Author Topic: Idea: File note (Read 71957 times)

Cuffy · « **Reply #25 on:** December 18, 2007, 11:21 PM »

Thanks GiorgosK for the info...........

"Cuffy yes you should use one or the other not both of them

At the time I created it I did not think there was a reason to have both choices

the reason I created it in the first place was to be able to tag a file and then search
for a specific keywords in the *.notes files and just by pressing on the .notes file to
get the associated file"

I'm getting fearless here so I removed everything regarding file notes from the registry and then merged the optional or alternate reg file.
It works exactly as you explained it, however, we obviously had a different mission for the tool.

Using a file I just downloaded as an example:

NetFx20SP1_x86.exe
Right click on the file and I get an empty file titled "NetFx20SP1_x86.exe.notes"
I make a note in the file "This is the new SP1 for .Net2.0.......... don't install until you're sure it's OK" Save
I now have NetFx20SP1_x86.exe.notes. containing what the file is.
Right click and I can read the note.
Left click and the install starts for the Service Pak.
Now I'm in trouble. I've started what I wanted to avoid......... starting the install without being sure what it is.
Set up that way I can understand the reason you created it. I doubt that I would ever have occasion to use it like that.
My need is to refresh my memory about what the file contains without running setup for a 250 mb service pak.
I removed and reinstalled it with the other option so when I left click the notes file opens in Notepad. It works fine for me like that and I thank you for your efforts.
I also have the FileNoter that NOD developed which opens an empty,titled, text file in Metapad and that works equally as well. I'm sure I'll get a lot of use out of both apps. Again my appreciation.
Now that we have that all talked over I'm sure I can stir up something else. There are so many things to be used for file extensions and there are dozens of small, very small, freeware text editors to associate them with.
So much to do, so little time! <G>

I wonder if Amando got set up to do what he wanted done?

GiorgosK · « **Reply #26 on:** December 19, 2007, 03:55 AM »

Its good to know you put it to use

and I am glad I could help

Also thanks Armando for the welcome note (I just read it)

Cuffy · « **Reply #27 on:** December 19, 2007, 10:16 AM »

GiorgosK ,

I don't know if you followed this conversation from the beginning but it started when my copy of Filenote from Moonsoftware wouldn't work on this install of XPPro64.
NOD came up with Filenoter, which works fine, and then I got your File Notes installed correctly so it also works as planned.
The point here is that both apps work with a 64 bit OS. The last time I checked the app by MoonSoftware still wouldn't work at 64 bits. BigJim has been in contact with MoonSoftware and they plan on doing some upgrading of their products soon.
Maybe we'll get another new toy soon? I love new toys (especially free ones)!
Again, thanks to all!

Happy Holidays,

Cuffy

ender · « **Reply #28 on:** January 05, 2008, 05:06 PM »

not sure if it does exactly does what you want (hotlinking) but adrive.com has 50 GB of free storage.

Cuffy · « **Reply #29 on:** January 27, 2008, 04:24 PM »

Folks,

I'm having a bad time here!
Avast insists that filenoter.exe and filenote.exe, two different apps, two different authors, on two different machines, are carrying a trojan. I have redownloaded, extracted to new folder and the siren still wails.
Is anyone else having a problem? I wondering if a recent update for Avast may have something to do with it?
Seems weird......... both of these little context menu apps were working fine since back in December but a couple of days ago started throwing fits!

Armando · « **Reply #30 on:** January 27, 2008, 07:37 PM »

Can't you setup avast to just ignore these files?

Cuffy · « **Reply #31 on:** January 27, 2008, 08:05 PM »

I haven't tried to ignore it. I would like to identify the problem.
Avast identifies Win32:Agent-QYH [trj] in each exe file. Google has nothing on that trojan nor does TrendMicro Housecall. Housecall doesn't scan for it??
I burned filenoter.zip to CD on 8 Dec and opening that archive I get the wailing again so what ever is in that file has been there since day one and Avast now sees a trojan in there. Is Avast ahead of the pack in identifying a new trojan before the other apps have included it? Avast auto-updates several times a day so that's a posibility.
A little time will tell, I hope!

Armando · « **Reply #32 on:** January 28, 2008, 12:08 AM »

hummmm. NOD32 doesn't see a trojan in there... And my firewall(s) (Comodo / Online Armor) never detected any suspicious activity.

Could you submit these files to avast ? http://support.avast...&kbarticleid=199

Nod5 · « **Reply #33 on:** January 28, 2008, 11:31 AM »

Hi Cuffy and others,
I haven't checked this thread for a while so I've missed some discussions. To reply to the most recent issue, filenoter.exe is written in the Autohotkey (AHK) language and compiled with the tool ahk2exe that come bundled with AHK. It is a well known issue that such compiled scripts from time to time get flagged by various AV and other security software as some form of malware despite not being anything of that kind.

See this thread in the AHK forum for some examples: http://www.autohotke...orum/topic27562.html

Since is is possible to write malware with AHK (or any other language) it is a good to be careful if an AHK application gives these kinds of AV-warnings. But in many cases the AHK application is distributed together with the source code and then the matter can easily be settled by glancing through the source to assure no harmful code is included and then compile it yourself. If the resulting .exe still gives AV-warnings then it can be treated as a false positive and added to the exclusions in the AV-program.

The source for filenoter.exe is included in the .zip posted previously in this thread so feel free to check it out.

