Vern 1.5 Release Copyright (c) 1996 One Guy Coding --------------------- Installing Vern 1.5 --------------------- - Copy the distribution file vern15.zip to the directory where you want to install vern - Unzip vern15.zip (winzip is good for this) - Optionally delete vern15.zip - Run vern.exe NOTE: if you were previously using a old version you should delete the files vern95.exe and vern95.hlp. That's it. If you want vern to start each time you start windows, create a shortcut in your StartUp menu, normally, c:\windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp you can do this from the Vern context menu. Right click on Vern and select 'Add to Startup Folder'. ---------------- Registering Vern ---------------- Vern is shareware. You may use the program for 30 days for evaluation purposes. After than 30 day period you must register vern if you continue using it. You can now register online. Click on the appropriate button in the Properties dialog under the Register Tab. Or point your browser to, http://newts.kagi.com/cgi-bin/register1.cgi?LV See the help file in the Registration section or the One Guy Coding web site at http://www.cam.org/~oneguy/registration ----------------------------- Bug Fixes & Feature Additions ----------------------------- Ver. 1.5h : April 8, 1997 - fixed the problem of April 3rd that wasn't quite fixed (mini window updates on Vern are NOT instantaneous since it is possible for Vern to *miss* a destroy window message, if this happens the mini window will be destroyed at the next window paint or mouse over). - fixed the Z-Order problem Ver. 1.5g : April 3, 1997 - fixed problem with hidden windows showing up on Vern. Ver. 1.5f : April 2, 1997 - fixed a minimising problem under Windows NT (the windows would always return to the top cell but shifted over to the right) - fixed mouse capture problem -- when switching vern cells, the mouse could get captured and trapped under certain conditions - fixed a couple of potential crash problems - Added "Kill process!" option to the Priorities menu. This option replaces the 'Real Time' option (which was deemed too dangerous). Note that the use of Kill may leave a program in a partially closed state (that is, DLL's of the process are not notified of its termination. - Added a Track Desktop Colours option. This is similar to the Track Desktop Bitmaps option. Open your display properties dialog and change the colour of your desktop. Repeat for each of your Vern cells. When you're done (and you have the track Desktop Colours option toggled on) you should see a different coloured desktop for each vern cell. Note that this option works better on WinNT boxes but is bearable under Win95 on a P5-100 or better. Ver. 1.5e : April 1, 1997 - fixed problem with mini windows being visible when Vern is autohiding. Ver. 1.5d : March 28, 1997 - Fixed a problem where Vern could spontaneously kill himself. This didn't cause any real problems other than the fact that the program closed without warning. (Moral: Always be sure to initialise your variables!) - Added 'Hide off screen' option which hides windows that are not on the current Vern screen. This also removes the buttons from the task bar and the icons from the Alt-Tab Task menu Ver. 1.5c : March 24, 1997 - Vern could be started more than once. If this happen, especially under Win95, the results are certainly catastrophic. Exporer crashes and the system freezes. Vern now prevents multiple instances. - Auto Activate was broken since 1.5 was released. This has been fixed. Ver. 1.5b : March 23, 1997 - a few more bug fixes connected with the major changes at 1.5, like stacking of mini windows, activation of mini windows, movement of mini windows, etc etc. - fixed problem with dragging vern mini windows on the mini window borders. Ver. 1.5 : March 20, 1997 - many many changes to numerous to really go into - the main changes involve the internal method for dealing with the mini windows - with the track bitmap option (in the options menu) turned on you can specify a different bitmap for some of all vern cells. Open the Display Properties dialog (right click on the desktop) and change the background bitmap. Then move to a new vern cell and try another. Ver. 1.4e : March 14, 1997 - nasty bug fix for System Crash in Win95 when using Alt-Tab to switch tasks - repaints are faster - system colours are now used for flyouts - icons look much nicer on vern now Ver. 1.4d : March 12, 1997 - fixed mouse switch (broken at 1.4) - updated Glue dialog Tab. One can now glue either window classes, or window titles (or fragments of titles) -- previously glued windows will have to be reglued (sorry) - added 'Lock cells' options menu item. This prevents the vern window from being resized or moved. - brand new method for window movement (VB 4.0 now handled about as well as one could expect) - when autohiding, vern now covers only the edge of the screen along its own dimension. - many other little internal changes Ver. 1.4 : February 28, 1997 - this version includes a rewrite of large parts of the hook functions in Vernhook.dll. You must replace any old version of this file with the new version. The old hooks caused the system to become unstable if a program crashed. The new hooks are much more stable and have eliminated these problems. Ver. 1.3f : February 6, 1997 - removed Nag screen - made another tweak to the continuing VB saga - VB forms are displayed on Vern - if no form is visible VB is not seen on Vern - VB will return to the vern cell in which it was opened if a form is closed and vern cells change Ver. 1.3e : January 29, 1997 - refined the Visual Basic 4.0 fix - fixed problem with a certain class of window that wasn't being moved or displayed in vern (this was related to the VB4 fix of Jan 28 Ver. 1.3d : January 28, 1997 - fix for Visual Basic 4.0 (still not perfect but better) - fixed up the code responsible for window placement in vernspace Ver. 1.3b : January 10, 1997 - changing the cell width/height in the properties dialog cell tab now respects the Proportional resize option - cell labels are shown in the caption bar (if the caption is being displayed) for the current cell under which the mouse is pointing - changed systray Label from Vern95 to Vern 32 - fixed startup problem Ver. 1.3 : January 8, 1997 - added caption with labels for each vern cell - hit Ctrl-L on specific cell to set label - modified auto-hiding to take up entire edge when hidden - fixed some re-painting problems related to Win NT 4.0 - Vern responds now to screen resolution changes by rescaling to the new screen resolution Ver. 1.2a : November 22, 1996 - renamed program from vern95.exe to vern.exe to remove Win95 bias - updated help file and renamed it vern.hlp - added auto hide option to allow/disallow auto hiding - if vern is auto hiding and you are moving icons around on vern vern will not lose focus when you drop the mini icon - icons painting has been refined - text is now displayed if icons are not being shown - fixed maximised window bug. On certain systems vern was having trouble moving maximised windows. This was mostly due to the fact that a maximised window is now less than the screen height (if the Task bar is displayed on the top or bottom.) Well, actually it was a mistake on my part, I admit it. - regrouped options on option menu and properties dialog option tab Ver. 1.105 : November 11, 1996 - some windows with a dialog border were behaving strangely, this had to do with some code I'd written to speed up window moves. This has been fixed. Ver. 1.104 : November 8, 1996 - Properties dialog options where not being set properly - 1.103 Properties dialog caused crashes on some systems (fixed I think) - Vern jumped around in NT 4.0 and mini windows didn't drag properly due to an integer conversion error, fixed Ver. 1.103 : November 7, 1996 - hold Ctrl to reverse freeze option while resizing - hold Ctrl before displaying priorities to set priorities for non-movable windows (systray, invisible, zero area, etc) - redesigned properties dialog box - added 100ms delay to autohide (doesn't jump out so easily) - fixed glue bug - can now force delete of glued items by selecting the class in the dialog box and hitting the delete Key Ver. 1.101 : October 24, 1996 - added options to the Cells Tab of the properties dialog box to control how vern is repainted - added register.exe program to distribution. Use this program to pay for Vern with a Credit Card Ver. 1.100 : October 18, 1996 - vern can now be made to hide on an edge. If you have a horizontal vern with 10 cells and your Task bar is at the bottom of the screen slide vern up to the top of the screen and let go. Selecting another program hides vern. Move your cursor over the area where vern is hiding to restore Vern. - made vern aware of blanch - can add a startup folder icon from the main context menu - the Nag screen now times out after 8secs. Ver. 1.026 : October 15, 1996 - added show Systray toggle to add/remove vern icon from sys tray - added show 3D toggle to display mini windows either flat or 3d - added show icon toggle for mini windows Ver. 1.025 : October 8, 1996 - prevent screen switches when screen saver is active - added flyout font select button to Options tab of properties dialog Ver. 1.023 : September 25, 1996 - added help files and cheque/money order registration information Ver. 1.022 : September 23, 1996 - fixed lost vern problem. Vern could be moved off screen which made it difficult to negotiate vernspace. This only happened when moving vern and releasing the mouse button off screen (something which I had been unable to do but which was pointed out my an alert user). - changed hotkey from Alt-Cursor (used by some programs) to Ctrl-Alt-Cursor (which seems to be rare). - fixed problem where a window would not be raised to the foreground if it were selected in Vern while in the current vern screen. Ver. 1.019 Final Beta V : Later on June 4, 1996 - Fixed the xmouse problem (finally) Ver. 1.018 Final Beta IV : June 4, 1996 - Fixed Visual Basic Problem. The main Visual Basic window (parent) is given coords of (0,0)-(0,0) so it was not being moved. I've added a hack to move this window around properly (as much as I've tested without my own copy of VB) throughout vern space. - If the 'Freeze Cells' option was selected it was possible to make vern so small that it was impossible to make it bigger again. This has been fixed by ensuring that the width and/or height of an individual vern cell is at least 8 pixels. Ver. 1.017 Final Beta III : May 15, 1996 - Can Move Vern Without holding the Ctrl key down - If vern was laid out horizontally and mouse switching was selected then scrolling could lead to unwanted mouse switches. This has been eliminated by ignorning mouse switches when the Left Mouse button is down. - Fixed double click option which somehow got broken while featurising - Moved the priorities menu from the options menu to the main menu. Someone pointed out that when using Mathematica (or one of the math packages, I'm going from memory) it ran 3 times faster when set with a *high* priority! This is much more convenient. Ver. 1.016 Final Beta II : May 9, 1996 - Fixed a painting problem (mostly cosmetic) - Fixed a problem with toolbar type programs (like the MS Office Toolbar, Appbar, ...) These programs are no longer, and should never have been, movable. - Still haven't been able to find a fix for Xmouse other than making sure that Xmouse is loaded AFTER vern. - Still don't know why Eudora Pro doesn't work. In the interrum I suggest 'Gluing' Eudora to the Vern desktop so that it is not Movable. Ver. 1.015 Final Beta : May 3, 1996 - Fixed a weird problem which was introduced in ver 1.014. If one were to switch back and forth between two windows really quickly the program would continue switching between the windows ad nauseum. Nausiating, yes. - The icons are now BIGGER and easier to identify. - dragging the little windows works better - Changed home site to http://www.cam.org/~oneguy - there a still a couple problems with repaints but other than that this is almost certainly the final beta before the official release Ver. 1.014 beta : April 20, 1996 - Fixed (I hope) a problem where a window would be flagged being restored (ie., not iconic) and yet still have the coordinates of a minimised window. I'll have to check the fix for various resolutions (it works at 1024x768) - removed the windows check timeout from the cells tab of properties - replaced with hooks for activation, creation, destruction as well as min/max and move/size. Much cleaner. Ver. 1.013 beta : April 18, 1996 - Fixed (again, argh) the owned popups problem. The popups would appear properly only if the window was *NOT* maximised (since I rarely work with maximised windows this one slipped by me) I pray to the good laird above that this has finally fixed the bloody problem. - Occasionally, if Auto Activate and Mouse Switching were both activated, a program window would be positioned at apparently random locations when *restoring* (that is, un-minimising) the app. I've taken steps to prevent this (I believe it occurs when a mouse switch event occurs while a window is being restored, I'm not sure if this is licked but with this version I've minimised and restored several applications many times and it hasn't happened to me yet. Keeping my fingers crossed. - The first item on the Switch To menu was not responding. This is definitely fixed! Ver. 1.012 beta : April 16, 1996 - Fixed problem where windows would occasionally jump around and the active vern cell would spontaneously change - Removed 'vernhook.dll not found' message (you can use vern without vernhook.dll but will loose the ability to do screen switching with the mouse) - Added sensitivity menu for mouse switching Ver. 1.011 beta : April 13, 1996 - fixed the owned popups problem *again* (silly me) Ver. 1.010 beta : April 13, 1996 - this is the last beta release, I'll be releasing the help files with the next version. I'm still looking for a way to accept payment and a new service provider. - more changes to the Properties dialog - added code for registering software - fixed some annoying bugs - changed the registry entries under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE and HKEY_CURRENT_USER to 'Software\One Guy Coding\' Ver. 1.009 beta : April 10, 1996 - fixed problem with Microsoft Office Toolbar - rearranged menus - Added a single properties dialog with Tab controls - added a proportional resize option for the 'freeze cells' option - added a 'none' button for the hotkeys tab in the properties dialog - fixed a bunch of other niggling little bugs here and there Ver. 1.008 beta : April 8, 1996 - mouse switching now works on task bar and window borders etc - fixed 'lost captures' while dragging - added mouse switch toggle in Options menu and properties dialog - added wrap toggle in Options menu and properties dialog - added hidden toggle in Options menu and properties dialog - window is properly activated if clicked on in vern cell - raise vern by right clicking on minimise, restore buttons or child window caption bars Ver. 1.007 beta : April 6, 1996 - Changed 'Ctrl-Cursor' hotkeys to 'Alt-Cursor' hotkeys. Somehow I'd forgotten that I use 'Ctrl-right', etc about 4000 times per day while editing text! Still configurable in the Hotkey dialog. Ver. 1.007 beta : April 5, 1996 - Added mouse based screen switching and vernhook.dll If the cursor is moved along one of the borders (unfortunately this does not work on the taskbar border) vern will automatically switch to the next cell. Eventually this will be configurable. - Snazzed up the web page Ver. 1.006 beta : April 5, 1996 - Added 'Ctrl-Cursor Key' hotkeys (Ctrl-Up, Ctrl-Left, ...) to raise and navigate between vern cells (configurable in hotkey dialog) - cleaned up multiple repaints - active vern cell doesn't change now until the left mouse button is released Ver. 1.005 beta : April 4, 1996 - Added 'ignore Minimised' to not auto switch to minimised windows - Added 'snap to desktop' to snap windows onto screens when dragging them around in vern space - Fixed hotkey fiasco - Fixed vern lost when display resolution changed - Fixed problem where windows slightly off the top of vern space were jumping around in real space Ver. 1.004 beta : April 3, 1996 - Fixed ontop reset between sessions - Active vern cell is coloured 'darker' - Added 'Freeze cells' to the Options menu checked: cells are added when resizing uncheck: cells are resized without adding/deleting cells Ver. 1.003 beta : April 3, 1996 - moved Vern into the SysTray on the Task bar - changed the behavious of the flyout descriptions - fixed the raise vern hotkey - fixed xmouse behaviour problem Ver. 1.002 beta : April 2, 1996 - added ability to set all three hot keys in the hotkeys dialog. Ver. 1.001 beta : April 2, 1996 - fixed priorities menu - added auto activate for taskbar/tasklist selections - added window check timeout to properties dialog Features -------- Moving Vern - Hold down the Ctrl key before dragging Vern Options - Right click to open the Vern popup menu Vern Hotkey - Hit F12 (by default) to raise vern Resizing Vern - Set Cell Width and Height in Properties dialog - expand or contract by resizing Vern window For information see the One Guy Coding Web page at, http://www.cam.org/~oneguy or the Vern page at, http://www.cam.org/~oneguy/vern95 One Guy Coding is: oneguy@cam.org