Recent Posts

3126

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlook 2007 isn't so bad

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 08, 2008, 06:19 PM »

I uninstalled BCM and guess what ... the uninstaller doesn't work properly. You have the option of removing BCM and SQL Express - since I have no other use for SQL on my system I opted to remove both.

Every time my system started after that I got a pop up saying that SQL services couldn't start and so in the end I had to reinstall BCM and Express and then uninstall just BCM.

Anyone know how to get rid of SQL Express without having to use SC to delete rogue services left behind - and goodness knows what else?

Thinking about it I have a couple of Sony programs that may use SQL databases so they might be the cause of the pop up - but surely the MS installer should be able to detect that stuff is still needed by other programs ... isn't that the whole point of the registry system?

3127

Living Room / Re: 32-bit Windows and the dreaded (and misunderstood) 4GB RAM limit

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 08, 2008, 04:10 PM »

I would expect you to have 4Gb - 512Gb of video RAM = 3.5Gb visible to Windows - so the question is where has the other half a gig gone?

I can only presume that you have nealy half a gig of other memory mapped IO devices on your system but it seems unlikely.

What other devices have you got that might use mapped memory? Check you device manager and check for memory mapped devices and see what has gobbled up you new memory!

From what I read (and its been a while so I may be wrong) enabling PAE in 32-bit XP doesn't actually do anything at all.

3128

Living Room / Free (or cheap) simple database app to generate XML files.

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 08, 2008, 04:03 AM »

I need an app that can set up a simple card index type database (including text fields and urls at the minimum) and then output the database as a simple XML file.

All of the cards will have the same format so the XML file will be very simple.

It needs to be very simple to use.

Anyone any ideas?

TIA

3129

Activation/License/Language Help / Re: I really need a XoftSpySE license key

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 07, 2008, 08:19 AM »

Because a user used the "Report to moderator" link to request a key! Sorry I didn't look at the dates. I am going to lock this thread!

3130

Living Room / Re: Vista suffering from FUD?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 07, 2008, 06:29 AM »

Presumably Eóin has had problems with Symantec on Vista (and who hasn't had problems with them at times on any version of Windows?).

I am still trying to persuade people that just because practically every computer comes with Symantec preinstalled they don't have to keep it and they don't have to respond to the nagware with a credit card!

3131

Activation/License/Language Help / Re: I really need a XoftSpySE license key

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 07, 2008, 06:25 AM »

dstarr - if you purchased a license you have a problem with the company and only they can deal with it. No one here is going to give you another code because it would be illegal.

Look up this thread and you will find a message from someone at the company - why not send them a PM (click the bubble under their name). As Darwin says PLEASE DON'T SHOUT when you type - turn off the Caps lock on you keyboard!

3132

Living Room / Re: Win XP auto-update query

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 06, 2008, 06:18 PM »

If you tell auto update not to install an update and ignore it in the future it SHOULDN'T install it even if you have automatic upate set on 'fry my system at your leisure' setting.

If at some point in the future you decide you want to install SP3  (or any other updates) you need to manually go to the Windows update site and get it to display ignored updates. At that point you can remove the ignore setting.

Having said all that I think MS may ignore your ignore setting if they send out a revised SP3 - not sure on that one. Also MicroSnoop might well decide they know what is best at some point and install it whatever you do (just like they update 'automatic update' without your permission unless you set updates to 'never').

3133

Living Room / Re: Vista suffering from FUD?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 06, 2008, 03:44 AM »

Don't want to discourage you but unless the monopoly authorities in various countries sink their teeth into Apple for uncompetitive practices I think Apple will pursue them until the crack of Doom and ultimately they have enough money to win. Having said that the monopoly authorities around the world have only had partial success against MS (which is genuinely a monopoly with over 90% of the market) - I can't see them bothering with Apple as they have such a tiny share of the market (last time I looked it was something like 5% of the world PC market). Effectively Apple computers are a bit of a novelty on the world stage so no regulator is going to spend a lot of time worrying about them.

