It works fine for me, but may still have problems finding your desktop. If so, let me know, providing precise details, so I can fine tune it.
I hope to bring out a new version before then.
I no longer attempt to remove the user's Backup directory, since this seems to cause problems on NT systems. It was unnecessary anyway; it is sufficient to remove all of the files before re-creating the directory.
The debug log file is now removed at start-up, so the information in it pertains to the last session only, rather than it growing forever.
The various flags in the preferences dialog were not being read unless you went into that dialog. Now they are.
If the file list has changed, but you haven't pressed "Save File List" you are prompted before the program exits, to give you a chance to save it first.
Ripcord now writes all debug messages to the file ripcord.log in your main windows directory. It does this irrespective of whether you have debugging turned on, so you don't have to try to re-create a problem that has occurred.
Therefore, if Ripcord crashes for some reason, you can just mail that file to me and I should be able to track the problem down down much more quickly.
Hopefully, this version fixes a bug that caused "(null)" lines to be written to the ripcord.ini file, which in turn caused Ripcord to crash the next time it was run.
If anyone sees this behaviour from this version on, I'd appreciate it if you could send me some mail.
Also, previously, if you had not added any new files, when you pressed the "Install New Files" button you were told so and not allowed to continue. Now, a message box appears, but you can opt to run HotSync anyway.
Rather than assuming it knows where in the windows registry your Pilot Desktop information resides, this version searches the registry looking for any that have a subkey of "Pilot Desktop".
If you have a value in your ripcord.ini file, and that
registry entry actually exists, it overrides Ripcord's guess at
the correct value. Ripcord tells you what line you should put
in your ripcord.ini to stop the message coming up.
If the entry you have specified does not exist, then Ripcord
assumes its guess is correct, but tells you what you had and
what entries it discovered during its search, so you can update
your ripcord.ini to the correct value.
Version 1.06 ...
Now adds "Pilot Files" in as the thing to be displayed
inside Explorer when looking at file settings.
Also sets the default icon for .prc and ,pdb files to one of its own icons. Now, all I have to do is get a real icon. Any takers, for a free registration?
The registered version no longer says "(Unregistered)".
I've added some more debug in the search for the HotSync executable, because someone had a problem; hopefully, this will help me sort it out.
I have now changed the command that is inserted into the registry to
say "ripcord.exe %1", rather than just "ripcord.exe". I
think this should fix the problem some people had getting the
associations to work correctly.
Version 1.03 ...
This version attempts to work correctly with Ascend97's
own version of HotSync (hsm12.exe) by making sure it runs
in the same directory as the executable.
If you user Ascend97 and this doesn't work, let me know.
Note that the old associations are stored so you can press the button again later to restore them, in case you decide to associate another installer or other program with those extensions.
This version fixes that!
I will be updating the web page very soon to include some more user-friendly explanation of how to use Ripcord, including how to overcome various problems you might encounter.
This version will expire on Feb 2nd. The next version, which will come out before the current one expires, will be such that you can use it for 14 days from the date you first run it.
The only changes in this version are that it is a lot smarter about it's handling of the "registry" line if you need one in your ripcord.ini file.
I also attempted to have Ripcord remember where it was last positioned on the screen, but that isn't working yet. I hope to get that right in version 1.01, which will be released shortly.
Someone sent me some mail saying Ascend 97 has a new HotSync called "hsm12.exe", so I now look for hotsync.exe, hsm1N.exe and hsm2N.exe where N ranges from zero to nine. That should catch just about everything that's out there.
If you have problems getting Ripcord to work because it can't find registry entries, there is now much more extensive debug that you can turn on if you run Ripcord from a DOS command line that says "ripcord debug". You might also like to try turning on debug while it is running if you get any problems after start-up. I've added quite a lot of information that can help me track a bug down for you.
Also, Ripcord now looks for all of the following variants of the HotSync program ...
Obviously, if you use the normal Pilot Desktop, you don't need to do this, since the value mentioned above is used as the default.
The ideas behind this is so that people who are using things other than the standard Pilot desktop and HotSync can still use Ripcord (so long as there are "Preferences" and "Core" sub-keys in there).
If anyone who is using another product tries this and has problems, please let me know what your registry entries actually look like and I'll try to organise that it works with your software.
You can sort the lists by clicking on the headings, just like in Explorer. The nice thing about this is that it makes it easier to see if you have included a particular file. You can also easily check if you have two copies of the same file, being pulled in from different directories. I will do something smarter re this in a later version, such as put all but the newest one in the "Possibly Redundant" list.
The horizontal scroll bars now work. You get approximately double the width of each list box to scroll in, which should be sufficient for almost any file path.
It no longer displays the "The following file has changed ..." message box if you are installing by double clicking or dragging onto the icon.
