29, 2006, 03:35 AM »

I once came across a reference to the Printergeist, a malevolent spirit that lived in the printer and occasionally had to be placated.  This was in the manual to a $1,200 piece of commercial software!

2821

General Software Discussion / Re: Browsers, Bookmarks, & synching

« Last post by rjbull on June 28, 2006, 09:14 AM »

A (portable?) programme that you can save your bookmarks to say with a universal hotkey, or from the context menu.
Then you dont have to be thinking, now where did i save that.

-tomos link=topic=4164.msg29398#msg29398

It might be worth asking for that in Coding Snacks.  Presumably hotkey-fired AHK script could just pick out the window of whichever browser you're using, capture the address line, and save it in a file, popping up a message box for your description on the way?

Or maybe something that can import bookmarks from diff browsers, synch them, and export them or save them in format for import back to browser

There're plenty out there, but, many of the free ones (e.g. Columbine) seem to be too old to include Firefox   

2822

Living Room / Re: French rival to Google Earth announced

« Last post by rjbull on June 27, 2006, 03:54 AM »

French rival to Google Earth announced

Reminds me a bit of the early days of colour television, when there were three competing systems.  The original American one was NTSC, which allegedly stood for Never Twice the Same Color.  The German one was PAL, Pray And Learn.  The French one was SECAM - Supreme Effort Contre les AMericaines...

2823

Living Room / Re: PDAs - any use?

« Last post by rjbull on June 26, 2006, 04:52 AM »

Anyone have seen / used the Fujitsu Siemens Loox N500 series?

-Mark0 (June 25, 2006, 04:20 PM)

Only reviews of Fujitsu Loox I've seen were for 420 and 610, date back to 2004, and were lukewarm.  UK Computer Shopper magazine often recommend Acer for a cheap Pocket PC, but it depends on how much you want the GPS.

2824

Living Room / Re: Unprotected Wireless Lans?

« Last post by rjbull on June 26, 2006, 04:41 AM »

:huh:Don't understand why anyone with wireless would not secure it. dumb...... dumb.....
Thank gawd mine is secured.

-dancin39 (May 16, 2006, 12:30 AM)

Because some of us actually know what we're doing, and want to share with people who aren't able to afford internet, or just want to google something on their pocketpc as they're walking by.

-gsull (June 26, 2006, 03:14 AM)

That's public-spirited, but dangerous.  I'm in the UK, which is currently paranoid about paedophiles.  Such people could download kiddie porn through your unsecured connection - and the police would trace it to you, and it's your life and reputation that would be destroyed.  Over here, it's not worth taking the risk of an unsecured connection.

2825

General Software Discussion / Free Web printing toolbar

« Last post by rjbull on June 20, 2006, 10:31 AM »

Lexmark Toolbar for Web Printing  http://toolbar.lexmark.com/
Internet Explorer only.

It's free and easy to install.

The Lexmark Toolbar is easy to install and just as easy to use. Here are some more benefits:

    * Automatically scales web pages to print without cutting off text or images
    * Prints relevant text only, eliminating images
    * Print only using the black cartridge (Excludes printers that use the #1 cartridge)
    * Enables easy web photo printing using the included Lexmark Fast Pics software

For independent review, see Jim Lyons Observations  http://jimlyonsobser...-from-webare-we.html
Apparently works with other brands of printer as well as Lexmark.