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TopOCR Portable 3.1 Development Test 10

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computerfreaker
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TopOCR Portable 3.1 Development Test 10

Application: TopOCR
Category: Office
Description: TopOCR is designed to be simple and user-friendly for use with your digital camera or smartphone. Now wherever you go, you can quickly and easily acquire documents from business cards, newspapers, books and magazines, without having to carry around a bulky and costly portable scanner.

Download TopOCR Portable 3.1 Development Test 10 online [965
KB + 7.72 MB download / 9.3MB installed]

(MD5: 1ef29b59c2fbffa04a234e4d88f98569)

Online Installer: TopOCR Portable is an online installer that will download additional files during setup.

Permission: Permission has been received from TopSoft, Ltd. to make this portable build.

OK, I see how you're doing it, under the circumstances you describe, I certainly have no objections.
Your choice as to location of your script.

Thanks, TopSoft!

Release Notes:

Development Test 10 (2010-06-20):
Bug fix: Under Windows Vista and Windows 7, when TopOCR Portable was run without admin rights, a file would be left behind (thanks to xuesheng for the code to fix this!)
Improvement: Deleted languages section from installer.ini

Development Test 9 (2010-06-11):
Bug fix: Under certain circumstances, TopOCR would fail to run. The reason for this is currently unknown, although a problem with the NSIS UAC plugin is suspected. (Thanks to xuesheng for reporting & testing, thanks to Kim_Wood for confirming the fix)
Bug fix: %WINDIR%\TopOCR.ini was left behind due to an improperly written instruction in TopOCR's launcher file

Development Test 8 (2010-06-11):
Bug fix: TopOCR's files weren't extracted properly, making TopOCR Portable unable to start (thanks to RogerL, caglartoklu, and xuesheng for report)

Development Test 7 (2010-06-05):
Improvement: Updated to the latest version of the PortableApps.com Launcher
Improvement: Updated to the latest version of the PortableApps.com Installer
Improvement: Updated to the latest version of the PortableApps.com Format

Development Test 6 (2010-04-08):
Upgraded to the latest version of the PortableApps.com Launcher

Development Test 5 (2010-01-28):
Bug fix: TopOCR Portable would screw up a local install of TopOCR

Development Test 4 (2009-12-23):
Installer is now set to Multilingual, and supports the same 11 languages TopOCR does

Development Test 3 (2009-12-23):

  • Changed app category from Graphics & Pictures to Office (thanks to Chris Morgan for report)
  • Added code to remove unnecessary NSIS remnants from the TopOCR installer (thanks to Bruce for report)
  • Fixed a problem with the ReadMe (thanks to digitxp for report)

Development Test 2 (2009-12-22):

  • Help images were missing (thanks to digitxp for report)
  • Removed the unnecessary App\DefaultData folder (thanks to digitxp for report)
  • Changed app category from Utilities to Graphics & Pictures (thanks to digitxp for report)
  • Forgot to add my name to Other\Source\Readme.txt (thanks to digitxp for report)
  • Removed Other\Source\AppSource.txt, since TopOCR is closed-source (thanks to digitxp for report)
  • Launcher now moves ioSpecial.ini into Data, where it belongs (thanks to digitxp for report)

Development Test 1 (2009-12-22): Initial release

digitxp
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Testing

Now testing. Smile
How did you get the installer to work in the end?

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computerfreaker
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Gringoloco suggested I use a

Gringoloco suggested I use a custom code macro, and that worked like a charm. Check out Other\Source\PortableApps.comInstallerCustom.nsh...

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

digitxp
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Test

PAF Compliance

  • Appinfo.ini IMO, TopOCR is a Graphics and Pictures program.
  • Appicon.ico If there's a better, more hi-res icon, please use it ;).
  • DefaultData There's no point of it existing ;).
  • Other\Source\Readme.txt You forgot to replace (You) with your name/handle. Also, the complete Directory structure is not there.
  • AppSource.txt TopOCR is closed source. You can't get the source.
  • Other\Help There's a reason that the images are there. Wink

Traces

  • App ioSpecial.ini looks like it should be in the Data directory
  • Regshot:
    ----------------------------------
    Values deleted:0
    ----------------------------------
    
    ----------------------------------
    Values added:0
    ----------------------------------
    
    ----------------------------------
    Values modified:0
    ----------------------------------
    
    ----------------------------------
    Files added:1
    ----------------------------------
    C:\Documents and Settings\Casey\My Documents\TopOCRPortable\Data\settings\topocr_portable.reg
    
    ----------------------------------
    Files deleted:0
    ----------------------------------
    
    ----------------------------------
    Files [attributes?] modified:0
    ----------------------------------
    
    ----------------------------------
    Folders added:1
    ----------------------------------
    C:\Documents and Settings\Casey\My Documents\TopOCRPortable\Data\settings
    
    ----------------------------------
    Total changes:2
    ----------------------------------
    

I'd say as soon as you fix up the small PAF stuff, then it's good to go B-).

