terrypin

Thanks Cory, but doesn't closing Explorer.exe almost shut down normal XP operation, at least for a while? I'll resist the temptation to try it right now, but I do recall using it only as a final last ditch resort short of re-booting. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Paul. Did you send via a PM here? Don't see anything yet. Or normal email to terrypinATdialDOTpipexDOTcom? If the latter, maybe my over-zealous spam washer zapped it before I could see it. Yesterday I was also recommended to a nice tool which I'd never heard of before. I've installed it and it does the job sweetly. It's a small command-line tool with lots of other uses, called NirCmd by Nirsoft, from http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.html Before that I thought I'd found a neat way of doing it with ME Pro: use Win+Tab to cycle through the taskbar entries, then Sh+F10 to open the context menu, and then just r-click on 'Close Group'. But I don't see how to recognise when the grouped Explorer taskbar item is the one selected? Another idea I had that I'm confident would work is this: open XP Task Mgr, open the Applications tab, then use pixel logic tests to find each yellow Explorer icon, r-click and choose End Task. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Alan, very helpful. I just have the single standard Win key (which I use a lot for hotkey shortcuts). I'd have expected Left Window to give the same result as Win, but apparently not. And BTW I find that I have to use Win Down and Win Up with a short delay to bring up the Start menu. My Context key is as you describe for the Application key. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I was surprised to find that the % symbol is apparently not required when setting variables. For example, both of these work identically: Variable Set Integer X: Set to the Current Window's Left <VARIABLE SET INTEGER Option="\x09" Destination="X"/> Variable Set Integer %X%: Set to the Current Window's Left <VARIABLE SET INTEGER Option="\x09" Destination="%X%"/> -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Steve but I'd already found at least a dozen like that. They save and restore desktop icons, not windows. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I've been looking for a program (ideally freeware) that will save & restore the current windows layout. For any project, having set things up nicely with several programs and maybe a dozen folders in an optimum view, I'd like to be able to quickly return to that at any time. IOW, a simple click to save, click to restore approach. I'd have thought it a pretty popular requirement. Many users must like me have a bunch of stuff open at any time, and spend a lot of time getting it arranged just so. I reckon I waste a significant portion of my time merely dragging windows around, resizing them, etc, then later after they get changed, covered up, minimised, or closed finding them to do it all over again. I'm still looking, but so far without success. So I'm thinking of possibly tackling it myself with ME Pro. I reckon it will essentially be a matter of identifying and storing the location and size of every currently open folder and program, saving that collective data to a name of choice, then, on request, restoring the saved layout, i.e. re-opening, resizing and re-positioning. But before I square up to that, has anyone done it already please? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

The drop-down for Miscellaneous offers many keys. The Help just lists them, so I guess their meaning is meant to be obvious. But some puzzle me. Are those I've indicated below found only on specialist (gaming?) keyboards, so I can ignore them? Left Window Right Window Application Matt Rel Erase OF Zoom PA1 Conversely, I have some keys that aren't listed. In particular I'm curious to know if the following 3 can be used somehow by ME Pro: 'Alt Gr' (on right of Space bar) 'FN' (orange lettering, on the right of the 'Alt Gr' key) Used in conjunction with 4 orange 'multimedia' alternatives for F1-F4) 'Context' (on the right of the 'FN' key) BTW, what behaviour should I expect from using a TextType command with a key I don't have? Totally ignored? A quick test with 'Left Window' appears to show that something happens, but I'm not sure what! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks, but unfortunately no. Because after using a command like Repeat with Windows: Visible Windows: Store in variable %T[1]% and reading T1, there's no way of identifying which are the Explorer windows. I have no path shown in my Explorer window title bars (as otherwise it's often impossible to identify the folder unless you make it excessively wide). Although that does give me an idea. I suppose I could temporarily change Tools > Folder Options > View > Display the full path in the title bar so that the path was shown, and then try to deduce that a value of T1 was an Explorer window by analysing its content, e.g looking for '\' characters. But if I can find some way of implementing Paul's suggestion of trawling through the taskbar to identify the 'group entry', that would be much easier. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks. I use TweakUI to customise it more readily than editing the Registry, and that offers several options: Group least used applications first. Group applications with the most windows first. Group any application with at least N windows. (I use the last, with N set to 3.) Your last sentence looks very promising, but what commands can access the taskbar's text labels please? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Can anyone think of a way to close all currently open Explorer/My Computer windows please? A regular item in my XP Taskbar is a 'grouped' entry, or whatever it's called. Right now, alongside its yellow folder icon, it says '14 Windows Explorer'. Some of those are open, some are minimised. I want to close all of them. Just as if I r-clicked the taskbar item and chose Close Group. I don't know of a Windows keyboard shortcut that will do it, and so far I haven't come up with a reliable way to find the taskbar entry so that i can r-click it. Recognising its yellow icon isn't going to be practicable because there are so many other items in the taskbar, including Quick Launch and system tray icons. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

