Recent Posts

5001

General Software Discussion / Re: Is there a way to directly write notes onto the Windows desktop?

« Last post by Curt on January 21, 2009, 08:37 AM »

http://sourceforge.n.../projects/xfwallmem/

Xfwallmem - the application for XFce desktop environment allows make memory notes directly on your desktop. In fact it is simple graphic editor for drawing on desktop wallpaper.

xfwallmem 0.1
Last Update: Nov 24, 2008




http://sourceforge.n.../projects/xfwallmem/

5002

General Software Discussion / Box, a new figure description language, to make graphics

« Last post by Curt on January 21, 2009, 07:30 AM »

Box is in its early stage of development.

http://boxc.sourceforge.net/index.html

Introduction

Box is a vector graphics language developed to make graphics as easy as possible. Box is in its early stage of development, but it already provides most of the features needed to create quality pictures and figures. Box has many advantages over traditional GUI graphics editors:

    * Reusability: you can draw things inside a Window; you can then translate, rotate, scale and put it inside another Window;
    * Transformation matrices can be calculated automatically from constraints given by the user;
    * Flexible syntax: the philosophy is "don't complain if something is missing, use default values!". You can specify many parameters, but you don't have to!
    * Even more flexible syntax: if p is a list of points then p.Get[3] gives the third point, p.Get[3.5] gives a point between the third and the fourth and p.Get[(3.5, 1)]... look at the documentation ;-)
    * You can even draw fractal pictures;
    * Box compiles under Linux, Mac and Windows. Packages are available for Ubuntu and a zip archive (containing the executable) is available for Windows.

Box has also the following features:

    * Translucency: the alpha channel of colors can be set to draw partially transparent objects;
    * Radial and linear color gradients can be set very easily, specifying even more than two colors;
    * Supported output formats are Postscript (EPS), PDF, SVG, PNG.

Examples

The documentation of Box is still under construction. However you may find some examples inside the tarball (examples directory). Some of them can be browsed >here<.

Box example

wheatstone.box

A simple electric circuit

Figure: the output produced by Box.

// Under a shell type: box wheatstone.box -l g
// ---
// This example shows how to use Window.Put to place figures.

include "g"
include "electric"

// This is not a real Wheatstone bridge.
// We replace some of the resistors with other components, just to make
// the thing more interesting!
wheatstone = Window["fig"][
  d1 = 20.0 // d1 = half diagonal
  p1 = (0, -d1), p2 = (d1, 0), p3 = (0, d1), p4 = (-d1, 0)

  // Places the four components.
  // Each component has two connections. Here we want to rotate and translate
  // ("rt") a resistor such that the first of its terminals is near to
  // the point p1 and the second one is near to p2.
  r12 = .Put[resistor, "rt", .Near[1, p1], .Near[2, p2]]
  // We proceed in a similar way for the other components:
  r23 = .Put[diode, "rt", .Near[1, p2], .Near[2, p3]]
  r34 = .Put[inductance, "rt", .Near[1, p3], .Near[2, p4]]
  r41 = .Put[resistor, "rt", .Near[1, p4], .Near[2, p1]]

  // Connecting the four resistors
  \ .Line[0.2, p1, r12.Get[1]; r12.Get[2], p2; p2, r23.Get[1]; r23.Get[2], p3;
          p3, r34.Get[1]; r34.Get[2], p4; p4, r41.Get[1]; r41.Get[2], p1]

  // Drawing small circles on the nodes
  // Here you see how a single Circle instruction can be used to draw many
  // circles. To start a new circle one should use the separator ";" and
  // specify only the quantities that changed with respect to the previous
  // circle. Here we change only the center, so we need to specify the radius
  // only once!
  \ .Circle[0.8, p1; p2; p3; p4]

  .Save["wheatstone.eps"]  // Saving to eps file
]

Box can be used also to create simple animations, here are some examples:

-yet another discovery made on Freeware World Team, all 4 you

5003

Developer's Corner / Re: extra Visual Basic Unicode support

« Last post by Curt on January 19, 2009, 01:07 PM »

- yes, VB already supports Unicode.

If you're coding in Visual Basic and have ever been frustrated that (Danish) Greek, Japanese, Hindi, Korean, Russian or Chinese characters display as '?' in the user interface, then you need UniToolbox.

And, no, not many are using VB, now. However, there are still an awful lot of people writing programs that doesn't fully support Unicode - I have quite a few of them on my PC - but of course, I have no idea if they were written using Visual Basic or whatever.

