Free Software List for Vista

[MilesAhead]

New Folder 2 v. 2.4.1.0

A simple Hotkey app to create a New Folder when you press F7 function key. It works if either the Desktop or an Explorer Folder Window is the "active window."

It should work on Vista and Windows Seven.
Note that my programs are only tested on English Language versions of Windows.
They may work on other Windows flavors but I have no way to test them.

Edit: New Folder has been rewritten as New Folder 2

Now it uses 2 cooperating processes to ensure that keys are passed on to application windows properly.

It's free for you to use at your own risk:

Hotkeys

edit2: I also added a "convenience" function. If you press Shift-NumPadMinus hotkey the folder of the program associated with the active window will open. Makes it easy to get to the folder of a running exe. Just hit the hotkey while its window is active.

edit3: I added code so that InputBox stays on top when asking you to type in a new folder name.

 

[MilesAhead]

Too Long Path checker

TLPD | Free System Administration software downloads at SourceForge.net

Checks all or selected drives for paths longer than x.

For example if you are getting "path too long" errors when you try to copy files over a network or burn a CD or whatnot. It has a valid ranger of 3 to 255 characters. But if you program AutoIt3 source code is available for download.

Very nice little utility. It pops up a text file with a list of all the paths that were over the length you specified.

You can use it in scripts with command line params. Or just run it and it will ask you to check all paths or select the root of the tree from a BrowseForFolder dialog. Then it will ask you to enter a number for the max path length. Defaults to 200.

edit: since the latest version of AutoIt3 is more Unicode friendly than the one used to compile TLPD I posted the source with a few tweaks to allow searching for paths longer than 260 characters. The source mod can be found on the page in this link:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/tlpd/forums/forum/1027595/topic/4757081

 

[jesica]

hey thanks for the big list

 

[MilesAhead]

SnapDraw Free

SnapDraw Free

This is a nice free screen cap program that provides annotation tools without requiring a lot of reading to figure them out.

Here's one I did in a couple of minutes to document the main form of one of my programs. Balloon thingies with typed in text is accomplished quite easily.

 

[MilesAhead]

WinMerge - free merge utility for Windows

WinMerge | Free Security & Utilities software downloads at SourceForge.net

Not super intuitive for the newbie. You have to mess with it a bit to get the hang of it. For basic operation like "add lines from file on the right, that aren't already in the file on the left, to the file on the left" you need to use the Merge menu. Usually if you select Next Difference it will fill in the panels at the bottom. Then select Copy to Left and Advance.

Otherwise if you use the toolbar Copy button you tend to get one file just overwriting the other. But it does have Explorer Shell Extension so you can right click on file(s) to get started. Once you get used to it, it's a good tool for the toolbox.

Of course you may choose to merge from left to right. User preference.

 

[ICit2lol]

Don't know if I am in the right spot but...
I have had a quick scan through but cannot find a really good defrag app for a Vista machine I am working on at the moment.
Have tried Windows, Defraggler, and the cmd prompt for systems32\defrag c:-w all of which come up with some pretty amazing and very different results.

Heaps in Windows and Defraggler – in different %'s and the cmd =0% fragmented.
But the machine is a crawler ++ I have CC'd it uninstalled all the useless and bloat apps, set autorun and msconfig to boot with the minimum possible, got the minimum of Desktop icons on, and taskbar stuff buttons but she is still a snail.

The only thing I haven't run – yet is a chkdsk.

Machine is a Compaq Presario CQ 60 / AMD Sempron 2.1Ghz 4GB DDR2 RAM running Vista (obviously) SP2. Drive is only 35 % filled.
Any suggestions please?

 

[MilesAhead]

I don't want to get in the middle of the unending defrag argument. But there are 2 main approaches: Very thorough, that takes a lot longer and therefore you do it less frequently; very light, gets done quicker so you can do it more often.

Also some people do a thorough defrag at distant invtervals with light defrags often between.

I tend to keep my system partition at least 70% free space during defrags. I like to do a light defrag. I find Auslogics, Puran good for this.. but there are others. Right now I'm satisfied with Puran so I haven't been keeping up on new features of others.

Aside from thorough vs light then you have scheduled vs "in the background". I'm not a believer of "in the background" defrag since to me it defeats the purpose. But it works for some. I do my defrags manually so I don't really pay much attention to the scheduler features.

Here's one list of freewares for defrag:

Best Free Disk De-fragmenter

On techsupportalert it's also useful to read the user comments. Sometimes you find a reference to another good free app that's not in the review list.

 

[ICit2lol]

Hey Thanks Miles I am going to try the lot as I have already run Defraggler at least 10 times now and the Windows one which is a bit wimpy for my liking and the msconfig well I don't know what it did to be honest cos the others still show fragged files when it goes 0%

The Defraggler has brought it down to 29% at least whereas the others - hmmmm!

