Where does one get advice about Apple products?

On 2/24/2014 8:08 PM, Mayayana wrote:
I don't know if this is of any value to you, but it might
be if you do that kind of operation frequently....

I use VBscripts that I keep on the Desktop, so that I
can just drop files onto them. I've got a dozen or more
for common operations. One of them fixes returns. For
instance, to replace Linux/Unix returns with CrLf (character
13 & character 10). It's easily adapted to do something
like replace all double returns with single, etc.

Yes I do this all of the time with many different programs and macros.
Although I was attempting to do this LibreOffice too. Although
LibreOffice appears it isn't going to make this very easy.

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v24.3.0
Centrino Core2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz - 4GB - Windows XP SP2

On 2/24/2014 8:51 PM, Paul wrote:
BillW50 wrote:
Are you marveling at the caret-dollar syntax ?

Think about the origins of a program (Windows or Linux/Unix)
before reaching for your six-shooter. It could be the program
has Linux/Unix roots or development started in a Unix company.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expression

^ Matches the starting position within the string.
In line-based tools, it matches the starting position of any line.

$ Matches the ending position of the string or the position just
before a string-ending newline. In line-based tools, it matches
the ending position of any line.

So caret-dollar would be some kind of empty line.

Now, on word processors, I'm more used to various escape
sequences, to allow searching for what you want. For example,
in some, you can enter an octal constant for the ASCII character
you're interested in. And others, might even use caret
as an escape character.

And besides "power tools" like SED, Awk, Perl, there have actually
been dedicated programs written to correct line terminations. The
Unix2DOS and DOS2Unix programs, being examples.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix2dos

Unix2dos and Dos2Unix ports are available in this package.
Gnuwin32 is an acquired taste, for those comfortable
with fixing broken stuff while running in Command Prompt :-)
Programs like this, are useful if scripting.

http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/cygutils.htm

Since you can fix line terminations in one direction, with
Wordpad, I don't have a lot of reasons to run Unix2dos and Dos2Unix.
But when I have 60,000 files to correct that way, they are
the tools for the job. I'm not doing that with Wordpad :-)

Yes I am marveling at the caret-dollar syntax. It has been decades since
I have used Edlin (MS-DOS) and Ed (CP/M), but I don't remember either of
them working like this. CP/M and DOS word and text editors generally use
^p for searching and replacing EOL.

An text editor that use that sounds like it does what Unix2dos and
Dos2Unix does, plus tons more is a tiny program called NewtPad (it's
payware). Which runs under Windows and I have used it since 2008. It is
a rare gem that it seems like almost nobody ever heard of before.

Also I too noticed that behavior in WordPad. And I am not sure, but Word
seems to under some file conversions.

http://www.newtpad.com/

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v24.3.0
Centrino Core2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz - 4GB - Windows XP SP2

"BillW50" wrote:

"Todd" wrote in message
...
On 02/24/2014 01:41 PM, BillW50 wrote:
"Todd" wrote in message
...

I refuse to pay the monopoly prices for Office.


You could always pay eBay's low price for a copy.


If it was real and not pirate. I also really don't
like the bloat on my hard drive. And, Office has bugs
too, but nobody to report them to.

An aside: one of the things I dislike about M$'s OEM licensing
is that you are not allowed to transfer between machine.
Run into it all the time when folks buy new computers.
I tell them to try Libre Office first and see if they
want to pay the extra money for Office. Most, home users stick
with Libre Office. Most businesses go with Office
for the reasons BillW stated (the bugs).

It is M$'s right to set the terms. My right not to
purchase their overpriced ...


I could search and replace for EOL characters with MS Works, but I can't
figure out how to do it with LibreOffice. Most home users could probably
be fine with MS Works. Also most people report Works is super easy to
use and I agree. And you could buy a copy just for a few bucks. Works
can also read and save in MS Office formats.

Works has been replace by Office Starter Edition
http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/starter/. It is often supplied
free with a new Windows PC but can be downloaded without charge from
several sites. There are no restrictions on using it but it does have
irritating advertisements. This program
http://www.kluug.net/office-starter-ad-remover.php which is also
free and legal will get rid of the ads.

On 25 Feb 2014, BillW50 wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

On 2/24/2014 10:50 PM, Nil wrote:
On 24 Feb 2014, "BillW50" wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

And why is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only
within the current paragraph?

It's not.

http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

I would be a little surprised if Open Office hadn't fixed that bug in
the 6 years since that thread was written. I don't have the program
installed so I can't try it myself. But be that as it may...

You claim that LibreOffice suffers from the same problem. It does not.