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computerfreaker
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Re: Test

digitxpAppinfo.ini IMO, TopOCR is a Graphics and Pictures program.

Should I change the category, do you think? I figured it was a utility, but you could easily be right...
nvm, Softpedia agrees with you. I've changed the category.

digitxpAppicon.ico If there's a better, more hi-res icon, please use it Wink

No better icon AFAIK. I used Resource Hacker to get that icon straight out of TopOCR itself; there was just that one icon (and one icon I didn't want, a "piece of paper" icon that was useless for my purposes), so I had to scale it & change the bitdepth using IcoFX. Not too pretty, I know, but I don't have another icon. (Unless some talented graphics designer wants to create one? My graphic-design skills really stink...)

digitxpDefaultData There's no point of it existing Wink

So should I delete that? NP...
Done.

digitxpOther\Source\Readme.txt You forgot to replace (You) with your name/handle. Also, the complete Directory structure is not there.

What do you mean by "complete Directory structure"? I just checked the PAF specs and everything seems to be there...

digitxpAppSource.txt TopOCR is closed source. You can't get the source.

So should I delete that? Or should I modify it to say something like "You can't get the source for TopOCR"?
EDIT: just looked at Google Chrome Portable, and there's no AppSource.txt; I'd assume I should delete the TopOCR one, too?
EDIT 2: I deleted AppSource.txt; if it should be in there, please let me know & I will re-add it.

digitxpOther\Help There's a reason that the images are there. Wink

OOPS, that's probably my most embarrassing error yet... thanks for catching it.
EDIT: Taken care of.

digitxpApp ioSpecial.ini looks like it should be in the Data directory

hmm, you're right. Shouldn't be too hard to add that to the launcher...
Done.

digitxpRegshot: <snip>
I'd say as soon as you fix up the small PAF stuff, then it's good to go B-).

Great, thanks for the tests! I'll get Dev Test 2 out right away.
Done.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Chris Morgan
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Softpedia saying something is

Softpedia saying something is utterly irrelevant...

I'd categorise it under Office. It deals with turning Graphics & Pictures into text documents - definitely an Office job.

I am a Christian and a developer and moderator here.

“A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” – Proverbs 15:1

computerfreaker
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OK, I'll change the category

OK, I'll change the category again... (hum, this seems to be a "broad" app! 3 different categories...)

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

digitxp
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Data

Concerning the directory structure, you forgot the part under Data (in the readme :P).

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computerfreaker
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Drat. Copy & paste problem,

Drat. Copy & paste problem, due to an ID-10-T error... I'll fix that in DT3.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated 2009-12-22

Updated 2009-12-22, see above for details

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Mark Sikkema
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Just had a look at your source folder .

Next release of Winamp I will implement the double '$' as well !

Anyway,

Is there any reason why you are making use of 'ReplaceInFile.nsh' by Datenbert ?

Lately all launchers make use of 'ReplaceInFileWithTextReplace.nsh' by John T. Haller

It is more reliable and faster, just include 'TextReplace.nsh' as well! (instead of 'StrRep.nsh')

It's a minor issue, but just wanted to inform you !

Formerly Gringoloco
Windows XP Pro sp3 x32

computerfreaker
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The double '$' is to escape

The double '$' is to escape the dollar sign in the folders, because the installer has a folder named $COMMONFILES and a folder named $PLUGINSDIR in it. You don't need a double dollar sign unless you have a similar situation... Wink

I'm using 'ReplaceInFile.nsh' because that was what the 7-Zip launcher used, and I essentially copied, pasted & modified that launcher; I assume 'ReplaceInFileWithTextReplace.nsh' has the same syntax, etc.? I don't want to rewrite the entire launcher for the sake of a few lines of code, but I'm willing to rewrite parts of it...

Thanks for the info! (And especially thanks for the custom code suggestion; that's the only reason this got off the ground)

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Bruce Pascoe
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Winamp

Ever open Winamp's installer with 7-Zip? It has folders with dollar signs all over the place. Seems to be an NSIS thing...

By the way, I hope you're not extracting stuff from $PLUGINSDIR. Those are NSIS plugins; I don't think the app itself needs them. Wink

computerfreaker
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No, I don't use Winamp so

No, I don't use Winamp so I've never even tried opening the installer with 7-zip.
Your suggestion the dollar-sign folders might be an NSIS thing is supported by TopOCR, btw - it's an NSIS installer. (Given that variable names in NSIS start with a dollar sign, I'm not too surprised...)

I'm not sure which $PLUGINSDIR you were referring to: the embedded $PLUGINSDIR in the TopOCR installer or the NSIS $PLUGINSDIR?
EDIT: doesn't matter. I just glanced into the embedded $PLUGINSDIR and you're right, it's all NSIS stuff.

I guess I'm going to bring out Dev Test 3 shortly... thanks for the heads-up!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated 2009-12-23

Updated 2009-12-23, see above for details

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Darkbee
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Looks cool but...

This software looks almost too good to be true (free). So what's the catch? When is it going to become shareware?

I don't quite understand why somebody would spend literally years working on something so complex and then give it away. Perhaps I'm just a mean-spirited old Scrooge. Smile

computerfreaker
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I have no idea what TopSoft's

I have no idea what TopSoft's plans are. As far as I know, there's no catch; however, I'm not affiliated with TopSoft in any way, so they don't tell me what they're going to do. Wink

As for "spending years working on something so complex and then giving it away", that's pretty much what all freeware & OSS is... OpenOffice.org, for example, or Firefox, or even the relatively simple (compared to other apps) Notepad++.
(I seriously doubt you're a mean-spirited old Scrooge though!)

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Darkbee
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Yes and No

Well yes and no, the difference being that OpenOffice and others don't need highly specialized, scientific algorithms to run. I'm overly trivializing, but any programmer of reasonable skill could given sufficient time and resources code OpenOffice. However, not just any old programmer could code OCR software (from scratch). That requires some highly specialized knowledge (one would imagine).

It's a bit like writing an MP3 encoder from scratch (i.e. not using an existing library like Lame or BladeEnc), it's not just something that you can just do. It requires lots of learning and knowledge. It's an investment of your time (probably more so than just writing a "plain old app").

I'm not complaining, I think it's fantastic that people are willing to do that, and no doubt if I had the skill I probably wouldn't mind "giving back" in a similar way. I'm just curious as to the mind-set, given humanity's general propensity toward greed and materialism these days.

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I see what you're saying

I see what you're saying, and I completely agree with you.
(Given the nearly-complete absence of freeware OCR stuff, and the virtually-complete absence of good freeware OCR stuff, I'm a trifle surprised too... hopefully this stays freeware)

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated (again) 2009-12-23, see above for details

Updated (again) 2009-12-23, see above for details

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Devo
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Better type of Upgrade

This is probably more of a general question for online installers, but is there any way you can check for the version installed in the App folder against the latest version? The reason I ask is because I downloaded Test 3 a few hours ago and ran the installer and everything worked perfectly. I just downloaded Test 4 to "upgrade" to the newer version, but while upgrading, it downloaded TopOCR again. This is completely unnecessary since I doubt the author came out with a new version in the last few hours.

Again, I realize this is probably an issue with all online installers, but maybe it's something you could look at so it tries to download TopOCR only when a new version comes out, otherwise it just upgrades the launcher.

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Yes, I'm aware of that. Not a

Yes, I'm aware of that. Not a fun problem, but one I don't know how to resolve. (I've already scoured the PortableApps.com Format for some sort of fix, but no luck)
I'm not even sure the problem can legally be resolved, since the downloading is taken care of by the PortableApps.com Installer (per the options in an INI file), and (due to trademarks) we can't recompile the Installer without rebranding it - quite a bit of trouble IMHO.

I'll head into IRC and see if I can work out a solution with someone... hopefully Chris Morgan's available right now.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Devo
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What if you put the installed

What if you put the installed version number in an ini in the data folder, then the installer can check that number against the version on the site. Hopefully this can be integrated into the installer.

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How?

But check it how? Is there a standard, universal mechanism for getting version numbers of software from websites? I know there's PAD but not everybody implements it.

computerfreaker
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OK, I just talked to MaienM

OK, I just talked to MaienM in IRC. The way to check for a new version would be to compare the current version's md5 hash against the downloaded version's md5 hash, but that would involve downloading the latest version from its website.

In other words, there's nothing we can really do about the problem. Sorry!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated 2010-01-28

Updated 2010-01-28, see above for details.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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No "Help" and No Spell Check Dictionary?

