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676

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 06:04 PM »

surely, if you are running a laptop, you must have the opportunity to exit the security program(s), and test if things are improving by this way. Your problem #sounds# like the one I had some years ago when my Agnitum Outpost / Eset NOD32 security combination wasn't working well together.

Also, it sounds as if the laptop needs some more / new / better memory.

-Curt (December 13, 2012, 05:12 PM)

one might think so, unfortunately this is a corporate environment so users are locked out of a lot of things 'for their own safety'

I should think 4G would be sufficient for most non graphical operations (actually, isn't that the hard limit for x32 win7?)

Also, wild guesses here, but perhaps could be related to GDI object leaks or (perhaps a bit less likely?) desktop heap memory size.

-f0dder (December 13, 2012, 05:12 PM)

ce?

interesting that this seems to be new to most here, especially given that it appears to be a relatively common occurrence (at least according to google, and they wouldn't lie about it, would they?)

677

Developer's Corner / Re: What is the COOLEST language?

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:57 PM »

If you were half as drunk as I am ... You'd be laughing right now.

-Stoic Joker (December 13, 2012, 04:42 PM)

if we were that drunk we'd both be speaking braille...

678

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:51 PM »

The only white screen I have seen using laptops is connector (or power) related. Flaky connection to LCD. If at boot could mean a power draw it can't handle.

-rgdot (December 13, 2012, 04:49 PM)

I've never had the issue at boot, and while I'm working off a laptop, a lot of my colleagues aren't

679

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:50 PM »

or perhaps bad some bad anti-malware stuff.

well, the company does use mcafee

680

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:35 PM »

I've seen this behaviour a lot in Firefox on Win7 - window fades out & does not respond - I *am* able to alt-tab to other apps. I'm also able to reproduce it once after each FF restart (it seems to be related to a particular plugin) - it recovers after 10 to 20 seconds. It's actually a minor problem for me so I havent bothered following up on it.

not sure what 3.x looks like - here it's like a transparent white overlay on top of the window - or a faded-out version of window.

-tomos (December 13, 2012, 04:30 PM)

I wondered whether it was related to a particular app, but I can't say categorically.  I've played around with alternatives where I can but it doesn't seem to make much difference.  I also wondered whether it mightn't be a dodgy bit of hardware, but given that I'm getting similar stories from my colleagues I'm inclined to think not...

and you're description matches mine

681

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:31 PM »

the entire window goes white, including all borders, scroll bars, menu bars, and other sundry decorations

on other thing I just remembered - if I call task manager when it happens, it doesn't respond (display) till the thaw....

682

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 04:16 PM »

Hm, the *entire* screen? And does the entire system lock up, or "just" the applications? What about the mouse cursor? Can you take a picture next time it happens?

-f0dder (December 13, 2012, 03:57 PM)

let's agree on the entire 'window'.  I pretty much run most everything fullscreen all the time, so it's effectively fullscreen.

When it occurs, it usually locks 'the applications' - usually it will take out a couple of apps (eg the browser AND excel AND outlook, sometimes others as well (eg TC, 1x1).  I can toggle to some other app's but I might have limited access, or the functional apps could be annexed by the WSOD...

Office is prominent as it's at the centre of most of my workday () but it might or might not be relevant

683

General Software Discussion / Re: WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 03:40 PM »

Daheck is a WSOD? Don't think I've ever seen one?

-f0dder (December 13, 2012, 03:35 PM)

white is the new blue

in my case, the screen goes semi opaque (white) and the 'application(s)' lockup

from talking to my colleagues it seems to be a fairly common experience, google seems to back that up

684

General Software Discussion / WSOD

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 03:18 PM »

anyone here have any experience with the 'White Screen of Death' phenomenon?

Running win7 x32 on my work laptop, I get random WSOD's throughout the day.  They seem to centre around office apps (excel, outlook) and the browser (IE, firefox,greenbrowser) and can last anywhere from 10 seconds to a total lockup.