OK, thanks Cory, that rings true. What puzzles me most is why ME Pro reports the size differently to other applications, like the 4 image editors I've tried. The only reason I'm fussing with the issue at all is because I'm unclear whether it affects the way I write macros that depend on pixel positions. Also, I've just emailed ISS to ask if there are still issues with window sizing & positioning in general. I can't pin them down, but I'm getting intermittent strange behaviour that seems to implicate those commands. For example, after using them to resize my Google Earth window, whenever I click any key after that I get unwanted movement. (If you're familiar with GE, it's like a tour starting!) If I close ME Pro then restart GE, normality returns. It also somehow seems to arise only if I use shortcut keys for activation, such as typing '##gs' to run a macro named 'Get Size'. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I'd appreciate feedback before reporting the following as a possible bug please. My screen has a resolution of 1920 x 1200. When applied to any maximised window, these ME Pro commands return incorrect results: Variable Set Integer %X%: Set to the Current Window's Left returns -4 instead of 0 Variable Set Integer Y: Set to the Current Window's Top returns -4 instead of 0 Variable Set Integer WindowWidth: Set to the Current Window's Width returns 1928 instead of 1920 Variable Set Integer WindowHeight: Set to the Current Window's Height returns 1180 instead of 1200 This seems to be down to ME Pro because if I use the Prt Scr key to copy the screen to any of my image editors, the size reported is 1920 x 1200. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Any hope of a reply please? I'm still hoping for some more information or a pointer on where to find it please. Meanwhile I tried a few macros and see that they require a password. So I assume that confirms that a license must be bought. Yet I see nothing about that on the site. Hence my follow up query a couple of weeks ago. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Hi Cory, I was just looking for confirmation that others could reproduce it. But I've now reported it as a bug, -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Double-click. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I'm not sure if this is a cosmetic quirk, file corruption, or some other functional issue, but I've encountered it several times. If I copy commands from my script editor to my text editor, using Copy Command Text, I sometimes get strange additions added to various Mouse commands. Here's an example: Also, sometimes the spurious additions are in the Script too, but disappear if I d-click the command! Edit: After more work I've isolated this now. It consistently arises whenever I toggle between Script Editor to Direct Editor. Code like this Delay: 50 milliseconds Mouse Left Button Down Delay: 100 milliseconds gets changed to Delay: 50 milliseconds Mouse Left Button Down: 50 milliseconds Delay: 100 milliseconds And from that point on, if it's copy/pasted anywhere else it will have the spurious addition. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

This might get the tray icon back: Start > Run > C:\Program Files\Macro Express3\MacExp.exe -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Steve: Neat! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Steve, well spotted - I'll watch out for that sort of mistake in future! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Did you read Post #7 of that thread? I can't tell without studying your macro code, but I suspect the difference in behaviour is due to the absence or not of the trailing backslash. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Moving or copying an entire folder is more complicated than it should be IMO, as discussed in this thread. http://pgmacros.invisionzone.com/index.php?showtopic=3655 I've now submitted a formal feature request. Like other well-designed ME commands, I think a new Move/Copy Folder command should be added. Its dialog would simply let you browse to the Target folder and Destination folder respectively (checking for the latter's existence in standard Windows fashion and giving you the option of creating it if not), and a checkbox asking whether you want to Move or Copy. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Kevin, What about my example please? I'm not using Text Box Close, so why does the floating message close before the end of the macro? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I can reproduce that. Also, do you think the following issue is directly associated? As I understand it, this macro should keep the floating box open until I've closed the final message, but it doesn't. Text Box Display: Floating box Delay: 1 seconds Text Box Display: Child message Macro Return <TEXT BOX DISPLAY Title="Floating box" Content="{\\rtf1\\ansi\\ansicpg1252\\deff0\\deflang2057{\\fonttbl{\\f0\\fnil\\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\\f1\\fnil Tahoma;}}\r\n\\viewkind4\\uc1\\pard\\f0\\fs16 This is supposed to close on a 'Close Box' command or end of macro\\f1 \r\n\\par }\r\n" Left="Center" Top="Center" Width="278" Height="200" Monitor="0" OnTop="FALSE" Keep_Focus="TRUE" Mode="\x02" Delay="0"/> <DELAY Flags="\x01" Time="1"/> <TEXT BOX DISPLAY Title="Child message" Content="{\\rtf1\\ansi\\ansicpg1252\\deff0\\deflang2057{\\fonttbl{\\f0\\fnil\\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\\f1\\fnil Tahoma;}}\r\n\\viewkind4\\uc1\\pard\\f0\\fs16 Floating box should still be open because no 'Close Box' was issued and macro has not ended.\\f1 \r\n\\par }\r\n" Left="Center" Top="Center" Width="278" Height="200" Monitor="0" OnTop="FALSE" Keep_Focus="TRUE" Mode="\x00" Delay="0"/> <MACRO RETURN/> -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

When you display a pop-up or floating menu, ME Pro neatly sizes it to exactly fit the number of macros it displays. But a snag is that for longish names the default column is not wide enough. Yet when that is manually dragged wider, an unnecessary vertical scroll bar appears and the bottom macro disappears. Apart from fixing that minor quirk, would it be possible to make the whole window resizeable in standard fashion? At present, you can resize it but none of the extra space is usable (either horizontally or vertically). Alternatively, optionally eliminate the Scope column, or at least abbreviate its contents, to allow more space. While on this point, I've personally never found it of much practical use in its present form. I'd like to see it show what program it's scoped to (or 'Multiple'), not just that it is scoped. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

This is a minor point but I'd appreciate comments on resolving it please. If I have a menu open in the Menu Builder and I press a letter key, the selection jumps helpfully to the first macro starting with that letter. But if I happen to use one of my global shortkey macros while that window is in focus, all of which in my case start with the # symbol, I get beeped at, because I don't have any macro starting with # ! I'm not sure what the best solution might be, either by ISS or a user. The beep is presumably the one activated optionally within Windows, using Control Panel > Sounds & Audio Devices > Sounds > Default Beep. But there are times when I do want that warning, so I don't want to switch it off altogether. BTW, I recall that same feature of 'finding the first name starting with...' was requested in a recent thread for the Explorer window. If/when that facility is released, this unwanted beep will become much more frequent. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK