Recent Posts

776

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on April 06, 2016, 07:53 PM »

Dose the extended forecast for the new version of  sWeather work ?

-sportman12 (April 06, 2016, 04:07 PM)

Instead of asking and waiting, why not just try it?  Yes, the extended forecasts do work on my test systems (all some flavour of Windows 7).

no, does not work in version 1.6.3.1. (which is the most recent version at the time of this post).

-wd9598 (April 06, 2016, 06:39 PM)

wd9598, I added Windsor, Ontario to my test instance and I get extended forecasts using both the old and new APIs.  I'm not sure what the problem is for your system.  It could be the fact that you're running XP but I've had reports from other users that sWeather runs fine on their XP systems.  Another sWeather user on this forum, Ath, has reported that the extended forecast works fine for him at home but not on his computer at work which would lead me to believe it's a proxy or some other internet connection anomaly.

Can you verify that your Windsor WOEID is 4079?

777

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on April 03, 2016, 06:27 PM »

Arghhh, the performance of this new API is frustrating.  After several hours of testing, I'm certain this is not an sWeather; hell, even the official Yahoo! developer page doesn't return data a lot of the time.  I really hope they fix the issue but, in the meantime, I figured out a way to get data from the old API and have added an option for that (enabled by default).  As the changelog entry states below, I have no idea how long Yahoo! intend to make the older API available.  Please read the changelog entry for more caveats to this workaround.


Website | Download
v1.6.3 - 2016-04-03
    + Due to Yahoo!-realted issues with the new API, I've added a workaround
      option to use the old API.  This option is enabled by default.  That said,
      while the older API seems to be much more reliable, I cannot guarantee how
      long Yahoo! will make it available.  Maybe this workaround will buy enough
      time for Yahoo! to get their stuff together regarding the new API.  Please
      note that the data is slightly different between the two APIs and that the
      "Full forecast" link doesn't appear to provide proper links when using the
      old API.
    * Prettied up the Options dialog with some icons.
    * Made the main form display missing data more elegantly.

778

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on April 02, 2016, 08:19 AM »

@JanJ, @qbic: I've noticed this as well and it seemed particularly bad yesterday (especially later in the evening Central US time).  I'm mostly certain it's a Yahoo! issue, possibly one of capacity as more apps are moved to the new API.  At the moment I write this, it's very quick and it loaded my numerous locations into the expanded view with no hesitation at all.  I'll try to keep an eye on it and, the next time it's slow, I'll try to figure out if it's something in my code or not.

779

N.A.N.Y. 2016 / Re: N.A.N.Y. 2016 Announcement

« Last post by skwire on March 31, 2016, 02:29 PM »

Updated pic with new 2016 mug:

780

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 31, 2016, 01:48 PM »

I've resolved the problem by asking Norton to exclude it from its SONAR checks. Thanks for replying though. It works beautifully.

-Brothbeard (March 31, 2016, 01:33 PM)

Good to hear and thank you for the donation.   

FWIW, these false positives are usually because of the keyboard hook code AutoHotkey uses for the global shortcuts.  Basically, the A/V engines see this as potential keylogger.  However, in this latest update, I didn't change around any of that code so it probably has to do with compiling sWeather with a later version of AutoHotkey than before.  This usually causes A/V signatures to go apeshit again regarding the keyboard hook thing.

781

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 31, 2016, 09:14 AM »

I've just downloaded the latest version in the hope that things would start working again and the .exe file has been gobbled up by Norton Internet Security which complains that it is monitoring my keyboard. Since it's never done this with previous versions, I am puzzled. Is there anything I (or indeed you) can do? I'm running XP SP3.

-Brothbeard (March 31, 2016, 04:59 AM)

Thank you for taking the time to write.  This is a false positive that comes and goes due to the language my applications are written in (AutoHotkey).  As a test in the past, I've written a single line AHK script and compiled it:

F1:: ExitApp

That's it...one hotkey to exit the application.  Even that won't come up clean on VirusTotal.  I know it's only my word, but I can state that there is no malware in any of my applications.

Years ago, when the AV companies were a lot fewer, I used to contact them about stuff like this.  Things would get fixed but, due to the AV updates, false positives would, inevitably, occur again. I got tired of dealing with it so now I just shrug and trust that my body of work speaks for itself.  I know it sounds terribly apathetic, but fighting it just isn't worth the cycles.  =]  Cheers.

782

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 30, 2016, 10:45 AM »

Hi, qbic, and welcome to the DonationCoder site.   

Hi, just registered to thank you for a great application and quick solving of the problem with the API.
I've been using sWeather for months now and it's really great little app.

-qbic (March 30, 2016, 05:31 AM)

Thank you for your kind words.   

Regarding alternative weather providers someone mentioned earlier here are some that are available
on the main weather app i use on Android:

- Open Weather Map
- Foreca
- Yr.no

Not that I have any complaints what so ever with the current provider, just thought i could chip in some info.
The app is free and have a lot of users so i think there is no problem with large amount of daily requests since everything works just fine.

-qbic (March 30, 2016, 05:31 AM)

Thanks for the suggestions.  I have checked into those sites before and their free tiers of their APIs (if they even have one) are limited.  What I'm saying is that, even if an app is free, the authors might be paying for better API access and, possibly, making up the costs in ad revenue.  I honestly don't know.  The cost of some APIs are waaay up there.  We're talking hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of dollars per month.   

Writing freeware is a hobby for me and all of my software is ad-free and bundle-free.  Other than very gratefully accepting donations, I don't do anything to monetise my software.  In fact, I've gone the rounds with certain software sites that have, without my permission, bundled my software with their toolbars, installers, and other garbage.  CNet, I'm looking at you.     The fact is, sWeather just doesn't get enough donations to justify me paying for any kind of API access.  I truly hope I don't come across as crying about this; that wasn't my intention.  Again, writing freeware is a labour of love for me and I really enjoy doing it.   

Oh yeah, i noticed a small bug. For a couple of cities on my list sunset time is 7:70pm and 7:80pm

-qbic (March 30, 2016, 05:31 AM)

Fixed, thank you.

Website | Download
v1.6.1 - 2016-03-30
    ! Another fix for the incorrect Sunrise/Sunset times.  (Thanks, qbic)

783

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 29, 2016, 10:37 PM »

Workarounds for new Yahoo! Weather API inconsistencies.   

Website | Download
v1.6.0 - 2016-03-28
    ! Several fixes related to bad or different data coming from the new Yahoo!
      API.
        - Barometric pressure readings should now be correct.  Hey, I learned
          what a hectopascal is.  Thanks, Yahoo!.  =\
        - "Feels Like" temp should now be correct when using metric units.
        - Fixed Sunrise/Sunset times missing a trailing zero.  WTH, Yahoo!?

784

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 29, 2016, 08:48 AM »

Thanks for the bug reports, all, and welcome to DonationCoder for the first-time posters.

The bloody frustrating thing is that the data bugs are actually API bugs on Yahoo!'s side, i.e., they're not sWeather bugs.  Of course, some I can fix with math (Feels Like temp always reporting in Fahrenheit, for instance) but what happens if Yahoo! fix their side? Any math fix I implemented would then bork things up again.  The sunrise/sunset issue is, again, a data issue on their side.  Though, I should be able to fix this one so that it displays properly even if they end up fixing their side of things.

@Dogmeat: Regarding the titlebar timestamp, it uses a different API at https://timezonedb.com/.  Are you able to reach this site?  The feature seems to work fine for me.

785

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 28, 2016, 04:25 PM »

@finchley: This is probably due to the 1) lack of responsiveness of the new API and/or 2) the fact that it requires OAuth authentication.  During my testing, I noticed that the new API seems to be much slower than the old one.  On a hunch, I don't think this has much to do with the OAuth requirement; I think it's more the Yahoo! console API and the YQL (Yahoo! Query Language) I have to use now.  I've noticed some delays here and there on my home connection but have not seen what you're describing.  What kind of internet connection are you using?  Is it usually fast, stable, etc?

786

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 28, 2016, 01:02 PM »

Which OS are you running?

787

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 28, 2016, 11:08 AM »

The other weird thing when I click on Full Forecast link, I get the weather forecast page.  But as soon as I slide the mouse over the browser page it starts showing me some weird desktop screen caps.  Like a futuristic building and a rain forest shot.  I can't click on anything to get the page to do anything.

-MilesAhead (March 28, 2016, 09:51 AM)

I tested this in a new VM and I get the same popup you're describing.  However, I just clicked the "X" in the upper right of the popup and was able to access the weather site just fine.   

788

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 28, 2016, 08:08 AM »

Thanks, Ath, much appreciated.   

789

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 28, 2016, 12:18 AM »

Thanks for the kind words, AzureToad & mouser.  Much appreciated.   

790

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 27, 2016, 11:46 PM »

I've just updated sWeather to v1.5.9 which should support Yahoo!'s new weather API.  Please download and test.

Website | Download
v1.5.9 - 2016-03-27
    * Updated sWeather to work with new Yahoo! Weather API.
    + Added Yahoo! logo as per new API's attribution guidelines:
      https://developer.yahoo.com/attribution/
    ! Fixed non-working "Full forecast" links.
    ! Fixed cursor when hovering over buttons and links.
    ! Right-click copy data now includes days 6-10 of the extended forecast.

791

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 27, 2016, 10:51 AM »

Hi, chance of sun, and welcome to the DonationCoder site.   

Any plans to move to a different provider/API? Curious what the advantage is to using Yahoo, especially since their data/detail isn't as good as other services.

-chance of sun (March 26, 2016, 08:26 AM)

No plans currently.

The problem is that a lot of the other sites' "free" API access limits the number of total API calls per hour/day, etc.  Though I have no real data to back it up, sWeather seems pretty popular, and I fear that it would exceed most sites' free API limits.  An option is to pay ($$$) for more API access but I don't get near enough donations to cover using a pay tier for most sites' APIs.

Yahoo!'s API is free, easy to work with (until now, sorta), and they never seemed to have an API call limit issue with sWeather.  They recently changed things so that I have to use OAuth (pain in the ass) to access an entirely different API than what sWeather was using beforehand. 

Which service did you have in mind?

792

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sWeather (tray-based weather app)

« Last post by skwire on March 25, 2016, 10:05 AM »

Hi, finchley, and welcome to the DonationCoder site.   

Since early this morning (about 1am 25 Mar 16) sWeather is running but it isn't accessing the weather server.  Is something up with the server or is Windows blocking it (on my end).  I've updated to the latest and the behavior is the same.  If the problem is on my end someone is going to have to guide me on how to fix it since I am not that IT-savvy.

-finchley (March 25, 2016, 09:52 AM)

https://developer.yahoo.com/weather/

Apologies for this; it's not your fault.  Unfortunately, Yahoo have changed their Weather API that sWeather uses.  I'll try to find some time to update sWeather to work with the new API.

793

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Release: ClipTrap

« Last post by skwire on March 24, 2016, 05:14 PM »

But why do I need to copy a line before being enable to copy it to the clipboard?
Why didn't you just make every line (every single clip) clickable?

-robbero (March 24, 2016, 11:35 AM)

Long-winded explanation coming up...   

This goes way back to why I wrote ClipTrap in the first place.  During that time, my job entailed working on the CLI of many different networking devices (routers, switches, BRAS, DSLAMS, etc.) and it was very common to have to run several commands on various devices and then get all that content into, say, a trouble ticket.  As you might imagine, this involved very long outputs (1000s of lines) of text.  ClipTrap was designed to make this sort of temporary aggregation of data very easy.

For instance, let's assume you have six different SSH sessions open to various devices.  You clear ClipTrap's current state, run your commands on those devices, and then do a copy command on each window.  You then switch over to ClipTrap, which now has all the outputs from the six SSH windows.  You do a copy there in ClipTrap and, bam, you're ready to paste all that output into a trouble ticket, email, etc.  Does that make sense?

ClipTrap was never designed as a long-term permanent database type of clipboard caching tool as there are plenty of those already available.  As it states on ClipTrap's webpage, you can think of ClipTrap as something in between using a full-fledged clipboard manager and using nothing. I use this in conjunction with ArsClip, a fantastic clipboard caching tool.

ps: I confirm that it is wind10 compatible.

-robbero (March 24, 2016, 11:35 AM)

Great to hear.  Thank you for the report.

794

Post New Requests Here / Re: Move/Organize Files Into Folders

« Last post by skwire on March 24, 2016, 10:15 AM »

Apologies, Nick, I got completely sidetracked.  Did you still need this?

795

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: SFV Ninja (Simple File Verification application)

« Last post by skwire on March 18, 2016, 06:27 PM »

What relay would be nice is adding the drag&drop-function from sPlayListMaker.

-Sempfmaus (March 17, 2016, 10:27 AM)

Hi, Sempfmaus, and thank you for trying SFV Ninja as well as the feedback.  SFV Ninja is one of the few apps I've written that I actually wrote for my own uses as opposed to a Coding Snack request, etc.  As such, it's written to fit into my own workflow so I have no plans to add an sPlaylistMaker-like automatic mode.

796

Post New Requests Here / Re: Transform list of url links to copies of the actual web pages

« Last post by skwire on March 17, 2016, 08:52 AM »

In AutoHotkey:

Code: Autohotkey [Select]

1. mySitesFile   := "c:\tmp\15\Sites.txt"
2. mySitesFolder := "c:\tmp\16"
3.  
4. FileRead, myData, % mySitesFile
5. Loop, Parse, myData, `n, `r
6. {
7.     UrlDownloadToFile, % A_LoopField, % mySitesFolder . "\xyz_" . A_Index . ".html"
8. }

Change path variables to suit.

797

Post New Requests Here / Re: Transform list of url links to copies of the actual web pages

« Last post by skwire on March 17, 2016, 07:54 AM »

This can easily be done.  However, keep in mind that simply downloading the "page" of said site, unless they're simply static sites, doesn't always work that well when it comes to viewing them afterward.  If you're okay with that, this can be done with just a few lines of AHK code.  Let me know.

798

Post New Requests Here / Re: Move/Organize Files Into Folders

« Last post by skwire on March 17, 2016, 07:52 AM »

I can do this one a little later today.  Stay tuned.

799

Skwire Empire / Re: Release: sChecklist

« Last post by skwire on March 15, 2016, 12:47 AM »

Hi, littlecousinjimmy, and welcome to the DonationCoder site.

Thanks for this app, which I really love, but I'd just like to add +1 on the disappearing list-contents problem. Happens to me on Win 7 32-bit, not running as admin. Really frustrating.

-littlecousinjimmy (March 10, 2016, 10:47 AM)

Man, this bug will be the death of me.  Would you be willing to try an interim build with a few changes in hopes that it solves the issue for you?

800

DC Website Help and Extras / Re: How to open a Photoshop file and save it in another format?

« Last post by skwire on March 14, 2016, 06:11 PM »

You might have better luck just using a commandline call to something like ImageMagick in your VB.NET program as opposed to handling the file natively in VB.net (might not even be feasible).