Some of the parts of the main dialog have been lined up more carefully.
I've shortened the main dialog so that it fits perfectly on a 640 X 480 screen.
There is now a button to mark all of the redundant files as being new, so you can do an "Install New Files" to get them back into your Pilot.
A check is now made to make certain you didn't press the "Re-Install Everything" button by mistake.
There is a new option in the preferences that allows you to have everything removed from the Backup directory when doing a new install, so all your 3rd party databases should get backed up ... assuming you're using HS 1.1 :-).
I've added horizontal scroll bars to the lists, but they don't work yet ... next version, I hope.
This is because it dawned on me that when you do your complete backup, you probably want your PalDB.pdb file installed as well.
At least that's what I decided after having done a complete re-install to get QuickSheet onto my Pilot and discovered that my PAL config was completely gone!
If anyone sees anything wrong with this, please let me know.
The expiry date dialog no longer appears if you double click on a file, or drag files onto the icon.
You can now drag multiple files onto the Ripcord icon. Unfortunately, due to the way windows passes the file paths to me, all files that are installed in this way will be in the list with tilde-based file names, rather than their long file names.
If you have your preferences set to not open the main dialog when installing .prc and .pdb files by double clicking on them, it was not adding the new file to ripcord.ini. That's now fixed.
There was a typo in the preferences dialog ("double-clck" instead of "double-click"). I've corrected that and changed the wording so the options are, hopefully, a little more self-explanatory.
I'd forgotten to update the version number. That has been corrected.
I have also increased the size of the list of installed files.
So, now you don't have to peer at the sceen looking for those little plus and minus signs!
There is no actual change in functionality, just cosmetics. However, I think this layout makes it a lot easier to see what's going on.
When you run Ripcord it checks each file to see whether the timestamp has changed. That implies the file has been updated and it is automatically marked as new, so all you have to do is press the "Install New Files" button.
The idea is to pick up when you have downloaded new versions of Pilot applications, updated your PointCast news database and so on.
If you find it doesn't work for you, please let me know. If that is the case, send me a copy of your paldb.pdb, which will help a lot.
Also, when multiple files were chosen to be added, it missed out the directory names on all but the first. This is also fixed.
The debug didn't stop when you pressed cancel! Now fixed.
I've also included some debug to help track down any problems with the handling of the PAL database.
The installation order for databases that contain only small records should be fairly irrelevant. I will do some specific testing later, by fiddling this minimum "significant" size and seeing how well things get packed in, but for the time being, I think this makes a reasonable heuristic.
Any applications that PAL does not show as being installed are marked with a minus sign ('-'). There is now a button that you can press to remove all such redundant applications from the list.
Currently, databases are not checked, but I intend to do something about that in a later version.
I have also changed from using "[new]" for new files, to using a plus sign ('+'), to be more consistent. I will probably change this again at some later stage, to use a separate column for each of the new, redundant and priority statuses.
Thanks to Andy Tane for this suggestion!
This version fixes that. The last directory you added a file from is remembered in the windows registry across runs of Ripcord.
I also have my first promised registration!
Also, if you drag one file onto Ripcord's icon, the program will start up and handle it. However, due to inconsistencies in the way Windows seems to handle this stuff, it will fail if you drag more than one file onto the icon. I'll try to come up with a workaround later, if people think it's a problem.
To do this ...
For some reason, files with extension ".pdb" are included under "Intermediate File". To associate Ripcord with databases, therefore, you then need to repeat steps 4 through 7 for "Intermediate File".
I'll try to get Ripcord to install itself in a later version.
NOTE: In order to get this to work correctly, I have changed the standard location of the ripcord.ini file to be your windows directory.
If you have already set up a ripcord.ini file, just move it there by hand.
Ripcord is now a complete replacement for InstApp! There are now two buttons: one that installs only new files you have just added, and the other that does a complete re-install.
Obviously, if you use Ripcord to install any new applications, it will keep track of all the files you have installed on your Pilot.
You can tell which files you have just installed, because they have "[new]" next to them in the file list.
Andy Tane (my chief tester!) found that Ripcord didn't work properly with HotSync 1.1, because of the way it uses the windows registry.
This version uses different information and now seems to work with both HS 1.0 and 1.1, but let me know if you have problems with it.
If you mark a set of files and then press the TogglePriority button, those files are marked as being high-priority and are installed before any other files.
The idea behind this is to get around the HotSync 1.0 problem where only the first 32 databases are backed up. For example, it is a good idea to mark dinkypad.prc and pal.prc as priority programs, since they have databases that require backing up.
Priority programs are marked in ripcord.ini, and in the GUI, by being prefixed with an asterisk ('*').