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Last post Author Topic: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011  (Read 32800 times)

bmms

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #25 on: April 21, 2011, 01:38 AM »
System Resources - as in Memory and CPU usage.
Are you just kidding around or just don't know what I'm speaking of?
I know what I'm talking about, I suspect the majority here do as well.

No offense intended at all. Please understand that I can't see from here whether you already know all that or not.

The following is not to convince you to switch. Keep what you like. I just would like to write more about system resources in general as system resource efficiency is actually one of our main software design requirements.

Measuring "memory consumption" sometimes is based on misconceptions. If you already know all this, please allow it for other readers:

The Windows task manager, for example, is not a suitable tool to measure memory load as it only shows the memory that is temporarily allocated by Windows for any launched program. It does not mean, that the program necessarily requires that allocated memory but it can use the memory quickly, if it should become required. If, however, another program requires more memory, it will be taken from the unnecessarily allocated memory. The actual programs have only very little influence in this procedure. It is managed by Windows.

In an ideal system all memory would be allocated and your task manager would show zero free RAM. Think about it: In theory, it is no good and would be waste if you have unused RAM at all.

So, if you find in task manager, that PE seem to take 100MB RAM in your system it doesn't mean that it is required by PE. It just does mean that Windows decided, that PE could quickly use 100MB if it would need it.

However, we took utmost care to minimize system load in general. That is why PE may look reduced or even "boring" for some at first. You won't find any fancy stuff such as gauges, statistics graphs or extensive use of graphics buttons in PE. It is because such gimmikry has only limited value. We are spartans  in this regard and hate waste of memory.

I posted the file sizes as this is somehow a good start to compare system loads: Programs require at least the memory of their own size when executed.

On top of that, programs require memory for linked libraries that are loaded with them. That is why programs such as .NET applications load so slowly. They have to load linked libraries of often multiple times of their size.

Then there is dynamic data for the actual user data and internal program tables required for the program operation.

I don't believe that PE uses so much more of that dynamic data unless you use the extra options that it has to offer.

For example, it requires (a little) extra memory to store formatted text but if you don't use it, the extra memory is not required. And most of the little additional CPU load is caused by the unique text prediction feature that analyszes your text input to automatically create new phrases based on your individual writing style.

If you turn off PE's extra features, it barely exceeds 0.5..1% CPU of a normal today's computer when used for plain text replacement. It should be very similar to other well-designed text replacement utilities.

If you come to another conclusion, I would be curious to learn how you measure it.

However, I agree with you up to a certain degree. PE is a mature application and does more things at startup and during data I/O operations. We believe, that you may like the reason as it increases data security and operation safety: PE creates auto-backups, scans the phrase file for integrity, uses a shadow copy method to save you from data loss in case of a power failure, etc. You may not need these security measures but other users store many thousands phrases with PE and rely on this data for doing business. These professional users welcome the extra measures that, yes, require a very small extra system load which is, however, barely measurable.

Hope this helps.
Michael
« Last Edit: April 21, 2011, 02:43 AM by BartelsMedia »

cmpm

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #26 on: April 21, 2011, 08:12 AM »
I didn't use windows task manger to observe PE and Auspex's resource usage.

The flood of words that follows that assumption is about PE.

And some misconceptions, or maybe redirection about my point.

bmms

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #27 on: April 21, 2011, 09:20 AM »
OK, your snarky and arrogant reply tells me that you are not interested to actually discuss but just rant. The usual business here.
Michael

Shades

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #28 on: April 21, 2011, 04:46 PM »
@CMPM:
BartelsMedia warns in the first paragraph of his post that explains the resource use of the product he represents that the content might be below your understanding and that you can disregard it as such.

To me it appears that BartelsMedia receives a lot of unnecessary "flak" for explaining some concepts regarding resource use and how those are handled by PE, the only application he is at professional liberty to write about. I can see nothing wrong in that.

Sure, sometimes the comments made by BartelsMedia are very pro-PE and anti-Rest, but I don't hold that against him. He gets (hopefully) paid to do so. As such I regard his comments on DoCo threads.


cmpm

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #29 on: April 21, 2011, 06:12 PM »
Thanks for the post Shades.

I really did not mean any malice to Michael or PE.
I try to stay even toned without any assumptions, and yet I'm called or accused of certain things as you see.

Anyone that can use Process Explorer and other tools, beyond the basics, can see what PE is using for it's resources and how much.

There was nothing 'snarky' (whatever that means) or arrogant in my posts. But an honest question and what I have checked out for myself.

