Author Topic: My favorite software! What's yours? (Read 234200 times)

f0dder · « **Reply #225 on:** April 14, 2008, 12:22 PM »

UNICODE is a big can of worms.

One big issue is that we old-school programmers are used to dealing with 'characters'. One character = one item displayed on screen. Unicode changes things around a lot, with terms such as "code points", "glyphs", ... and even when you use UTF-16 encoding (windows' unicode format), one 16-bit isn't necessarily enough to display one glyph on the screen.

To make matters worse, things like comparing strings for equality becomes very hard - should the german ß be treated equally to "ss"? Some glyphs may look equal on screen, but be different characters. A glyph can be constructed by multiple code points in different order (this can be fixed via canonization though). And what about upper/lower casing? Not every language supported by unicode has a concept of this.

Too bad the entire world wasn't colonized by England, and all previous history/culture/LANGUAGE burnt :p

Curt · « **Reply #226 on:** April 14, 2008, 05:17 PM »

:p

Because of the ":p" I will forgive you, f0dder - but I happen to like our æ, ø and å...

---
But Thank You to Horst and f0dder for these two mini lessons. I have learned more about Unicode during the last five minutes than ever before - I thought it was some kind of wonder technique.

Armando · « **Reply #227 on:** April 14, 2008, 05:45 PM »

Too bad the entire world wasn't colonized by England, and all previous history/culture/LANGUAGE burnt :p
-f0dder (April 14, 2008, 12:22 PM)

Ahah. Yes. It makes it pretty complicated. Sometimes I wouldn't mind getting rid of French -- I'm not to attached to the thing. Uselessly intricate.

iphigenie · « **Reply #228 on:** April 15, 2008, 04:18 AM »

I'm not sure about the idea of the english culture being the only one in the world... especially if all the other cultures had disappeared before they improved the english one a bit

The whole world would be eating boiled food and living in a caste culture

f0dder · « **Reply #229 on:** April 15, 2008, 06:07 AM »

iphigenie: it was meant jokingly, in frustration. I really would wish that we'd have only one language to bother about, though, and English wouldn't be the worst choice for that. It's sane computing wise, and while there's a lot of exceptions and quirks, it's a very rich language with a very rich vocabulary (exhume always comes to mind - a verb for "dig up dead people", how crazy is that

).

Grorgy · « **Reply #230 on:** April 15, 2008, 07:16 AM »

interesting choice, exhume - 1783, from Fr. exhumer, from M.L. exhumare, from L. ex- "out of" + humare "bury," from humus "earth." An earlier form was exhumate (1548), taken directly from the M.L. (http://www.etymonlin...ex.php?search=exhume) no latin no french we would have missed such a worthy word

iphigenie · « **Reply #231 on:** April 15, 2008, 09:32 AM »

F0dder - I did smile, and that's why i replied as a joke too - there *is* more to english culture than boiled food, I think, there's.... there's....

And you are right about unicode being a right pain from a technical point of view. I cant count the issues unicode has caused me in web development, but it was a lot of wasted hours and half my 20 white hairs come from it.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #232 on:** April 15, 2008, 09:44 AM »

The whole world would be eating boiled food
-iphigenie

~~Nothing wrong with grey meat and limp vegetables, I grew up on them~~ I see your point!

exhume always comes to mind - a verb for "dig up dead people", how crazy is that
-f0dder

Crazy? From where do you think all that boiled food comes!?

Surely everyone knows you can't eat raw dead people.

Armando · « **Reply #233 on:** April 15, 2008, 09:57 AM »

surftwo · « **Reply #234 on:** April 15, 2008, 08:34 PM »

My favorite software as of latley:

firefox
Thunderbird
Blender
TreeNotesDB
XYplorer
Scrapbook
Todo list

kartal · « **Reply #235 on:** April 15, 2008, 09:17 PM »

Input director http://www.inputdirector.com/
Wikipad http://www.jhorman.org/wikidPad/
Messiah http://www.projectmessiah.com/
Modo www.luxology.com
Freecommander http://www.freecommander.com/
Process Lasso http://www.bitsum.com/prolasso.php
Farr
Launchy http://www.launchy.net/
Painter www.corel.com
Artrage http://www.ambientde...ign.com/artrage.html
Zbrush http://www.pixologic.com/
Topogun http://www.topogun.com/
DlgResizer
Filebox xtender http://www.hyperioni....com/files/index.asp
Autohotkey http://www.autohotkey.com/
Greenshot http://greenshot.sourceforge.net/
Clipboard help+spell
Winsplit revolution http://reptils.free.fr/
RssOwl http://www.rssowl.org/

tide · « **Reply #236 on:** April 16, 2008, 12:53 AM »

Here's my list.

ClipMate http://www.thornsoft.com/
Mathematica http://www.wolfram.com/
Hexagon 2 http://www.daz3d.com....x/software/hexagon/
IrfanView http://www.irfanview.com/
Opera http://www.opera.com
iRider http://www.irider.com/
POP Peeper http://www.poppeeper.com/
Quick Macros http://www.quickmacros.com/
Direct Folders http://www.codesecto...om/directfolders.php
FinePrint http://www.fineprint.com/
thinBasic http://www.thinbasic.com/
Scientific Notebook http://www.mackichan.com/
PlayBASIC http://www.playbasic.com/
Liquid Studio http://www.globalheavyindustries.com/
HotBasic http://www.angelfire...census/hotbasic.html
Project Dogwaffle Pro http://www.thebest3d...ogwaffle-readme.html

Armando · « **Reply #237 on:** April 16, 2008, 05:07 PM »

Interesting software Kartal and Tide. Lots of nice visual arts apps. Thanks for sharing.

