Author Topic: Efficiently view set of .htm files, one after another (Read 23133 times)

nkormanik · « **on:** May 01, 2014, 08:01 PM »

I have a set of 1000 .htm files in a folder. I'd like to quickly and efficiently view each of these in my web browser (Chrome), one after the other.

As of present I drag each file onto the browser window. That keeps only one tab open and active.

x1000 drags. What a drag.

What I would prefer..., is to use, say, the up-arrow key or right-arrow key to automatically bring next-in-line .htm file in.

So, just single press, arrow key, next file loaded, in single tab. Arrow key, arrow key, arrow key.

Easy peasy.

I do this with images in an image viewing program. I'd like to be able to do the same with .htm files.

(and, ideally, a set of web links in a folder as well)

Does anyone know of a way to do this? Or some other great approach? Seems pretty basic, huh? Surely others have seen the potential utility. And, if not, maybe someone can write a little program?

Thanks much.

Nicholas Kormanik

mouser · « **Reply #1 on:** May 02, 2014, 05:27 AM »

Nice idea.

One certainly could make an html viewer tool which did as you suggest, using an embedded web browser, which would be fast.

But there would also be some some use for a generic utility that showed a list of files and as you "arrowed-down" through them would cause them to be opened in another program.

skwire · « **Reply #2 on:** May 02, 2014, 10:40 AM »

Nick, if I write a quickie viewer using an embedded web browser, it'll use the IE engine. Is this an issue?

nkormanik · « **Reply #3 on:** May 02, 2014, 04:54 PM »

Skwire, not an issue at all, from my standpoint. I'd love to see it.

What mouser suggests -- a list of .htm or url link files at one side of screen, arrow down or up to view the .htm files in the other part of the screen -- sounds good. Only issue there would be giving up the screen real estate that the list of files would require. But, still, nice idea.

Surprised there isn't already a way to do this....

MilesAhead · « **Reply #4 on:** May 02, 2014, 07:48 PM »

There could be a cheesy Macro way to do it that would work in several browsers. It could work like this: Click the browser with the mouse to make it active, hit hotkey(which saves the window handle and also opens a Folder select dialog.) select folder. The tray hotkey would then read all htm files into an array. When you hit the arrow, if the original browser window is the active window the normal arrow function is superseded and the filename is pasted into the addressbar using file:// etc..

Seems like Opera FF chrome and IE control l makes the addressbar active and selects all text. A simple Send should paste in the file path and hit Enter. A bit clunky but that's Macro.

nkormanik · « **Reply #5 on:** May 03, 2014, 02:07 AM »

MilesAhead, I made it to "cheesy"....

Thank God for programmers.

MilesAhead · « **Reply #6 on:** May 03, 2014, 07:35 AM »

Cool.

skwire · « **Reply #7 on:** May 05, 2014, 12:38 PM »

Give this a try: http://skwire.dcmembers.com/apps/snacks/MassHTMLViewer.zip

Notes/caveats:

No frills.
Drag and drop htm/html/xml files (or folders) onto the listview and view away.
URL files are not handled (yet).
Nothing is saved.

Efficiently view set of .htm files, one after another

nkormanik · « **Reply #8 on:** May 05, 2014, 09:21 PM »

Wow, that's sure beats dragging and dropping, Skwire. And so fast acting. Views are instantaneous. Thanks very much.

Some of the .htm pages apparently give Mass HTM Viewer heartburn -- an error message pops up wanting to know if the 'script' should continue. Most pages are fine, though.

Hope you can do your magic with URL files (web bookmark files) as well.

Great work, Skwire. Another winner.

mouser · « **Reply #9 on:** May 05, 2014, 10:24 PM »

Very nice

skwire · « **Reply #10 on:** May 08, 2014, 03:43 PM »

Hope you can do your magic with URL files (web bookmark files) as well.
-nkormanik (May 05, 2014, 09:21 PM)

Please download again: http://skwire.dcmembers.com/apps/snacks/MassHTMLViewer.zip

Error popups should be reduced, URL files are supported, and the statusbar updates more like a real web browser now.

mouser · « **Reply #11 on:** May 08, 2014, 05:39 PM »

nkormanik · « **Reply #12 on:** May 08, 2014, 07:09 PM »

Mass HTM Viewer does seem to work better now on stored .htm files. Thanks!

And great to see the inclusion of URL links, too.