Perhaps because of all the other comments it was taken that way.

I still am not bothered by any remarks, the net is a hard place to communicate sometimes.
Things get misunderstood in their intent.

Peace! Michael and all!
« Last Edit: April 21, 2011, 06:14 PM by cmpm »

tomos

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #30 on: April 22, 2011, 06:18 AM »
Peace! Michael and all!

:Thmbsup:
Tom

Steven Avery

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #31 on: September 15, 2011, 06:39 AM »
Now on todays Bits.  Suggestions welcome.  I will probably try it during the day and read the comments, with a 50% estimated purchase possibility.

The tone above is a bit unfortunate, there was no snarkiness and generally DC has the most informed, hospitable discussions ..  on the other hand it is very excellent to have a person from the company in active dialog and explanation.

Let the research continue afresh and anew.

Steven

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #32 on: September 15, 2011, 09:33 AM »
I've been using PE since the last deal. Before that I was using AHK.

PE is easier and faster, if it can do what you need to do. Last week I came across the first situation where PE couldn't deliver -- I was trying to create a shortcut to restore a program hidden in the system tray. PE can't do this, AHK can.

In the end, it's ease of use (PE) against flexibility (AHK). Overall, I'm still happy I bought PE.

As I mentioned earlier, I bought two PE licences and converted them to network licences -- this allows me to run the PE server on my Windows Home Server box, and my laptop and desktop can share the same PE file, which is a nice feature.
« Last Edit: September 15, 2011, 11:35 AM by johnk »

tranglos

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #33 on: September 15, 2011, 10:04 AM »
Last week I came across the first situation where PE couldn't deliver -- I was trying to create a shortcut to restore a program hidden in the system tray. PE can't do this, AHK can.

Aaargh! That's exactly where I am stuck right now, too. Using AHK, bought a PE license on BdJ way back when. Would love to switch from AHK to a more GUI-fied environment to easier create and manage my expansions, which are — well — expanding.

But I don't want to run two apps that both use low-level keyboard hooks, because it's asking for trouble, it's confusing in the long run, and a waste of resources.

In AHK I have a lot of little macros that go like this:

ASSIGN the following to WIN+W:

IF (a window named "Word" already exists) THEN
    ACTIVATE (the existing window named "Word")
ELSE
    LAUNCH "c:\whatever\winword.exe"

Straight text expansion-type apps cannot do this, because it requires logic processing, hence a built-in macro language. So I've tried and rejected these so far:

Macro Toolsworks: awfully expensive and way too complex for my needs. I find that I don't ever need to actually record any macros in the first place. Plus, weird, overcomplicated syntax such as <command>(parameters) And, to define a simple text expansion item, you have to use 4 (four!) tabs. Sometimes I wonder, you know? Four tabs, only a small handful of settings on each, and there is no way to see all the settings at once. If you are looking at the abbreviation, you cannot see the activation key (or prefix, whatever). Sometimes I really wonder.

Macro Express Pro: also expensive, a really inconvenient UI for my taste, but the worst thing about it is their implementation of the actual text expansion feature. You can choose whether to use a prefix key or a suffix key in preferences, and it is applied to all expansions. At least this is how it works in ShortKeys, their smaller edition of MEPro. Unusable. (Unfortunately I managed to forget all about it after I installed the trial, which has now expired, so I cannot swear that the full Macro Express Pro edition has the same limitation. But I don't like the Outlook-like their "Save and Close" UI idiom anyway, too much hassle to define something as simple as a text expansion item. No go.)

Quick Macros: had a lot of hope for this one, but the macro language syntax is from hell, and their implementation of text expansion also seems badly designed. You create special "menus" (except they are not real menus) and then... see for yourself. It certainly didn't seem easier, faster or more GUI-fied than AHK.

For basic text expansion, I would choose Breevy. Its one annoyance is the jumpy bottom panel (why not just leave it in place?), but it's fast, lightweight, very clear on what it does and its expansion options cover all bases. It can also adapt character case to the case of the abbreviation you typed, so that "gm" becomes "good morning", but "Gm" is "Good morning". A critical feature, which AHK supports, but not all expanders do.

But, Breevy doesn't do hotkeys and certainly won't support conditional statements.

