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776

Living Room / Re: How can I identify a flashing DOS window?

« Last post by Shades on May 28, 2017, 02:27 PM »

Did you install software recently?

Remove it and try to detect the flashing DOS window again.
- If you do not see this flashing window anymore, it is safe to assume that this software was the culprit. And you should investigate what that latest piece of software is doing in the background. And find alternatives for this piece of software.
- If you keep seeing the flashing DOS window, repeat the step above with the latest software you installed -1

This is the 'elimination' process.

Or you can use:
- JRT
- AdwCleaner
- RKill
- ComboFix

Those will kill whatever your antivirus software and/or anti-malware software miss.

777

General Software Discussion / Re: Battery Management software

« Last post by Shades on May 20, 2017, 07:12 PM »

Leaving it always plugged in normally means that the functional life expectancy of the battery is decreased. That is as far I know the only reason to run your laptop on battery power.

Perhaps if you have a very poorly constructed laptop, the heat from a CPU under (heavy) load can have an effect. Or if you don't clean out dust, hair and fluff (for those "smart" enough to use laptops on blankets or carpeted rooms) from your laptops at regular intervals. Once a year, actually open your laptop and be amazed about how much cruft has found its way into your device. I would even suggest to use a very small air compressor or canned air to blow out the vents on your laptop every 6 months.

Even if you think you are in clean spaces, a laptop always find ways to attract much more dust than you think it does. And as a laptop has hardly any room to disperse heat generated by CPU, RAM or hard disk, keeping it clean means that your laptop won't throttle or even turns itself off to prevent damage caused by a build-up of excessive heat. Whatever that source may be.

Keeping Lithium-based battery technology within the 20%-80% range of charge is supposed to extend the functional life of the battery. Some batteries in laptops have technology on-board which adjusts the way how it is charged, depending on the amount of charge it contains. Some laptops have similar on-board tricks, but you won't find either in low-end laptops and it not even a given in mid-range laptops.

Links to software that shows battery status for windows 10:
http://www.makeuseof...laptop-battery-life/
http://www.windowsce...ry-report-windows-10
http://www.windowsce...-windows-10-settings
https://batterybarpro.com/
https://www.microsof...y-level/9wzdncrfhmwn
http://www.thewindow...software-windows-8-7
http://www.c-sharpco...-windows-10-uwp-app/

I have no experience with any of the software suggested at those links, mainly because I think that any type of computing on any laptop is a below-par experience at best. Having owned one, operated several others and repaired even more, I speak from experience.

However, if you must own or work on one, be nice to it and always use one of these:
http://www.laptopmag.../best-laptop-coolers
https://www.amazon.c...ng-Pad/dp/B000NWIOM6
https://www.amazon.c...&node=2243862011
https://www.newegg.c...s/SubCategory/ID-319

These will keep the laptop cooler and reduces the build-up of cruft. Now that will extend the functional life of the laptop as a whole. Not nonsense about keeping a laptop plugged in or not.

 

778

Living Room / Re: [Breaking News] Cyber Attack cripples UK NHS.

« Last post by Shades on May 17, 2017, 09:08 PM »

[Advocate of the devil mode]
Support for older software doesn't have to be free. And as long as there is monetary gains to be made, why would MS be so harsh?

If I may make the car analogy...You see a lot of Toyota's and Mercedes here in Paraguay. Old 15+ year models for standard cars. Buses and trucks last longer. Because they are solid and relatively easy to repair. It is also rather easy to get the parts. And if not available anymore, there are lots of machine-shops that adjust (slightly) different parts for retrofitting. Also, there is a lively 3rd party after-market for replacement parts.

This situation is common for most devices you can think of. And there is money to be made, else those markets wouldn't exist in the first place.

MS doesn't want to maintain any aftermarket "parts" by itself of allow 3rd parties to pick up their slack. As I said, support like that doesn't have to be free and why waste an aftermarket like that?

Granted, it is the right of MS to do any business how they please. Yet they deserve all the flak they get for that bull-headed stance. It is something they can afford, because of their "war-chest". But it doesn't make it right.

Not like their new stuff is so much greater than their previous products, or that much safer (as the 'WannaCry" outbreak proves).

[/Advocate of the devil mode]

779

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 update screwed dual boot system - STUMPED!!