I agree whole heartedly with you on the scheduled ones this machine showed the last scheduled one as back in 2007! So much for Windows pretty sad eh?

 

[MilesAhead]

@ICit2lol various programs measure fragmentation according to their own theories. The good news is there are a bunch of reliable free ones around. Windows incorporated defrag functions into the API. This makes it less risky to use a 3rd party defragger as most of them use the defrag API calls.

 

[ICit2lol]

Hey thanks Miles thats cleared a lot of queries I have had go round inside my mind.

To a simpleton like me I likened it to replacing the pages in say a novel of 500 pages say 1-500. That is No1 page goes at the front and page 500 goes at the back and if the pages were swapped around to different sites in any given chapter again lets hypothesise that page 345 was put between 46 and 47 and that was done for an increasing number of pages throughout the book then the book becomes very difficult or just about impossible to read with any comfort or ease?

So again for my simple perhaps logical tiny bit of grey matter I have, then one would just have to relocate the pages back into the correct positions in the book to make it readable in the correct chronological order to read said book with the original ease or comfort .

Now if I understand what you are saying that there are people who would do this in very different ways and also in a way that might not be optimal or usable to any specific user "reader" needs. That your comment on the Windows API now means that this "page replacing" is done on as an optimal operation as is necessary - keeping in mind that there may be another system that improves on what the API does, and it beholds the operator to make up their own minds as to which system or "page replacing" they prefer to use?

I am indeed very appreciative that you have explained it in that way because I was becoming ever more confused as to why the different defrags were constantly coming up with quite different %'s of fragmentation.

For example there was one that stated it would put the boot section at the start point of the disk in order that the read arm did not have to travel any distance much at all to be able to access the boot up of the machine.

But I must make the comment that the Auslogic app did make me rather irritated in that it went through quite an extensive run picked up a lot of stuff that needed to be fixed only to hit me with a message that I would have to pay for the rest of the clear up to be done which really I found a tad dishonest in a way.

Don't get me wrong I don't mind paying for anything if it is what I want but that was an unethical sucker punch as far as I am concerned and I told the so:sa:


StillI've had my little rant and again thanks for giving me a better insight into something that had bothered me for some time - you're a top fellow

 

[MilesAhead]

PropPage 1.1 opens Property Page for Selected File(s)

Windows has a shortcut to open the Property Page of a file or folder selected in Explorer. Alt Enter. At least on my machine it only opens one property page even if you have 4 files selected(grabs the first one it sees?) (edit: nope, guess it does the size total etc. as if you right click and press Properties.. but that's not what this is about.)

PropPage 1.1 is a simple hotkey that sits in the tray. The default hotkey is Control F6 but it may be changed using the Tray Menu. Select one or more files or folders in Explorer, press the hotkey. The Property Page for each should be opened.

Windows tends to stack them so that it appears as though there's only one page until you move them around. If you set the check mark on the Tray Menu option Place Windows, the program will attempt to unstack them after they are displayed.

Use the command Set Tab Name to attempt to open the Property Page with that Tab in the foreground. If the tab name does not exist the default it displayed.

Example usage: You intend to use it mainly to set the Sharing Properties on folders.

Use the Set Tab Name command in Tray Menu to set the tab name to Sharing.
Now when you select several folders and hit the hotkey, the property page for each will be opened to the Sharing Tab.

If you inadvertently open say 64 Property Pages and many are off the desktop a trick to undo that is just use the Quit Tray Menu command. When PropPage is closed, any Property Pages it has open will close.

It's just a hotkey convenience utility. It's not meant for opening 4000 Property Pages.

PropPage is free for you to use at your own risk.
You may download from my Hotkeys Page

edit: updated to 1.2. Just tried to place the windows on the screen a bit better. Unlike Explorer windows, resizing property dialogs is hazardous. So I just sprinkle 'em across the desktop.

 

[MilesAhead]

Free Internet Window Washer - index.dat overwrite

I found a nice freeware that overwrites index.dat files, among other things. It's called
Free Internet Window Washer

It will overwrite index.dat without a reboot. You can even leave it in the tray and set it to wash your browsing files at intervals.

Enjoy

 

[MilesAhead]

RunItOnce 1.0

I wrote a small utility called RunItOnce to add a program to the Windows Registry RunOnce key. If you're not familiar with that key, how it works is a program is added to the key as a string value. On next boot, the program is run, and then Windows removes it from the registry.

It's good for tasks that won't work if Windows is fully engaged. One example is deleting all the index.dat files on the system partition.

Here's a link to RunItOnce page:
Faves Downloads

Please see the included Readme.txt for usage details.

