Quick and Dirty Filtered Copy

Have you ever found that you needed all of a certain type of file in a file path only to discover that they are among dozens of other file types in varying levels of folders in the path? Did you want to copy only these files to another drive so you could work with them independently?

Set Files=*.txt
Set DestDrive=X

For /f "delims=" %%i in ('dir /a-d/s/b %Files%') Do md "%DestDrive%:%%~pi" & copy "%%i" "%DestDrive%:%%~pnxi"

This is a fairly simple script where you loop through each of the items found in a dir then create the directory structure on the new drive to mirror the original and copy each file.

This is more the kind of script to come up with when you just need to get something written quickly to just get it done and don't need to think of how fast or slow it runs. Robocopy provides all interfaces to copy quicker, though it requires a little more work in understanding the command.

The Browsers

A long time ago a then young company had come up with this awesome browser a window into another world. Everyone who saw it was entranced with what they saw including things they had never dreamt to be possible.

They had developed this browser on a platform that almost everyone had and could use. Now when the platform creator found out about this new browser thing they decided it made perfect sense and that such a thing should be included as a basic part of the platform so they made their own browser.

The company who had made the first browser now had competition but the new browser wasn't as good so they didn't worry too much they just kept making theirs better.

It didn't take long for the creator of the first browser to get all puffed up thinking the browser on it's own was better than the platform it was built on and soon declared to take over the platform and make everything else on it obsolete by making it's browser the foundation of everything on the platform. Let's just make the browser the platform.

Well the platform maker didn't like that to much. This was a threat to everything they had done so they took took the step to do just what the creator of the first browser had said they would do, only to make their browser the new foundation of the platform. It would be the new browser and the new platform. Everyone could build on this new platform and could write code which could be used everywhere and there wouldn't be a threat anymore.

Soon people were using the new browser more than the first because it was now included in the platform. The creator of the old browser tried to keep up but the new one was everywhere. No one had to go look for the old one to add it anymore so it was loosing ground. The creator of the old fought back against the new taking them to court. But now the new browser was so much a part of the platform that they couldn't remove it without destroying the platform.  So the creator of the first mostly gave up, handing the code to volunteers to keep it going.

Now that this threat was gone the platform creator didn't need to keep working on their browser quite as much, it could now be a stable piece of it's platform that didn't need to change so they stopped working on it and with the lawsuit on their heads they couldn't really do anymore of what they had planned to do to move everything to be written as the browser as the platform.

So they decided to start from scratch with the platform and rewrite it with a new language that was similar to what the browser used but was written in a way that was more uniform and could work better with the platform. Who needs a browser when your platform can be what was on the other side of the browser?

But as they worked on it they just kept adding and adding to it and then delaying and delaying it. It was getting better but it was nowhere near where they needed it to be to be what the old platform.

Those volunteers by now, had been working hard on the old browser, they had it up to the level and beyond of the new one. And they started to convince many to start using theirs instead and people were using it.

While deep in trying to work out the flaws of the new platform the platform maker looked up to see that the browser they had made was starting to loose ground, and they also started to realize their new platform wasn't coming together all that smooth. So they put aside the new platform and picked back up the old one and worked to make it better, while they also did their best to fix their browser which had stagnated.

But that uniform vision of a platform based on a different all encompassing browser is still the vision, it will just take more time to slowly dish out.

The revamped platform wasn't quite what was originally envisioned but it was better than what they almost ended up with. The new browser was now somewhere along the lines of being as good as the one the volunteers had done but it still needed more work.

Then comes along a late comer huffing and puffing and screaming foul play, you can't make your platform a browser! I won't be able to play! His call goes to the courts and the courts decide the platform must provide a choice in which browser is used.

Again another new platform and a new browser from the volunteers and the platform maker. And the new platform has to conform to the new rules while the others wag their tongues and point laughing.

Now the platform maker and the volunteers were in competition neck and neck with the little guy puffing up from behind, when a slick new guy steps in and looks around, he decides to make a browser of his own; He starts by pulling together pieces of other browsers that other volunteers had created and then makes it faster than any of the competition.

