Hotkeys don't persist

[RightPaddock]

Windows 10 Upgrade; Screen Shot Captor v4.13.0 BETA - Sep 12, 2015

This has been happening to me for a very long time, on Windows 7 and Windows 10 upgrade and many previous versions of SC.   

Today I had to do about 10 restarts and take screen shots with context menus - sometimes the hot key would persist, other times it wouldn't.  On one occasion the choices offered were bizarre, sorry I can't recall what they were - I was able to resolve that by logging off and on

Say I set the hot keys like this

Hotkeys don't persist

Tomorrow or maybe the next day (after a shut down, some zzzz's and start up) they will all be blank

Yes I do click the Accept the button

Where are the settings stored ?

Oh, I haven't reported it before, because I only use SC when I cant do something with Windows Capture tool, such as delayed captures or transients like context menu's.  But today it was 'driving me nuts' - I'm normally a fault tolerant user

RP

[mouser]

I've not heard of such a problem -- but it could be something else taking over the hotkeys..
SC saves its settings, by default in "C:\Users\USERNAME\Documents\DonationCoder\ScreenshotCaptor\ScreenshotCaptor.ini"

One thing that shouldn't happen but has been known to happen is SC not being able to save its settings at system reboot/shutdown.  To check if this is the case, change your hotkeys and then manually exit and restart SC and check the settings.

[tomos]

I presume this setting wont affect hotkeys, but maybe check it in case (i.e. ensure it's *not* ticked)

Hotkeys don't persist

[RightPaddock]

...To check if this is the case, change your hotkeys and then manually exit and restart SC and check the settings.

-mouser (October 21, 2015, 09:03 AM)

Yep that's fine

But why wait until shutdown to save them, why aren't they saved when Accept is clicked. 

Shutdown is a somewhat random process, essentially Windows broadcasts a message to tell all applications to terminate now, knowing what happens in that melee is like knowing what happens in a rugby scrum.  I probably run more tray apps than most folks

Hotkeys don't persist

What are the circumstances in which SC creates a fresh ScreenshotCaptor.ini file.  The other thing I change is default save location (to desktop) sometimes I lose that, it reverts to ...\Documents\DonationCoder\ScreenshotCaptor\Screenshots, not sure of that's coincident with losing hotkeys - maybe/probably.

BTW it's OK this morning, but tomorrow its likely it'll be not OK.  I'll save the ini file as it is now and when it goes awry I'll do a compare, post here etc.  But I really do think you should consider saving the settings into the ini file when the Accept key is clicked. Or provide a Save Settings button, or right context menu item at least.

[mouser]

The other thing I change is default save location (to desktop) sometimes I lose that, it reverts to ...\Documents\DonationCoder\ScreenshotCaptor\Screenshots, not sure of that's coincident with losing hotkeys -

hmm it sounds like it may be losing your settings file completely and reverting to defaults.. that's odd.

is your user documents directory on a network drive?

did you "install" SC by copying it from one machine to another?

[RightPaddock]

I presume this setting wont affect hotkeys, but maybe check it in case (i.e. ensure it's *not* ticked)

-tomos (October 21, 2015, 04:18 PM)

@tomos - thanks - it's not ticked and it's not a network install - but the tooltip warning is possibly germane

My %USERPROFILE%\Documents folder is relocated to D:\Documents.  I have that drive configured to spin down when its been idle for 3 minutes (heat, energy saver) - so I suspect the 'save ini file on exit' function in SC is timing out waiting for the drive to spin up, which is the sort of thing that can happen on networks.

I did look for a setting to relocate the preferences.  IMO the preferences belong in %APPDATA%, if they were there they'd be on my %SYSTEMDRIVE% which is an SSD.

So - I suggest the preferences be saved when they're Accepted and/or the location of the .ini files should be user configurable (preferably and)

Meantime, I'll try to exit SC manually before shut down and see what happens.

RP

[RightPaddock]

The other thing I change is default save location (to desktop) sometimes I lose that, it reverts to ...\Documents\DonationCoder\ScreenshotCaptor\Screenshots, not sure of that's coincident with losing hotkeys -

hmm it sounds like it may be losing your settings file completely and reverting to defaults.. that's odd.

did you "install" SC by copying it from one machine to another?

