terrypin

I created a snippet which contains some incorrect code. How do I delete or modify it please? I tried to simply create it again but ME won't let me give the corrected version an existing name. BTW, the mistake I made is one I make frequently. Is there any way I can change the default delay from 100 seconds to 100 milliseconds? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

OK, thanks Kevin. But are you entering this only as a bug (re F1 under Activation) or as a request to restore the major loss in function from ME 3 (a Context Help button in every dialog)? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

In your place I think I'd start with as clean a slate as possible. IOW, uninstall, remove all traces of ME Pro from HD and registry then re-install. Then methodically try some very simple newly-written macros. If OK, ensure any MEX file you want to import is still working OK in ME 3 before you try using it in ME Pro. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Both the forums for ME 3 and ME Pro display identical tabs in my Firefox browser. Icons are identical and visible text too ('Macro Expr...'). So it's impossible to distinguish which is which in a busy session with 10-20 tabs active. Is it possible to change them please, even if only their colour? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Just paste the string variable in directly - no need for clipboard. Here's a trivial example: Variable Set String MyVariable1 to "Test string" Window Activate: Textpad Text Type (Simulate Keystrokes): Pasted result = %MyVariable1% Macro Return <VARIABLE SET STRING Option="\x00" Destination="MyVariable1" Value="Test string"/> <WINDOW ACTIVATE Title="Textpad" Exact_Match="FALSE" Wildcards="FALSE"/> <TEXT TYPE Action="0" Text="Pasted result = %MyVariable1%"/> <MACRO RETURN/> Having opened a blank document in my text editor, when I run the above I get the following typed in: Pasted result = Test string -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I revised that macro to this: Delay: 100 milliseconds Text Box Display: Announcement Window Activate: ScheduleTest2.txt Wait for Window Title: ScheduleTest2.txt Text Type (Simulate Keystrokes): Time macro started (approx) = Delay: 100 milliseconds Delay: 100 milliseconds Date/Time: Type out the current date/time using "hh:mm:ss" as the format Delay: 100 milliseconds Text Type (Simulate Keystrokes): <ENTER> Delay: 100 milliseconds Macro Return <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <TEXT BOX DISPLAY Title="Announcement" Content="{\\rtf1\\ansi\\ansicpg1252\\deff0\\deflang2057{\\fonttbl{\\f0\\fnil\\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\\f1\\fnil Tahoma;}}\r\n\\viewkind4\\uc1\\pard\\f0\\fs16 Macro started. It will write the time to the open Textpad document then terminate and run again as specified in Activations.\\f1 \r\n\\par }\r\n" Left="Center" Top="Center" Width="278" Height="200" Monitor="0" OnTop="TRUE" Keep_Focus="TRUE" Mode="\x01" Delay="5"/> <WINDOW ACTIVATE Title="ScheduleTest2.txt" Exact_Match="FALSE" Wildcards="FALSE" _IGNORE="0x0006"/> <WAIT FOR WINDOW TITLE Title="ScheduleTest2.txt" Partial="TRUE" Wildcards="FALSE" Indefinite="TRUE" Hours="0" Minutes="0" Seconds="0"/> <TEXT TYPE Action="0" Text="Time macro started (approx) = "/> <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <DATE/TIME Format="hh:mm:ss" Flags="\x30" Date="02/01/2009 11:53:06" Day_Offset="0" Month_Offset="0" Year_Offset="0" Hour_Offset="0" Minute_Offset="0" Second_Offset="0" Left="Center" Top="Center" Monitor="0" IsDateVar="FALSE"/> <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <TEXT TYPE Action="0" Text="<ENTER>"/> <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <MACRO RETURN/> It gave these results (pasted from my text editor): Time macro started (approx) = 12:37:34 Time macro started (approx) = 12:40:34 Time macro started (approx) = 12:43:54 Time macro started (approx) = 12:46:54 Time macro started (approx) = 12:49:54 Time macro started (approx) = 12:53:54 Time macro started (approx) = 12:56:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:00:44 Time macro started (approx) = 13:03:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:06:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:09:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:14:04 Time macro started (approx) = 13:17:04 Time macro started (approx) = 13:20:04 Time macro started (approx) = 13:23:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:26:54 Time macro started (approx) = 13:29:54 Note how the intervals are mainly 3s but sometimes 4s. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

When I run a macro with F9 from the Script Editor there seems a relatively long wait (close to 2 secs) before the new dialog Start Debugger in a Different Window appears. Is that delay correct behaviour please, or maybe some setting of mine? Also, how do I set ME Pro to always start in the last window, as I can in ME 3, to avoid this extra step? BTW, 'debugger' gives no hits in Help > Search. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