3134

General Software Discussion / Re: Xobni beta - Outlook Mail indexer and organizer

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 05, 2008, 04:31 PM »

I looked at Xobni about a  month ago and the website still said they hadn't resolved SP3 issues. Not sure now.

As for Neo - I sort of liked it but I have stopped using it. It strikes me that managing Neo is pretty time consuming to configure the way you want it and until you do it just adds another layer of things to do to Outlook (and another reason for Outlook to get its knickers in a not). Having reinstalled my system after a crash a while ago I couldn't face installing it and reconfiguring it. Also Neo give the impression that it is still an ongoing project but there have been almost no updates since I bought it over 2 years ago. As far as I can tell there was one minor update to make it work with Outlook 2007 but there isn't much (if any) new functionality.

Nowadays I filter all my email through a GMAIL account. The spam filter is very effective (infinitely better than the Junk Mail system in Outlook 2007 which only seems to give false positives and ignores most spam - anyone know how to turn it off?) and about as good as my experiences with Spambayes and POPfile. I then use filters to sort incoming mail in Outlook into folders and delete anything of a temporary nature after reading it before archiving to MailStore Home Plus.

Outlook is now effectively a store for recent emails only (last 60 days) so it keeps the PST file small and I use the contacts, calendar and tasks etc. for keeping track of my life (for what it is worth).

3135

General Software Discussion / Re: What would your ideal Operating System be like?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 04, 2008, 06:22 PM »

And Opera being a bad model for extensions is also for me one of the things that it would make a perfect model for a perfect OS. Think about it. No matter how perfect an OS, if there are less than perfect programmers working on it than don't you risk breaking it now and again?

-Paul Keith (September 04, 2008, 04:57 PM)

Is there such a beast as a "perfect programmer" - even in the Opera team.

Without extensibility an OS would be dead in the water - there is no way that anyone will use an OS that tries to do everything internally.

What about applications - aren't they in effect extensions to the operating system - do you want a self contained turn key system that can't have any additional apps added? That would be SO proprietary as to be next to useless.

3136

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlook 2007 isn't so bad

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 04, 2008, 06:18 PM »

Thanks - I'll give it a go. I was trying to use it but it wasn't very useful and now I use QuickBooks which allows me to keep track of customers. I can always create an extra Contacts folder for buisness contacts in Outlook if I want.

3137

General Software Discussion / Re: Outlook 2007 isn't so bad

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 04, 2008, 11:04 AM »

I like Outlook 2007 but why is it so slow compared to earlier incarnations? For me it is VERY slow to load and downloading POP email makes the app freeze until it has finished - and it has done that since it was first installed. I deliberately keep my PST file reasonably small (hiving off all email to a MailStore archive after 60 days and deleting it in Outlook) and perform integrity checks and compaction on the PST file regularly so it keeps it in order.

I think it may have something to do with Business Contacts Manager (which was included with my version). It seems that loading SQL databases and starting services is slow but why it should affect the whole application all the time I really don't know.

3138

Living Room / Re: Self-destructing web message

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 04, 2008, 07:16 AM »

Excellent, good for writing love letters which you might be held to otherwise 

-Fred Nerd (September 04, 2008, 06:57 AM)

  oooooo .... it's men like you .....

3139

General Software Discussion / Re: What would your ideal Operating System be like?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 04, 2008, 01:47 AM »

Just give me the Opera equivalent of an OS. Customizeable, lightweight, secure and disposable.

-Paul Keith (September 02, 2008, 11:49 PM)

Ah ... so you want an OS that doesn't work properly a lot of the time [runs and ducks for cover ....]

What we need is an OS that doesn't include anything except for the absolute bare bones and is lightening fast. It should be possible of new 64-bit multicore technology so why does my system feel the same speed as it always has back to PIII days ?

Opera would be a bad model to use as the one thing such an operating system would need is a way to write extensions.

3140

General Software Discussion / Re: Strategies for international travellers regarding new US Customs seizure policy

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 01, 2008, 04:05 PM »

Can you get roll up LCDs for laptops?

3141

General Software Discussion / Re: Strategies for international travellers regarding new US Customs seizure policy

« Last post by Carol Haynes on September 01, 2008, 02:28 AM »

What is the optimun size of laptop hard disk size for swallowing (and how do I get it out again - I may have a big bum but ....) 

3142

Living Room / Re: If somebody offers you swapping your PC for a mac cold turkey: would you do it?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 29, 2008, 12:14 PM »

I think what I was trying to say (obviously not too well) was that you need to take into consideration what happens once your file leaves your desktop and goes out to a 4-color printshop, professional CD mastering studio, or design agency.

It depends on the software - if you submit Adobe files (which is what most print shops want) as far as I can tell they are identical on both systems. You just need to specify the colour profile used to get the best colour matching.

Let's see...

A PC that can run Linux (and XP in vmware).

vs.

A Mac that can run Linux (with XP in vmware)...that can dual boot to OSX.

In your case, it doesn't seem like that much of a loss (and more of a gain), considering it would be for work and you aren't paying for it or any of the software that would end up needing to be purchased for it, and if anything goes wrong with the hardware in it, your employer would be picking up the tab to fix/replace it.

As long as it's a high end machine that can handle running what you have now, and OSX, it sounds like a pretty good deal. You will still be able to be productive in the OS of your choice, if you need to switch things around a bit to meet a deadline. If OSX is slowing you down, you can boot up Linux and work there, or XP in vmware like you do now.

As far as software is concerned, you wouldn't be limited to only Mac software in your case, since you would also still be able to use anything you currently do on Linux and XP. So software isn't really an issue as long as whatever you are doing is in some standardized format that has software that can access the data cross-platform.

Since it is work, it's also likely you wouldn't be responsible for any headaches with networking...that is likely to be someone else's responsibility to get working properly. Plus if it did end up being your responsibility, you got those mac-heads you will be working with that should be good for something...don't forget that.

But if it was swapping a pc that YOU own, for a mac, and using it at home and being responsible for any repairs/replacements...and the cost of software...I wouldn't do it. (lots of reasons already expressed by others)

Even in my case, where I would be swapping an 11 year old hunk of junk for a brand new Mac, I don't think I could do it. I have a sentimental attachment to this old snail. I don't think I could trade it for anything. I'd have to be allowed to keep it, even if I had to retire it permanently.

-app103 (August 29, 2008, 01:35 AM)

Not sure about that. It is all very well to say that you can use XP/Vista/Linux in virtual machine (Parallels or whatever) but the experience of using any OS Is degraded to some extent in any of the virtual solutions because the emulated hardware support is at a pretty low level in all of them. If you expect to use Parallels on a Mac and use the normal USB hardware you had on a PC under  virtual Windows with the same drivers just forget it - at best USB support is shonky and netowrk support is not totally great either. (Same goes for VMWare on a Linux box).

At best virtual machines are a great way to use software occasionally that is restricted to an OS that won't run natively or just for testing purposes. Don't expect virtual machines to be robust (or quick) enough for serious production work. If you are wanting to use multiple OSes on a Mac and spend any time with Windows or Linux for serious work you need a multiple boot setup so that you can use proper versions with real hardware.

The one OS that runs better in virtual devices is Linux because it doesn't have the hardware compatibility issues that plague most people trying to get Linux up and running for the first time on a machine that isn't specifically built to work with Linux. You can even use unsupported devices such as printers by resorting to network print via the host OS.

3143

Living Room / Re: If somebody offers you swapping your PC for a mac cold turkey: would you do it?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 28, 2008, 12:54 PM »

At a professional level the graphics and publishing software available for Macs and PCs are almost identical (given that Adobe has pretty much cornered the market on professional level products).