Googling turns up plenty, though nothing of apparent value - most occurrences seem to be at boot, and no one seems to be able identify the cause or provide a definitive fix

I'd really like to solve this as it's really starting to piss me off

anyone?

685

General Software Discussion / Re: split table

« Last post by Target on December 13, 2012, 02:31 PM »

I don't have 2010, but in 2007 you simply highlight the row you want to split at, then select '
Split Table' from the layout tab (under table tools in the menu bar)

if you have to do this a lot you could use VBA as robinsiebler said

686

Living Room / Re: Video playback 101

« Last post by Target on December 12, 2012, 07:35 PM »

it's not a bandwidth issue is it?

687

General Software Discussion / Re: Script for word microsoft

« Last post by Target on December 11, 2012, 04:52 PM »

what version of word?

is this intended to be some form of document protection, and if not, what do you want to do with the result, ie does the content still need to be editable?

Watermarking is a simple task, but is generally limited to short pieces of text that are repeated on every page,  eg confidential, draft, etc
 

688

N.A.N.Y. 2013 / Re: NANY 2013 Pledge - Progress Bars of Life

« Last post by Target on December 03, 2012, 01:06 AM »

here you go...

of course it's beta so there might be a few bugs...

Spoiler

[ Invalid Attachment ]

apologies to mouser for hijacking his thread...

689

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Target on December 02, 2012, 04:59 PM »

How many people here would use the Klingon interface?
 (see attachment in previous post)

-Arizona Hot (December 01, 2012, 05:30 PM)

you mean apart from the klingons?

690

Living Room / Re: External DVD Writer

« Last post by Target on November 27, 2012, 02:27 PM »

My local PC shop is interested in your ahk script - can I send them a copy along with the ahk program?

-CleverCat (November 27, 2012, 03:52 AM)

knock yourself out 

hmmm, then again, maybe I should hold out for a lucrative licensing deal

691

Living Room / Re: External DVD Writer

« Last post by Target on November 26, 2012, 02:18 PM »

There have been interesting developments here! After testing it is starting to look like is was the Media Monkey burning engine that was playing up! After an update 

I have burned a disc using Win 7 and WMP and am currently playing it and so far so good - no decoding errors!

-CleverCat (November 26, 2012, 04:01 AM)

there's probably (?) nothing wrong with your drive

some (most?) disc handling app's have an option to lock the tray when they're doing something (ripping, writing) which is probably where this went wrong.  If the app fails the lock command may not be released and you'll probably have to use the paper clip to release the tray (possibly even after a reboot).

I have had success using another program to unlock the tray when this happens (eg imgburn, or diskcheck, or freac, or ahk...)

692

Living Room / Re: External DVD Writer

« Last post by Target on November 25, 2012, 05:39 PM »

not sure whether this might be useful or not, but we used to have a machine with a drive that refused to eject - I wrote a small AHK script that looped the unlock and eject commands until it complied

[Select]

driveget, tmp_, list, cdrom
loop
{
    drive, unlock, %tmp_%
    drive, eject
    sleep, 500
    driveget, tmp1, statusCD
    if tmp1 contains not ready, open
        break
}

note that I jotted this down from memory and YMMV from mine so it might or might not be 100% correct...

693

Living Room / Re: Your Smart Device Predictions?

« Last post by Target on November 20, 2012, 12:45 AM »

at the risk of hijacking the thread (apologies up front ), and on a semi related theme, what constitutes 'good battery life' as far as 'smart' phones go these days

I'm considering an upgrade and any references I can find seem to indicate the damn things need to be charged daily (WTF? my existing phone lasts me weeks...)

and can anyone refer me to a site that does worthwhile/reliable reviews?  I've been poking around but most seem to be little better than regurgitations of the manufacturers blurb

694

Living Room / Re: Your Smart Device Predictions?

« Last post by Target on November 19, 2012, 10:09 PM »

Totally.  What irks me is that most of that stuff was available on the regular pc as SOFTWARE!  All they've done is make each software into a piece of hardware.  The real innovation has been portability.  The software and the OSs are honestly a little lamer than they used to be.  But the portability is the big thing, and along with that, the connectivity (wifi, cellular) <--those are true advancements, no need for hype.

-superboyac (November 19, 2012, 08:52 PM)

not trying to take anything away from the advancements per se.  It's about context, and portablility is only as good the available access levels (and net access has a l o n g way to go before it's anything like being ubiquitous)

Seems counter-intuitive to leave an entire market segment marking time while spinning 'lesser' devices as being capable/compulsory/indispensable.

I suppose it's all about what you can get away with...

695

Living Room / Re: A secret society uncovered 250 years later

« Last post by Target on November 19, 2012, 08:46 PM »

but I also don't get a chance to observe and hang around many masons

-superboyac (November 19, 2012, 08:28 PM)

I note you said masons, but nothing about the strippers...

696

Living Room / Re: Your Smart Device Predictions?

« Last post by Target on November 19, 2012, 08:44 PM »

Seems to me like the devices are going from more complex to more simple, with the cloud and the big boys taking care of most geek stuff behind the scenes.  That's certainly what's happened to the computer.  From what I can tell, the whole personal computer thing peaked somewhere during 1995-2005.  There was DOS, Windows, internet, lots of great software.

Now it feels like the innovations are largely minor, but super-hyped.  Feels like the big boys are trying to squeeze as much money out of the whole industry as possible while keeping the actual real productive innovations as minor as possible.  OO...bigger phone screens, whoop dee do.  A lot of tinker-friendly features have been removed and continue to be removed.  Curious people and ideamen are made more and more to feel like illegal hackers unless they are working for one of the big boys.

But really...I think I'm just growing up or something.

-superboyac (November 19, 2012, 08:12 PM)

Seems (to me) that PC's are getting dumbed down - the hardware capabilities are still there, but the current money makers are devices like 'smart' phones, tablets, and game consoles (which collectively don't have anywhere near the same capability) so that's where the focus is, ie adding 'significant' features and functionality to devices in order to make them appear more useful/capable than they actually are, and at the same time limiting or neglecting similar advances in desktop applications (which already had all that and more...)

697

General Software Discussion / Re: Two classes of membership here?

« Last post by Target on November 15, 2012, 04:37 PM »

Watch this space for word from Squeaky!

-cranioscopical (November 15, 2012, 04:31 PM)

isn't that you?

698

Finished Programs / Re: DONE: Using AHK and PDFTK to combine daily pdf's

« Last post by Target on November 14, 2012, 08:00 PM »

I assume you're trying to do this in AHK?

you need 2 nested loops, something like this

[Select]

pub = MM,MC,FE,CS,RE,VL,WR

loop, parse, pub, CSV
{
    Loop, %a_loopfield%_%date%_*.pdf
        Runwait %comspec% /c pdftk %filename1% %A_LoopFileName% cat output MTR_%date%.pdf
}

699

General Software Discussion / Re: Why is Software for Hardware Always Sucky?

« Last post by Target on November 11, 2012, 07:20 PM »

Which is why I thank god for hackers.  I've bought software over the years that require an online connection to function, and I'm not always online, plus I don't want software that "reports" back to home base to get permission to use.

All of the software I've bought that uses this form of DRM I find a way to hack it, or send it back for a refund.  Personally I think it should be illegal for them to sell you anything that has to report home in order to use without advertising it on the software/hardware, and I'm not talking about tiny 6 point font either.  It should be bold emblazed on the front of the package and highlighted in the ad.

-Tinman57 (November 11, 2012, 07:13 PM)

granted, but you should never have to rely on a hack to get full functionality out of a mouse, especially not one that costs almost $100...

700

General Software Discussion / Re: Why is Software for Hardware Always Sucky?

« Last post by Target on November 11, 2012, 06:29 PM »

DRM or what?

This was posted on Techdirt last week Mouse requires net connection

pretty sad state of affairs when a 'generic' device (and a damn expensive one) isn't fully functional out of the box