Recent Posts

5501

Living Room / Re: Fast Food: Ads vs. Reality

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 09, 2010, 12:12 PM »

The big lie(tm) ain't the food, but the concept that the hot black chick with the ponytail would be working in a burger joint.  "Gimme' $2 and it's all free!"  Baby I'd give you $200 if you wuz on the menu!!

5502

Developer's Corner / Re: Strangest language feature

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 09, 2010, 12:07 PM »

ahk can't be too far behind with this usage:

[Select]

If 0 < 1
{
MsgBox, 64, DummyApp Usage, Usage: DummyApp params
ExitApp
}

To anyone coming from another programming language, the If statement should always be true, like "while 1" ... but not so!!

5503

Finished Programs / Re: Idea : Time Calculator that accepts a column paste of mm:ss

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 09, 2010, 11:54 AM »

@cranioscopical

I cleared the clipboard, then copied.  No matter what I get the error.

edit:
I don't know if it matters, but I'm running Chromium. I think it has issues with the cache.  I tried downloading a file from my site and kept getting the old version until I cleared the cache.  Weird.

But even so, I often highlight the address bar and then launch Selector to open the page with another browser.  Selector messes with the clipboard, saving current, then copying selected, then putting contents back, so it would just be havoc.

Target's utility looks cool though.  Good for someone with a different usage habits.

5504

Finished Programs / Re: Idea : Time Calculator that accepts a column paste of mm:ss

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 09, 2010, 12:37 AM »

All I get is "there was an error and the file was not downloaded".

I appreciate the effort. In this instance it feels like the block copy from the page is a better approach.  At least for me, since I have AutoCopy. Just drag the mouse and let go, then paste in skwire's app. To get the url in the clipboard I have to highlight then control-c.  Plus I do too much url copy/paste to leave it resident.  My Selector program launches stuff with selected text so I tend to use that a lot.

Don't know why it didn't download. I tried copying the url to the clipboard 3 or 4 times.

edit: This is the url I used for test:
http://www.allmusic....kind-of-blue-r104440

I'm not that much of a web programmer so I'm not sure exactly what's considered a "file" and what's some dynamically generated mumbo jumbo. It's not my area.

5505

Finished Programs / Re: Idea : Time Calculator that accepts a column paste of mm:ss

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 08, 2010, 09:18 PM »

do you use any other sites besides allmusic?

-Target (December 08, 2010, 04:45 PM)

No other site in particular. If I can't find the info at AllMusic then I'll just search. Usually something pops up like Borders or Amazon that has the track times.

5506

Finished Programs / Re: Idea : Time Calculator that accepts a column paste of mm:ss

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 08, 2010, 03:25 PM »

Thanks skwire.  I'll try it out right away.

Harvest Time sounds cool to me too.

@Renegade feel free to post your take when you have time(no pun intended.) I like to have more than one tool for a job.

edit: skwire this is perfect!! About as easy as it could be!!  Thanks.

5507

Finished Programs / DONE: Time Calculator that accepts a column paste of mm:ss

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 07, 2010, 07:39 PM »

I'm looking for an easy way to total the track times of albums listed on AllMusic.com.

The track times are on the right using mm:ss format as in 7:55
but I don't see a way to column select with chromium.

The only time calculator that comes close is the old AddTime.
But it only accepts either '.' or ',' as the separator.  So I have to block select in Chromium, paste into an editor that does right justify paragraph, line up the numbers by padding with zeros manually, column select and copy to clipboard, then AddTime will allow pasting.

Ideally something would read the clipboard, get the times from the end of each line, do the math, and pop up a total.  The display of the total can be a simple MsgBox. I don't care about being able to copy and paste the result.  One total time is no hassle to type.  But if a nicer display is more pleasing to the author that's fine with me.

Perhaps an .ini file with an option for minutes/seconds separator would make it more generally useful.  But I think most music sites give the times as MM:SS.

AddTime lets you enter using the number keypad but if there's more than 4 or 5 tracks it can be tedious.

5508

Post New Requests Here / Re: Idea: Chromium or general-purpose favicon fetcher

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 05, 2010, 06:44 PM »

I called it BookmarkVisit.  You can download from this page:

http://www.favessoft.com/downloads.html

The download includes a readme.  But basic usage is, make the browser that needs a favicon refresh the default.  Export bookmarks to an .html file.  Run bv.exe and select that file.  bv.exe picks up the exe associated with that file from Windows to get the process exe name to use when closing instances.