« Last post by Shades on April 29, 2017, 01:00 PM »

This partition is what my previous post was talking about:


Windows 7 installers create a partition of 100MByte, the Windows 2012 installer I used created a partition of 350MByte. But that might also be caused by the SSD.


No Boot\BCD folder in C:\ or anywhere else Windows allows access to for that matter. You will find all the boot info in that little partition.


With EasyBCD you can create/restore backups from the BCD information in that little partition. And you can edit it too.

The EasyBCD website I linked to in my previous post also has a boot disk on offer with repair tools for the BCD information. Which is really starting to sound like the solution to your problem.

780

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 update screwed dual boot system - STUMPED!!

« Last post by Shades on April 29, 2017, 09:24 AM »

You could try and take a look with 'EasyBCD'to see how your current BCD looks like and this software gives you a good idea how to add your Windows 10 back into the BCD.

If you take a look at your hard disk with Eindows own partition manager ('Disk Management' section of the 'Computer Management' administrative tool), you will see a small partition (100 to 300 MByte) that is usually in front of the main partition(s) on the first hard disk (Disk 0) in your computer. That little partition is where the boot information from both your Windows versions reside. When Windows has started, this little partition is not accessible...as in not showing up in any file manager you care to install in either Windows 7 or 10.

But with 'EasyBCD' you won't have such a hard time fixing things inside this little partition. This change in the Windows boot procedure was introduced in Windows Vista and is activated when you do a clean install  on a new hard disk...or when you do a clean install overwriting content of the boot partition of a used hard disk. The creation of this little partition doesn't happen when you, for example, upgraded from XP to Windows 7 and chose to not alter anything in the partition structure on that disk during this upgrade.

The default option, when you do a clean install of Windows 7, it ask you permission to create that little partition. And then you are stuck with it, for as long as you don't re-install.

By adding the SSD the Windows 7 Pro installation detected that the first disk already had that little partition and instead of creating that little partition on the 2nd disk, it uses the one of the 1st disk.The upgrade to Windows 10 detected the BCD settings from Windows 7 Pro and adjusted these.

This implicates that if your Windows 7 Ultimate disk develops any kind of hardware problem, you won't be able to continue working with Windows 10, because that little partition is missing from the Windows 10 boot procedure too. It is likely (but not a given!) that the Windows 10 repair disk will be able to make your Windows 10 disk boot-able. But without such a disk? You will be cursing at everyone and everything during the complete re-installation.

Oh, you think you covered this by creating an image to spool back in case of an emergency? Most image software doesn't get the boot-procedure from a dual-boot system right, especially when that little boot partition does not reside on the disk you are creating the image from, so you will be in the same mess, except with old(er) versions of your files.

Generally speaking, never ever have 2 empty hard disks connected for the creation of a dual boot system. Because then Windows will "decide" which disk gets that little partition where both versions of Windows will boot from. You'd better know the boot order set in your UEFI/BIOS and the numbering of the SATA connectors on your motherboard by heart to have an educated guess which disk will get that little partition. Better connect one disk, successfully install the first version of Windows, then connect the second disk to complete the dual boot setup.

781

Living Room / Re: What books are you reading?

« Last post by Shades on April 19, 2017, 01:26 AM »

The comment started out as a play on "vast web of connections."

-MilesAhead (April 18, 2017, 03:37 PM)

Yeah, I got that. Now that you say so, I think I spied a pun in there somewhere.

-cranioscopical (April 18, 2017, 09:32 PM)

Are we really going down the wire with this? 

782

General Software Discussion / Re: will Win 10 not 'do' a 1920x1080 monitor?

« Last post by Shades on April 19, 2017, 01:25 AM »

Manufacturers treat parts of the world differently then others. In Western-Europe, US/Canada and Japan/Korea/Australia you can take the specs from the monitor manufacturers at face value. In South America, not so much...

From the 36 active monitors here (mainly Samsung, Acer, LG and Sony) the website for their monitor models indicate that those monitors have a combination of VGA and/or DVI and/or HDMI connector. However, after unboxing I am surprised if there are any of the digital video connectors available. There is only the VGA connector. Sure, there are openings in the chassis for those digital video connectors, but th are simply not there. To add insult to injury, the VGA cable that comes with these monitors are of p.ss poor quality.

Many years ago, I had some Eizo CRT monitors and while those monitors have arrived at the great scrapyard in the sky, their VGA cables are still in use today...and have no problem with 1920x1080 resolution at all. The VGA cable that comes with monitors can barely keep up.