The two who where fighting neck and neck over features had to stop, the new guy could over take them if they weren't careful, so they all four are now racing to see who has the best.

Then while pulling ahead the new guy gets all smug and declares that his is the best browser of them all. Hey, it's even better than the platform so why do we need a platform at all? Why don't we just make the browser the platform?

So this new guy goes off and pulls together from among the works created by more volunteers, a new platform; one made almost entirely out of his new browser and one that doesn't work with the everything built on the other platform, except for what can be viewed through a browser. Even the other browsers won't work with this new platform, everything must be the browser.

Now we end up with volunteers with a browser which relies on other platforms and a platform maker with a platform which is forbidden from integrating a browser into the platform having to compete with someone who is doing what the other two had been trying to do in the first place.

We are still in the midst of the battle, who knows what will happen. The playing field is changing and the rules are no longer fair. It's certain that something is going to happen, what I do not know. But it will be an interesting race to see what comes of it.

But should the browser be the platform?

Office 2010 Beta.

Ooh yeah! Office 2010 Beta was released today! I spent far to much time downloading and installing it. And I'm having fun. All of the apps seem to run much faster than Office 2007 too.

This first screen shot is one of the first things which impressed me. For the first time since I can remember I actually have two separate Excel spreadsheets open at the same time and they don't share the same window! That's right, you can look at two spreadsheets at the same time! Woo, hoo!

This second screenshot shows the second thing I was excited about. See those buttons labeled New, Open and Save? Well Using the new Ribbon editor I was able to add them right where I thought they should have been the whole time.

And Here is is the ribbon editor all set up with my new custom File panel.

 

 

 

 

 

I also downloaded the betas for Visio and MS Project. Visio is still the mostly flow-chart oriented design that I find soo frustrating but this version does have at least one new redeeming quality that I have found.

That is Visio can now save as svg! Woo hoo!

Now if only Visio was a standard part of the suite…

 

Anyway It's looking good so far.

My Hope for the Future of Laptops

Way back when Natural Keyboards were all of the rage and gelled wrist rests were new, I was looking at the advancements in human interface input devices and started thinking about what my dream interface would be.
At the time there was this cool keyboard I saw advertised in the gaming magazines which had removable templates which would give you a themed lit keyboard. I was fascinated with it, what if instead of templates you could stick one of those really thin screens in there? Wouldn't that be cool? And what if it had some sort of touch interface to it? What if you could have programmed keys that you could reprogram and move around anyway you want? What if you could even raise the surface of the keyboard screen so you could touch type with it? Wouldn't that be cool?
The Idea I ended up with would have packaged it all up into a two monitor laptop with one defined as a screen and the other a keyboard. Then there would be a stylus for interfacing with the screen. You could type on the keyboard screen then pop up a different keyboard scheme for gaming, even have two sets of arrow keys for letting two gamers play at once.
I seem to remember making a little tiny mockup of the idea though I drew the keyboard using pencil and it had a track ball drawn on it as they were all the rage back then.
Later I started wondering why the screen should even be opaque? what if the screen was transparent and you could selectively make parts opaque or transparent/translucent at varying degrees. Then, what if you could even selectively make the screen reflective so a window could act a a mirror? Wouldn't that be cool?
Over time it has been fascinating to watch and see the advancements that have occurred to bring it closer to reality.
Screens have been getting thinner and thinner, more efficient and usable. LCDs now come in color and You can now look at from multiple angles. The advancements in OLED screens and color electronic ink display displays makes me drool at the possibilities if they could just be combined.
The advancements in touch to the point that it is now built into major operating systems around and with support for multi-touch it makes the dream even more interesting.
The only thing missing today is implementing a way to raise the surface of a transparent material so that it could be used to provide tactile clues and feedback for touch typers. [Update: This Brail E-book Looks Cool!]
I was excited when I found out OLPC was thinking along the keyboard screen for the XO-2. Microsoft working on the Courier tablet is excitedly similar as well.
Awhile back I read about a Sony VAIO laptop which has a transparent screen.
Now if the displays could also be 3D…