New Homepage For The Software Jedi

All applications can be seen and downloaded from my new home - http://www.TheSoftwareJedi.com.

To subscribe to the new news feed, use this link, or look for the RSS button on my homepage.

AnAppADay.com is not over. There will be more to follow, but in the meantime join in the news, chats, and forums at http://www.thesoftwarejedi.com.

May the source be with you.

Day 30 - Google Any Text

This app allows you to google the selected text from any application. Well, not "any" application. While a couple more hours of enhancements could have made it stronger - it currently works from within any textbox or richtextbox control. To activate it, press Ctrl-F11 after highlighting the text. This will cause your default browser to open with the search performed. The application resides in the systray as a red "G", and can be exited from the context menu.

Expect some mods to come out for this one to improve it's ability!

Download the app here
Download the source here

May the source be with you

DAY 29 - Big Ben

Nothing much to say. It resides in your systray. It sounds like Big Ben.

On the hour, every hour. Thanks to our British friends for requesting this app, and basically giving me the night off! THANKS Cowx!

Download the app here
Download the source here

May the source be with you.

Day 28 - Broadcast Clipboard

This is a simple little app that monitors your clipboard, sends the contents (text only today, sorry - someone will mod it) via UDP multicast to the specified group multicast IP, and puts the data in the remote PCs clipboard. In summary, when you copy from one pc, you can paste on the other. It works great - and I know plenty of people who will use this at the office.

There are other apps like this, but they tend to be point to point instead of multicasting. The point to point apps whine when one client or the other go down, and take extra configuration. Plus, this one is good for any number of PCs.

The only issue I've had with it is that my WIFI router, and Daemon's, seems to not send UDP multicast packets over the waves to clients. The other direction works, the wireless NIC in the pc does send the packets, and they get to the router and broadcast. Thus a machine on WIFI seems to be able to send the clipboard, but not receive. I'm unclear on whether this is per spec, or just a "feature" of our routers.

No special key combos are needed to use the app - it monitors the existing keyboard and broadcasts it. Double click the systray icon and you can set the group IP, the port, and the TTL. If you don't know what these mean, tinker only with the port to separate yourself from other clients on your network.

No configuration is needed unless you want to seperate yourself on your LAN from others that may be running this. Just start it on both PCs, and it takes over from there!

Download the app here
Download the source here

May the source be with you

Day 27 - Code Saver

**** Code updated - fixed issue causing screen saver not to exit

It's a screensaver, for code! It displays the *.cs (HAHA) code contained in the subdirectory and randomly changes every 30 seconds (I think... It's late...). Download the app, extract all files to a directory, and right click the ".scr" file. You should have "test" and "install" options - which work as advertised.

The download includes ALL AnAppADay.com source code flattened into the subdirectory. So out of box, it'll display all my code. I wanted to make it scroll the code and such, but I'm pooped. I didn't screenshot as it's a pain to screenshot a screensaver. It's late and I haven't slept in a while. Enjoy!

Download the screensaver here
Download the source here


Download DaemonCollector's modded version here (don't blame me)

This sweet mod makes the text for the code type itself onto the screen. It also has configuration options for text color, and code location. While the "debug" mode didn't work for me (Vista B2), word has it that on XP enabling that feature causes it to open random binaries and print the ASM! Wow!

Day 26 - Jedi Digg

Today's application is a tool bar docked at the top of your screen which displays the digg front page stories in rotation. From this tool bar you can left click the sotry title to open an embedded browser viewing the referenced page, right click the story title to open the story from duggmirror, left click the "Open Digg Page" text to open the digg page with comments, and lastly, you can directly digg the story from this toolbar. That's right, you can digg the story via a button on the toolbar.

The options menu (available via systray icon) allows you to change the opacity of the embedded browser, set your digg username and password, and choose which digg categories you'd like to see.

I believe it is against the Digg TOS to use this application (user beware), but c'mon - it's so damn convenient. Kevin Rose - give us something like this. If your boys can't make it happen, hire me. I have no problem cranking out applications. If you want your ads on it, that's cool. I would have done it but that would break the Google TOS too, and I can't go pissing off all the big tech companies in the same night (there's always tomorrow).

This was written in 6 hours - the longest of any of my applications. It's still far from perfect, but it's open source! Expect the list of mods to grow quickly very soon. Obviously I wish I could have made it do different types of feeds - like friends, upcoming, etc... Ran out of time. As usual, The Software Jedi will be back tomorrow - same time, same place.

*** known issues - the browser control doesn't like popups at all

For those not familiar with my applications, I encourage you to try them all out. If you're a programmer you'll probably like tweaking the source code too! All you need to run them is the latest .NET 2.0 framework. It's a quick download, available here!

 Download the app here
 Download the source here

The Jedi also reminds you to look at the paypal donate button on the right... You know you want to click it.

May the source be with you.

Day 25 - Jedi Honey Pot

Stick your hands into my honey pot by clicking here. What you'll see is a google map of the world, and everyone else who has stuck their hands into my honey pot.

How's it work? A simple .NET 2.0 client application resides on my machine which receives the HTTP connection, records your IP, and serves you a google map page along with the location of everyone else who has requested the page. The data is NOT persisted between application executions - so if I turn off my laptop, no more honey pot.

