Recent Posts

451

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011 Release: TaskDaddy Release

« Last post by daddydave on January 11, 2011, 06:56 PM »

Wow, I'm on Youtube, or actually TaskDaddy is. Got a good feeling seeing that, great job on the screencast, I couldn't have done better myself.

Now that I am past the end-of-year crunch, I will try to put some thought into where to take TaskDaddy. To my knowledge, there is no existing FARR alias for TaskDaddy and I have not started one, and it would be a cool idea.

452

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011 Teaser: TaskDaddy Pre Release

« Last post by daddydave on December 30, 2010, 06:52 PM »

Well, I have not been super motivated to work on this for sundry reasons, and it gets so busy at the end of year, so I guess it is as finished as it is going to be for 2010. I do hope to revisit it some day, there are too many things grabbing my attention at the moment. I would love to rewrite it in C++ some day.

So like it or not, it is December 31, I dub thee...Release. I'll try to do better next time.

453

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: [Freeware] Text Filter - search and filter text files with ease

« Last post by daddydave on November 01, 2010, 08:39 AM »

Do you plan any command line options? I tried for example from a command window "TextFilter.exe filename.ext" and it didn't seem to work. If you allow that, people could create shortcuts to TextFilter that opened up a specific file automatically, so you could have shortcuts to multiple files without cluttering up the simple interface.

454

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: [Freeware] Text Filter - search and filter text files with ease

« Last post by daddydave on October 22, 2010, 02:09 PM »

I haven't tried it yet , but I can see a lot of uses for it. Task management is one that comes to mind, especially with GTD and things like searching for contexts or projects. Or any kind of lookup of info that has to be instant.

And welcome to DonationCoder!

455

General Software Discussion / Re: Google Chrome: Time for a Second Chance?

« Last post by daddydave on October 22, 2010, 10:26 AM »

In the browser, my habits seem to change, and I always use the mouse, to the point of despising when I have to type in a url or search.

-wraith808 (October 22, 2010, 08:23 AM)

Reminds me of something else: I miss the dropdown arrow to the right of address bar in Chrome a little bit.

456

General Software Discussion / Re: iPod Touch, PIM, and Outlook (WAS: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub)

« Last post by daddydave on October 21, 2010, 06:58 AM »

The deed is done, I got an iPhone Second Generation 16GB off ebay.

This morning I find some timely news.

-daddydave (October 19, 2010, 05:26 AM)

I wasn't aware PwnAge Tool was Mac only. So now I have the Chronic Dev blog and greenpois0n bookmarked, or at least in browser history. I may try it un-jailbroken first so I have a better appreciation for the benefit of it. The device should arrive Friday. Making a list of apps I want to install, I think I'll put Couch to 5K first on the list.

457

Living Room / Re: Mobipocket, LIT, or Kindle - which is best?

« Last post by daddydave on October 21, 2010, 06:48 AM »

I came to know that Amazon has a 7 day return policy on Kindle content, which is good to know -- the other ones I am not sure about.

458

Living Room / Re: Why do support people never answer questions?

« Last post by daddydave on October 20, 2010, 03:22 PM »

When interviewing people I ask a group of yes or no questions that are increasingly complex and or obscure (just outside their stated skill-set). After a yes/no answer comes ok, Why? The answer I'm looking for is a simple straightforward "I don't know".

-Stoic Joker (October 08, 2010, 04:23 PM)

That's fascinating to me. In principle I agree with you, because sometimes I don't know enough to say something, but I know enough to recognize B.S when I hear it. However, I learned even as a small child that people hate to hear "I don't know". This has been reinforced countless times in my line of work as well. (For example, if we don't know, we should be able to find out.)

Although it sounds like you are asking pretty black-and-white questions where either you know it or you don't.

459

Living Room / Mobipocket, LIT, or Kindle - which is best?

« Last post by daddydave on October 20, 2010, 03:02 PM »

If I have a choice of buying a book in Mobipocket, LIT, or Kindle format, and the prices are similar, which should be my preference? In case it matters: some of the books I am interested in may have a fairly complicated layout and I will be reading on an iPod Touch.

[Self-edited for abrupt shift from third to first person]

460

General Software Discussion / Re: Google Chrome: Time for a Second Chance?

« Last post by daddydave on October 20, 2010, 02:57 PM »

I wonder if they fixed the issue where PDFs that come up in the native PDF support (without a plugin) being printing nothing but blank pages. Or is it just me experiencing that?

461

N.A.N.Y. 2011 / Re: NANY 2011 Teaser: TaskDaddy Pre Release

« Last post by daddydave on October 20, 2010, 07:23 AM »

Due to end of year crunch, I am not much motivated to add stuff to it, but I am thinking about it a lot. I do most of my programming away from the computer anyway

To support future features, I think I need to test for not only the first character but the second as well. If it is a double quote then we have a string that can have whitespace in it. This would have several important benefits. I could say:

@"Waiting For" - supporting categories with spaces
#"next Friday" - supporting due dates with spaces still no luck in finding a document with all the Outlook "shortcuts" for due dates btw
:"task bodies can have spaces already" - no known benefit that I can think of

I think this would work best from the GUI, not the command line. The command line parser would probably treat "Waiting For" as a single argument and strip off the quotes. From the command line, I think you would be able to double the quotes and make it work, but I haven't tried it.

Human language shortcuts leans me toward some kind of localization, which makes me think I should start the process of rewriting it in C++ before I do any further work on it in AutoIt3.

462

General Software Discussion / Re: iPod Touch, PIM, and Outlook (WAS: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub)

« Last post by daddydave on October 19, 2010, 05:26 AM »

The deed is done, I got an iPhone Second Generation 16GB off ebay.

This morning I find some timely news.

463

Living Room / Re: iPod Touch 2nd Generation vs 3rd Generation?

« Last post by daddydave on October 18, 2010, 09:36 PM »

Well, the answer appears to be on Wikipedia:

On June 21, 2010, the new iOS 4.0 software update was released to second and third generation iPod Touch users for free.[14][15] It includes multitasking, app folders, backgrounds, iAd, and much more. However, second generation iPod touch devices did not receive multitasking, backgrounds, and Bluetooth keyboard support

464

General Software Discussion / Re: iPod Touch, PIM, and Outlook (WAS: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub)

« Last post by daddydave on October 18, 2010, 08:45 PM »

According to this discontinued project on Google Code, IPhone 3.0 firmware and later allows syncing Outlook Notes natively. But not the iPod Touch?

Apparently the the iPod Touch too. I may need to do a firmware upgrade

465

Living Room / iPod Touch 2nd Generation vs 3rd Generation?

« Last post by daddydave on October 18, 2010, 07:44 PM »

If I buy a second generation iPod Touch off ebay, what would I be missing compared to third generation, in terms of firmware, upgradablility, jailbreakability or anything else I should keep in mind?

466

Living Room / Re: Windows Mobile device in $100-150 range on ebay..suggestions?

« Last post by daddydave on October 17, 2010, 03:27 PM »

This looks like a pretty sweet deal if you can get it (you'll have to bid, there's no buy it now price): http://cgi.ebay.com/...;hash=item3f03de1af1

Runs Windows Mobile 5 and isn't locked to any particular carrier. You don't even need a carrier if you use it with Wifi. Also comes with a heavy load of software.

-app103 (October 17, 2010, 03:24 PM)

Resolution 240x240 according to these guys. Bleh...I would use it as an ebook reader too, so the resolution makes it a no go. Not wanting a keyboard either. Thanks for the suggestion, though.

I am not interested in the phone function either. I'd hate to be stranded on the interstate because I read one too many RSS feed and my battery is dead. I have a separate NET10 phone for which I pay about $16.67 a month ($100 for 180 days) for voice and I am pretty happy with that.

467

Living Room / Re: Windows Mobile device in $100-150 range on ebay..suggestions?

« Last post by daddydave on October 17, 2010, 03:12 PM »

It's time to think about replacing my Dell Axim X51V, the second PDA which I had to retire due to a bad digitizer.

-daddydave (October 13, 2010, 03:18 PM)

Maybe you should check ebay for a replacement digitizer instead. It would only cost you around $8 to replace it.

http://shop.ebay.com...+Axim+X51V+digitizer

-app103 (October 17, 2010, 02:42 PM)

I think I have one in a wrapper. I bought one for my retired Tungsten T3 also, as a test to see if I was competent enough to replace digitizers in PDAs. I failed.

468

Living Room / Re: Windows Mobile device in $100-150 range on ebay..suggestions?

« Last post by daddydave on October 17, 2010, 01:12 PM »

I've probably changed my mind. Of all the PDAs that can sync PIM items cloudlessly to Outlook and has a decent screen resolution, the iPod Touch is probably my best option. steeladept convinced me to take a look, and further research of my own corroborated it.