It just uses Windows to open each bookmark that starts with "http:" and every multiple of 10 it closes all of the browser instances.  It just keeps the number of browser instances to a sane level.  You'll see your browser come up, open tabs, close etc.. repeatedly until all the bookmarks are processed.  When done the Gold Star Icon in the Tray should disappear.

It's probably not suitable for dial-up as the built-in delays are short.  But it should work with tabbed browsers running on broadband. Also your browser should be set to open new links in tabs rather than new windows. It should still work but they'll just be more clutter as multiple windows open and close rather than tabs.

See readme for the gory bits.

edit: I made some modifications.  Still, it's a last resort brute force approach. If you run Firefox I recommend using CheckPlaces AddOn instead.  This utility works pretty smoothly with Chromium 10.x on my machines though.

5509

Post New Requests Here / Re: Idea: Chromium or general-purpose favicon fetcher

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 05, 2010, 03:05 PM »

I hacked together something good enough for my own use. Not really smooth.  But it does the job without 50 chrome.exe processes running.

If I ever dress it up nice I'll upload it to my site.

5510

Developer's Corner / Re: Article: Paid developers power the Linux kernel

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 05, 2010, 12:40 PM »

Hmmmmmm, makes me wonder if Isaac Asimov really wrote all those science fiction works.  If you reverse his initials, you get AI.  Wonder if that's a hint they were really generated by a smart computer?

5511

Post New Requests Here / Idea: Chromium or general-purpose favicon fetcher

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 05, 2010, 12:34 PM »

I'm running Chromium.  Right now the "fix" for losing favicons in bookmarks is to open all bookmarks in each folder on my bookmarks bar.  It launches a ton of processes.  I haven't found a bookmark validation extension for Chrome/Chromium that refreshes the favicons.

What I'd like is a program that sifts through the bookmarks and refreshes the favicons. People say just use normally and they will eventually refresh.  But before then an update is likely to plunk it back to square one.  So a push-button fix would be handy. It doesn't have to be particularly fast.  Low on resources would be even better.

If anyone knows of an extension that already does this that works in Chromium that would be great too.

For Firefox, CheckPlaces does the job. I made a suggestion for Bookmark Sentry extension to add this feature but no one commented. I assume it's never going to happen.

5512

General Software Discussion / Re: Transpose 1.3.0.0

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 03, 2010, 12:24 PM »

I'm trying Chromium 10 from here:

http://www.softpedia...hrome-Chromium.shtml

It looks like they fixed the issue of the inability to open a new tab in the foreground.

(The build shows as 68163. I'm posting about it here since Transpose works with it.)

So far the only annoyance is having to refresh favicons by opening all bookmarks in a folder.  Since this workaround launches as many processes as it needs to open all the tabs quickly there seems to be no impetus for an extension rewrite to do a "favicon refresh" utility as part of a bookmark validity checker.  At least I haven't found one yet.

5513

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Zentimo at GAOTD (Nov 03, 2010)

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 02, 2010, 02:34 PM »

I like the eye candy. I wanted the program to work.  That's why I kept going through gyrations to see if I could find the quickest way to get the state to Ok To Remove my drives.  In the end it's too unpredictable on my machines at least.

Now I just exit from Everything Search, run sync.exe from SysInternals, and push the power button on the dock.  Periodically I do a scandisk on the drive in the dock. No problems reported.

Just didn't work out for me.  Glad I had the full version to play around with though.  Thanks for the free licenses.

5514

Finished Programs / Re: IDEA: Save Session for Windows (processes, open files, window positions)

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 01, 2010, 03:02 PM »

I'm experimenting with this one:

http://sourceforge.n...t/projects/winsize2/

It individually memorizes windows size/position when you hit a hotkey. It's an ahk compiled script with source included. Looks like it may be handy for those windows that don't remember their position. From looking at the options notebook it seems to use the class name as well as window title or title substring to recognize saved windows.

More for those pesky windows that refuse to remember where you put them than for saving a layout.  But I thought it may be of interest.

5515

General Software Discussion / Re: x64 DVD Decrypter Needed

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 30, 2010, 08:00 PM »

This is about as simple as it gets:

http://www.videohelp...tools/DVDFab_Passkey

It's been showing various beta versions for months. If that's any indication, it should stay "free" for quite awhile.

