Author Topic: FARR plugin: FARR Most Recently Used 1.0.0 (Read 104025 times)

nitrix-ud · « **Reply #25 on:** July 02, 2008, 01:58 AM »

nitrix: doesn't look like there's any path to a file.. If there was one in any of those folders, it might be possible to get them..

there are paths... but not in the same way as other applications
and it is the same for all adobe softwares...

paths are stored inside "folders" in the registry
so i guess FARR MostRecentlyUsed plugin does not see them, since it may only check for "direct" keys

I have Photoshop Elements. I'll check it out.

great, hope future releases of this plugin will work with adobe software

TucknDar · « **Reply #26 on:** July 02, 2008, 02:04 AM »

btw many of the file extensions in the ComdDlg32\OpenSaveMRU key are very useful to me
These would actually already work in 0.1.0, provided your running Windows XP
-phitsc (July 01, 2008, 02:42 PM)

Yes, I wasn't being clear what I meant, I just wanted to point out that these works fine

As for Office2003, here are some entries:

[Select]

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Recent Files
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\PowerPoint\Recent File List

I couldn't find an entry for Word for some reason, but the one for doc is ok.

Btw I use the SoftMaker Office suite, which stores all settings, including recent files in .ini files like this:

[Select]

[tmw History]
HistoryFile0=15,D:\firstfile.doc
HistoryFile1=15,D:\afile.doc
HistoryFile2=15,D:\thefile.doc
HistoryFile3=15,D:\someotherfile.doc

I realize that's quite a difference from the way recent files are read now, but would it be possible for FARRMRU to read settings from ini files as well? I've got a couple of other apps (portable) that also stores recent file list in ini format. The user would still have to provide the format that FARRMRU should read, of course. Maybe too much to ask for, but it would certainly be useful (to me, at least

).

phitsc · « **Reply #27 on:** July 02, 2008, 02:43 AM »

I think I found a way to improve directory checking for UNC paths, probably making the simplified directory checking obsolete. Unfortunately (well, depending on how you look at it), this also made me find out that file existence checking only works by coincidence now. Actually, there's no file existence checking built in to FARR MRU yet, but currently checking if a file is directory will remove the file from the mru list if it doesn't exist (or is not currently available, because it's on a removable drive or unconnected network drive, etc.). So the simplified directory checking option will probably go away in favour of a 'check file existence for UNC paths' if performance demands it (local files will always be checked for existence). I'll fix that this evening after work and make a new release.

phitsc · « **Reply #28 on:** July 02, 2008, 02:48 AM »

Btw I use the SoftMaker Office suite, which stores all settings, including recent files in .ini files like this:
[Select]
[tmw History]
HistoryFile0=15,D:\firstfile.doc
HistoryFile1=15,D:\afile.doc
HistoryFile2=15,D:\thefile.doc
HistoryFile3=15,D:\someotherfile.doc
I realize that's quite a difference from the way recent files are read now, but would it be possible for FARRMRU to read settings from ini files as well? I've got a couple of other apps (portable) that also stores recent file list in ini format. The user would still have to provide the format that FARRMRU should read, of course. Maybe too much to ask for, but it would certainly be useful (to me, at least ).
-TucknDar (July 02, 2008, 02:04 AM)

I'll consider adding this. I could well imagine that their are quite a number of applications storing their MRU files in a ini file instead of in the registry.

phitsc · « **Reply #29 on:** July 02, 2008, 02:50 AM »

nitrix: doesn't look like there's any path to a file.. If there was one in any of those folders, it might be possible to get them..
there are paths... but not in the same way as other applications
and it is the same for all adobe softwares...

paths are stored inside "folders" in the registry
so i guess FARR MostRecentlyUsed plugin does not see them, since it may only check for "direct" keys

I have Photoshop Elements. I'll check it out.
great, hope future releases of this plugin will work with adobe software
-nitrix-ud (July 02, 2008, 01:58 AM)

Photoshop Elements stores its MRU files in the registry, I found out. Will be added for the next release. Unfortunately, that doesn't solve the problem for other Adobe products.

phitsc · « **Reply #30 on:** July 02, 2008, 03:01 AM »

The idea being that they would be merged into the 'My Recent Documents' result list? Yes, that would be an idea.

right, which would also let people who always wanted their office files shown in main mru list do that, and add any such entries to the main mru list.

I was also thinking about a modifier that would list all of the configured applications mru files. I think that would serve the FARR filtering idea better.
that would also be a good idea; you can do that by deteced when user types mrua
and return a result list like
mru office | restartsearch mru +office
mru foxit pdf reader| restartsearch mru +foxit
that essentially lets you make a menu of choices for the user that farr will present
-mouser (July 01, 2008, 02:52 PM)

To follow up on mouser's idea. What do you guys think about the following (the aliases being examples)?

mrum - list only 'My Recent Documents' (what mru with no program modifiers does now)
mrup - list MRU items of all configured programs (what mru with all program modifers added would do now)
mrua - list everything (mrum and mrup combined)
mru - list a combination of mrum and user selected modifiers (definable in the options dialog)

mouser · « **Reply #31 on:** July 02, 2008, 03:10 AM »

i like it

the only thing that might be worth considering would be making mruc do what you say mru would do, and leaving mru for a simple alias "menu" that would essentially show:
mrum - list only 'My Recent Documents' (what mru with no program modifiers does now)
mrup - list MRU items of all configured programs (what mru with all program modifers added would do now)
mrua - list everything (mrum and mrup combined)
mruc - list a combination of mrum and user selected modifiers (definable in the options dialog)

mouser · « **Reply #32 on:** July 02, 2008, 07:28 AM »

another idea:
if user types clear at end of search, it could clear the contents of the specified mru list.

e.g.:
mru clear
mru +office clear

just an idea -- not saying it's worth implementing.

phitsc · « **Reply #33 on:** July 02, 2008, 07:32 AM »

another idea:
if user types clear at end of search, it could clear the contents of the specified mru list.

e.g.:
mru clear
mru +office clear

just an idea -- not saying it's worth implementing.
-mouser (July 02, 2008, 07:28 AM)

Yes, I was thinking about this as well, although I think 'mru +clear!' would make it a bit safer (and allow searching for files containing clear).

phitsc · « **Reply #34 on:** July 02, 2008, 05:10 PM »

0.2.0 is available. Only a small step, but I hope in the right direction. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get rid of the simple directory check for UNC paths. While I found a way to improve this for My Recent Documents, that improvement made MRUs for programs worse. So I just left it how it was for now, waiting for a better idea of how this could be improved.

I've mainly added file existence checking for local files. UNC paths are currently never checked, it just takes too long. I just noticed that Vista doesn't even seem to check local files for existence for the Recent Items list.

TucknDar · « **Reply #35 on:** July 03, 2008, 12:12 AM »

when providing upgrades, would it be possible to not overwrite custom config-file? Not that I had put a lot of stuff in there yet, but a bit annoying losing custom entries. I suggest two separate config files, one default, which shouldn't be touched and is updated along with the plugin and one custom for user specific stuff .

phitsc · « **Reply #36 on:** July 03, 2008, 02:14 AM »

when providing upgrades, would it be possible to not overwrite custom config-file? Not that I had put a lot of stuff in there yet, but a bit annoying losing custom entries. I suggest two separate config files, one default, which shouldn't be touched and is updated along with the plugin and one custom for user specific stuff .
-TucknDar (July 03, 2008, 12:12 AM)

Yes, that is a good idea.

phitsc · « **Reply #37 on:** July 07, 2008, 03:54 PM »

0.3.0 is now available. It hasn't gone through much testing yet, I hope you guys can help me out with this

. 0.3.0 has gone through considerable rework though, and I hope it is much more usable now. At least it's a good basis to implement more applications (i.e. some which don't store their MRU in the registry).

Sorting and filtering is much more sophisticated now and items are now cached once one of the aliases has been detected so that resorting and filtering for application groups, file extensions and filename substrings should be much faster. See first post for a complete list of changes in this release.

Note that I added a separate config file for user specific stuff (as suggested by TucknDar), so if you have added anything else since the last release, make sure to backup the FarrMostRecentlyUsed.config file first and copy it into the FarrMostRecentlyUsed.user file after upgrade.
Also note that I almost completely changed the options, so please either delete your FarrMostRecentlyUsed.ini file before updating or make sure to visit the options dialog after the update.

A request to the graphics-design-gifted amongst the FARR users: the FARR MRU plugin now shows a simple menu when you just type 'mru'. It basically looks like this:

- mrum : Shows files in your 'My Recent Documents' - mrup : Shows files of configured programs - mrua : Show a combined list of files out of mrum and mrup - mruu : Show files from selected groups only (the u standing for user)

It would be really cool to have some nice (similar) icons to put before these entries and another one for the plugin itself. If anyone of you likes creating icons or knows some free ones you think would fit please let me know.

mouser · « **Reply #38 on:** July 07, 2008, 04:04 PM »

so so so good.

mouser · « **Reply #39 on:** July 07, 2008, 06:33 PM »

if you are collecting feature requests, one nice one might be to specify at the end of the config file a list of patterns (regex?) which if they match an item mean the item should not be displayed. in this way we could configure it to ignore certain files or folders.

hamradio · « **Reply #40 on:** July 07, 2008, 09:14 PM »

I have made some icons and have sent the url for download to phitsc for approval.

Lashiec · « **Reply #41 on:** July 08, 2008, 09:30 AM »

The new version does not show any item

phitsc · « **Reply #42 on:** July 08, 2008, 09:34 AM »

The new version does not show any item
-Lashiec (July 08, 2008, 09:30 AM)

Do you mean you type mrum, mrup or mrua and the result list is empty?

Lashiec · « **Reply #43 on:** July 08, 2008, 09:40 AM »

Yep, it shows nothing.

phitsc · « **Reply #44 on:** July 08, 2008, 02:27 PM »

I've uploaded a version which outputs some debug information now. If you'd like to help me find out why you're not getting any results, please first download version ~~0.3.1 here~~ (Update: version 0.4.0 up understands the debug modifiers) :

~~http://farrmru.objec...tRecentlyUsed031.zip~~

then download Sysinternals Debug Output Viewer here:

http://download.sysi.../Files/DebugView.zip

Then start Dbgview.exe and bring up FARR and type:

mru +debug1!

to enable debug level 1.

Then type mrum or mrup and see what the MRU plugin finds.

You should see the directory where it fetches your My Recent Documents files (if you typed mrum). How many it found there. Then how many items are left after the 3 filtering stages.

Then please post the results here or send me by private message.

If you enable debug level 2 (+debug2!), you'll get a list of each and every file as it's in the item list after every filtering stage.

I doubt I can already solve your problem with this information, but at least it gives me and idea where to start looking.

phitsc · « **Reply #45 on:** July 09, 2008, 04:27 PM »

0.4.0 is now available. I've added hamradio's icons (thanks!) and added support for the most requested (by me

) applications storing their MRUs in a file: Notepad++ and OpenOffice 2. Both of these store their MRUs in an xml file. While OpenOffice's is not trivial, Notepad++ stores its MRUs 'the other way round', i.e. from oldest to newest. They are therefore both hard-coded, although I think they could probably both be handled in a descriptive form with xpath and an xpath capable parser. I'll leave that for later though

. I've also added support for Adobe Acrobat Reader 9 which stores its MRUs in the registry, but in a bit an ugly form. Nevertheless, it can be quite easily described and is now implemented in a generic way in FARR MRU. This means:
besides MRUs of the form:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\SomeApplication\Recent File List with Values
with values of the form Item 1 = Path_to_some_file in the Recent File List key

FARR MRU can now also handle MRUs of the form:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\SomeApplication\Recent Files Key with Subkeys|Value name
with subkeys of the form Item 1 in the key Recent Files Key with Subkeys which store the respective file path in the value Value name under Item 1

Not sure if that is explained well enough now. Well, just ask if you find an MRU in the registry which you're not sure if FARR MRU can handle it.

It would also be cool if someone could confirm that Adobe Acrobat Reader files are working, as I don't have it installed myself (although I somewhat tested it in a virtual machine).

I also did not hear back from Lashiec yet. Anyone else experiencing the problem he describes (i.e. typing mrua gives an empty results list)?

Lashiec · « **Reply #46 on:** July 10, 2008, 06:00 PM »

Oh, sorry you have to do all the work to prepare a debug-capable version, but due to problems beyond my control I had to rebuilt the entire system, and thus reinstall everything, and surprisingly enough, the plugin works perfectly now. It may be, but maybe I had something wrong in my FARR installation (or in the computer). Anyway, if something happens again, I'll let you know :)

mouser · « **Reply #47 on:** July 10, 2008, 06:05 PM »

Very cool and the icons look great.

justice · « **Reply #48 on:** July 11, 2008, 04:25 AM »

Great work, very useful plugin. I hope it's possible to keep a balance between poweruse and the easyness / amount of characters entered because you don't want to end up using a 50 character combo of keywords (i guess this goes for Farr in general) but I think i'll find a good use for this.

Got one to share to add in:

[Select]

+dwcs3|Dreamweaver CS3
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Adobe\Dreamweaver 9\Recent File List

Does the plugin check if the registry key exists periodically? It could then hide items of programs that are not installed, in case you don't use DwCs3 then you have no need for my code.

phitsc · « **Reply #49 on:** July 11, 2008, 11:08 AM »

Great work, very useful plugin. I hope it's possible to keep a balance between poweruse and the easyness / amount of characters entered because you don't want to end up using a 50 character combo of keywords (i guess this goes for Farr in general) but I think i'll find a good use for this.

I would expect the typical use to be: enter either of mrum or mrup or mruu (if configured) together with a substring search (or even without, if you just want a list of the files you used recently). For mrup maybe add one of the application filters. I don't think I'd typically type mrup and then enter many of the application filters even though it's possible. Or then at least make it a 'dosearch' alias. But I understand what you mean.

Got one to share to add in:
+dwcs3|Dreamweaver CS3
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Adobe\Dreamweaver 9\Recent File List

Thanks, I'll add that one to the FarrMostRecentlyUsed.config file.

Does the plugin check if the registry key exists periodically? It could then hide items of programs that are not installed, in case you don't use DwCs3 then you have no need for my code.

If you mean hide in the Options dialog's user defined result list. Yes, that would maybe be a good idea. For the actual search it doesn't matter, e.g. typing mrup +dwcs3 without Dreamweaver CS3 installed will just give you an empty result list.

Thanks for your feedback!