There are different choices for video and sound but the professional tools available on both platforms are very good. ProTools on the Mac probably has the edge but only if you want to have a pure recording studio setup  and don't use the computer for anything else. Even so there is probably much greater choice on a PC even at professional level when you take into account the purely PC manufacturers producing video and audio equipment and software.

Years ago the complaint was levelled that Windows was not truly WYSIWYG for publishing - but that complaint really died with the introduction of TrueType Fonts.

3144

Living Room / Re: Anyone good with search engines - I am thoroughly frustrated!

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 24, 2008, 03:56 PM »

Not yet - losing the will to live on this rapidly!

I do have a German translation of the whole thing but it isn't the one used by Schumann.

3145

Living Room / Re: Anyone good with search engines - I am thoroughly frustrated!

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 19, 2008, 07:21 AM »

OK I have finally tracked down a copy of Schumann's adapted version of Manfred (someone at Breitkopf, the original publishers, kindly scanned me a copy).

The challenge remains though to find a copy of Suckow's original translation of the Byron!

3146

General Software Discussion / Re: Does it make sense to disable the windows swap file?

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 18, 2008, 07:14 PM »

It is a very bad idea to allow Windows to decide on the size of the PageFile. The trouble is it will make a small one, then decide it needs a bit bigger, then a bit bigger and before long you have fragments all over your disc.

Fix the maximum and minimum sizes to be the same. As a rule of thumb 1.5 x memory is useful but with 2Gb of memory you can probably allocate less. Once you create a new PageFile defrag it and it will then remain as a single contiguous file forever.

3147

Living Room / Re: Show us the View Outside Your Window

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 18, 2008, 07:11 PM »

Nice - but which bit of Aus?

3148

General Software Discussion / Re: New Linux Distro specifically designed for programmers

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 17, 2008, 05:35 PM »

Not at all - thanks for that (sounds like my credit card is in for another beating!).

3149

General Software Discussion / Re: New Linux Distro specifically designed for programmers

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 16, 2008, 11:10 AM »

Part of my experiment was to work on setting up a network server (not a webserver). I figure I should at least learn the rudimentary set up details to get an effective and secure network setup in case I am ever asked to do it for work. I figure I need to get to grips with Samba and Windows 2003/8 Server.

I have a free copy of Windows 2003 Server Standard (and I can use Enterprise up to 90 days for free).

Trouble is all of these things are less than obvious to set up and almost all the dosumentation seems to assume that you don't actually need documentation because they assume you know what is required and understand the jargon and acronyms like a seasoned professional. How anybody is ever meant to find out about this stuff these days I am still trying to figure out. The other problem is that by the time you start to get to grips with stuff it all changes!

For simple file sharing - I think you are right. A large USB drive attached to a Windows XP box (old redundant gear will do) via a Gigabit switch is probably the ideal for small networks. If you want security just switch off simple file sharing and implement proper permissions on folders.

3150

Living Room / Re: Anyone good with search engines - I am thoroughly frustrated!

« Last post by Carol Haynes on August 16, 2008, 10:40 AM »

Thanks - I have the Kalmus Edition of the Score. It has the sung pats of the German text but not the spoken parts. (The work is a dramatised performance of the poem with incidental music and some of the poem set to music eiother for solists, ensembles or choir).

Unfortunately I think the Breitkopf and Peters Editions are  out of print.

The only full version on CD mentioned is the Carl Schuricht recording. I have a copy of this and it doesn't have any text included.

I am waiting to hear back from Breitkopf - they are the original publishers of the work.

The trouble is my essay is about how the original text is transformed both in content and meaning during the process of creating the musical work. This requires 3 stage of transformation:

• Byron original text (English) -> German translation (Suckow)
• Suckow text -> Schumann's German adaptation prior to composition
• Schumann's text -> performance version of the work

Even if I can find a copy of the complete text in the piece I still need to find Suckow's original translation. It is referred to often but I can't seem to find a reference to a copy anywhere.