469

General Software Discussion / Re: PDA Comparison, PIM, and Outlook (WAS: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub)

« Last post by daddydave on October 16, 2010, 09:57 PM »

Handbase on the Windows Mobile platform and also on Palm was a great app which I almost registered. In fact, I tried several and on the WM platform, I found it to be the best balance of power and ease-of-use.

470

Living Room / PDAdb.net's PDA Chooser

« Last post by daddydave on October 16, 2010, 09:54 PM »

You can easily find the perfect mobile device with PDAchooser too. The PDAchooser is the simplified variant of PDAmaster and it is optimzed for quick and efficient device searching. It provides less features but easier usage and clearer user interface than PDAmaster. You can also compare the results after the query.

Lost this site for a while, and just found it again after a few days. Helpful in searching for PDA's or smartphones within certain specifications such as screen resolution.

471

Living Room / Re: Request: Facebook Sharing

« Last post by daddydave on October 16, 2010, 08:58 PM »

I think the best thing would be something like an AddToAny or AddThis button, kind of like what you're doing with the eKstreme link at the bottom but more user friendly and more visible. I would suggest that the phrase "social bookmark this page" doesn't mean much to most people, it sounds a bit marketing guru-ese and not something I would want to click.

472

General Software Discussion / Re: PDA Comparison, PIM, and Outlook (WAS: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub)

« Last post by daddydave on October 16, 2010, 08:44 PM »

steeladept, thanks for making me consider iPod Touch as an option, which was unthinkable for me before you started making the case. Sounds like you were where I was. My own research is so far corroborating what you say:

• MobileNoter Wi-Fi edition for iPod Touch/iPhone syncs to Microsoft OneNote cloudlessly. I don't currently use OneNote, don't really like it, but maybe I need to.
• Pocket Informant for iPhone. Used to sync  only to ToodleDo and Google though, but  "Version 1.2 adds syncing directly to Oulook via our WebIS Desktop Sync" Thus it also can be cloudless.
• The PIM situation on Android seems grim. Do a Google search for Android PIM and you will find dozens of threads like this, but no finished apps and apparently no open API's on Google's side.

473

General Software Discussion / Re: Why the aversion to .NET Frameworks?

« Last post by daddydave on October 14, 2010, 08:41 PM »

Microsoft has made .NET the path of least resistance at least for their express versions of their compilers/IDEs, so by avoiding .NET you are weeding out a lot of hobbyist programmers as well, which is a good thing or bad thing depending on how you look at it.

I assume that people who hate .NET hate it on the Windows Mobile platform as well. If I wanted to try my hand at developing an app for Windows Mobile, I'd probably install SharpDevelop which is non-Microsoft IDE for .net/mono apps simply because I have no clue how I would do it otherwise and I have been able to get a "Hello World" running at least that way. (Microsoft's express versions do not support compiling to the mobile versions the last time I checked, you need the full Visual Studio for that).

As a user, which I am 99% of the time, it is weird to have 4 versions of .NET installed at all times but it does seem superior to getting notified of a Java update every week. But I assume the .NET haters hate Java even more than I do.

474

General Software Discussion / Re: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub - questions

« Last post by daddydave on October 14, 2010, 03:43 PM »

steeladept, does that assessment change any at all when it is considered I will not be buying a data plan for reasons stated here? How many cloudless Apple apps are out there?

Actually looks like there are a few. I know there is an iSilo for iPhone as well.

Also, can iPod Touch use passthrough connectivity from a PC when connected to the PC like Windows Mobile can? Then in theory I could do some things like downloading podcasts "online".

475

General Software Discussion / Re: Thunderbird as a PIM Hub - questions

« Last post by daddydave on October 14, 2010, 12:44 PM »

LeaderTask (free on GOTD today) seems to have what you are looking for. Tasks, notes, calendar & contacts. Syncs with Outlook and Gmail.

And free; today at least.

-Dormouse (October 11, 2010, 10:38 AM)

I did take advantage of the giveaway and was very impressed until I saw that sync is one-way except for contacts. When you click on sync, you do a two way contact sync, and then an import of Outlook notes, tasks, and calendar items, but it does not push its own notes, tasks, and calendar items to Outlook. I was interested in seeing how it represented sub-items, like subnotes and subtasks in Outlook, but it doesn't try. However at least there is a mobile version so that may not matter.

The interface is very nice.