News Page

On this page I'll report on changes to my web site or related news items.

Don't expect a full-blown weblog, more like a list of highlights in shorthand.

For a file based list of changes look at the What's New list.

2025-03-17

• RxGrep.exe had another update: you may now specify multiple match groups on the command line.

• CreationDate.bat is a new batch file to list the creation date(s) of a single file or multiple files in tab delimited format.
It uses Phil Harvey's ExifTool.

2025-03-16

• BluetoothStatus.bat is a new batch file, using DEVCON to check if Bluetooth is enabled.

2025-03-13

• Ruler.exe is a new GUI program to show a ruler on the primary monitor.
Its properties (e.g. line color, opacity, postion, horizontal/vertical, scale, centimeters/inches) can be set on the command line or in interactive mode, or in a saved configuration file.

Credits: code to redraw the screen by RogerN, singleton form by djdd87, set a property and then make it readonly by Tomer-Barkan, and console output from a WinForms program by Timm.

Thanks

2025-03-03

• Hardware.hta has been updated:

The monitor inventory subroutine was completely rewritten because of unreliable results with WMI's Win32_DesktopMonitor class
The sound inventory subroutine has been rewritten, it no longer assumes audio settings are found in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\HDAUDIO only, but will search for any key in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum ending with AUDIO

The sound inventory subroutine was rewritten with help of Steve Robertson, who reported that on his computer there was no HDAUDIO key at all, only INTELAUDIO.
Finding the monitor manufacturer's full name without using Win32_DesktopMonitor was achieved by using a list of 3-letter monitor manufacturer codes found in the Lansweeper knowledgebase.

Thanks

2025-02-10

• GetCurrentWallpapers.exe had a minor update: with the new optional commandline switch /V it will display the registry key for each wallpaper it finds.

2025-01-27

• AudioEndPoints had a bug fixed: it no longer assumes there are always 2 channels available on all audio endpoints.

2025-01-23

• GetCurrentWallpapers.exe is a new program to list the path(s) of the current wallpaper(s).
It is based on PowerShell code by Ramesh Srinivasan on GitHub.

Thanks Ramesh Srinivasan

2025-01-17

• Marker.exe is a new program, still in beta, that displays an elliptical ring with transparent background on screen.
You may see one on screen right now, depending on your browser and its settings; if so, you may want to drag it to a different location on screen to allow clicking the Marker link.
I intend to use it to mark details in screenshots, including the ellipse in the screenshot itself rather than adding one later on.
I'm still working on rotating the ellipse; though I do manage to rotate it, I haven't managed to keep it inside the window boundaries yet.

Credits: code to make a transparent window resizable by user1306322, make it moveable by FreewareFire, send output to the parent console by Timm.
The HTML version is based on code from TutorialsPoint.com (ellipse), W3Schools.com (make it draggable) and StackOverflow.com (make it draggable for touchscreens as well).

Thanks guys

2025-01-15

• AudioEndPoints had a major update:

it has been rewritten as a true console program, which still generates a GUI to display the results
it now also displays the active devices' peak levels
command line switches have all been abbreviated to single letters, see the program's help
the new optional /R[:nn] command line switch tells the program to Refresh the table every nn seconds (default interval 1 second if nn not specified or invalid)
use the optional /M command line switch (Mono) to show the peak level of Left and Right channels combined (by default both are shown separately)
press F5 to manually refresh the table
the /dB command line switch has been dropped

2025-01-13

• Another update for AudioEndPoints: like MonitorClipboard.exe it now sends its help text to the parent console (credits: Timm), and some obsolete code was removed.

Thanks Timm

2025-01-12

• AudioEndPoints has been updated: I added a column with the volume level for active devices.
With the optional /DB switch you can set the reading in dB instead of a percentage.

AudioEndPoints screenshot