It sits in the tray.  Insert a disc. It will ask you the region code.  Then open Explorer for the optical disc and just drag & drop the whole shootin' match to a folder on your HD.

It also has some settings similar to DVDFab .. what you want removed etc..

Once you have VIDEO_TS on HD use Imgburn as usual.

I have Vista64 and didn't notice any problem using it.  The only annoying thing is by default, it's set to start with Windows and be active all the time. Just right click on Tray Icon to change settings.

5516

General Software Discussion / Re: Small Linux kernal patch = big improvement in desktop experience

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 28, 2010, 03:31 PM »

It's been several years since I did any kernel compiling.  But the nice thing about Linux is you can set up the boot loader to allow kernel selection on start-up.  The old one that presumably works is still there to select if the modified one is giving trouble.  I think it was grub that had the easier configuration.  Lilo was a pain in that every time you compiled a kernel, even if the output was in the same spot, if may have changed its absolute location on the drive, requiring running the setup every time to be sure.  They may have fixed it eventually though.

With a graphical configuration program that works, modifying the kernel is kind of fun.  When it sucked was the script based text mode deal where it asked you about 250 questions, do you want this? yes, no maybe? and if you messed up hitting Enter too quickly, back to square one and run the script all over again!!  Loads of laughs!!

The Gui one is easy. Don't know about Ubuntu, but the old Red Hat, Mandrake, Debian, and even Slackware distros, once you had the Gui config app, came set up pretty logically.  And with modules you could configure things to be optional on start up.  No longer using that scanner? Don't load the module in the start up scripts.

Also you set up different sections of the source tree for different kernel versions. Usually you would compile something newer than came as the default kernel.  Start up scripts would branch using kernel version detection. If you wanted to go back to the kernel that came with the distro it was usually a matter of copying vmlinuz file and running grub configuration at the most.

5517

General Software Discussion / Free Windows command line converter for text based subtitles

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 27, 2010, 04:27 PM »

http://sourceforge.net/projects/saconv/

There seems to be some .NET dependency but it's not specified.  It runs fine for me in Vista64 and Windows Seven 32 bit command lines.

If you download the source it has a handy batch file you can use to convert subs in a folder to .srt.  It supports quite a few text sub formats.  The documentation is practically zero. Run with no args on command line to get help text.

It's for those occasions when you have more than a few subtitle files to process so that manually loading in a Gui and saving would be tedious.

5518

General Software Discussion / HmsTimes 1.0.0.1

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 23, 2010, 07:41 PM »

HmsTimes 1.0

Reads xml chapters file.  Writes text file in HH:MM:SS format.

If you use DVDAuthorGui DVD authoring program, you may find this program useful.
It reads an xml chapter file such as you get when you extract the chapters from an .mkv file. It writes a text file of the same name but with .txt extension.  The text file is just chapter start times in HH:MM:SS format as used by DVDAuthorGui.

For years I have been pasting in the DVDAuthorGui chapters dialog from a file I made with times at 5 minute intervals.  Since MakeMKV produces an .mkv with the chapter info I though it would be desirable to have the chapters the same as the original.

I've only tried it on a couple of rips but it worked flawlessly on both.
It's a compiled AutoIt3 program. It should run on Windows XP and later.

It's free for you to use at your own risk. You may download from this link:

http://www.favessoft.com/downloads.html

Just search on HmsTimes.

The included Readme.txt has a link for donations as well as sample output.

To extract the .mkv chapters to xml I recommend MKVExtractGUI-2.

Edit: A minor update.  If no chapter time tags were detecting in the input
file, an error dialog is shown.

5519

Living Room / Re: Fake Coffee Shop in China (NSFW) (Can you guess?)

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 19, 2010, 04:16 PM »

Here's a real store. I just wonder how many times in his life the guy said "it's pronounced fooks"?

http://ctt.trains.co...d%20old%20store.aspx

5520

Living Room / Re: Ever asked, "Now why did I uninstall that program?" A tip for you...

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 19, 2010, 02:28 PM »

Thanks.  I've used it before, but don't think it'll do particularly well for this.