On 02/22/2014 10:48 PM, nospam wrote:
In article , Mayayana
wrote:

The issue seems to be whether she has a use for
tablets, more than an issue between brands. It's not
a matter of whether to "give Apple a chance". What if
she tries them out and decides she doesn't want them?
It doesn't sound like she has an option to use them for
awhile and then trade them in.

resale value for ipads is very high. if she doesn't like it, she can
sell it for nearly retail prices.

plus, it was a gift anyway.

+1

Personally I still don't have any use for a tablet.
If they cost under $50 I might want one for reading
long articles, so that I could sit on the sofa. But we
have a jailbroken Kindle here and I've still yet to use
it. Small e-screens are simply not a comfortable way
to read text. If I'm going to leave my 24" monitor for
the comfort of a sofa or reading chair I'd rather just
print the text to paper.

what if you want to carry dozens of books with you?

Haven't had the need or desire to do that since leaving college, over 40
years ago. I don't use my tablet for ebooks.

and the ebook readers are about the same size as many books and bigger
than some.

But as I misunderstand it, reading ebooks is about all most of them are
good for. An Android tablet is more versatile.

I took a friend shopping awhile back, to see what's
available for tablets. At the Apple Church the clerk couldn't
tell me whether there was a usable file system on the iPad.
After some exploring, it turned out that there apparently is:
an "app" named, appropriately, iExplorer. But it was clear
that customers were not expected to actually manage
their own files. Apparently one is expected to rent iBooks
and iEntertainment from the iStore.

that would be wrong.

ebooks, movies and music do not have to be rented from apple.

they can be bought or rented from many places.

there are also free options, including project guttenberg for books.

movies and music doesn't tend to be free but there is some, or just
encode cds.

The we went to the Microsoft store. The Surface tablets,
like the iPads, were wildly overpriced. And of course Microsoft
is in on the same racket: trying to hook people into online
services through a limited device.

that's funny. the usual claim is macs are overpriced, not windows
systems.

Both are overpriced. Linux is much more cost-efficient. And of course,
Android is simply a specialized Linux.

There was an interesting
Acer tablet for about $500 with full Windows 8. But the more
I looked at tablets the more I realized I was looking for something
that could give me the functionality of a PC: Real software.
File storage. Multiple media ports. Preferably a CD writer.
Definitely an option for mouse and keyboard. Looked at that
way, a tablet makes no sense. Given the limitations and
lock-in with tablets I'd almost expect them to be given away
for free.

My $130 10.1" Android tablet has most of the functionality you mention.
Real software, including office suites, Internet browsers, email
programs, audio and video players, photo editing, and much, much more.
File storage limited only to the number of 32GB memory cards you want to
carry, plus flash drives. Only one usb port, but you can use anything on
it, as long as it has external power, like hard drives, optical drives,
etc. Bluetooth for a keyboard option. Even a mouse option, though they
aren't needed for much with a touch interface.

you want a laptop.

tablets are for a different use case, one which doesn't fit your needs.
no big deal. tablets aren't for everyone.

hundreds of millions of people have tablets and are very satisfied.

He (Mayayana. Could be female I suppose, but sounds like a guy to me.)
seems to think that you have to get rid of your Mac/PC desktop/laptop to
own a tablet and/or laptop. No reason to. Every reason NOT to. You
simply use the tool best-suited for the job. That could be a tablet, or
a laptop, or a desktop.

On the other hand, I know people who like to read
news online or shop via tablet. Some people seem to
find them very handy. To each their own. (I suspect that
the majority of buyers bought for novelty, egged on by the
mainstream media, flooded as it is with press releases about
how tablets are the future.)

you suspect wrong.

He's wrong about MY reason, anyway. I own a farm, with a roadside stand.
I have three Linux desktops in the house for my more heavy-duty
computing needs, but like any desktop they are ponderous to move around.
I wanted something that I could have out at the stand to keep an eye on
radar when storms are supposed to be approaching, and for entertainment
during the slow times.

I looked at laptops with the idea of dumping Windows once the warranty
ran out and installing Linux, but even refurbished models cost twice as
much as I wanted to spend for this purpose. So I bought the tablet from
Walmart on a Black Friday sale. It will easily do what I want it to do
when the 2014 season begins, and more. And since getting it I discovered
that Android app's touch controls are much nicer for reading my daily
morning paper than the mouse and PC's browser interface, so I cancelled
the print version except on Sundays (the ad inserts aren't in the
e-version), thus saving enough money in just one year to pay for the tablet.

If this were me I wouldn't be much concerned with whether
it's an iPad, Surface, Kindle, or whatever. The question would
be whether I actually want two tablets,

two tablets are not needed unless there are multiple people wanting to
use it at the same time.

it's no different than two computers or two tvs or two cars. sometimes
one can be shared and sometimes it can't.

