ArsClip 4.0.1 and Windows 8

Version 4.0.0 should be uploaded in the next 24 hours as an official official release, but I've already some preliminary plans for things to test or fix in version 4.0.1:

- Completely re-write the Clipboard Bar window
- option to auto-collapse expandable menus when another is expanded
- option to auto-expand expandable menus on hover
- fix issues with the [RUN] command and URL encoding
- add a way to drag the entire popup

Work won't begin on 4.0.1 new features until a few days after the release of 4.0.0. I plan on leaving some space to be able to quickly fix reported problems.

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I've done some minimal testing of ArsClip and Rename Master in Windows 8 and there are only some minor cosmetic issues. The only real issue is that Winkey+V is a default hotkey in Win8, so the 'Paste as plaintext' hotkey default in ArsClip won't work.

ArsClip 4.0.0 - Finishing Touches 3

The last of the major functionality has been added in the latest upload. What remains is polishing the rough spots and fixing any remaining bugs. I think I've fixed all of the stability issues and I've been using this version on my own system.

Since the entire popup was written from scratch, every possible configuration combination has not been tested. I've tested what I can, but I'm sure I've missed something. Luckily, feedback and bug reports have been good lately, so I'm getting help in this area.

In the current test version, the All Clips menu item has been changed to All Permanent. It combines the functionality of the All Clips menu and the Permanent Groups menu. When expanded, it shows all Permanent Clips in submenus and can change the current Permanent Group shown on the popup.

An option to show double height Popup Clips has also been added. While this version compacts captions by replacing whitespace, it's sometimes hard to visualize clips without more information. The Tooltip hint window shown when hovered is one method, but the new option will show a second line of text when longer clips are detected.

I've a very small TODO list left, so keep sending feedback.

ArsClip 4.0.0 - Finishing Touches 2

There are some known issues that I'm working on for the next test version:

- highlight moving with the hot key broken in test 3 and 4
- a small square window is visible during a reboot/login
- 'access violation' error rarely occurs when pressing the popup hotkey

I've not tracked down the 'access violation' error yet because I don't know how to reproduce the error. I'm going to update the debug logging to help track this.

ArsClip 4.0.0 - Finishing Touches

In the latest Public Beta upload, I've implemented almost all the functionality in my goals.

One thing that always was poorly implemented was the Menu Order settings in the Configuration window. With the new Show Preview button, it's much more intuitive. Changes made are automatically drawn to a window that shows a representation of the popup. It's much easier to see what all those options do when the description isn't easily clear.

Clip visualization has been improved. Tabs, newlines, and running spaces have been replaced with symbols that allows more of the text clips to be shown on the popup. I may also add an option to allow for more than one line to be used for menu items that show clips.

The popup is now more interactive. Many functions can be performed directly on the popup without dismissing it. Drag-and-drop reordering is an example one of the things not possible using the old popup control, but now is implemented. This creates many opportunities for customization ideas that before, like using increasing the popup's width using a keystroke.

The last tasks to perform on my list are implementing Form Mode and updating the Configuration options.


EDIT: There are some display problems on WinXP with the popup not refreshing correctly that I'm currently working on.

Still Going ...

Tons of progress has been made and the popup is now mostly functional. I should have a version ready for upload in a few days. Some features are likely to still be missing, though. I'm likely going to call this test version 4.0.0 because it's starting to feel like a brand-new program.

Visually, I've added some nice graphical cues to the popup. Items that paste are the normal 'button face' color. Expandable menus have a gradient color as well as a chevron to show their special functionality. All the colors used are based on the current system settings, so they won't clash with the theme.

The popup is extremely keyboard friendly. Menus can be expanded and collapsed by a shortcut key as well as spacebar or enter. Up, Down, Left, and Right navigation is supported and support for other keys, like Delete for removing Popup Clips, is planned.

As strange as it sounds, features are being removed and it's a good thing. A lot of the old 'tricks' are no longer needed. I'm going to have to look at every option on the Configuration window to see which ones are still relevant. A few important decisions are left to make, like using a Clip Menu or a right-click menu, or supporting both.

The ArsClip Prototype

For a very long time, ArsClip has been limited by its popup window. The Windows context menu is extremely limited in functionality. It doesn't report most keystrokes, nor does it detect a left click from a right click and it will only display one context menu at a time. Over the years, I've used many dirty tricks to work around these issues. I've invested so much time into it, that I could have created my own in much less time with much less code.

Pictured above is a work in progress. It's a full-blown replacement for a Windows popup menu. The goal for it is to support right clicking, keyboard navigation, delete key support, drag-and-drop reordering, in-place expandable menus, and more. You'll notice the 'System' menu above is expanded and this is done without having to close and re-open the window.

The bad part is that I'm having to duplicate every function of the original popup, and it is time consuming. The popup shown above displays data and supports navigation, expansion and submenus, but doesn't actually do anything. It's already taken about 30 hours of work. This means that it will be a while before I'll be able to upload a beta using the new popup.

Finishing Touches

Rename Master v2.9.7 is getting closer to being complete. In the last upload, the Skip/Execute step was updated with new functionality. This step can make any other step conditional.

The new conditions are 'matching', 'containing', or 'changing'. Matching let you test the filename using a filemask, like "*.jpg", or a literal string. Containing lets you test for a phrase in the name. Changing lets you test the result of the previous step.

While most will not need this step, those that do can use it to make some very detailed and specific scripts. Tasks that may have required two or more scripts to perform can be combined into a single script. This adds the ability to perform "if-then" logic and even "if-then-else" logic. This also can be used for more flexible filtering of filenames.

A New Step

One of the things that Rename Master doesn't do well is moving parts of the filename. To do this, a Remove Step is combined with an Add step and a special ?temp? variable. While it's very flexible because of the possible number of Remove and Add combinations, it's not very intuitive or easy to do.

I've had ideas before about trying to implement a "Split" style step, but I never thought of a good way to do it. The splitting portion would be easy to do, but using special temporary variables and an Add step was just as unintuitive as the Remove and Add procedure.

Recently, I had some feedback from a user showing how he used to perform expression style renaming using an abandoned freeware program. I, long ago, added full Regular Expression support to the program but very few people understand it, even programmers. While the example he showed me was complicated for a new user, it would have taken at least 8 steps in RM to replicate the same behavior.

Unless I could automate it somehow, I'd never add it to the program. It, however, was such a powerful method that even if only partially automated, it would likely be easier to learn than any other moving methods I've tried.

In the current Public Beta, I've included a new Split and Move step that has an Auto-Split button that will automatically generate example expressions. The program will automatically detect the most used file extension and use it as part of the filemask. Next, the program will detect spaces and symbols and use those as separators.

The bottom section is very similar, but it is used to re-order those parts in the new filename. The '$1', '$2' and '$3' variables represent the characters found for the first, second, and third asterisk in the above example picture. Those are the parts of the filename separated by spaces and dash. For example, a file named 'Artist - 01 - Song.mp3' would replace $1 with 'Artist', $2 with '01' and $3 with 'Song'. The expressions are simplified down and only use two special variables, [*] and [$x]. I may end up replacing the [*] variables with [$x] variables, if it makes this step a bit easier to learn.