For me it is a necessity to have good VGA cables...so I have made some myself. Even one that is 15 meters long. That particular cable I got from a someone who works at the national phone company. Shielded and 32 wires in twisted pairs, ideal for a VGA cable of that length. The twisted pairs an shielding eliminate all interference, making it a very useful cable with the bonus of not having DRM standards build into the digital connector standards. Those standards are know to introduce problems, when the display port on the transmitting device is not using the same version of the DVI/HDMI connectors as on the device showing the image.

With those unnecessary headaches and practically unnoticeable differences in image quality, you will need to pry my good VGA cables from my cold dead hands.

783

Living Room / Re: Get legal access to paywalled research and science papers free with Unpaywall

« Last post by Shades on April 17, 2017, 10:03 AM »

unpaywall.org doesn't resolve at this end of the globe. The add-on I could download.

784

General Software Discussion / Re: is there any better software available that won't break the bank?

« Last post by Shades on April 16, 2017, 11:07 AM »

VueScan is the only scanner software I know of, that is able to take the output from different models and brands of scanners and use that output in it's own interface.

It isn't terribly expensive, but not cheap either.

There is a "trick" I always employ when I need to scan.  I have an all-in-one inkjet printer/scanner from HP and the interface you get from the original HP software is convoluted (when I compare it to professional scanning gear and software from HP). Canon isn't be that much better, I understand from the request made by the OP.

For this "trick" I use the tool 'IrfanView' and open the option 'Select TWAIN source...'. Now I get a list of available sources. There I select the source with the name/model of my scanner. From the main menu of IrfanView I now open option 'Acquire batch scanning'. Now a scanner interface appears that is much more 'old-skool' with a much improved work-flow.

In HP's case, their interface has a lot of extra layers added, but the actual scanner software is still rather simple and I think it is very likely that Canon software behaves the same. Irfanview is freeware. Perhaps XNview can do the same. This "trick" should even work with any software that can select TWAIN sources and scan.

785

General Software Discussion / Re: Firefox regularly not taking/executing input

« Last post by Shades on April 13, 2017, 12:40 PM »

Yesterday I encountered something similar here in my Firefox 52.0.2 setup. While typing a comment on a Dutch forum, suddenly the keyboard stopped working...at least it felt that way. After getting to a certain level of frustration I started to press buttons forcefully (useless, I know) and for a longer period. Suddenly the character beneath the key I was pressing appeared in the edit box.

For some reason I managed to enable the 'FilterKey' functionality from, in my case, Windows Server 2012 (on a 9 year old Dual Core Intel PC). Something that didn't show up until opening the complete overview from the tray menu. Which I only did, because I needed to properly dismount a pendrive from my system.

To me it was unclear how I could have managed to do this, the 'FilterKeys' functionality is something I disable after installing Windows for my own purposes and I am the only user of that system. My first thoughts were that this old PC was starting to fail on me. Or the keyboard itself, as it has a similar age. After disabling this functionality again, everything worked as normal.

Hope the above helps in finding out what goes wrong on your system...

786

General Software Discussion / Re: Adobe Acrobat DC

« Last post by Shades on April 13, 2017, 12:46 AM »

File corruption is indeed the most likely cause of your problem. And as MilesAhead already stated, it can be the source.

But you can also consider the actual source of the file. How was the file created and by whom?

PDF is an old standard and there are several iterations of this format. Are you sure the person/organization creating the PDF file, used an iteration of the PDF format that your version of Acrobat DC isn't supporting anymore?

Because in that case, any file repair attempt would be in vain. The only thing to try is opening the PDF file in a different PDF viewer or editor. If the alternative PDF software is able to read the file, you'll know that Acrobat DC is the party-po.per.

Perhaps you could open the problematic PDF file in a (free) PDF editor and store it again, using an PDF iteration that is supported by your Acrobat DC software. When that works, you could mention to the creator of this PDF file that he/she/they should use a different or more modern iteration of the PDF format when they create their PDF file.


 

787

General Software Discussion / Re: Adobe Acrobat - is there an alternative?

« Last post by Shades on April 09, 2017, 10:22 AM »

While wraith808's suggestion for an alternative is a good one, how is the actual use case at your school?

Do you receive external PDF documents that require editing? Or does the school only create/edit their own documents?