5004

Developer's Corner / extra Visual Basic Unicode support

« Last post by Curt on January 19, 2009, 06:38 AM »

email "offer" from Iconico, but
I don't know if the asking prices are supposed to be attractive: $400 + $700 !

http://www.iconico.com/UniToolbox
http://www.iconico.com/UniToolbox2

If you're coding in Visual Basic and have ever been frustrated that (Danish) Greek, Japanese, Hindi, Korean, Russian or Chinese characters display as '?' in the user interface, then you need UniToolbox.

The UniToolbox family of controls integrate seamlessly into your software, bridging the gap between Visual Basic's internal Unicode support and the shortfalls in VB's user interface. The controls in UniToolbox have been designed as a direct replacement to the standard Microsoft controls. Simply by dropping the new controls into your existing projects you can quickly and easily add support for any language.

We've made it as easy as possible to get the most out of UniToolbox as the control suite comes with a Control Migration Wizard. Running the wizard will automatically convert your entire project, with advanced options that allow you to specify exactly how every control and property is converted. UniToolbox also comes with a set of demonstration applications that help you get the most out of supporting Unicode in every single place in your application.

UniToolbox comes with 8 standard controls, for controls such as textboxes, comboboxes, labels and buttons. For richer user interfaces take a look at UniToolbox2, which has 9 additional controls such as Grid, Menu, Tab and Treeview controls. We also offer UniTabDlg and UniFlexGrid, which are direct replacements for the SSTab and FlexGrid Controls.

What controls does UniToolbox have?
UniToolbox With this comprehensive set of Unicode-aware ActiveX controls and utilities you can at last create Unicode-enabled software with Visual Basic. UniToolbox displays Greek, Japanese, Hindi, Korean, Cyrillic, Chinese and all UniCode symbols correctly. The UniToolbox Active-X control library contains the following 'drop-in' replacement Unicode-aware controls.

UniCombo   Replaces the VB ComboBox
UniLabel   Replaces the VB Label
UniList   Replaces the VB ListBox
UniText   Replaces the VB TextBox
UniButton   Replaces the VB CommandButton
UniCheck   Replaces the VB CheckBox
UniFrame   Replaces the VB Frame
UniOption   Replaces the VB OptionButton

These eight controls are included in the UniToolbox and UniToolboxVB control sets.

You can also get 9 more controls together with the controls listed above in UniToolbox2. Also check out UniFlexGrid and UniTabDlg.

UniToolbox runs on all Windows systems.

    * You may download the trial, and evaluate the software for as long as you need
    * Single developer license is only $399.00
    * Save money by purchasing 3, 5 or more licenses together
    * We offer a risk free 30 day money back guarantee

5005

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft Songsmith

« Last post by Curt on January 15, 2009, 05:37 AM »

- well, then you too will get the best of both worlds... 

5006

Living Room / Re: What may you be missing?

« Last post by Curt on January 15, 2009, 05:32 AM »

...I'll opt for a jerkier perspective.

-Paul Keith (January 15, 2009, 02:05 AM)

 

Music, without the right marketing or the wrong passion, is just...sound

-Paul Keith (January 15, 2009, 02:05 AM)

- ehh... shouldn't that be "without passion" or "with the wrong passion"?

---

I believe God gave us music to express feelings (passions) rather than clever thoughts.

5007

General Software Discussion / Re: Image joining software?

« Last post by Curt on January 14, 2009, 03:41 AM »

- yes, Shades, you are right. I now realize that both IrfanView and XnView refer to this feature as "panorama". Maybe others are also doing so? I might have to re-think every time I meet the description again.

5008

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft Songsmith

« Last post by Curt on January 13, 2009, 06:29 PM »

If anyone, other than me, are going to trial this program, it may pay off to first study this Help&HowTo page: http://research.micr.../songsmith/help.html

5009

General Software Discussion / Re: Image joining software?

« Last post by Curt on January 13, 2009, 06:16 PM »

I cannot find such feature in my IrfanView 4.23, Shades. Please direct me! 


- or were you perhaps thinking about panorama pictures? Not quite the same.

5010

General Software Discussion / Re: Image joining software?

« Last post by Curt on January 13, 2009, 05:05 PM »

I use PhotoScape for a similar feature; they call it, to combine.

