utilities

I just applied the WDTLER fix to all my 1TB WD Green drives.  No visible change, but the intrawebs say it'll fix me up good.  Best trust the intrawebs!

Here's some info on TLER. Start there if you're wondering what I'm talking about. Here's an abridged version of the problem for the "Oh! Shiny penny!" folks out there (like me, heh).

Some notes before we get started....

THIS IS NOT SUPPORTED BY Western Digital!!

I've seen a couple threads on the MediaMonkey Forums looking for help on supporting multiple databases, and it just so happens that I needed something that would let me switch databases easily while I test my Play Server application.

Being new to MediaMonkey, and not immediately seeing a solution to my problem, I went ahead and made my own!

Basically you use this program to switch the database and launch MediaMonkey. You can replace the MediaMonkey shortcut with a shortcut to this program, even.

I just discovered Dave's Quick Search Deskbar and man, this thing is cool! It gives you easy access to a ton of different functions like calculator, calendar, clock, currency converter, and stock quotes. Not only that, but any kind of internet search you can dream up like acronym finder, dictionary, translations - anything!

Not only is it so versatile right out of the box, but it's so easy to modify! The one thing I could find though was renewing my IP address though the tool. So I wrote it :)

Check out my "iptools" attachment. Just unzip it into your addons folder and refresh the Deskbar. Then you will have a couple commands at your disposal:

• "renewip": Renews your IP address.
• "showip": Shows your local IP addresses
• "showip /ext": Shows your external IP address

Sick of these things yet? ;)

One of these days I'm going to switch to Mono and check that out now that it supposedly has a Windows.Forms implementation. Someday.

For now, this is what I was doing this weekend when I wasn't visiting fam or fixing up my gameroom.

I present... Tail (shows you the last X lines in a file and/or monitors that file for changes). It's a lot like mTail but with a couple more features. Incidentally, mTail is a great program, so if this doesn't work for you I suggest you check it out (after letting me know how I can improve it of course ;) ).

Next up, Verify hash! This one will verify MD5, SHA1, and CRC32s of files that you download. The cool thing that I haven't found in other apps that do this (yes, I know there are about a million of them), is that it will look for one of these hashes in your Windows clipboard to verify against as well as a .md5, .sha, or .crc in the same folder as the file.

So, that means that when you download a file from a website and the hash is posted on the download page, you can simply copy the hash to your clipboard, right click on the downloaded file and select "Verify Hash" and you'll get verification right away.

It's portable too, unless you optionally register it to your shell (so you can right-click a file to get the hash).

So few steps, it's like taking a opening a can of beer!

This is the first release of a new application I'm working on called PortaLaunch. It is an integrated menu and launcher, primarily used for launching "portable applications" At this point, the menu is fully functional and feature-complete, but the launcher needs to be converted over from my NSIS version. PortaLaunch is programmed in AutoIt, which should make it easier for other people to hop on in and help out with the project.

XML Cooktop: http://www.xmlcooktop.com/

It checks for well-formedness and validation! And it is free!