kevin

Greg,

I just reread your original post where you say you are not connected to a network. The programmer is puzzled about why the Windows 'internetgetconnectedstate' API (note new name) is returning true in this case.

You may want to discuss this directly with the Insight Software Solutions support people. See www.macros.com/support.htm

Greg,

I did not know the answer to your question so I asked one of the programmers.

The 'If Online' command uses the Windows Inetconnected API to see if there is a network connection. This API returns true if any network connection is active.

In other words, if you are connected to an internal network using TCP/IP, the 'If Online' command will return true regardless of whether or not your dialup connection is active.

Have you tried this:

Variable Set String %T1% from Program Name
Activate Window: "%T1%"

Macro Express will only run one macro at a time.

Renee,

If your users are sharing a single macro file you need to make sure that the "File Locking of Macro Files" and "Automatic Synchronization Update" options are enabled. These are found in Options | Preferences | Network.

These are disabled by default. Are these options enabled for your users?

By the way, if 'Automatic Synchronization Update' is enabled, the users will not have to terminate and relaunch Macro Express. Each copy of Macro Express will reload the macro file when a changed macro file is detected. The 'Synchronize Ever [ xx ] Minutes' option determines how often Macro Express checks for changes. By default, this is set to 10 minutes.

If you know the path and name of the file that you are saving to, you could use the "Wait for File Ready" command. When the application is done writing to the file, the file should become 'ready'.

Linda,

If your macro has already 'tabbed' to the correct field, you should be able to use these macro commands to use the Capture Control command:

Mouse Move To Text Cursor Position
Variable Set Integer %N1% from Mouse X Position
Variable Set Integer %N2% from Mouse Y Position
Capture Control to %C1%

Use %N1% and %N2% in the X and Y coordinates fields. As long as your commands to tab to a specific field work, this technique will work regardless of the screen resolution.

Have you tried the "Log Message" command? This command seems to do what you need including adding a date/time stamp. It is found in the Debug category of commands.

Macro Express will send keystrokes to the Command window for Windows XP, 2000 and NT. It will NOT send keystrokes to the MS-DOS window for Windows ME, 98 and 95.

I do not think the problem is with Hyper Threading. We have heard some speculation that certain problems may have been caused by HT so I upgraded to a faster computer. But Macro Express works fine on my new, fast, HT computer ... including Wait for Web Page.

The 'Wait for Web Page' command was rewritten for Macro Express v 3.5. Prior versions of Macro Express used the 'browser helper object' icapture.dll. Macro Express v 3.5 no longer uses or requires icapture.dll.

One consequence of the change is in the timing of the 'Wait for Web Page' command. If you have a fast internet connection and your web page comes up very fast, the 'Wait for Web Page' command may not realize that the page is already loaded. To get around this, I have added a small delay like this:

Web Site: http://www.msn.com [Default Browser]

Delay 0.1 Seconds

Wait for Web Page: "www.msn.com"

Note that msn.com is NOT a web page that will load fast. In fact, quite the opposite. I used this only as an example.

Another thing to try is to use the new Wait for Web Page option in the Web Site command. Now instead of having both Web Site and Wait for Web Page commands, you can have a single command.

Web Site: http://www.msn.com [Default Browser - Wait to load]

Some types of macro activations, like scheduled macros, are queued. Others are not. A HotKey activation is never queued. Whether or not a Window Activated macro is queued is controlled by the 'Enable Window Activation Caching' option that Joe mentioned.

There is no way to add or delete activations from the internal queue.

Your suggestion of storing a flag in the registry should work. Another idea would be to add a 'Disable Macro' command at the top of your scheduled macro and an 'Enable Macro' command at the end of it. This will prevent any additional activations of that macro during the time that the macro is running. However, you will have to make sure that the 'Enable Macro' command does not interfere with your existing routine to disable the macro.

Jim,

Your crash report was forwarded to a programmer for analysis. I will ask if they have had a chance to analyze it yet. When we find something out you will hear directly (outside this forum).

Richard,

I progressed from paper tape to punched cards and then 8" floppies to write programs in assembly language. We have sure come a long way since then.

I too have limited patience remembering hotkeys. My solution is to dedicate a single hotkey to handle most of my macros. I happen to use F2. Using the Scope properties and 'If Window' commands, I can have F2 do specific things for each window in a given program. And F2 can do completely different things for other programs.

I also use F3 to enter passwords. So whenever I need to enter a password I just press the F3 key. Macro Express figures out which macro to run and that macro figures out which window is displayed. Then the password is entered.

I echo the advice from the other posters. I create a lot of 'No Activation' macros and use these inside my more complex macros. And I use the remark command to put comments in my macros including a comment box at the top of each macro that describes what it does and which variables are used and what they are used for. As my 'libarary' of macro functions increase, it gets easier to create complex macros.

About a year and a half ago I experimented with voice recognition with the idea of adding voice recognition to Macro Express. I was using a 1.7 GHz computer. I decided that the computer just didn't have quite enough power and I set the project aside. Now that I have a 3 GHz computer, I may try again.

There are several Macro Express customers who already use voice recognition software with Macro Express. It isn't as integrated as they would like but it is possible. Their advice? Use a high quality microphone in a quiet environment on a very powerful computer.

Andy,

A quick google search and experiment with Explorer and Regedit turned up the this. When the Tools | Folder Options | View | "Do not show hidden files and folders" radio button is clicked the registry value 'Hidden' in the registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

changed from 1 to 2. Similarly when the the Tools | Folder Options | View | "Show hidden files and folders" radio button is clicked the registry value 'Hidden' changed from 2 to 1.

Using this information you could write a macro that uses the 'Write Registry Integer' command to change this registry value.

I did not check to see if this was the only registry value that changed so some testing and experimenting may be needed.

sfigg,

Thank you for pointing this out. I have entered this issue into our issue/bug tracking system so it can be fixed.

We encourage feedback from users. You may use the form found at Report a Bug.

You may request features at Request a feature

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Kevin Heaton

Insight Software Solutions, Inc.

Simon,

If there is another window with 'Lotus' or 'Notes' in the name, then it may get focus when the Activate Window command runs instead of the intended window. I have written macros that, to my chagrin, didn't work because I used part of the Window name in my macro name. For example, I created a macro titled 'Launch Calculator'. It didn't work be cause the Activate or Launch: "Calculator" command found the macro and set focus to it.

Another thing to watch out for are hidden or invisible windows that contain the part of the name that you are trying to activate. Click on the elipse button [...] in the Activate or Launch Window command dialog to view the list of windows. Check both the list of visible windows and the list of hidden windows for any that contain 'Lotus' or 'Notes'.

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Kevin Heaton

Insight Software Solutions, Inc.