AlexPGP's Corner

My client sends me a huge (50 MB) Word file that frankly, can only be transmitted using exceptional means (i.e., Dropbox, Skype) because few, if any, email systems will allow attachments of such size. My task is not to translate the monster, but to reduce the size of the file.

My first step involved doing a search-and-replace on the graphics, searching for ^g and replacing with nothing. The resulting file was less than 2 MB in size, so it's a safe bet that reducing the size of the graphics (in the sense of data volume, as opposed to display dimensions) is called for.

I did not quite write a macro to do this, but I think one could be written with little trouble. The general algorithm would be:

1. Make sure ImageMagick is installed with the legacy convert option enabled.
2. In Word, find the next graphic
3. Cut the graphic to the clipboard.
4. From a DOS command line, in a known directory (say, C:\temp) run the command convert clipboard:myimage image.png.
5. In Word, click on Insert|Pictures, navigate to the known directory from step 4 (this only needs to be done the first time), select image.png and click on Insert.
6. Unless all of the graphics have been replaced, go to step 2 and repeat the subsequent steps.

The final product was a hair over 6 MB in size, which is still large enough to make some email systems gag, but completely usable elsewhere.

Excelsior!

It occurs to me that the { DATE } field in Word documents isn't tremendously useful, since it seems to always show the current date.

One might argue that it would be useful to show a date, on paper, on which a document was printed, but then you'd never be able to tell what that date was unless you looked at the paper (in other words, the file would be of no help).

Better to use, perhaps:

• { DATE } for the date on which the document was created;
• { PRINTDATE } for the date on which the document was last printed;
• { SAVEDATE } for the date on which the document was last saved.

Cheers...

I had this idea yesterday of creating a table of many narrow columns and short rows in Word - the effect would be not unlike graph paper - and then to use the merge-cell command to create a table whose format would very nearly match that of the tax return I'm to translate (or at least the first page of said return).

Having printed the table, I was faced with the problem of superposing the printed table and the printed document, and nothing short of a light table (which I do not have) would appear to do the trick. It then occurred to me that if I printed the table on something transparent (a sheet of plastic) my problem would be solved. Not having any such sheets available out-of-the-box, I cut up an A4-sized plastic folder that I use when I want to group several related items together, and sent one of the sheets through the laser printer.

Oops!

At about the time the leading edge of the plastic sheet should have been coming out of the printer, it wasn't and it dawned on me in a flash: laser printing involves a step in which the sheet being printed is run around a very hot roller to fuse the toner to the paper. At which point the plastic sheet stopped moving altogether and an alarm light started blinking.

Fortunately, I was able to extract the melted mess that was created without any apparent problem, since the printer continues to work without problems, but I think I may have just lucked out.

* * *For the second time, I've run across a phenomenon in which an application appears to freeze or do nothing when invoked. The apparent reason? There's a part of it that was "left behind" on the "other" monitor when the machine was put to sleep from two-monitor mode.

What actually happened: In laptop-only mode, I fired up Semagic from the tray, whereupon it would not respond at all. Upon returning home and connecting the second monitor, it turns out there was a "History Item" dialog box open on the second screen. Something similar happened the other day when I tried to use The Sleuthhound, but in that case, I killed the process and continued on my merry way.

Just some things to keep in mind.

Cheers...

A while ago I got one of those new FreeAgent portable drives from Seagate, hoping that the advertised ability to take your work environment with you was something more than just a rewarmed version of U3 technology, which has been applied with almost imperceptible success in the thumb drive market (at least in my limited view). While hoping for the best, I was prepared for the worst, and figured that the "worst case scenario" was my acquiring a reasonably priced drive with twice the capacity of my laptop.

What I wanted to do was offload my iTunes application (and library) from my laptop to something that would hold both without leaving any permanent footprint on my VAIO. (Basically, this means installing iTunes on the FreeAgent drive so that no residue finds its way into the VAIO's registry.)

The FreeAgent add-on software - whose name I have forgotten - was only a trial version, requiring yet another module to implement the functionality that I sought. So I installed trial versions of the add-on software and the add-on to the add-on, and attempted to install iTunes.

No joy.

Somewhere in my gyrations about the Web, I picked up the name of something called MojoPac, which I downloaded and installed as a 30-day trial. I was pleased that iTunes installed like a champ. Office 97 installed like a champ as well, onto a drive called "C" that has nothing to do with the drive installed in my VAIO (and which drive is inaccessible while Mojo is running).

With the ability to switch back and forth between Mojo and my VAIO (as "host") it's like having two environments running on one piece of iron.

It's not all fun and games, though.

Primo, if I leave the system alone for a while, Windows (on the "host") will eventually try to go into standby mode, but is prevented by the Mojo application. If the host system is trying to go into standby because of a low battery condition, the results could be unpleasant (loss of data, file corruption).

Secondo, the ability to carry your environment with you, with your music, applications, data, etc. is a double-edged sword. An external drive is much easier to forget to take with you when you go on the road (I mean, it's not a computer, see?), and for the same reason, I imagine it'd be easier to misplace or have someone misplace it for you, if you get my drift, while you are on the road. I'll post more about this issue in some other rock, later.

Terzo - and this is a big one - there is iTunes.

( ...on authorizations, or lack of them, explained in geek behind the cut! )

Ya gotta love that DRM! (And I'm sure it's only going to get "better" as time goes by... but not for us poor users, but again, I digress...)

Quarto, portability only extends as far as the administrator of any given machine allows. You can't take the Mojo drive and connect it to a machine that has a lot of restrictions on it, because despite the fact you are isolated from the machine's drives, you are still running a program on the machine and are making use of resources such as network cards. Still, this really isn't a limitation of Mojo, but of Life.

* * *The loaf I made earlier today... oops, yesterday, came out pretty well, except that the very top looks like it collapsed. I suspect there may have been too much water in the mix, this time. The product, however, is edible. I look forward to more experimentation.

So, it's just after midnight as I type this, and I have a pile of stuff that has to get done tomorrow, since today turned into one more of those "days off" that folks have from time to time. (This may be an indicator of burnout, I suspect, but I'm going to enjoy such indicators while I can!)

I plan to get up early tomorrow (around 5 am) and really hit it hard, and then try to get some sound sleep late in the afternoon, as another week of MSR night shifts starts tomorrow night.

Cheers...

Now, in the real world, repeating the same actions over and over to get the same failed result is a pretty good definition of insanity. However, if you play with technology enough - and especially if you do any programming - you'll soon find that sometimes trying it just One More Time™ does the trick.

You see, the server has a "reset" button that didn't seem to do anything the previous 17.5 times I depressed it, but for some reason (or for some combination of arcane circumstances) actually reset the unit this last time I pressed it. From there onward, setting up the server was a piece of cake.

Not only that, but I learned how to clear out a print job that doesn't seem to want to go away using "conventional" methods (the way the gnomes of Redmond intended). Summarized without fluff:

1. NET STOP SPOOLER (entered from command prompt)
2. Delete the SPL and SHD files associated with the jammed job from %WinRoot%\System32\Spool\Printers (need to rely on file time stamps for this)
3. NET START SPOOLER (again, from command prompt)

Telecon tomorrow! Early start! (Good thing I napped this afternoon!)

Cheers...

One more note, and then I'll call it a night.

Some time ago, I downloaded a pretty nifty piece of software (USBDLM) that installs as a Windows service and allows you to control what drive letters are assigned to USB drives plugged into your system (for example, you could always have your "Geek Squad" USB drive always show up as drive K:). This is royally helpful if you use a backup routine that expects to see your backup directory, which resides on a USB drive, sitting on a particular drive.

To a lesser extent, from a usability standpoint, it also allows you to install applications, though they will still be tied to machine the USB drive is connected to and on which the application was installed (registry issues, dontchaknow).

And on that note, I shall go to sleep.

Cheers...

A client sent me a reminder a few minutes ago - part of a broader effort aimed at its entire freelance staff (about 100 names), since their names were included in the "From:" field - about the need to maintain confidentiality. There is a sort of quintessential irony there, which could have been avoided via the judicious use of the "bcc:" option, but in any event, the irony brought a smile to my face.

I've just discovered Pixel, an image editor that performs much the same functions as Photoshop, but at a much lower price. It does not use the cookie-cutter functionality (i.e., standard dialogs and controls) available through commercial Windows application frameworks, which gives it a slightly different look and feel, but the plus side is that Pixel is available for a number of platforms (including Linux). The trial version is said to be full-featured, except for a popup window exhorting the user to buy a copy of the program and the fact that processed images have a watermark applied to them.

I ran into a feature of TrueCrypt this morning that at first looked like a bug, which I discovered as follows: My VAIO went into hibernation from a Windows session yesterday, but as I am used to starting the machine by jogging the power switch (I am told one hits the "any key" to revive a hibernating Windows session), the unit came up in boot-ready configuration and booted into Ubuntu Linux.

An attempt to mount the TrueCrypt "partition" failed, which flummoxed me, as I was absolutely sure I had the passphrase right. I put it out of my mind until I rebooted the VAIO into Windows (restoring the "hibernating" session) where, hey, presto! it was apparent that the TrueCrypt "partition" was still mounted. I haven't checked to make sure, but I've since dismounted and remounted the partition using the right passphrase, and suspect my problem lay with the partition's having already been mounted (even if hibernating) when I tried to mount it again under Linux.

I'll verify that later, however. As it is, I'm behind the eight-ball for the day's work: I need to apply some effort now.

Cheers...