Meanwhile, AHK does it all flawlessly, using a tiny amount of resources, *but* it's getting harder and harder to navigate the growing script, ensure there are no duplicate abbreviations, etc. I'd really welcome a nice, lightweight GUI with all the scripting power of AHK and a human-friendly syntax I could actually memorize!
« Last Edit: September 15, 2011, 11:32 AM by tranglos »

bmms

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #34 on: September 15, 2011, 10:24 AM »
Hi folks, we will look into the hidden program window issue. We gladly inform you about improvements in PhraseExpress and new versions. Please sign the spam-free newsletter to stay tuned for news about product releases: http://newsletter.phraseexpress.com.
Michael

Steven Avery

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #35 on: September 15, 2011, 11:51 PM »
Hi,

Most of my repetitive keystrokes are scripture verse references, where I use a software program to find copy and format.  So if "1T316" expands to a formatted copy of the verse 1 Timothy 3:16 (RTF would be nice, perhaps in an alt version "R1T316", carriage returns embedded is one main point for formatting clean) that would be nice.  

So Breevy might be an early try.  Breevy and PhraseExpress have forums, always a nice indicator, with PE more active.

Maybe I have 100 other semi-repetitive phrases, often quotes (it is hard to think about what I do repetitively, makes me into an automaton) right now I use Linkman as my database holder and finder, combined with searching sections of my Eudora email.

Hmmm...  I could see trying to use a phrase -text expander for this purpose, but I am not sure it would be best.

=================

The Phrase Express freeware might be sufficient as well, and a good compare to Breevy. Especially since I should qualify for personal use, and would recommend it at work-client (20 PCs there) if I find it a big help.

The big issue here is what triggers the nagging for commercial use ?.  In the Snapfiles discussion, and elsewhere, it is clear that it used to be way overdone, and this was even acknowledged ...  however is it ok now ? (the PhraseExpress website indicates it is only based on rather obvious business use phrases)  Any users able to comment ? I do not want to start with the effort if this is going to be a problem.

=================

I understand the point about only one low-level keyboard hook program. Right now I am not using AutoHotKey or another, so I don't have that direct, immediate clash problem.

Do these programs tend to  uninstall clean ?  That is a major concern if there is a lower-level aspect.  Should you just try one at a time ?

I noticed one program said that it worked with pasting instead of individual keys.  Is that a significant architectural difference ?

Do we have a super "text expander-- autocomplete -- autotext" thread somewhere ?

Shalom,
Steven
« Last Edit: September 16, 2011, 12:14 AM by Steven Avery »

cyberdiva

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #36 on: September 16, 2011, 10:34 AM »
Steven, it may be that either Breevy or PhraseExpress will meet your needs.  As I read about what you'd like to do with scripture verses, I thought of another program you might want to try: ActiveWords.  I've used it for years and find it almost indispensible.  With it, you can certainly do text expansion (which it calls Substitute text), launch a program, navigate to a website, send email, open a file (and, if you wish, specify the program in which you want the file to open), open a folder, or do more complicated procedures via its Scripting codes.  I've tried a couple of other text expansion programs, but I find I prefer ActiveWords.  It's available in a very limited free version and in the much more capable commercial version.  IIRC, you can test the commercial version for 60 days before deciding whether to buy it.
« Last Edit: September 16, 2011, 03:34 PM by cyberdiva »

rjbull

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #37 on: September 16, 2011, 02:32 PM »
Do we have a super "text expander-- autocomplete -- autotext" thread somewhere ?

Just a few  ;)  Take a look at these:


Donation Coder threads, which deal with text expanders, completers and the
like:

jgpaiva's abbreviations importer
https://www.donation...dex.php?topic=2598.0
link to jgpaiva's AHK tools
https://www.donation...dex.php?topic=3461.0

Harrie's review of Instant Text, and following posts
https://www.donation...dex.php?topic=2631.0


Word AutoCompleter
https://www.donation...1036.msg6713#msg6713 (mentions IntelliComplete, AutoTyping, LetMeType, AllChars, Type Pilot)

Auspex
https://www.donation....msg231091#msg231091


External links:

Productivity Talk - Harrie's own forum site for (primarily) Medical
Transcriptionists
http://www.productivitytalk.com/

Jon Knowles site on typing productivity
http://home.earthlin...net/~agjon/index.htm

Jon Knowles' ABCZ typing abbreviation system
http://home.earthlin.../~agjon/abczrule.htm



rjbull

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #38 on: September 16, 2011, 03:05 PM »
Most of my repetitive keystrokes are scripture verse references, where I use a software program to find copy and format.  So if "1T316" expands to a formatted copy of the verse 1 Timothy 3:16 (RTF would be nice
As an alternative, you might find it useful to consider one of the clipboard extenders and/or code-snippet holders, like mouser's Clipboard Help+Spell, or AceText, or one of the many others.

tranglos

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #39 on: September 17, 2011, 12:05 PM »
Hi folks, we will look into the hidden program window issue. We gladly inform you about improvements in PhraseExpress and new versions. Please sign the spam-free newsletter to stay tuned for news about product releases: http://newsletter.phraseexpress.com.