I would disagree on that one. Larger tablets are better at some things;
smaller ones at others. I only have the one, but I can see that a
smaller one would have better portability, and definitely be easier to
use as a camera. The bigger one would be better for editing photos,
watching videos, and for my e-newspaper. Again, no reason, other than
cost (not a consideration in the OP's case), to limit yourself to but
one tool. When you have more than one, you just choose the one you
believe is most appropriate for the job.

assuming that I
have the option to get something else of equivalent value, like
say a new PC and toaster oven.... an expensive laptop.... or maybe
a washer, dryer and TV. One pays a dear premium these days
for small size in electronics. I could think of a thousand better
things to spend $1,000 on than two tablets.

except it was a gift. she didn't spend anything.


Yup.

TJ

On 2/25/14 2:40 AM, tlvp wrote:
On Sat, 22 Feb 2014 21:18:57 -0700, Ken Springer wrote:

... but don't think I'll ever upgrade from 10.8 Mountain Lion
to 10.9 Mavericks, as Mavericks offers me nothing that interests me AFAIK ...

Mmm ... have a look at this security blogging, see if it changes your mind:

http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/02/24/anatomy-of-a-goto-fail-apples-ssl-bug-explained-plus-an-unofficial-patch/.

Patch for iOS is here, for 10.9 is coming; but none for 10.8 (no longer
"supported"). Indeed, the Sophos folks say, the

... 10.8 ... Apple no longer supports it. At least from a security point of view: if
you are still running 10.8, you have *much* more to worry about than this bug.

Cheers, -- tlvp

Most of that article, way over my head. I don't use Safari, so I'm safe
there. And I don't surf the type of websites that are likely to be
compromised.

And unlike many Mac users, I run AV software. Maybe one or more of them
will come up with a solution.

Mavericks not only offers nothing I know of that interests me, it has
things I don't want, primarily more integration with Apple's system for
syncing across all your iOS devices. And I don't own any iOS devices,
have no plans to either. I am not a cloud fan or proponent, so my use
is limited, mainly banking, occasional online shopping, and a Dropbox
account used simply for sharing files rather than clog the email systems
with large attachments.


--
Ken

Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 24.0
Thunderbird 24.0

On 2/25/2014 8:23 AM, Gordon Levi wrote:
"BillW50" wrote:

Works has been replace by Office Starter Edition
http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/starter/. It is often supplied
free with a new Windows PC but can be downloaded without charge from
several sites. There are no restrictions on using it but it does have
irritating advertisements.

Oh yes, I have it on some of my Windows 7 machines. I even mention it on
the Microsoft newsgroups from time to time. It doesn't run on XP or
Windows 8 though.

This program http://www.kluug.net/office-starter-ad-remover.php
which is also free and legal will get rid of the ads.

Oh I didn't know about that one. :-)

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v24.3.0
Centrino Core2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz - 4GB - Windows XP SP2

On 2/25/2014 10:01 AM, Nil wrote:
On 25 Feb 2014, BillW50 wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

On 2/24/2014 10:50 PM, Nil wrote:
On 24 Feb 2014, "BillW50" wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

And why is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only
within the current paragraph?

It's not.

http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

I would be a little surprised if Open Office hadn't fixed that bug in
the 6 years since that thread was written. I don't have the program
installed so I can't try it myself. But be that as it may...

You claim that LibreOffice suffers from the same problem. It does not.

Ok I believe you. Although it has a very odd way of finding and
replacing EOL characters. And there is more things very strange about
it. MS Office is so much easier to use and MS Works is super easy to use
(although less powerful). And Kingsoft seems so much better than
LibreOffice is anyway. And it makes much more sense to use like MS
Office does.

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v24.3.0
Centrino Core2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz - 4GB - Windows XP SP2

On Tue, 25 Feb 2014 15:38:24 -0500, TJ wrote:


what if you want to carry dozens of books with you?

Haven't had the need or desire to do that since leaving college, over 40
years ago. I don't use my tablet for ebooks.

and the ebook readers are about the same size as many books and bigger
than some.

But as I misunderstand it, reading ebooks is about all most of them are
good for. An Android tablet is more versatile.


I have a Kindle and an inexpensive Android tablet. I agree that the
Kindle is good for nothing but reading e-books.

I bought the Android table because I wanted to take one device with me
on vacation, instead of two--the Kindle for e-books and a netbook for
e-mail. I'm off on vacation in a couple of weeks and I'll find out
then how well it works.