Version 3.3 is brand new: http://www.photoscap...wnload.php?update=on

5011

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft Songsmith

« Last post by Curt on January 13, 2009, 01:57 PM »

edited

$30

The servers must be heavily burdened, I expect, because right now the download speed is below 20 kbps!

Edit2:
98½ MB; time to complete: 1:27:56 = average download speed: 19.12 KB/s!!!

5012

General Software Discussion / Re: Microsoft Songsmith

« Last post by Curt on January 13, 2009, 01:49 PM »

I don't understand why nontroppo wrote what he did. The add is fine,
- considered its an American thing...

5013

Living Room / Re: What may you be missing?

« Last post by Curt on January 12, 2009, 05:28 PM »

- of course I don't mind - I also received it from somewhere, didn't I - in fact, I am pleased.

Friendfeed seems to be a pleasant place to hang out (I see you spend at least an hour or so there, per day)?

5014

General Software Discussion / Stanza, free e-book Reader and more

« Last post by Curt on January 11, 2009, 05:31 PM »

New freeware from http://www.lexcycle.com/stanza

Stanza
— read eBooks on your Mac or PC and share with your iPhone, iPod Touch, & Kindle.

Stanza is expressly designed for reading digital publications, including electronic books, newspapers, PDFs, and general web content.

--//--

...hyphenation, text columnation, automatic text scrolling, and user-friendly page and chapter navigation.

--//--

built-in support for HTML, PDF, Microsoft Word, and Rich Text Format reading, as well as all the major eBook standards: unprotected Amazon Kindle and Mobipocket, Microsoft LIT, Palm doc, and the International Digital Publishing Forum's new epub Open eBook standard. In addition to supporting a plethora of formats, Stanza features an open API that allows developers to implement support for their own document formats. Stanza is more than just a reader: it is a reading platform!

--//--

...native iPhone/iPod Touch Stanza application (available for free from the Apple App Store) can share books with Stanza Desktop wirelessly, so you can take your books on the road and read them wirelessly — no internet connection required!

--//--

...export to MobiPocket, enabling you to use the popular MobiPocket Reader to read your exported book on your Blackberry, PocketPC, Palm OS, Nokia Series 60, Sony Ericsson UIQ, and many other mobile devices.

--//--

...built-in export feature especially for the Amazon Kindle.

--//--

...export your books to MP3 audiobooks. Your entire audiobook can then be added to iTunes and synchronized with your iPod or other digital music player.

However:

Important Information about Stanza for Windows

This is the first beta release of Stanza for Windows. There are a number of features that are not yet implemented and there are some areas where Stanza is rough around the edges. Please be patient and understanding with us as we work to improve our Windows support.

Specifically, the following known issues exist:

    * Copying to the clipboard does not yet work.
    * Exporting to an Audio Book is not supported.
    * Only one layout (vertical) is currently available.

-Stanza Desktop version for Windows

The development of Stanza for iPod seems to be far ahead of the desktop version. However, if this is a "rough beta version", then I really expect a lot from the finished version!
    http://www.lexcycle.com/stanza

5015

Living Room / Re: What may you be missing?

« Last post by Curt on January 11, 2009, 05:19 AM »

a busker myself,

-Fred Nerd (January 11, 2009, 04:41 AM)

- I had to look that one up

busker:

chiefly British : a person who entertains in a public place for donations

-Merriam Webster

- per definition you ought to feel at home here at DC 

5016

General Software Discussion / Re: photo duplicate scanner

« Last post by Curt on January 10, 2009, 06:17 PM »

... Yet another freeware "photo duplicate scanner" worthy of mention is SimilarImages at http://celebnamer.ce...ld.ws/similarimages/ .

-sajman99 (January 10, 2009, 04:06 PM)

SimilarImages may be The Slowest scanner/processor I so far have tried for this kind of job, but it turned out to also be (one of) the most accurate! On my Vista, the $35 Image Comparer will use 45 minutes to scan&process my 8.000 photos. The free SimilarImages used 61 minutes for the same job, but also gave a better, more precise result. 

5017

Living Room / What may you be missing?

« Last post by Curt on January 10, 2009, 02:43 PM »

This is a true story:

He Played the Violin in the Subway

A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold, December morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.
 
Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was a musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.
 
A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk.
 
A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.
 
The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.
 
In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.
 
No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.
 
Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100 each.

(1600x1200):


 
This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?
 
One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:
 
If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing some of the best music ever written, (on one of the finest instruments ever created), how many other things are we missing?


http://www.washingto...AR2007040401721.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Bell

So, what may YOU be missing? 