Michael, thank you for sticking with us here :) May I make a request? I have reinstalled PhraseExpress because, even though I cannot use it for conditional app launching that I do with AHK, I still wanted to try out TypoLearn, which seems like an awesome idea (and I do make a lot of typos).

So this is where I noticed that PE does not seem to support another feature that's crucial to me: adjusting the letter case of the expansion phrase to the typed abbreviation. Many text expanders support it and I was surprised to see it missing from PE. Ideally, it should work like this:

You define a basic, case-insensitive expansion:

shtt = say Hi to Tom for me!

This is a snippet that could be used at the beginning of a sentence, but it might as well appear in the middle.

a) If the abbreviation is typed in all lowercase (shtt), expand it exactly as defined. (I.e., do not force it to all lowercase, the above example shows why)

b) If the abbreviation is typed in all UPPERCASE (SHTT), expand it to all uppercase, OR (perhaps more usefully), Capitalize Each Word (title case).

c) If the abbreviation begins with a capital letter (Shtt), capitalize the first letter of the expanded text ("Say Hi to Tom")

In my line of translation work (software localization) I'm finding plenty of expressions that, in my language, can be used in various contexts. But even in English you can come up with lots of simple, useful cases:

faq = frequently asked questions (just a generic phrase in the middle of sentence)
FAQ = Frequently Asked Questions (title case, though not all languages use that spelling)
Faq = Frequently asked questions (beginning of a sentence).

I have dozens of phrases such as these. PE can import my AHK expansions, but it seems to me that at the moment I would have to manually duplicate my expansions to create two or three case-specific versions of each. I would rather avoid that, because it's going to nearly triple the number of expansions, making them much harder to maintain.

Basically, instead of the "case-sensitive" checkbox, I would suggest a drop-down box with three options:

- case insensitive
- case sensitive
- adjust case to abbreviation.

Do you think this is feasible near term? Thanks a lot for listening!

(Reposted on PhraseExpress support forum)
« Last Edit: September 17, 2011, 12:23 PM by tranglos »

bmms

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #40 on: September 17, 2011, 01:08 PM »
feature that's crucial to me: adjusting the letter case of the expansion phrase to the typed abbreviation.

PhraseExpress offers exactly this feature for a long time: http://manual.phraseexpress.com#caps

:-)
Michael
« Last Edit: September 17, 2011, 01:23 PM by BartelsMedia »

tranglos

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #41 on: September 17, 2011, 01:51 PM »

PhraseExpress offers exactly this feature for a long time: http://manual.phraseexpress.com#caps

:-)

Ah, indeed, my apologies! But this turns into another problem for me - I'll post details on your support forum. Thanks!

madmanx33

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #42 on: September 21, 2011, 06:17 PM »
Hello Everyone
I was wondering if anyone can help me with this problem. I will gladly donate $5 for any help.
I answer customer service emails and 90% of my emails are customers wondering when they will receive their item.
I normally have to look up every order to see the date it shipped.


I was wondering if there are any of these autofill programs that can automatically grab information from a website or database. I can program my own server side script to deliver  the customer date, but Im looking for a program that has the ability to pull it.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Thank you!

rjbull

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Re: PhraseExpress v8, Pro Edition, on BdJ, Tuesday 12 April, 2011
« Reply #43 on: September 22, 2011, 02:58 PM »
I was wondering if there are any of these autofill programs that can automatically grab information from a website or database. I can program my own server side script to deliver  the customer date, but Im looking for a program that has the ability to pull it.

I haven't seen a text expander program that can what you're asking.  However, there will soon be a Bits du Jour offer on iMacros, which apparently can (I haven't tried it):
Web Scraping, Data Extraction and Web Mining with iMacros
Do you need to screen-scrape web data into your database, spreadsheet or any other application? In just minutes, you can create a simple iMacros solution that does all the web-harvesting and web crawling for you automatically.
Note that iMacros comes in several versions, some very expensive (and included in the BdJ 50% offer), but there's also a free iMacros addon for Firefox.