But only the editors it seems? No context help is available elsewhere. For example, under the Activation tab I d-click the entry to bring up the Scheduled dialog, but F1 does nothing. If I close that and try F1 (to get help on Activations in general, as a second best), F1 brings up help on Script Editor. This seems a significant loss of functionality. ME 3 has context help accessible in every dialog. For example, the Help button in its equivalent Set Schedule dialog immediately displays what I need. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

When I get time I'll try it myself, but meanwhile are you confident nothing else is running that could invalidate the 'idle' criteria? I've never really understood whether 'idle' is defined simply as 'no keyboard or mouse activity'. 'Idle' seems obvious enough until you run a utility like Filemon or Procmon and see thousands of entries in a few seconds! BTW, I take it the macro can't run without your being aware of it? In your closing sentence did you mean 2-min wait? --------- A little later I wrote a similar macro myself. It's set to run after 1 min of idle time and then every 2 mins. But, after 10 mins or so of staring at the inactive screen, it hasn't run once yet! FWIW, here's my macro: Delay: 100 milliseconds Text Box Display: Announcement Macro Return <DELAY Flags="\x02" Time="100"/> <TEXT BOX DISPLAY Title="Announcement" Content="{\\rtf1\\ansi\\ansicpg1252\\deff0\\deflang2057{\\fonttbl{\\f0\\fnil\\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\\f1\\fnil Tahoma;}}\r\n\\viewkind4\\uc1\\pard\\f0\\fs16 Macro started. Will terminate in a few seconds and then run again every 2 mins.\\f1 \r\n\\par }\r\n" Left="Center" Top="Center" Width="278" Height="200" Monitor="0" OnTop="TRUE" Keep_Focus="TRUE" Mode="\x01" Delay="5"/> <MACRO RETURN/> Incidentally, surely if your macro runs every 1-min there is a high likelihood that it breaks the 2-min idle period, so there will never be another run? Does the setting under the Range tab have any bearing? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Steve - and same to you! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I know the Feature Request URL, but what's the address for bug reporting? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I too am having trouble getting anywhere with Date/Time. But in any case it seems to me that ME's Date/Time function is very limited compared to say Excel, which would be my obvious choice of application for such calculations. In Excel: =INT(A2-A1) would give you the number of whole days between two date/ time values (which you would typically format as Number or General). =MOD(A2-A1,1) would give you the remaining time (format with Custom to say hh:mm:ss). Nevertheless it really should be pretty trivial to do this in ME, but I'm still struggling. I haven't used the Date/Time functions before this discussion, so I expect there may be some glaringly obvious points I'm missing. One thing that threw me for a while was that under Variables the list of commands includes 'Date/Time', which for consistency I think should be called 'Variable Set Date/Time' (or, better, change the entire list to get rid of the redundant word 'Variable' in every command). Another stumbling block I encountered while trying to write the following simple macro to subtract two dates was that ME wouldn't let me use the name I'd used earlier but mistakenly assigned as a text variable, even though I'd deleted all commands and started again. Anyway, here's my code as it currently stands: // Enter two date/time values into appropriately named Date/Time variables Date/Time: Set %Earlier Date% to "10/11/2008 16:48:00" Date/Time: Set %Later date% to "11/12/2008 16:48:00" Variable Modify Date/Time: %Result% = %Later date% - %Earlier Date% Text Box Display: <COMMENT Value="Enter two date/time values into appropriately named Date/Time variables"/> <DATE/TIME Flags="\xB1" Date="10/11/2008 16:48:00" Day_Offset="0" Month_Offset="0" Year_Offset="0" Hour_Offset="0" Minute_Offset="0" Second_Offset="0" Left="Center" Top="Center" Monitor="0" Variable="%Earlier Date%" IsDateVar="TRUE"/> <DATE/TIME Flags="\xB1" Date="11/12/2008 16:48:00" Day_Offset="0" Month_Offset="0" Year_Offset="0" Hour_Offset="0" Minute_Offset="0" Second_Offset="0" Left="Center" Top="Center" Monitor="0" Variable="%Later date%" IsDateVar="TRUE"/> <VARIABLE MODIFY DATE/TIME DateVar="%Result%" Option="\x01" LeftVar="%Later date%" RightVal="%Earlier Date%" UseInteger="TRUE" MathOpt="\x00"/> <TEXT BOX DISPLAY Content="{\\rtf1\\ansi\\ansicpg1252\\deff0\\deflang2057{\\fonttbl{\\f0\\fnil\\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\\f1\\fnil Tahoma;}}\r\n{\\colortbl ;\\red128\\green0\\blue0;}\r\n\\viewkind4\\uc1\\pard\\cf1\\b\\f0\\fs16 Result = \\f1 %Result%\\cf0\\b0 \r\n\\par }\r\n" Left="Center" Top="Center" Width="278" Height="200" Monitor="0" OnTop="FALSE" Keep_Focus="TRUE" Mode="\x00" Delay="0"/> That gave me the following strange result: Result = 29/01/1900 23:59:59 Bottom line: all very confusing. A few worked examples in Help would be good. Or a few here in the forum from users who have mastered it. (BTW, these new formating features sure do make the Codebox entries here long! Is there any clever forum feature to wrap them?) -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

A minor cosmetic point. With a Comment command selected in the Script Editor, if I use R-click > Set Text Color to change the text colour to black, it also changes the background to black. Also, Clear Colors on a Comment doesn't change the blue to black as I'd expect. Presumably blue is the default? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Yes, I know, but my question is why would you expect that additional information to be acceptable as part of a hyperlink? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I've recently installed a couple of Icon utilities. Icons from File from http://www.vlsoftware.net/exico/ lets you drag an EXE or DLL onto it and then save all the icons as .ICO files (or as several other types) in one quick operation, choosing your destination folder. IconViewer from http://www.botproductions.com/iconview/iconview.html adds an Icon tab to a file's Properties, as I've shown here: As mentioned, in my case I'm usually just assigning the icon associated with that application, so I need to extract it from say Excel.exe. But if I wanted to make an icon from any of my own images then I could use IrfanView, resize to 32x32, and save as .ICO. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks all. Cory: I've duly sent that feature request, although from Jeff's comment I'd hope it's already high on the list of things to fix? BTW, does a list of 'bugs encountered' exist, to avoid duplication? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

I just tried this with a similar shortcut: "C:\Program Files\Macro Express3\MacExp.exe" /APosition & size GE & Mem-Map (The macro works fine, positioning and sizing two program windows, Google Earth and Memory-Map.) But the hyperlink that ends up in Word 2000 is only the executable: C:\Program Files\Macro Express3\MacExp.exe I don't see why the other parameters would be included? But you obviously do, so maybe I'm missing something? On clicking the link, I get the familiar warning message about macros (VBA macros in this context) and on clicking OK that's all I see (presumably because MacExp.exe is already running). -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Joe, same to you! -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

OK, duly done. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Even with some of my more flakey macros I've never had a problem stopping the macro in ME 3, with either: - R-clicking the System Tray 'Running macro' icon - Using the Pause+Scroll Lock keys But today neither method worked on a simple macro that opened a web site page. I had to use Terminate Macro Express. Eventually I found that the likely cause was that I had 'Wait for the webpage' enabled, although I'm using Firefox. I always had this set in ME 3 without any problem. It's worrying that these Aborts, particularly the hotkey method, cannot be relied upon 100%. In this case there was no major problem, but if I saw my HD starting to disappear I'd like to be able to hit those keys and minimise the damage! BTW, the reason I had it set in ME 3 was that I had hoped that sooner or later you would get the feature to support Firefox. It's disappointing that ME Pro doesn't do so. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Kevin, that fixed it. I'll give that a try too sometime soon. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Steve. I expect Kevin or Stan will look at this and let us know what's up. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

In ME3 I activate macros with shortkeys like p-l, p8-1, s-mm, etc. But in ME Pro when I try to enter the minus sign when assigning a shortkey it is ignored. No character is entered. Yet those old ME3 macros do work in ME Pro, i.e. I can activate them with ##s-mm etc. --------- A little later I discovered that I can fix this by removing the minus sign from the list of 'punctuation characters'. But Help says these only apply to Suffix shortkeys, not Prefixes which I'm using. And I do not have 'Use Punctuation Chars' checked anyway. So something seems wrong. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Thanks Steve. At present I do indeed have all my icons in a fixed location, C:\Docs\My Pictures\Icons. (A trivial ME macro with the shortkey 'ic' gets me to it quickly for Explorer operations.) That's handy sometimes, for assigning icons from several other applications, like waypoints for my mapping programs. But for ME icons I mainly need executables, like Excel.exe in the example I mentioned, which are located in various places, typically within \Program Files or \Windows. So unless someone comes up with a clever hack then I think I'll have to write a macro to make these bulk changes. A suggestion to the developers which would solve the issue: show the last used path and filename by default. BTW, I'm curious whether other ME users actually bother customising icons? -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK