Virtual Magnifying Glass

Hi John,

Thanks for logging this bug (and many thanks for creating the
PortableApps.com installer ;-).

You're quite right, the config settings need to go to the official place.
This is more important on Vista, and soon-to-be-Win7, which actually
enforces this concept. So we'll need to fix this for the next release.

-Chris O

Ah, ok, now I understand better what you are doing.

I think that your code can be merged to our trunk. I think this would be
good for you, wouldn't it?

I would prefer separating references to portable apps with IFDEFs too.
IFDEFs make the separation stronger, and when building the PortableApps
version just activate the define and have it built.

How should we procede for the merger? I would prefer if I simply add you
as developer and you commit in our subversion, althougth it's also ok if
you just send a patch.

And how do you build your custom version of the magnifier? With Lazarus or
Delphi?

I think we may do our custom version going forward unless you'd like to
incorporate it into the main tree. Basically within the Windows section,
it first checks to see if the environment variable PortableApps.comData
exists. If it does, it stores magnifier.ini there. If not, it will fall
back to your current code. This makes it very easy to package in
PortableApps.com Format which separates the application from the data
making backups much easier for users without impacting your standard local
build since it's the exact same build. I'd actually be happy to assist
having a PortableApps.com Format version from you available directly. Our
additional code and installer is licensed under the GPL like VMG and the
apps can run with or without or Platform (menu, auto-runner, app closer on
eject, etc).

I have code that will cause VMG to automatically start in the language the
Platform is in (end user picks German in our menu, VMG automatically comes
up in German) as well as redirecting the data. If you're not familiar,
PortableApps.com is the most popular portable software site in the world
with the most widely used portable platform (even more widely used than the
closed commercial ones), so it would be a nice thing to offer your users.

I found some MS docs on the subject:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms995853.aspx

And yes, the path you proposed is better. I will use it for the next
version together with the system to check if config file in the application
directory should be used.

Another portable applications distributor just talked to me. When making
this change, which was to fix a bug where accounts with limited rights cant
right to the magnifier.ini in the application directory, I didn't think
about portable suites.

If you send me an e-mail I have prepared a new executable which operates
like this: If there is a magnifier.ini in the same dir as the executable,
and it is not a directory and it is not read-only, then it will be used. If
not, then the Local Settings will be used.

I will also research the difference between those locations...