5018

General Software Discussion / Re: teracopy: copy your files faster

« Last post by Curt on January 09, 2009, 01:24 PM »

- yes, that is usually what the word "can" implies. "Why do you say that?"

5019

Living Room / Do you draw? Get a new perspective!

« Last post by Curt on January 09, 2009, 05:04 AM »

An acquainted of mine, a friend's brother, Steven Aguilera, ("Steve"), has written and released this printed art instruction book, Perspective Book. I am not much of an artist, so I don't dare to judge it's qualities, but I do know that he is an extremely serious guy who never tries to pull a trick on anyone. I am saying this because I expect this book to reveal NEW insight, not just saying what already has been said a lot of times.


Soft cover, 49 chapters, 188 pages, 350 illustrations, Price: $29.95 U.S.
http://www.PerspectiveBook.com

Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, Steven has worked occasionally in the film industry as a preproduction illustrator, scenic artist and composer.

Since 1997, he has poised his talents in the direction of graphic art and website design. Through his graphic design company, he has created countless visually stunning presentations for many major clientele all over the world.

Having worked on his book, A New Perspective, as a side project for twenty years, Steven has devoted countless hours to researching and perfecting the ground-breaking information it contains.

Exploring other artistic interests like music, filmmaking and screenwriting, he is constantly growing as an artist as his reach for new art forms constantly expands.

This material covers the subject of Perspective, but goes way beyond merely creating depth in one’s picture. In fact, it is indispensible to any artist working with three-dimensional form, whether in drawing, painting, photography, motion picture, video game design or virtual reality.

Building the subject up from scratch through nearly twenty years of extensive research, "A New Perspective" consists mostly of new material which is not available anywhere else. Describing more than drawing techniques, it contains radical new breakthroughs, completely redefining what perspective is and how it really works.

This book also takes a frank and honest look at the subject of perspective as it has been taught, correcting and updating dozens of fundamental falsehoods, omissions and misconceptions perpetuated for centuries.

Visit the website for more information at http://www.PerspectiveBook.com

Download sample chapters at http://www.Perspecti...k.com/downloads.html


Thanks!

Steve Aguilera

sample chapter, pdf, 199 kb:

The First Perspective Book for Any Type of Artist

A New Perspective is the only perspective book written for any field that deals with three-dimensional form, including traditional drawing and painting.

But perspective is not just about drawing and painting. It is equally relevant in other visual fields of art. Yet, until now, perspective was used by many professions that had few or no learning materials available to them. These include:

    * photography
    * motion picture (directing, camerawork, visual effects, set design, etc.)
    * video game design
    * computer graphics (website design, software design, graphic design)
    * animation
    * stage design
    * virtual reality
    * general display and exhibit design

A new perspective book that goes beyond mere depth perspective; indispensible for anyone working in three-dimensional form, whether Motion Picture, Photography, Video Game Design or Painting.

Finally Reveals Perspective's Many Flaws

Perspective is widely considered the most difficult subject in Art. This is actually because it is loaded with false information while most of its basics were missing.

A New Perspective takes a frank and honest look at perspective, correcting and updating many dozens of fundamental falsehoods, omissions and misconceptions perpetuated for centuries.

Along with perspective, this book also expands upon and even challenges many established principals taught in photography, filmmaking, psychology, color theory, physics, optics, audio theory, motion theory and art.

For the first time, one fully realizes how flawed many of our techniques have been and how limited our understanding of perspective really was.

A new perspective book that goes beyond mere depth perspective; indispensible for anyone working in three-dimensional form, whether Motion Picture, Photography, Video Game Design or Painting.




More Than Just "Depth Perspective"

The most complete perspective book ever written, this includes all conventional perspective knowledge, but goes beyond basic "depth perspective" and covers many unique topics not covered in other perspective books, such as:

    * Motion and perspective
    * Understanding form, including the three ingredients that make up form
    * Establishing an "eye" in your artwork through which your audience sees
    * Thinking in three dimensions
    * Why "the camera adds ten pounds" to a person's weight
    * The two most basic things to know about setting up a shot
    * Why we can use miniatures in film
    * Using perspective to best portray people
    * How to give anything more dimension (even food or a character in a film)
    * The role of past experience in depth perception
    * Clarifies unnecessary complexities and confusions about photography
    * How to suggest a subject's actual size (size perception)
    * Creating unlimited ways of enhancing depth perspective
    * The use of color in depth perspective
    * Understanding the two main types of distortion and their characteristics
    * How to use distortion to enhance your artwork and depth perspective
    * The basis of wide-angle, curvilinear (having curved lines) perspective
    * Effectively shooting comedy
    * The best ways of positioning your artwork to an audience
    * How stereoscopic vision (seeing with two eyes) amplifies depth
    * Clarifies shot types (close-ups, wide angles, etc.) and misleading terms
    * The truth behind "left-right brain theory" and creative thinking
    * The true effects of lenses on perspective
    * Using audio to enhance perspective

www.perspectivebook.com/

5020

General Software Discussion / Re: EULAlyzer™ 1.1

« Last post by Curt on January 09, 2009, 04:28 AM »

- and their answer was:

For the duration of the EULAlyzer Pro license (1 year), you get access to:

1.) All EULAlyzer Pro features, including EULA-Watch.
2.) All updates / upgrades.

We don't charge for major version upgrades - the duration of your license covers any and all updates to EULAlyzer Pro. This is important, and helps to maintain active detection of the latest installers and license agreements, as well as detection of the latest Interesting words/phrases.

After your license expires (1 year later), you can either renew (at your option) or resume use of all of the normal EULAlyzer (free) features.

Best Regards,
-Javacool Software Support

So, after a year, a Pro version will degrade into a 'free' version, if you don't subscribe.

5021

General Software Discussion / Re: teracopy: copy your files faster

« Last post by Curt on January 09, 2009, 04:00 AM »

Shell integration. TeraCopy can completely replace Explorer copy and move functions, allowing you work with files as usual.

5022

General Software Discussion / Re: photo duplicate scanner

« Last post by Curt on January 07, 2009, 05:34 PM »

- please forgive me, sajman99, but don't you think it might be a good idea to actually RUN the program? Besides, the lack of tooltips made me skip testing it further than the initial scanning. But other than that, I must say Similar Images Finder is incredible fast!

5023

General Software Discussion / Re: Editor for PDFs: recommendations, please?

« Last post by Curt on January 07, 2009, 02:21 PM »

- I am using it. I don't think about it; it does the job. I am not sure why I upgraded to version 6, version 5 worked well. I guess it is the same old syndrome: it is new, and that is the reason! Actually, I just might recommend any other pdf editor as well. I am using this one because I almost never bothers to EDIT my pdf files, but I will very often "print to pdf" - which it does well.

Edited:
- oh yes, and I use it because it has this "add to file". Select some text on the Internet or in another file, and have it added to the text in a pdf file from your store. Nice feature!

5024

General Software Discussion / Firefox not safe at all

« Last post by Curt on January 07, 2009, 01:09 PM »

How did this report stay unnoticed for 3 weeks? Did "you" choose to put the monocular in front of the blind eye, or what? Or is it, that "we" have chosen not to trust the result of the report? Well, anyway, I have eagerly been waiting for 8 hours to see who would post about this and have some wise words to say. But no-one have spoken, yet, so I guess I will have to do it, even though I have very little real knowledge about the subject - so I will pass it on as 'an info'.


Today CyberNet's email could tell this old news from December 15, 2008:

Firefox tops list of 12 most vulnerable apps

Firefox Considered Most Vulnerable App
Many people I know use Firefox because they’re told it’s the most secure browser, but this report says otherwise. In fact it puts it at the top of the list for being the most vulnerable app of 2008.
Others on the list include Flash, Skype, Norton, and QuickTime.

-CyberNet

On this list, number one is not the best, but the worst:

#1 Mozilla Firefox: 
In 2008, Mozilla patched 10 vulnerabilities that could be used by remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via buffer overflow, malformed URI links, documents, JavaScript and third party tools.

-ZDNet

Read for yourself: >>> http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=2304 <<<

The report was made by Bit9 (http://www.bit9.com/ "The Pioneer and Leader in Application Whitelisting"). Bit9 are partners with Symantec.

Bit9's report, pdf, 274 kb:

Vulnerable_Apps_DEC_08.pdf (274.79 kB - downloaded 474 times.)



 
 
 

5025

General Software Discussion / Re: Please don't let me wrack my brain again: annotating Helpfiles in htm format

« Last post by Curt on January 06, 2009, 07:23 AM »

I know it is too late for this free solution, but in general, a devoted editor for help files surely must be a better option?