Also I'll post the index.dat cleaner code if you wish to use it. To run or compile the script you should first get and install AutoHotKey_L

Note that the AHK script will not work run normally since Windows doesn't like you deleting index.dat files once the system is up. It will work via the RunOnce key. That's why I wrote the RunItOnce program as it seemed like a simple utility to make this type of thing convenient.

I recommend you only run IndexDotDatCleaner on occasion. Maybe once a month. It will slow your boot down because it scans the entire system partition looking for index.dats and deleting them. That's why it's a good candidate for RunItOnce. You don't want to run it every boot.

Here's the AHK script

; IndexDotDatCleaner to delete all index.dat files on system
; partition. Should only be run via RunOnce key in Registry
; HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce
;
; (See my RunItOnce program for a convenient way to add it.)
;
; It searches the entire partition for index.dat files.  It will slow
; down the boot.  It should only be used occasionally to clean them all out.
;
; MilesAhead
;
#NoTrayIcon
stringleft,sysdrive,A_WinDir,3
SetWorkingDir,%sysdrive%
Loop,index.dat,,1
{
	FileDelete,%A_LoopFileFullPath%
}

Edit: note that if you have a 64 bit OS you may need to compile this as 64 bit code for it to see and delete all the index.dat files.

For info on AutoHotKey_L see this page:
http://www.autohotkey.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=77423&highlight=autohotkeyl

 

[MilesAhead]

RunInTrayMod 1.0

RunInTrayMod 1.0 I found an AutoIt3 utility to run a client app minimized to tray here:

RunInTray

I made several modifications and included a tool to generate a shortcut from the client app's shortcut. The shortcut generator optionally runs the client to capture the exact window title for inclusion in the shortcut.

I call my mod RunInTrayMod. The modified version with shortcut generator may be downloaded here:

Faves Downloads

Since AutoIt3 creates a Tray Icon by default, RunInTray substituted the icon from the client exe for it's own tray icon. Double clicking the tray icon toggled show/hide of the client app. The program depended on the Window Title for all window manipulation.


RunInTrayMod is set up to toggle window hide/show just by left clicking the Tray Icon.

RunInTrayMod gets the title in most cases from the executable process
name. Once the client window is recognized, a window handle is stored
for window manipulations. This allows the window caption to change
without breaking the connection to the window. Also windows are
closed rather than killed. Less chance of lost data.

Another modification is the short name to the client application is
associated with the tray icon as a ToolTip. For example if Notepad.exe
is the client, hovering the mouse on the tray icon should show "notepad"
in the ToolTip.

Note that if you have several Trayed shortcuts in StartUp Folder it may be advisable to space them out with a startup delay utility. A lot of window creation goes on at logon. A client app that minimized to tray fine when tested alone may have problems with window detection or hiding on startup. Spacing out the opens and using exact window titles should minimize(pun intended) errors.

Also not every app is compatible. Some will leave orphaned Taskbar icons after being hidden etc.. Some apps such as DVD Flick that have a splash screen may work if the exact window title is specified during shortcut creation. Otherwise what you get is toggle of the splash screen show/hide.

I recommend putting a shortcut to StartMinShortcut shortcut generator in your SendTo Folder. That way you may right click on any app shortcut and select it from SendTo rather than the tedious process of navigating with the FileOpenDialog.

edit: Update:

I didn't update the version number. But I added a call to EmptyWorkingSet() every minute in the idle loop. It seems to cut down the memory shown in Task Manager to less than a MB. Should be acceptable for running several apps Trayed.

edit2: The client app should be one that can run with no arguments. The shortcut generator can create a shortcut with executable path, starting folder and window title. But command line switches are not transferred from the shortcut. Also the source shortcut should be to an executable. Not a URL or batch file.

 

[MilesAhead]

IndexDatViewer

I found another free index.dat viewer. It gathers all the data into one list. No need to relentlessly click on files.

index.dat Viewer

edit: note that this is a 32 bit program. Therefore it may not be able to see all the index.dat data on a 64 bit system.

 

[MilesAhead]

rcopy - recursively copy files to existing folder

rcopy is a command line program to recursively copy
files matching FilePattern to a Destination Folder.
If FilePattern contains a valid path, it will be set
as the working directory, or starting point for the copy.
Otherwise the current path in the command prompt is the
working directory. The target folder must already exist.
No folder structure is created. All files are copied to
the same target folder.

You can download here: Faves Downloads

I wrote rcopy because other command line copy commands such
as xcopy want to recreate the folder structure in the target.
The idea of rcopy is to produce the same effect as searching
a file pattern in Explorer, then dragging the files to a
target folder, but using the command line.


Important Note: I wrote this utility for my own use. You are
welcome to use it at your own risk. I only have English Language
versions of Windows for testing. Your mileage may vary. I hope you
find the utility useful.

 

[MilesAhead]

Quotidian Folders 1.0.0.0

Quotidian Folders for folders you use every day.

It's a hotkey.

Control Right Click on Explorer window to add selected folders to the list.
Control Right Click on Desktop to pop up List near the mouse.

Tray Menu option Open On Click, if checked the selected folders will be opened immediately. Otherwise they are just added to the list. In the latter case there's a chime so you know it got the hotkey press.

See readme and About MsgBox. Pretty simple.

It's free for you to use at your own risk. Download from my page here:

Quotidian Folders

I've updated this a few times. Current version is 1.0.3.3
The ListView has a larger, easier to read font. Also clicking the vertical scroll arrow increments the rows so that the entire text for the row is shown. Got rid of "chopped" look. If nothing in the list is selected, Open Button opens Explorer to Computer.

Another Edit: latest is v. 1.2.2.1 - improvements include: single folder opens are centered in work area; small editor included to edit ini file options via the Tray Menu; check for update command in Tray Menu. Complete source and custom icon included in download.

 

[xraiderv1]

some good programs here, I'll have to check them out in the morning.

 

[MilesAhead]

Delayed Cuts 1.3.2.0

Delayed Cuts 1.0.0.4 Delayed Cuts is a simple ListView utility for creating a list of shortcuts to be run delayed at logon. Shortcuts are added via drag and drop. The delay range is 10 to 600 seconds. All delays are timed from the launch of DelayedLoad.exe which runs the shortcuts. When you create a list, a shortcut to DelayedLoad is created in the StartUp Folder if it doesn't already exist.

I designed this utility to only accept shortcuts because that ensures you may pass all needed information to the launching program, such as command line arguments, working directory, start minimized etc..

The shortcuts are simply launched in a loop using ShellExecute() system call.

By default the "Toast" splash screen slides up near the system tray to show a countdown, icon and shortcut name next in line to load. The Toast feature is enabled by default. It may be disabled via .ini file option. UseToast=True or UseToast=1 enables. Any other value disables it. If Toast is disabled, the info is shown in the Tray Icon Tooltip during mouse hover.

DelayedLoad.ini is created in the same folder as DelayedLoad.exe the first time DelayedLoad closes.

One advantage to delay loading via an app that has a visible Tray Icon, you can cancel the loading of the remaining programs just by quitting DelayedLoad via the tray icon menu.

It should run on XP and later. Tested on English language Windows only.

edit: please download new version 1.0.0.5 I added a splash delay to reduce flicker. Also fixed a bug where ini file was not always written on exit.

edit2: v. 1.0.0.8 has more options for Toast Splash screen. It can be moved away from the system tray to avoid overlap if another program is using the Toast display at the same time. See DelayedCuts.exe About Dialog for settings.

another edit: v. 1.1.0.0 Added a menu command Skip Next Load to skip over the next app.

edit .. another update: v. 1.3.2.0 has added some features to make using Delayed Cuts easier. There are ReGap Buttons to set the delay by increments of 5 or 10 seconds from the selected row on in the List. Also a Context Menu has been added with Move To Top,Cut,Paste and Move To Bottom commands make it easier to reorder the shortcuts.

Here''s a screen shot of the newest release

 

[tom982]

Re: Delayed Cuts 1.0.0.4

Delayed Cuts 1.0.0.4 Delayed Cuts is a simple ListView utility for creating a list of shortcuts to be run delayed at logon. Shortcuts are added via drag and drop. The delay range is 10 to 600 seconds. All delays are timed from the launch of DelayedLoad.exe which runs the shortcuts. When you create a list, a shortcut to DelayedLoad is created in the StartUp Folder if it doesn't already exist.

I designed this utility to only accept shortcuts because that ensures you may pass all needed information to the launching program, such as command line arguments, working directory, start minimized etc..

The shortcuts are simply launched in a loop using ShellExecute() system call.

By default the "Toast" splash screen slides up near the system tray to show a countdown, icon and shortcut name next in line to load. The Toast feature is enabled by default. It may be disabled via .ini file option. UseToast=True or UseToast=1 enables. Any other value disables it. If Toast is disabled, the info is shown in the Tray Icon Tooltip during mouse hover.

DelayedLoad.ini is created in the same folder as DelayedLoad.exe the first time DelayedLoad closes.

One advantage to delay loading via an app that has a visible Tray Icon, you can cancel the loading of the remaining programs just by quitting DelayedLoad via the tray icon menu.

It should run on XP and later. Tested on English language Windows only.

edit: please download new version 1.0.0.5 I added a splash delay to reduce flicker. Also fixed a bug where ini file was not always written on exit.

This looks great, I'll give it a go now I needed something like this in a thread a few days ago:

http://www.vistax64.com/software/294933-task-scheduler.html

If the guy ever returns, I'll recommend this.

Tom