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Macro Express News
May 4, 2006 You have received this message because you are subscribed to the Macro Express News email list. To unsubscribe from this email list go to http://www.macros.com/esubs.htm, click on the unsubscribe link and follow the instructions. Contents 1 - Vote Now for the 2006 People's Choice Awards 2 - Tip: Back Up Your Macro File 3 - Tip: Get Current Macro File 4 - User Submitted Macro - HTML Helper Macros 5 - User Submitted Macro - Define Word Revised (Again) 6 - User Submitted Macros - Handy Macros 7 - Tip: Installing Macro Express on a Network 8 - Sample Macro - Toggle the Touchpad on a Notebook Computer 9 - Past issues of the Macro Express News 1 - Vote Now for the 2006 People's Choice Awards We would like to again thank those who voted for Macro Express in the 2005 People's Choice Awards. It won Best Vertical Market Program or Utility at the 2005 Shareware Industry Conference. Voting for the 2006 People's Choice Awards began May 1, 2006 and runs through May 31, 2006. We invite you again to vote for your favorite software. Read more here: http://www.siafvoting.com/pca/index.asp. Vote here: http://www.siafvoting.com/pca/index.asp. 2 - Tip: Back Up Your Macro File The July 2005 issue of the Macro Express News included an article titled "Protect your Macro File using the Backup Options". Our support staff continues to hear from users who have lost their macro file. This is a reminder to back up your macro file! There are several ways to do this. a. Back up your macro file by copying it to another location on your hard drive or to an external drive. This can be done by copying the file using My Computer/Windows Explorer. Or you can automate the process using a batch file or by writing a macro to copy the macro file. b. Back up your macro file as part of a complete backup of your entire computer. c. Macro Express can be configured to automatically back up your macro file. Check the backup options found in Options, Preferences, Backup. With the latest version of Macro Express the macro backup options are now turned on by default when Macro Express is first installed. If you have been using Macro Express for a while and you install the latest version, if you do not have the backup option enabled, a new dialog is displayed when Macro Express loads suggesting that you enable the backup options. If all else fails and your macro file is lost or corrupted, you might find a recent copy in your temporary folder. Whenever the macro file is saved, a copy of the macro file is created in the Temp directory. Look for files named _macexp30.$$$, _macexp30.$$1, _macexp30.$$2, etc. 3 - Tip: Get Current Macro File Knowing the file and path of the current macro file allows you to write a macro to back up your macro file. You may even want your macro to do different things depending on which macro file is loaded. It is now possible to read the pathname of the current macro file using the new "Set Variable %T1% to Current Macro File" macro command. It has been possible to read the pathname of the macro file from the registry. However, this technique is no longer recommended. Future versions of Macro Express will not write the pathname of the current macro file in the registry. If you have a macro that reads the pathname of the current macro file from the registry we recommend that you modify it to use "Set Variable %T1% to Current Macro File" instead. 4 - User Submitted Macro - HTML Helper Macros Brad Heintz has submitted several HTML helper macros. He says "They scratch some of my common HTML editing itches, and save me from typing a lot of angle brackets." These macros help with bold, italic, underline and link tags in HTML. View more information and download these macros by visiting http://www.macros.com/usermacs/umhtmlhelpers.htm. Brad wins a Macro Express T-shirt for his submission. 5 - User Submitted Macro - Define Word Revised (Again) This macro submitted by Martin and Rada Shapiro uses Macro Express and your Internet connection to look up the definition of any highlighted word or phrase at Answer.com's on-line dictionary. This macro was originally submitted by Mark Bender. Later, Lance Neustaeter submitted a revised version. Now Martin and Rada Shapiro have revised it again. They said "This version always opens a new browser window for the definition so you don't leave the url you are looking at to look up the word definition). Also, it uses ... Answers.com instead of Merriam Webster." It is interesting to see the refinements made to this macro by each submitter. Each revision provides a valuable addition. Visit http://www.macros.com/usermacs/umdefinewordagain.htm to download this macro and to read its history. Martin and Rada win a Macro Express T-shirt for this submission. 6 - User Submitted Macros - Handy Macros Joseph Maddison sent us some handy macros saying "Here are a few that I like to use. I hope these are useful for someone besides me." The macros will nudge an object, provide the select all (Ctrl+a) function in dialogs that do not normally support it, set text to upper case, and allow you to paste text from the clipboard without any of the formatting that some programs include. Read a more detailed description of the macros and download them from this web page: http://www.macros.com/usermacs/umhandymacros.htm. Joseph wins a Macro Express T-shirt for his submission. 7 - Tip: Installing Macro Express on a Network Macro Express is being used by many large organizations with many networked computers. There are several features available in Macro Express to ease installing Macro Express on a large number of networked computers. A recent article was added to the Macro Express Knowledgebase describing how to do this. Visit http://www.macros.com/faq//5.9.html. The Macro Express knowledgebase contains several other articles describing the networking features. To view them, visit http://www.macros.com/kb.htm and enter the keyword 'network' in the Knowledgebase search box. 8 - Sample Macro - Toggle the Touchpad on a Notebook Computer When I type on my notebook computer, my hands brush against the touchpad causing extraneous mouse movements and clicks. When I plug in a mouse I don't need the touchpad. It is possible to disable the touchpad but it requires clicking on a checkbox in a Control Panel applet. Recently I used a friend's notebook computer. It has a feature that allows the touchpad to be disabled by right-clicking on the touchpad icon in the system tray and choosing a menu option. This was such a convenient feature that I contacted the manufacturer of my notebook computer to see if there was a similar feature available for it. Alas, the answer was no. Luckily I have Macro Express! I wrote a macro that uses features in the touchpad driver software to toggle the touchpad on and off. If you have an HP Pavilion notebook computer with a touchpad that uses the Alps touchpad driver, you may want this macro. If you use a different computer you might be able to modify this macro to work for you. View more information and download this macro by visiting http://www.macros.com/usermacs/umenabledisabletouchpad.htm. 9 - Past issues of the Macro Express News Are you a new subscriber to the Macro Express News email newsletter? Did you miss an issue? Past newsletters are available online at http://www.macros.com/newsletters/MENews.htm. Comments and Suggestions We welcome customer feedback. Let us know what you like and dislike about Macro Express. Send questions, comments and suggestions: Insight Software Solutions Home Page: http://www.wintools.com Macro Express Home Page: http://www.macros.com Email: mailto:info@wintools.com Mail: Insight Software Solutions, Inc. PO Box 106 Kaysville, Utah 84037-0106 Thank you, The Macro Express Development Team |  |
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