ArsClip Official Release

Version 5.07 of ArsClip has been released. It's only been a month since the last release, but a lot has changed.

Form Mode Improved

Form Mode is a great tool for inputing several Popup Clip items into a program or web page. Instead of copying and pasting several times switching between to location, all copies can be performed at once and then pasted using the Popup in this "stay open" mode.

The menu items, under the Pasting Tools menu, only supported a hardcoded "Tab" menu item for navigating controls. Now, a new Permanent Group has been created, "_Form Mode", to add any type of Permanent Clip to help with the data input. For example, a comma and a space can be inserted to combine two entries for an address field.

Edit Clips: update and new items

The History and Databases tabs have been updated. The history tab now shows the configured sizes for both Popup and Removed Clips, and has a clickable link to these options in the Configuration window. The databases tab now show the size of the current database and added an option to compact the database. This compact option useful if you keep the program on a thumb drive or cloud synced folder and need to keep the size as small as possible. While any new database updates will automatically perform this procedure, the compact link gives a little more user control.

A new CLIPBOARDSPLIT command for Macros has been added for advanced users. This command will split the clipboard, using a set separator, into pieces to be recombined with keystrokes or formatting. This command can be used as a loop to treat all the pieces the same, or each piece can be inserted individually. If a block of text can be separated consistently, it can be copied once instead of each part being copied manually. This is an alternative to using Form Mode for copy-and-paste automation.

Stability and Fixes

The new clip database has solved many issues, but a few new ones have surfaced. First, outside programs - like file scanners - can prevent SQLite from locking the database. ArsClip has now a mechanism to detect this condition and retry a few times first before quiting with an error.

A simple updating database window has been added that will appear if an import or update to the database may take some time at startup. This will show the program isn't frozen and that a one-time change is occurring that is delaying the load of the program.

A New ArsClip Release

Version 5.05 of ArsClip is a solely bug fix and stability release. Notably, this fixes the issue where the Removed Clips menu item is missing from Popup. Also, a memory error that occurs on a some installs has been rectified.

New Program: WinColor

This is the first official release of WinColor: a tool for changing the colors used by Win8/10 to paint the taskbar, start menu, and so on.

Since release, this program has been overwhelmingly popular. It is being downloaded twice as much as ArsClip and Rename Master combined (the two most popular programs on this site).

Hire Me

I'm now officially offering creating custom tools to the public. I'll be specializing in creating niche utility programs for Windows in either command-line and/or GUI form. Programs you just can't find anywhere else.

See the Custom Apps page for details.

A New Arslip

Version 5 of ArsClip has been officially released.

New Clip Storage
Clips are now stored in a SQLite database. This open format is used to support the following new features:

Cloud Support, Shared Folder support
While not directly supported, AC has been updated to work when run from a shared folder. This means that multiple computers can run a single install have their own data when run from a network share. Importing data from other installs is supported.

Optional Global Clipboard
When using a shared location, AC can share clipboard changes between multiple computers. AC doesn't do the sharing, so a mechanism like a cloud sync tool or a network share is required. I said ArsClip would never share data over the Internet very early on. This still technically true, but now AC is compatible with sharing tools.

In a future update of ArsClip Mini, it will also be able to use the global clipboard on a LAN connection.

Portable Still Supported
AC automatically detects certain situations, like running from a USB drive. In USB mode, a single instance for clip data is used. So, it will behave as expected.

One Edit Window
The Edit History and Edit Permanent Clips windows have been combined into a single window. The new Edit Clips/Macros window makes it much easier to juggle all those activities in one location.

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Thank you, to all the beta testers that contributed to this update.