Appears URL links are trickier for the embedded browser. Sometimes a message appears in status bar at bottom... "Waiting for...." And that never ends. Web browser freezes. Have to use Windows Task Manager to kill entire program.

Other websites with no status bar message simply cause Mass HTM Viewer to freeze up. Have to, once again, use Windows Task Manager to kill program.

skwire · « **Reply #13 on:** May 08, 2014, 11:30 PM »

Does it freeze up consistently on certain .URL files? If so, can you PM me a few of them?

nkormanik · « **Reply #14 on:** May 08, 2014, 11:47 PM »

Yes, consistently. I only tried a handful of URLs, though, so far.

I'll PM you one to begin with...

nkormanik · « **Reply #15 on:** May 09, 2014, 12:15 AM »

Quickly made it through all 1000 .htm files stored on hard disk..., and without a single error message popping up.

So, being able to handle URLs would be frosting on top. Not totally crucial, as it appears there's more to it than one might think.

skwire · « **Reply #16 on:** May 09, 2014, 09:25 AM »

Quickly made it through all 1000 .htm files stored on hard disk..., and without a single error message popping up.
-nkormanik (May 09, 2014, 12:15 AM)

That's great to hear.

So, being able to handle URLs would be frosting on top. Not totally crucial, as it appears there's more to it than one might think.
-nkormanik (May 09, 2014, 12:15 AM)

I've been playing with the .URL handling this morning and it's a pain in the ass. Stuff that works on W7 shits the bed on XP. Frustrating. What I think I might do is take out the .URL support and write you another script that will let you do the .URL stuff within your own browser. It won't be nearly as elegant (pretty kludgy, actually) but I think it be much better functionally. Are you cool with that?

nkormanik · « **Reply #17 on:** May 09, 2014, 08:01 PM »

How about that. Well, another reason to upgrade to W7. Hmmm.

No worries about kludgy. Simply works is all I care about.

Super idea, not only for me, but for others out there. As said, surprised no one has accomplished this before.

MilesAhead · « **Reply #18 on:** May 10, 2014, 07:19 AM »

@skwire I don't know if you've seen this function by SKAN
( just in case it may be helpful )

[Select]

; function by SKAN on AHK forums
;
PathCreateFromURL( URL )
{
if (! URL)
return ""
VarSetCapacity( fPath, Sz := 2084, 0 )
DllCall( "shlwapi\PathCreateFromUrl" ( A_IsUnicode ? "W" : "A" )
, Str,URL, Str,fPath, UIntP,Sz, UInt,0 )
return fPath
}

elvisbrown · « **Reply #19 on:** May 20, 2014, 06:04 AM »

Maybe a side track but you know that an epub file is just a load of .htm files zipped up?

If you replace the .epub with .zip then double click on it you will see what I mean.

skwire · « **Reply #20 on:** May 20, 2014, 07:35 AM »

Maybe a side track but you know that an epub file is just a load of .htm files zipped up?
-elvisbrown (May 20, 2014, 06:04 AM)

Thanks! Yes, I did know this. However, there are plenty of epub viewers out there that are eminently more capable than Mass HTML Viewer (I need to come up with a better name).

IainB · « **Reply #21 on:** May 21, 2014, 07:29 PM »

I have a set of 1000 .htm files in a folder. I'd like to quickly and efficiently view each of these in my web browser (Chrome), one after the other. ...
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-nkormanik (May 01, 2014, 08:01 PM)

I've been following this thread for a while as I have a very similar requirement to @nkormanik's, with the difference that my HTML files (documents) are in a library numbering several thousands of documents, having been gathered from the Internet over several years of browsing and saving using the Firefox Scrapbook extension.
At the moment, the only way I can view these files is with a browser, and the easiest way is via the Firefox Scrapbook tree-viewer, which only works in Firefox. The content of the files themselves is searchable using either Windows desktop search or the built-in Scrapbook search, and the files are categorised into subject folders in the Firefox Scrapbook tree-viewer. Those folders are proprietary folders for Scrapbook and invisible to the desktop search or Windows Explorer.
What I need is a viewer that can enable me to retain categorisation and search and read the documents at speed. I have considered exporting the files as .MHT or .MAFF format, but then they are not amenable to any existing viewer other than a browser - or not that I am aware of anyway. So there is no point (no gain) in exporting them. At least in Scrapbook database form, they are categorised and searchable, though it's all a bit kludgy. I have considered using WizNote or InfoSelect8, but see some constraints to getting what I want from those.