In the latter case you can do without Adobe Acrobat (or alternatives) altogether. That is, if you want to spend time on getting PDF printer functionality to work as your school expects it to, they can create/edit the documentation they want in the native file formats from the software they use for creating that documentation and later on export it to the PDF printer to generate the PDF.

For documents with a rather simple layout and a few images you can do without Acrobat. Whether the efforts you spend on getting this to work weighs up against costs for getting licensed copies of Acrobat or alternatives is up to you and/or the school's accountant(s).

Personally, where possible I like to reduce anything I generate to text-based file formats during the creation/editing process and only after it's done, export it to the file format other users expect my data in.

While this could be seen as counter-intuitive, it doesn't have to be. The main reason behind this is that the software I create needs to support a lot of MS-Office versions, as in use functionality from these software packages without any form of user-interaction in automatic processes. With all the differences between versions and sometimes even between service-packs, it becomes a major headache getting the same results/output in all these different Office packages. So much so that I don't do it at all anymore. Whatever I need I (re-)create as script snippets in our software and make the process do the export to file format as  final step.

Consultants happy, because they see/get what they need in their Excel documents and admins are happy because without the (excessive) MS-Office overhead their servers can run much(!) more automatic processes on the same hardware with better performance. Even the scripters are happier, as initially it is more work, but in the end they do not have to take so many exceptions/workarounds into account (at least, I see less complaints in the version control comments).

Then again, what works for me...well, works for me, not necessarily for you.

788

General Software Discussion / Re: will Win 10 not 'do' a 1920x1080 monitor?

« Last post by Shades on April 08, 2017, 07:40 PM »

The generic Windows video driver software that Windows falls back upon when it doesn't recognize the capabilities of either your monitor or video card...isn't very fond of the 1920x1080 resolution. But this was already happening in Windows 7 and XP.

In my anecdotal experience the consumer versions of Windows have a slightly "smarter" generic video driver than Windows Server versions. Still, I haven't seen this type of automagic mis-configuration for quite some time. Installing the proper drivers for your video card and/or monitor(s) will help Windows to correctly identify the native resolution of your monitor. Old and/or cheap brand monitors would not always "tell" Windows their native resolution, hence it is not shown as a select-able option.

With software like SIW you can quickly find out the type and model of the video card in your computer, which allows you to download the correct driver from its manufacturer.

789

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 KB4013429 Failed to Install... Again and Again

« Last post by Shades on March 26, 2017, 01:58 PM »

The 'Windows Event Viewer' can be used to find which part of the installation went wrong an it very likely that the error code is given in the error description. From there you look for solutions to fix that problem and start the installation of the Windows 10 update again.

Now I am not sure about the 'Windows Event Viewer' being available in Home or OEM versions of Windows 10, because I don't have such a version not at hand and my internet is flaky, because the current weather here makes me feel like sitting in a swimming pool, even tough I'm sitting behind my desk (airco's give me a headache).

My last statement was made, just because it is my impression that these Home/OEM versions of Windows have become (even) more limited with each new version of Windows. Or in case with Windows 10 each update.

But if you do have access to the 'Windows Event Viewer', you will find it helpful.

790

Post New Requests Here / Re: How to keep app from minimizing with Noclose

« Last post by Shades on March 23, 2017, 11:18 PM »

Although I am not familiar with the 'NoClose' software, I don't think it is possible. to prevent a selected application to be minimized...in the tool 'NoColse' that is. Your answer might be found here (AutoHotKey website). Scroll through the posts a bit and you'll see a script that disables the minimize button for a specific application of your choice.

791

General Software Discussion / Re: When testing untrustworthy software, remember virtual machines can be escaped

« Last post by Shades on March 20, 2017, 08:54 PM »

So one should be cagey?

-cranioscopical (March 20, 2017, 11:46 AM)

The "vault" at fault, you could say... 

792

Post New Requests Here / Re: Controlling the keyboard

« Last post by Shades on March 19, 2017, 09:52 PM »

Sounds like you have some extension or macro or script running in Word to help you out with something you need/do in MS Office. Even if you think you don't have such things running, verify if that really is the case.

For example:

• you could be making use of a non-standard spell checker
• you have unwittingly bought an illegal copy of MS-Office where the software that keeps Office "valid" is making your computer slow
• or worse, the "validation" software contains a keylogger of some kind

LibreOffice does not come with such problems, therefore you don't notice the lag in keystrokes. Text-editors like Notepad++ do not come with such "extras" by default, so no lag there either.