Cuffy · « **Reply #34 on:** January 28, 2008, 12:56 PM »

Thanks Armando and Nod,

I've just now sent filenoter.exe to Avast and hopefully they can shed some light on the problem.
I'm getting more confused by the minute. I burned a copy of filenoter.zip to CD shortly after I downloaded it from DC. If I'm using the right tool and doing it correctly the hash supplied in the zip and the one generated here don't match? I don't understand that?

Other AV scanners blow right by filenoter.exe without issue.

During the course of this little escapade filenoter, filenotes by GiorgosK , Universal Viewer and maybe other items have been removed from my context menu. They all show in the registry but won't display in the context menu. The AV scan in the context menu stopped working. I just installed Clam AV which installed a context menu entry. That won't work either?

I've obviously got some corruption that has screwed up my context menu. Removing and reinstalling these items hasn't made any difference. I'm facing a Repair install of XPPro64.......... ARRGGGGGGGGG!!!

Cuffy · « **Reply #35 on:** January 28, 2008, 04:38 PM »

I'm finding some answers. The problem is not in filenoter.zip or filenoter.exe. The problem is Avast. I haven't heard from them yet but I removed Avast from the XPPro machine and installed AVG. The filenoter.exe file is unlocked, the context menu works as designed. Filenoter, filenotes, Universal Viewer are all back and working fine.

Unfortunately I can't say the same for XPPro64. Reinstalling filenoter doesn't help. The upgrade from Moon Software that BigJim mentioned earlier is available for download so I installed that but there's no change in the context menu so the corruption persists. I'm going to try a repair install now and see what happens. If push comes to shove I can do a clean install to a new drive, identical to the drive that's in the machine.

Armando · « **Reply #36 on:** January 28, 2008, 11:52 PM »

Thanks for the feedback. And sorry to hear about your problems...

It will be interesting to hear what Avast has to say if they do send you a message at some point...

Cuffy · « **Reply #37 on:** March 16, 2008, 12:19 AM »

This is the thread I just posted about.

Nod5 · « **Reply #38 on:** April 16, 2008, 11:35 AM »

I've now written a better description for FileNoter and placed it on a separate page: http://nod5.dcmembers.com/filenoter.html
I also did some very minor changes:
small code cleanup + commenting
now support two datestamp formats: YYMMDD (=new) & YYMMDD-HHMM

kartal · « **Reply #39 on:** April 16, 2008, 01:32 PM »

Nod5, thank you. It works great. But I have a suggestion. It would be great to be able to change the note file extension to something else or at least let the user define it maybe in the ini file. Because .txt is a pretty common file format and if someone searches for file notes all the text files will show up.

thanks

Nod5 · « **Reply #40 on:** April 16, 2008, 04:55 PM »

Hi, I'm glad you like it!

I did a quick update:
v080417: added ini option to choose file extension for notes (default: txt)
Let me know if you find any bugs while using it.

EDIT: I should add that I'm sticking to .txt extensions for my own notes and instead use the .ini to set a custom tag in the non extension part of the filename. By using the tag "--note" it is easy to search for all and only note files later on even if they have a .txt extension. An advantage with that is that the files works straight away by double clicking on most computers whereas files with custom extensions often needs a setup procedure at least once per computer.

kartal · « **Reply #41 on:** April 16, 2008, 07:00 PM »

Very cool man! One more wish thou

How about folder support?

Cuffy · « **Reply #42 on:** April 17, 2008, 10:01 AM »

Nod,
The new version works fine and the date-time stamp is a nice touch. I should add that it works fine in Win 2000 as that's where I installed it when you posted the current version.
Thanks again!

Nod5 · « **Reply #43 on:** April 17, 2008, 11:07 AM »

Again, glad you guys like it!

Kartal, what do you mean with folder support? An option to create all note files in one specified folder and not the same folder as the file the note file concerns?

kartal · « **Reply #44 on:** April 17, 2008, 11:47 AM »

Same like file noting but notes for folders. Right now if you click on a folder filenotes does not show up in the right click menu. Note for the folder should show up where the folder is rather than inside of the folder, if you would be supporting it.

Nod5 · « **Reply #45 on:** April 17, 2008, 03:26 PM »

Now I understand. Good suggestion!
v080418: filenotes can now also be created for folders
http://nod5.dcmembers.com/filenoter.html

kartal · « **Reply #46 on:** April 17, 2008, 03:32 PM »

Very Nice, thank you!

skooter1121 · « **Reply #47 on:** April 25, 2009, 04:02 PM »

Love FileNote.

When I right click on a FOLDER to create a file note it doesn't put the note in the folder itself.

Could that be done automatically?

Jimdoria · « **Reply #48 on:** April 25, 2009, 11:17 PM »

As I was reading through this thread, an interesting idea occurred to me.

File streams are a little-known feature of NTFS, but basically they let you store the contents of one file within another. (See http://tinyurl.com/cl7yfj which links to Microsoft's article on them.)

It seems like with a little extra effort, the text files could be attached to the files they describe as an alternate stream. Then you'd avoid having two files for each file you wanted to describe, the notes would always move along with the file (provided you stuck to NTFS and didn't copy the file onto a FAT32 thumb drive.)

It should also allow you to attach notes directly to a folder, as Skooter1121 asked about.

Nod5 · « **Reply #49 on:** April 26, 2009, 08:32 AM »

skooter1121: good idea, I'll add an .ini option for that later tonight.
jimdoria: Isn't there a risk that anti-malware products (that often rely on file hashes) would flag such files as suspicious? If I remember correctly Kaspersky AV once added something like that to all files it had scanned and that didn't go well with other security software. Anyway, I think it is good with the extra file because then you immediately see if a file has a note or not.