To run this application on your own computer, you'll need:
- A static IP, or DNS name (dyndns.org or no-ip.com are good for this)
- A Google API key (get it here)
- To edit the HTM file included with the application to have your google API key.
- To port forward port 15632 to your machine (sorry hard-coded, late night!)
- To execute the application on your machine
- To invite people to visit http://[your IP or DNS]:15632/

To shut down your honey pot, just right click the systray icon (blue target with yellow center) and choose Exit.

View my honey pot here (same as honey pot link above)
Download the binaries to run your own honey pot here
Download the source here

See that button on the right that says "PayPal..."? It's a neat little button/graphic, eh? Ever wonder what happens if you click it? Me too.


Download Chris's modded version here (don't blame me)

I added a configuration window to change the Port while the program is running.
I also added in an "Admin" page that will list the IP's of anyone
hitting your honey pot inside a message balloon, modify the
"AnAppADay.JediHoneyPot.AdminPage.htm" to change how it looks.
There is also an option to set the location of the admin page,
"http://site:port/adminpage/", I'd recommend it be changed to
something unique so that only the owner can see the admin page, that
too is able to be changed while the program is running.

Both text boxes in the configuration window have tooltips.

I added a tool tip to the Notify Icon, now it shows "Total hits: 12 -
Unique hits: 8" on mouse-over, just a simple count of how many hits
the honey pot has gotten so far.

Day 24 - Input Prank

Tonight's application runs silently in the background, and screws with the keyboard input. Typically I do a screen shot, but in this case, there is nothing to screen shot. Instead I'll write the pledge of allegiance below, with the args 20 10 2 passed to the application:

ŸI!pledge alegiance to the flg,"of te unjed states of amekca.# ¢¢And# o he rrepubic, ffor wwhich it stnds one ation, UgE GOD, with libey, aandjustie for aall

It has 3 different styles of achieving this prank:
Replace - replaces the pressed character with a psuedo-random replacement.
Consume - consumes the pressed key (does not get pressed).
Repeat - repeats the pressed key.

This application should be run from the console, and running with no args provides a brief help box. It's named "ankey.exe" so it won't look too obvious in task manager. You can rename it anything you'd like (but the Utils DLL must remain the same). The three args are the settings above. Run it with 500 500 500 to really trick people into thinking that their keyboard is broke. Run it with 20 10 2 to piss people off completely - but they'll know something is up!

Download the app here
Download the source here

Then, the Jedi commands you to click the PayPal donate button on the right. 24 free applications in 24 days... You can at least throw a dollar in my hat!

Day 23 - RSS Text to Speech

Tonights application let's you subscribe to RSS feeds and hear them via text-to-speech spoken over your speakers. After loading the application it will reside in your systray as a large red "T". Double click to open the options.

This application is again best for HOT feeds - that is, feeds you want to see (hear) immediately, then never again. I haven't written a good COLD feed reader yet. For my description about hot and cold feeds, see my earlier post on RSS/Information Delivery and my day 5 app - RSS Alerter.

You have the option to set the times it is active (can be used as an alarm clock in this case), set the poll rate, and then give it feeds to subscribe to. Seperate each feed on a new line. It will mark all items as "read" the first time hitting the feed, and then speak any subsequent items.

As it speaks, and for a bit after, you can right click the systray icon and choose "Last Item Details" to have the webpage for the last item read opened up for you. This is a GREAT application for my home machine in the evening where I don't mind the sound.

The voice used for reading is adjustable in your control panel under speech. This varies by OS version - I'd love to hear some feedback on what voices you have. Windows Vista B2 only has one voice. My XP SP2 Machine has 3 voices. You can also adjust the speed of the voice in this control panel.

REMEMBER - don't expect immediate speaking when you start this app. Enter some feeds, then give those feeds time to have new items! It does NOT speak old items. Some of my favorite feeds (10-30 minute additions):
http://www.digg.com/rss/containertechnology.xml
http://feeds.feedburner.com/boingboing/iBag
http://news.com.com/2063-10801_3-0.xml
http://news.com.com/2547-1_3-0-20.xml

 Download the app here
 Download the source here

MODS! DaemonCollector already modded this app to include choosing the voice to use when speaking. Link provided here but I haven't even looked at his mod, thus don't whine to me! Check it out here!

Day 22 - Jedi Window Dock

Tonights application allows you to dock any number of applications inside of a tabbed window.

You can dock all your putty sessions together, put all of your instant message conversations on tabs, or perhaps you manage a ton of remote desktop sessions... All of these windows need not take up space on your taskbar any longer! Software Jedi to the rescue.

Any application, with the exception of console apps, can be docked. Some strange behavior has been reported with a couple of apps but it works fine for most.
After docking, you can right click the active tab and close the application - or undock it, which pops it out of the tabbed frame.

This app goes into my top 5 list for sure! For the new visitors, be sure to download the .NET Framework 2.0 first. Most of my applications require it!

 Download the app here
 Download the source here

Modded version (credit to DaemonCollector and dharh):
Fixed some huge bugs(not restoring window on popout and some smaller ones) added drag and drop tab control and added the ability to change the tab alignment
Also added some functions to the WinAPI thing in the utils librarary to make these work.