This is the [tentative] list of requirements I can envision:

• file name
• file date/time
• install date/time
• file version
• path, installed from
• path, installed to
• path(s), data and auxiliary file(s)
• install notes (purpose, nature (portable, fixed, temporary, etc.), warnings external requirements)

I think that will cover most information needed.  Then either store in a database or individual flat files that can be reviewed as needed, edited in the event of an uninstall.  I'm kinda partial to a database, mostly for the sort/query ability, so that would need additional fields:

• uninstall date/time
• uninstall reason
• product review
• product recommendation (Think I just creeped my own scope .)

Hm-m-m ... what's been missed?

Really don't know that my skill set is up to this, but should -  - be fun trying .

-barney (November 19, 2010, 02:03 PM)

It sounds like the easy way to do it would be to automate MyUninstaller and add the list info to DB before removal.

5521

Living Room / Re: Ever asked, "Now why did I uninstall that program?" A tip for you...

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 19, 2010, 02:24 PM »

Your comment reminded me of this thread:

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=15916.0
...
I should probably keep screen shots of annoying programs so I can avoid them in the future. But I'm not that organized.

-MilesAhead (November 18, 2010, 10:12 PM)

Yes, you can avoid the programs that have fallen out favor, but you won't know "why?" 

Not knowing "why" probably won't stop you from reinstalling.  Remember there was a good reason "why" the (rejected) app was installed in the first place and it will probably be an undoing as the remembered favorable provocation will overpower the doubt concerning why it was rejected.  I speak from senile experience.

-CodeTRUCKER (November 19, 2010, 12:22 AM)

There's nothing to preclude text with the picture. Plus I don't believe you can copyright titles. I have a program Quick Click and just saw one on one of those review pages where the click is spelled as "Cliq" .. not that it matters. But remembering by name can be misleading as time passes.

5522

Living Room / Re: Ever asked, "Now why did I uninstall that program?" A tip for you...

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 19, 2010, 01:11 PM »

I have a TreePad file generator that may be helpful if you are already behind the curve.  The concept is to generate a TreePad file for an entire folder with a node named for each file. Then just manually enter notes for each node. The original impetus was for commenting my downloaded files, but it's a general way of annotating files without touching the original file or embedding it in another storage.

For example when I download a chromium nightly builds zip file I change the name from "chrome-win32.zip" to "chrome-win32_nnnnn.zip" with build number inserted.

After running TreePadGen there's a node in the TreePad file for each file in the folder.  I think if it sees an .hjt(TreePad) file already named for the folder inside the folder, it offers to append nodes to it. (It's been awhile since I used it.  Sometimes I get tired of testing stuff so I don't want to use it once it's stable.  A bad trait I guess.)

http://www.treepad.c...onversion_utilities/

Just search TreePadGen.

edit: The TreePad Lite version works with it fine.  The main limitation of Lite is no graphics.  But for logs, tips, notes it works well.  You can search it for terms, and I believe you can drag & drop nodes, append subtrees, from one TreePad editor instance to another etc..

5523

Living Room / Re: Ever asked, "Now why did I uninstall that program?" A tip for you...

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 18, 2010, 10:12 PM »

Your comment reminded me of this thread:

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=15916.0

I haven't checked out the tool so I'm not sure if it's apropos.
I find as my memory deteriorates pictures help a lot. Guess that's the reason for Icons in the first place.  I should probably keep screen shots of annoying programs so I can avoid them in the future. But I'm not that organized.

5524

Unfinished Requests / Re: One word, three dictionaries

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 18, 2010, 10:07 PM »

Sorry for my not having been specific enough.

-lls (November 18, 2010, 09:20 PM)

It helps to define your terms.  heh heh

5525

General Software Discussion / Re: BD Rebuilder Beta 0.36.03

« Last post by MilesAhead on November 18, 2010, 08:49 PM »

I did a run with dvd5 output using HC BEST profile.  Resulting size was 4.25 GB. Using best instead of normal didn't slow it down as much as I thought. I'm starting to suspect what bogged the throughput in my manual encodes was setting DC precision to 10. I guess most use 9.

In any case, the processing even with best profile was just a tad over the run time of the film on my quad.  It varies with input I guess.  Some 2 hour films take about 3 hours to encode even using normal profile.

The missing piece now is subtitle support.  Eventually PGS subs should automatically be muxed in using .sup format in standard dvd fashion(jdobbs has stated this will be implemented eventually.) For the time being subs can be burned in using the avs filter or you can add them later using Subtitle Creator mux wizard.

Next thing I have to investigate is multi-thread AviSynth. If I could shave 20 minutes or more off the encoding time then it may be worth doing it manually.