On 2/25/2014, BillW50 posted:
On 2/25/2014 10:01 AM, Nil wrote:
On 25 Feb 2014, BillW50 wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

On 2/24/2014 10:50 PM, Nil wrote:
On 24 Feb 2014, "BillW50" wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

And why is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only
within the current paragraph?

It's not.

http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

I would be a little surprised if Open Office hadn't fixed that bug
in
the 6 years since that thread was written. I don't have the program
installed so I can't try it myself. But be that as it may...

You claim that LibreOffice suffers from the same problem. It does
not.

Ok I believe you. Although it has a very odd way of finding and
replacing EOL characters.

Just because you are 40 years late in learning of ^$ doesn't make it
odd :-)

....

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

On 2/25/2014 5:23 PM, Gene E. Bloch wrote:
On 2/25/2014, BillW50 posted:
On 2/25/2014 10:01 AM, Nil wrote:
On 25 Feb 2014, BillW50 wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

On 2/24/2014 10:50 PM, Nil wrote:
On 24 Feb 2014, "BillW50" wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

And why is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only
within the current paragraph?

It's not.

http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

I would be a little surprised if Open Office hadn't fixed that bug in
the 6 years since that thread was written. I don't have the program
installed so I can't try it myself. But be that as it may...

You claim that LibreOffice suffers from the same problem. It does not.

Ok I believe you. Although it has a very odd way of finding and
replacing EOL characters.

Just because you are 40 years late in learning of ^$ doesn't make it odd
:-)

Well what can I say? $40 short and 40 years too late. ;-)

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v24.3.0
Centrino Core2 Duo T5600 1.83GHz - 4GB - Windows XP SP2

In article , "BillW50" wrote:
"Todd" wrote in message
...
On 02/24/2014 02:43 PM, BillW50 wrote:

I could search and replace for EOL characters with MS Works, but I
can't
figure out how to do it with LibreOffice.

See if this works:
http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765


OMG! Who figured out that totally nonstandard way of doing it? And why
is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only within the
current paragraph?

... even if you select evreything first ?

I haven't had a problem.


Win group removed for sanity.

In article , Paul wrote:
BillW50 wrote:
"Todd" wrote in message
...
On 02/24/2014 02:43 PM, BillW50 wrote:
I could search and replace for EOL characters with MS Works, but I
can't
figure out how to do it with LibreOffice.
See if this works:
http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

OMG! Who figured out that totally nonstandard way of doing it? And why
is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only within the
current paragraph?

Are you marveling at the caret-dollar syntax ?

Think about the origins of a program (Windows or Linux/Unix)
before reaching for your six-shooter. It could be the program
has Linux/Unix roots or development started in a Unix company.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expression

^ Matches the starting position within the string.
In line-based tools, it matches the starting position of any line.

$ Matches the ending position of the string or the position just
before a string-ending newline. In line-based tools, it matches
the ending position of any line.

So caret-dollar would be some kind of empty line.

Reminds me a lot of the old teco editor on a vax. Multiple esc s and $$ were
common ... but blindingly fast once you got used to it.


windows group removed for sanity

In article , BillW50 wrote:
(snip)

Ok I believe you. Although it has a very odd way of finding and
replacing EOL characters.

And there is more things very strange about
it. MS Office is so much easier to use

No. It's just different. Much about it is ... incomprehensible.

and MS Works is super easy to use

Works used to be a wonder ... back in the days of win 3.11, and XL 5.
With works, publisher and XL5, you had a complete system that you could
pretty much do anything with. Since then, it seems to have been down hill.
Pity.

(snip)

windows group removd for sanity.

On 2/25/2014, BillW50 posted:
On 2/25/2014 5:23 PM, Gene E. Bloch wrote:
On 2/25/2014, BillW50 posted:
On 2/25/2014 10:01 AM, Nil wrote:
On 25 Feb 2014, BillW50 wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

On 2/24/2014 10:50 PM, Nil wrote:
On 24 Feb 2014, "BillW50" wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

And why is LibreOffice only limited to search and replace only
within the current paragraph?

It's not.

http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=73765

I would be a little surprised if Open Office hadn't fixed that
bug in
the 6 years since that thread was written. I don't have the
program
installed so I can't try it myself. But be that as it may...

You claim that LibreOffice suffers from the same problem. It does
not.

Ok I believe you. Although it has a very odd way of finding and
replacing EOL characters.

Just because you are 40 years late in learning of ^$ doesn't make
it odd
:-)

Well what can I say? $40 short and 40 years too late. ;-)

LOL!

To be honest, I haven't used the ^$ thing for years; these days I
mostly use various regular expressions or wildcards that mean newline,
which seem to be different in every application :-)

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)