Best advice? Always check if software you buy doesn't come with hidden "surprises" and don't use Office until you absolutely have to. The content of your texts can just as easy be created in a standard text-editor. Once you're done, copy-paste the content into Word and adjust the layout of this content to your liking, then store, send and/or print it.

If you must have a modicum of layout directly with your texts...use a MarkDown editor instead of MS Office. Preferably one with 2 panes where in one pane you edit and the other pane showing you the real-time preview. Or a HTML editor with real-time preview, such as Microsoft Expression Web 4.0 (out of MS support, but free to use). HTML files can be converted to whatever format you like really easy and those editors have matching options when compared with a Word processor. The most used options anyway...

793

General Software Discussion / Re: XYplorer is not responding.

« Last post by Shades on March 18, 2017, 11:10 PM »

Time to go low then...

API Monitor can be a helpful tool for investigating. Although it is marked as alpha software, it did work when I needed it at the time. It is both free and available as PortableApp.

First run this software, then use this software to execute the application you want to track/investigate. It shows you all functions and calls the application makes, but more importantly, it also keeps track of the time it takes for each function/call to complete. That should give you and/or DonL more usable info about the culprit(s) that make XYplorer behave the way it does on your system.

This software is the next best thing after having a completely installed development environment for the language XYplorer is written in on your system. The capture that API Monitor makes can be stored, so it might be really helpful to you and/or DonL.

794

General Software Discussion / Re: Trial Gillmeister Word Text Replacer

« Last post by Shades on March 16, 2017, 11:47 AM »

Holy crap...that taskbar!

Anyway, with special character they mean here: characters that Word isn't showing you (when you use the default Word settings).

The ASCII table knows about a lot of characters, including the common ones you use to type texts in Word. Word uses a lot of the characters outside the standard ASCII table range to mark where certain features start and stop inside a Word document.

If you are familiar with those, you can quickly add or remove these features with one or more search-n-replace actions in several Word documents at once.

Word can show you where those special characters are used inside a document by enabling this option in the ribbon interface. That option will help you to get familiar with these special characters.

795

General Software Discussion / Re: Re: XYplorer is not responding.

« Last post by Shades on March 15, 2017, 01:28 AM »

But maybe it's time to re-evaluate XYplorer and see what all the hubbub is about.

-Deozaan (March 13, 2017, 04:14 PM)

Nope. I still can't do XYplorer. It frequently locks up on me for several seconds at a time.

-Deozaan (March 14, 2017, 09:20 PM)

That sounds like a familiar problem, which usually happens when you access folders on your LAN. Is that the case?

If so, you better take a look at the network configuration of the system you experience this problem on. The TCP protocol is responsible for actual communication over the network and can make Windows wait, giving the user the impression the currently application is doing something badly, while it just waiting for the TCP implementation in Windows before it is allowed to continue.

Of course, if you more than 2 computers/devices in your LAN and this problem occurs on any device while accessing the same shared folder, you better take a look at the device with the share that gives problems.

WiFi connections can introduce high(er) latencies between network nodes at any given moment, which in turn can make Windows wait for the TCP protocol to get things straight again. 

I kept complaining about a shitty connection that I got from the cable provider. Existing connections acted as expected, but whenever a new connection had to be made, a lot of TCP packets not arriving, improperly transmitted etc. A tool like WireShark helped me to prove to several field techs that their connection appeared to be as promised, but in practice wasn't. Several modems later the problem still wasn't fixed, so at the end the company inspected their cable to the server that managed the traffic for my barrio and now the connection really works as advertised.

WireShark proved to be invaluable. Run it on the computer experiencing the problem and when you see a lot of black lines passing through the capture session, while you do your thing on your LAN, your connection is (much) crappier than you think.

Not all file managers treat such problems in the network in the same way. More often than not they make use of a commonly used library for the language they wrote the application in. And that library can treat network mishaps very differently than the one Windows Explorer uses. For all I know, the used library can be more strict (as in: crappy connection == untrustworthy connection == no connection) than the library Windows Explorer uses.

More info about the behavior of the library being used by XYplorer should be asked to the person(s) that wrote XYplorer. If you are interested in such things, of course. Unfortunately applications get the blame for something that (the TCP implementation) Windows itself should be blamed for, because the software author has no control over it.

796

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows Explorer now has banner ads

« Last post by Shades on March 13, 2017, 08:06 PM »

Who knew...Windows was better off under Steve Ballmer. 

797

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows Explorer now has banner ads

« Last post by Shades on March 11, 2017, 11:13 PM »

My post was not intended to be offending. And I honestly never thought showing someone more useful tools than Windows provides by default, could be interpreted as condescending. Never too old to learn.

And you are right, recently WikiLeaks showed that the CIA uses Notepad++ (specific .dll) as a way to gain access to Windows servers, so that could be seen as a big disadvantage. To clarify, the software I am involved in uses its own specific scripting language and comes with a 350 page manual that just describes the commands and their parameters. Notepad++ allows you to create your own script language file for command highlighting, filling out partial commands and such things. There is a lot of that scripting going on, so any tool that helps us get things done faster, is better for all parties involved. Notepad itself is inadequate for anything beside editing relatively small text files

Besides, I asked that same company 6 weeks ago for an email-address (on a mail server they own and manage themselves) to send automatic notifications to a certain group of people on their own mail server. The manager agreed I should have the mail address and thanked me for pro-active thinking in their benefit. Yet I still don't have it even after sending weekly reminders.

Wouldn't be too much of a stretch to consider this to be condescending as well.

I will finish with this:  when someone thinks they have all wisdom, that's the moment they should go back to the "trenches", as they clearly have spent too much time in their ivory tower. That was how I was thought by parents, family and (in a slightly lesser degree) at school. As I said earlier, never considered it to be condescending when pointing towards better software for mutual benefit. Till now, that is.

798

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows Explorer now has banner ads

« Last post by Shades on March 11, 2017, 07:11 PM »

Here is another viewpoint:
On systems I need to work on (from a different company) there are the same strict rules. Nothing but basic Windows and a minimal, heavily supervised, set of tools on them. So we started to use a portable version of Notepad++ on those machines (a lot of scripting is going on). I assume the admin(s) saw that this program was opened a lot by many different user at any given time and suddenly, without any notification, all of systems we work on now have a licensed copy on Notepad++ installed.

While I don't deny there is an adverse effect when people tell other people what to use, my example above shows it can help if you enlighten "the powers that be" there are often better tools than the standard tools Windows provides and which do not necessarily create a mess of software policies or cause administrative troubles either.

And if you can demonstrate that tasks can be finished faster by people who you have to pay by the hour, the offset of costs between license(s) and labor can be a very persuading argument too.

799

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows Explorer now has banner ads

« Last post by Shades on March 11, 2017, 04:36 PM »

Next up on the MS advertising scheme, is to have banners where you will be able to use UWP apps for 3 minutes in full mode (streamed to your system, so no install) and if you like the app you can buy it in the MS store and, of course, install it on your computer.

This to generate revenue for app makers and MS...while you try to do your work. Will be interesting to see how this way of advertising is handled on Enterprise systems, but for now it strengthens my opinion about Windows being on the wrong track for serious/professional use of operating systems.

Spoiler

If GPSoft would make a native Directory Opus (v9 or higher) for Linux and Notepad++ would do the same, I would have no issue jumping ship to that OS for my desktop. Most of the servers in my control are already running Linux.

800

General Software Discussion / Re: Best Script type to build an email body line by line

« Last post by Shades on March 10, 2017, 09:07 AM »

Just make sure that when you decide to drop the whole RTF thing and make an HTML-based mail body, you keep the HTML layout as simple as possible. Forgo the use of CSS as much as you can, because if you think browsers on computers, tablets and/or smartphones can suck, you haven't had the "pleasure" of making HTML content look the same in mail clients.

Better use simple HTML v4.0 stuff.  The above isn't valid if you just create a file only with a set of links...but once that list gets spread around, there will soon be someone telling you to make something look visually pleasing, add the company logo, etc., etc. You'd think you had a headache till now?

I need to transport builds of from different versions of our software and was asked to make a dynamically generated mail message with logo, layout and all...in batch and send it (to be in line with the rest of the procedure). Serious levels of frustration getting things to look the same on multiple mail clients, browsers and devices, I now get completely why people use mail-list companies and their software to send visually pleasing mail messages.

For the sending part, I tried Blat, but had more success with CMail. Ah well, both are freeware.