The computer/OS/interface/webpage annoyances thread

Stormtroper

That was quicker than I expected. Made in Python 2.7. I haven't installed Dropbox yet so hopefully putting it as a quote will preserve indenting:

print "Enter the file's name (e.g. fileTest.txt)"
filename = raw_input('>> ')
readFile = open(filename,'r')
filename = filename[0:-4] #Excise '.txt'

#Saves heading lines for later use
line1 = readFile.readline()
line2 = readFile.readline()

#Reads first line
newLine = readFile.readline()
x = None
newX = x

while newLine != '':
    print newLine
    for i in range(len(newLine)):
        if newLine == ']':   #Finds the first ']' to get the x value
            newX = newLine[1:i]
            if newX != x:   #Compares the new value for x with the old one,
                x = newX    #create a new file if it's different
                newFilename = filename + '_' + newX + ".txt"
                writtenFile = open(newFilename,'w')
                writtenFile.write(line1)
                writtenFile.write(line2)
            break
    writtenFile.write(newLine)
    newLine = readFile.readline()
       
writtenFile.close()
print "Finished."

(How does one do the html code block thing?)

How to use: put that in a .py file in a folder with your data file and nothing else (other stuff might get overwritten), run the .py file and enter the filename (including the .txt or whatever). While we're at it you probably should back up the data file just in case.

lrdgck

...woah.

I owe you an Internet, looks like.

There are some parts that I'll have to trim to make it fit the text format and some stuff like that, but I guess I'll be able to pull it off on my own now that I have a ready code to play with. In any case I'll ask again. Thanks mate.

Stormtroper

Ahh, it's nothing

glennmagusharvey

> library has ebook for "borrowing" (whatever that means)
> can't actually look inside it before borrowing it, so i can't check whether it's what i want
> borrow
> i can now download it
> download a tiny .acsm file
> turns out it's basically a file that (1) can only be opened by Adobe Digital Editions, and (2) downloads a DRM-laden ebook file
> choose web view
> find out it's not a book that i want
> can't even return it; it's stuck on my loans list until october

Bee

Presumably it self-deletes at the end of the period.

Stormtroper

I wonder how come the computer world came to agree that editing a .pdf should be extremely hard and that there should be no easily available software to do it. I only want to increase font size...

I downloaded something that on second thought probably shouldn't have. Hopefully it's nothing. Internet last words.

Bee

PDF is for printers, not word processing.  Also Adobe is shit.

Stormtroper

Yeah, but after ages of using .pdfs for whatever, you'd think someone would've come up with babby tier functions like that.

glennmagusharvey

I guess someone could have made PDF such that elements on it are an easily-editable canvas that has resizing and such

glennmagusharvey

This is really useful to know.

http://www.askvg.com/tip-how-to-show-file-extensions-of-shortcuts-lnk-url-pif-in-windows-explorer/

Especially the part about showing extensions like .url, .lnk, and such.

Edit: Huh.  I can't seem to find them in that form in Windows 8.1.

Central Avenue

The instructions are like "search through the registry till you find this string, then edit the value" and it's like holy shit those are some poor instructions

Like it would be one thing if it directed you to a particular registry key but instead it's just "search till it looks right then edit it" which is a nice way to screw stuff up

glennmagusharvey

I'm starting to really hate touchpads where the buttons are part of the touchpad.

I tend to have one finger on the touchpad and one finger on the button at the same time.  This makes this awkward.

And occasionally my cursor flies to the bottom of the screen because of the timing of my fingers.

Blueeyedrat

Yeeep. My laptop has a touchpad like that, and I keep a USB mouse nearby at pretty much all times.

glennmagusharvey

Just found out that the Page Info keyboard shortcut, Ctrl+i, is left out in recent Firefox versions.

That's just a shame.  It's an actually useful thing.

And what do they replace it with?  Another way to see your bookmarks.  Ctrl+b already does that.  But now Ctrl+b AND Ctrl+i do that.

Why?

(Fortunately there's this: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/page-info-button/ )

Edit: Apparently it's just never been there.  But I remember easily accessing it before.  Maybe I was using the menus, so I checked the menus...and it's not there either.  Huh.  What happened to it?

glennmagusharvey

> C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\slack\slack.exe
> no custom directory option

Well, you're going to get unceremoniously dumped for the same reason that Discord got unceremoniously dumped.

But I am going to send a feature suggestion message.

Central Avenue

I'm actually with you on this one, albeit for different reasons.

I hate programs that install to AppData. Programs files belong in, well, Program Files.

Installing to AppData instead just seems to be a shady way of letting people install your app without administrator permissions.

glennmagusharvey

Yeah, I'd be less annoyed if they just stuck it in Program Files.  At least there'd be less folder-nesting to go through.

Stormtroper

In Windows 7 Ultimate (maybe Windows 7 in general) and from what I read Windows Vista too, changing the password you connect to a wi-fi network with does nothing, it'll just say the network configuration info is wrong and refuse to connect. You have to delete the network configuration and retry.

Central Avenue

I've encountered that with multiple operating systems, though I don't quite remember which ones.

I get that, like, most people never change the password on their home wifi, but for university wifi I use my single-sign-on and that password expires every 6 months...

glennmagusharvey

OH GOSH YOU ARE SO RIGHT
"This is in fact an old legacy bug, apparently from the times of Windows XP": https://superuser.com/questions/327479/ctrl-space-always-toggles-chinese-ime-windows-7
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/929bbe77-1a98-4bbc-b201-c813a8499d22/windows-81-is-forgetting-ctrl12345-shortcuts-designated-for-keyboard-layout-switching-after?forum=w8itproinstall
this is a very old bug and it's STILL around
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1261058-windows-81-is-forgetting-ctrl12345-shortcuts-designated-for-keyboard-layout-switching-after-wa/

apparently i might need to dive into the registry???  i don't know which of the numbers go with which languages and what settings...

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-desktop/custom-hotkeys-to-change-input-language-disappear/66d1d89d-e5dc-41e1-a8b3-48d596ab8e11?page=4&tm=1391057416056#LastReply
this may be able to solve it without having to registry-dive

glennmagusharvey

okay the oddest thing is happening now

i have left shift + alt + 1 => US International
but if i open up my language hot key settings, that hot key is not set

HOWEVER
if i go and set it
it disables it

wtf windows?????

incidentally i am getting the sense that a number of weird features about the way windows is set up has to do with it presuming that there are multiple users on a computer and then trying to find ways to compartmentalize the settings and preserve a sort of default neutral territory to load first before changing the settings to a customized version after login

lrdgck

You know what guys, I've got a weird problem with Windows 10 installed on a laptop. In keyboard settings, you can set how fast does the text cursor move and symbols are typed if you hold on to a key, right? So, in this case these settings somehow switch to some kind of default apparently with every reboot, but then, when the keyboard settings menu is opened, they are listed as the new values. You need to click OK, and nothing visibly changes in the menu, but once you do that the settings are set to the new values. After a reboot, repeat. So it's not only about resetting, but also the values being listed as the good ones even after reset.

glennmagusharvey

lrdgck wrote: »

You know what guys, I've got a weird problem with Windows 10 installed on a laptop. In keyboard settings, you can set how fast does the text cursor move and symbols are typed if you hold on to a key, right? So, in this case these settings somehow switch to some kind of default apparently with every reboot, but then, when the keyboard settings menu is opened, they are listed as the new values. You need to click OK, and nothing visibly changes in the menu, but once you do that the settings are set to the new values. After a reboot, repeat. So it's not only about resetting, but also the values being listed as the good ones even after reset.

I recently wrestled with Windows 8.1 doing something very similar to this but with hotkeys for switching keyboard layout (as I frequently us€ sú©h çìgñs ænd sÿµßø£s) but it would keep resetting, and it turned out that this was a bug that stretched back to WinXP or Win7 days in which it'd switch back to default Region settings every time the computer was logged off, and then it wouldn't switch back on -- despite the display saying that it remembered my hotkeys.  Oddly, sometimes it'd remember one hotkeys but not another.

I'm aware that my touchpad ALSO does something similar -- tap-to-click is re-enabled and edge scrolling is re-disabled when I'm not logged in, and even for a little while after I am, before it loads the mouse settings.

So if there's a way for you to change the default settings, that might be the answer.

lrdgck

Still unsure how to use this knowledge. Try to play around in regional settings, do I get it right? But thanks for the reply anyways.

glennmagusharvey

I'm not sure how to use it either. I'm not sure these keyboard settings are a regional setting, but if they are, you can force them to become the default settings by setting them active and then going to Region -> Administrative -> Welcome screen and new user accounts : Copy settings -> Copy your current settings to: Welcome screen and system accounts.

Stormtroper

I don't think I've posted about this. For a good while whenever Windows Update and something called Background Transfer Manager or something like that come up they cause the 'net to get all laggy, and cannot be stopped. Just now I managed to at least make it work slowly on this computer only by using a software to limit download/upload speeds.

glennmagusharvey

Stormtroper wrote: »

I don't think I've posted about this. For a good while whenever Windows Update and something called Background Transfer Manager or something like that come up they cause the 'net to get all laggy, and cannot be stopped. Just now I managed to at least make it work slowly on this computer only by using a software to limit download/upload speeds.

Oh gosh, Windows Update.

A misunderstanding about Windows Update was what caused me to factory reset my computer last month.

Apparently it can be really, really, really slow to show any visual signs of progress. I didn't understand this and I mistook it for hanging, and I ended up troubleshooting it, trying to apply fixes, downloading possible fixes from Microsoft, calling Microsoft tech support, and doing things left and right to try to reset settings and clear caches and whatnot.

Eventually uninstalled everything, broke the OS in weird ways, and went for a factory reset.

glennmagusharvey

I'm actually annoyed that Twitter tags messages as replies or not replies, and displays them differently.

Like, why isn't every reply treated equally like every non-reply, all in one giant feed?

Okay, yeah, i can figure out the answer, because this allows message threading and allows for people to have conversations.

But I'd prefer it differently. I'd prefer it to be like a giant worldwide chat room where people kept track of their conversations using temporary hashtags as search terms and kept their NON-TWITTER-WEBSITE THIRD PARTY CLIENTS (which will always be better than Twitter's own website, because web apps always suck due to requiring use of browsers which become increasingly bloated due to having to accommodate this) constantly refreshed.

ITP: GMH proposes that Twitter become IRC.

fourteenwings

A while ago, updating from Android Marshmallow to Nougat permanently changed the default font on my phone to the ugliest looking, least clean/professional thing I've ever seen.

Of course, the "change font" thing also disappeared.

glennmagusharvey

So I got this 3 TB external hard drive but the problem with it is that it constantly keeps turning off, like every few minutes or every half hour or so (I haven't ever bothered to time it but it's somewhere in that range).

I can use it for stuff that doesn't require use of the drive continuously, as long as I am willing to possibly have to wait for the thing to reconnect (or just pull it and plug it back in). And honestly it's got a huge amount of storage and I need that space. But sometimes this makes it inconvenient to do some things that typically require continuous drive activity.

I have one other drive but it's "just" 160 GB. I guess I could use that partly.