Rebuilding a PC: SyncToy

Although it didn't make the original list, one of the things I really missed during my Ubuntu adventure was SyncToy, from Microsoft.

It allows me to run all sorts of "choose your own" style backups, and make them as deep or simple as I want. This is good.

What it doesn't do is perhaps work more complicated, or have fancy feedback styled logging with pretty beautiful error output.

I don't care. It's free, it works, and I like its simplicity.

Find it here at Microsoft.

Rebuilding a PC: Firefox

In rebuilding Firefox, nearly everything I need is built in. However, since I am really NOT a fan of editing Firefox's about:config by hand, I adore the addon Tab Mix Plus.

You can find it here:

https://addons.mozilla.org/addon/1122


And the developer's website is over here:

http://tmp.garyr.net

Rebuilding a PC

So I'm rebuilding my PC again, and I realized that I'm going to need a list of my Windows-based software that is essential to getting stuff done.

Without fanfare, then, here's my top few:

1) Vista - hey, you gotta have an OS, right?

2) Thunderbird

3) EditPad Pro

4) Agent Ransack - I couldn't survive without this, because with it, I don't have to remember where I put things (as much :P)

5) Firefox

6) Eraser

My New Thunderbird Favorite AddOn

EMail Address Crawler 1.8.0 by CySlider has to be my new favorite Thunderbird AddOn:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/9995

The description is rather straightforward:

Automatically fill your address books or send mass mails with e-mail addresses extracted from all your e-mails.


It sounds like something a good person wouldn't do, doesn't it? Lose their addressbook, I mean.

But if you do, and you're a Thunderbird user, this little gem can save your life, not to mention your hair!

Ubuntu & VPC 2007

I kinda wish I'd found this link before I went all nuts on down this road. I think I could have learned a lot more about email and application configurability if I'd played more before leaping.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuAndVirtualPC2007

iTunes & Amazon

I'm downloading music from iTunes, and finding that I don't like their DRM. I think I will be switching to Amazon, eMusic, or even (shudder) straight CD rips.

mp3 Woes: Getting rid of tracks, revised

So here's an updated version of the track delete script. It uses a genre change to make the genre of the track "ToDelete", and I now believe this is a much cleaner way to get rid of your junk tracks.

Benefits of removing tracks this way are:

You can review them in the UI before removing them

It updates the modified date of the track, so you can run this script for a number of date ranges, and then pick them up using one O/S search

Because they're in the UI, and you'll be removing them via the UI, you have the option to delete them from disk as well, further lessening any followup needed

As always, have a backup of your library (and library of files) made before doing any of this. Caveat Emptor and all that. :)




' so here we begin the main portion of the script
Const ForReading = 1, ForWriting = 2, ForAppending = 8
Const TristateUseDefault = -2, TristateTrue = -1, TristateFalse = 0
Dim fso, MyFile, FileName, TextLine
Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

' Open the file for output.
FileName = ".\ResultsFile.txt"
Set MyFile = fso.OpenTextFile(FileName, ForWriting, True)

' Write the result of the function directly to the file
MyFile.WriteLine findfilesmod

' Because you have to close every door you open
MyFile.Close


function findFilesMod

' I really like the ability to run test runs, and having the timings makes it a cake
resultstring = ""
resultstring = "Beginning " & cstr(time) & vbcrlf

' Otherwise, make some variables!
ITTrackKindFile = 1
deletedTracks = 0
counter = 0

' Get a copy of iTunes running
set iTunesApp = WScript.CreateObject("iTunes.Application")
set mainLibrary = iTunesApp.LibraryPlaylist

' Since we're trying to get to the full list of songs, we need this
set tracks = mainLibrary.Tracks

' Now then! We loop the full library to touch the tracks
for each currTrack in tracks

' is this a file track?
if (currTrack.Kind = ITTrackKindFile) then

' if the track has the date we're looking for, in this case 1 January 2001, then
if (cdate(currTrack.ModificationDate) >= cdate("1/1/2001 00:00:00")) and (cdate(currTrack.ModificationDate) < cdate("1/2/2001 00:00:00")) then

' keep track of what's deleted, so it hits the results file
' Then, mark the track
resultstring = resultstring & currTrack.Name & _
"(" & currtrack.genre & ") - " _
& currTrack.ModificationDate & vbcrlf
currtrack.genre = "ToDelete"

' increment the counter
counter = counter + 1

end if

end if
' if you want an early out after deleting a set number of files, you can use this
' otherwise, this script will loop iTunes whole library, nuking as it goes
'if counter >= 1 then exit for
next

' the last output
resultstring = resultstring & "Counted " & counter & " track(s)." & vbcrlf
resultstring = resultstring & "Finished at " & cstr(time) & vbcrlf

' return the results
findfilesmod = resultstring

end function