Shades · « **Reply #238 on:** April 16, 2008, 05:55 PM »

...
Input director http://www.inputdirector.com/
...
-kartal (April 15, 2008, 09:17 PM)

If you would be so kind, Kartal....can you explain me the difference between your 'Input Director' and my 'Synergy'?

Sorry, currently my head is swamped because of a software delivery dead line but I still cannot resist the "call" from this forum

kartal · « **Reply #239 on:** April 16, 2008, 06:59 PM »

Input director offers seamless integration. I do nto know if synergy offers but you can move your mouse without shortcuts to other screen(s). And It is easier to setup, offers clipboard as well.

cthorpe · « **Reply #240 on:** July 16, 2008, 04:31 AM »

Current favs/must haves:

First off, we have the usual suspects: Firefox, Find and Run Robot,

Roboform - Since I got Roboform, I have actually followed the advice I always gave others and assigned unique passwords to various web services. My Roboform password is pretty much a string of random characters that correspond somewhat to a sentence that was written on something on my desk when I first set it up, so I feel secure that it won't be easy to break.

Office 2007 - The more I use it, the more I like it. I can't work efficiently with earlier versions now that I am used to the ribbon.

MyLife Organized on PC and PocketPC

It's the summer, so I have lots of time to play games...

Oblivion (Game of the Year Edition) http://www.elderscro...blivion_overview.htm
Audiosurf http://www.audio-surf.com/
Gish http://www.chroniclogic.com/gish.htm
Gametap games http://gametap.com

justice · « **Reply #241 on:** July 16, 2008, 05:30 AM »

http://Arsclip
http://TortoiseSVN
http://LSLEditor
http://Internet Info...rvices (IIS) Manager
http://Pikybasket
http://Filebox Extender
http://JungleDisk

rjbull · « **Reply #242 on:** July 17, 2008, 03:32 AM »

Roboform - Since I got Roboform, I have actually followed the advice I always gave others and assigned unique passwords to various web services. My Roboform password is pretty much a string of random characters that correspond somewhat to a sentence that was written on something on my desk when I first set it up, so I feel secure that it won't be easy to break.
-cthorpe (July 16, 2008, 04:31 AM)

Do you mean, you have a master password for Roboform that then runs different passwords for different services; or, that you've assigned them all different passwords in Roboform as well? I thought the former approach was usual. If the latter, how do you remember them all?

cthorpe · « **Reply #243 on:** July 17, 2008, 03:44 AM »

I have one master password for Roboform and unique passwords for various web services, accounts, etc. Yes, that's the usual way to use Roboform, but before I started using it, I just had a few passwords that I used for everything.

rjbull · « **Reply #244 on:** July 17, 2008, 05:21 AM »

Yes, that's the usual way to use Roboform, but before I started using it, I just had a few passwords that I used for everything.
-cthorpe (July 17, 2008, 03:44 AM)

And its much easier to remember just one master password

No wonder Roboform, KeePass etc. are popular.

40hz · « **Reply #245 on:** July 17, 2008, 09:31 PM »

My current hands-down favorite is the oddly named Write Monkey.

From the website:

Zenware for full screen distraction free creative writing. No whistles and bells, just empty screen, you and your words. WriteMonkey is light, fast, and perfectly handy for those who enjoy the simplicity of a typewriter but live in modern times.

Write Monkey is a writer's tool. It comes up as a blank screen that you can type on. But beneath that simple interface there are a host of features just a right click or keystroke away. Mouse or command key - the choice is yours. (F1 brings up the help screen. See below)

(This screenshot shows the fullscreen view reduced to a window. It can be toggled back and forth by hitting ESC F11)

There's even a feature to turn on a typewriter sound for those of us old enough to appreciate the crutch that old clickety-clack provides.

Does not require installation. Just unzip to a pendrive (or the directory of your choice) and get writing.

Download link: http://pomarancha.co...ritemonkey/index.php

jgpaiva · « **Reply #246 on:** July 18, 2008, 03:43 AM »

[offtopic] I am pretty sure there's a topic here on DC with a few text editors similar to the one 40hz just posted, I just can't find the topic

[/offtopic]

PhilB66 · « **Reply #247 on:** July 18, 2008, 03:46 AM »

[offtopic] I am pretty sure there's a topic here on DC with a few text editors similar to the one 40hz just posted, I just can't find the topic [/offtopic]
-jgpaiva (July 18, 2008, 03:43 AM)

That's correct jgpaiva. See this link:

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=11917.0

tomos · « **Reply #248 on:** July 18, 2008, 03:47 AM »

[offtopic] I am pretty sure there's a topic here on DC with a few text editors similar to the one 40hz just posted, I just can't find the topic [/offtopic]
-jgpaiva (July 18, 2008, 03:43 AM)

Darkroom is a similar Windows one based on a mac programme (WriteRoom?)
Darkroom is extremely basic, nice, but a bit buggy with cut/copy n paste so thanks for the tip 40hz

jgpaiva · « **Reply #249 on:** July 18, 2008, 03:48 AM »

That's correct jgpaiva. See this link:

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=11917.0
-PhilB66 (July 18, 2008, 03:46 AM)

[offtopic] Oh, and writemonkey was there too! Thanks for finding the link, phil! [/offtopic]