-mouser (October 21, 2015, 04:59 PM)

Good try mate - of course I didn't :rofl: 

[mouser]

and/or the location of the .ini files should be user configurable (preferably and)

you can customize this by editing the ConfigDir.ini file in the program directory.

[RightPaddock]

and/or the location of the .ini files should be user configurable (preferably and)

you can customize this by editing the ConfigDir.ini file in the program directory.

-mouser (October 21, 2015, 05:50 PM)

What will happen if/when I install a new version or have to reinstall ?

[mouser]

that file will survive upgrades.
actually if my memory is correct what you will find in the SC program files directory is ConfigDirDefault.ini, so you should rename that to ConfigDir.ini and then edit it.
either way, it won't be overridden on update/reinstall.

[RightPaddock]

that file will survive upgrades.
actually if my memory is correct what you will find in the SC program files directory is ConfigDirDefault.ini, so you should rename that to ConfigDir.ini and then edit it.
either way, it won't be overridden on update/reinstall.

-mouser (October 21, 2015, 06:08 PM)

Great - it was ConfigDir.ini, I've set it to APPDATA

I have another program where I have to change the content of the program's file directory, a non trivial html file - it gets clobbered on an install. 

But it's not ideal even if it does survive an upgrade, to edit the file you have to be in Admin mode and it wont survive an uninstall/reinstall.  IMO it would be better to use an environment variable eg SCREEN_CAPTOR_CONFIG_DIR, if it's absent then default to Documents.  And environment variables are saved in System Restore Points.

So, I'll see how this goes, I've set a reminder to come back and report in a month.  Of course if it doesn't fix it I'll be back sooner, but I think it will fix it.  Perhaps you'll consider my suggestions for a future release.

Cheers & thanks to everyone for your help - RP

[RightPaddock]

Relocating the SC data to the %APPDATA%\DonationCoder\ScreenshotCaptor folder (that's on my system (SSD) drive) has NOT stopped the loss of the Hotkey settings, I'm still losing them - so my theory about drives being idle is invalid.  I am now running version 4.15 and I've already experienced the loss of Hotkeys with it.

I noticed that I do NOT lose the delay setting - if I change the value it persists, no matter what.  So it would appear that it is something specifically related to hot keys.

I'll try to remember to exit SC explicitly before doing a shut down and see if that overcomes the problem. 

I'm still of the opinion that the .ini file should be saved at the time settings changes are "Accepted". 

[mouser]

I'm still of the opinion that the .ini file should be saved at the time settings changes are "Accepted". 

I thought it was.. let me check.

[RightPaddock]

I'm not sure if I made this clear - I lose the hot key settings even if I don't actually use the program.  That is, they can be there on Monday morning, but when I start the system on Tuesday they may be gone, even though i didn't use the program on Monday.

Also this, which must be related

Hotkeys don't persist

[mouser]

Ok I can confirm that settings were not being saved immediately.

Can you try this beta version:
Download beta version (4.15.1 BETA) from here (or portable).

[RightPaddock]

Ok I can confirm that settings were not being saved immediately.

Can you try this beta version:
Download beta version (4.15.1 BETA) from here (or portable).

-mouser (November 06, 2015, 02:51 PM)

Will give it a try - btw I just discovered that nirsofts CSV File View is a great way to view ini files

Hotkeys don't persist

[RightPaddock]

Ok I can confirm that settings were not being saved immediately.

Can you try this beta version:
Download beta version (4.15.1 BETA) from here (or portable).

-mouser (November 06, 2015, 02:51 PM)

@mouser - That didn't fix it  

However, between the Win 10 Clip Tool and Win+PrtScrn all my needs are covered - they do things that XP equivalents didn't do, which is when I started using SC.  I have never used most of SC's features (eg editing and annotating), so I am abandoning it as my primary screen capture tool. If and when I ever need it, I'll start and stop it as a regular application . 

Thanks for your efforts over the years.

RP