Just gave 3.1 dev test 5 a try on an WinXP-Sp3 system and it installed (via automatic web downloaded) beautifully and worked very well (for a free one!).

However I was hoping to be able to read some help file or information on some of its tools, but clicking the "Help" menu heading and "?" tool icon produced no effect that I could notice. I also tried doing a spell check on the OCRed result, but it gave a brief message about no dictionary being installed. But other than those things (and making plenty of OCR mistakes) it did the job I wanted.

Thanks for a very useful addition to my PortableApps suite!

JohnW

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No help file

No, unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a help file. It's possible it was forgotten, or maybe it hasn't been written yet.
Fortunately, the functions are pretty much self-explanatory; it's a fairly simple app to use.

I also had a pretty large number of OCR mistakes in the test docs I tried, but that's probably normal. After all, software has a long way to go before it can catch up to human minds. Wink

Thanks for the feedback!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated, 2010-04-08

Updated, 2010-04-08. See above for details.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Darkbee
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TopOCR to the rescue!

I used this today for an actual real-world purpose! A friend had a scanned document and was going to type out the text from the document by hand. I stopped them immediately and said "Don't do that, I have just the application for you!", within a minute they had an almost near perfect Rich Text version of the text in electronic form.

It's not fool-proof but I'm not going to argue with the results for the price, and my friend was very grateful that they didn't have to type out a page of text by hand. Smile

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Cool :D

Glad to hear somebody's using (and liking) this; since I've got it on Dropbox, I have no way of seeing whether anybody downloaded it or not.

Two questions, if you don't mind:
#1: does your friend have admin rights? If not, did TopOCR do anything unusual? (It saves settings in $WINDIR\TopOCR.ini, so I told PAL to request admin rights)
#2: Did you happen to notice if the portability aspect is OK? I do my best to make sure I cover all the bases, but occasionally a Reg key or a file slips by (particularly those that are only created when a particular setting, or a particular setting combination, is set).

Thanks for the feedback!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

Darkbee
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Check back in a week.

I'm going to be on vacation for a week, so I'll have to double check when I come back but the app was actually used on my PC under my login, which is Win XP with admin rights.

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Please leave a message at the tone ;)

I'll be leaving again on Monday, so could you please just leave me a message? I'll see it when I get back in late May/early June. (If there's any files/Registry entries I missed, I'll come back for that; if there's anything like that, better shoot me an e-mail or I probably won't find out)

Thanks!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated, 2010-06-05

Updated, 2010-06-05; see above for details.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

RogerL
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Doesn't work for me

Starting TopOCRPortable.exe in G:\PortableApps\TopOCRPortable - splash displays, then disappears but TopOCR doesn't show. Process Explorer shows TopOCRportable.exe runs then stops and TopOCR doesn't run.

Non-portable version installed to C:\Program files\TopOCR works ok.

Comparison of files in C:\Program files\TopOCR and G:\PortableApps\TopOCRPortable\App\TopOCR\$COMMONFILES\TopOCR shows same file set so I don't think the portable version was downloaded incorrectly. Did it twice to be sure. OS - WinXp Pro SP2

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Doesn't work for me too

I have the same problem. I have seen the splash screen and that is it.

The process TopOCRPortable.exe appears in Task Manager, when the splash is gone, it disappears and terminates. The process topocr.exe never appears.

I am using Windows 7 64-bit. I have tried the application both normally and with admin rights.

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Does not work for me either

When I tried to run the portable version on my Win7 64-bit system from a standard account I got a UAC prompt. After entering the administrator password I saw the splash screen and then nothing else.

I tried installing TopOCR 3.1 from the TopOCR website and it started up OK when I tried it from a standard account.

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Fixed, thanks for the report!

Thanks for the report!
The portable version wasn't downloaded incorrectly, but it was extracted incorrectly. I was using some custom code for that, and accidentally deleted that custom code when I upgraded TopOCR to the latest version of the PortableApps.com Installer.
I just replaced that custom code, so TopOCR Portable should work for you again.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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TopOCR Portable 3.1 DT 8 still does not work for me

When I try to run TopOCR 3.1 DT 8 from a standard account on my Win7 64-bit system I get a UAC prompt. After I enter the admin password the splash screen appears for a while but TopOCR does not start.

An error file is being created every time I try to run TopOCR from the menu:

[drive-letter]:\PortableApps\TopOCRPortable\error.log

error.log contains the text "Error opening file" which does not mean much to me.

computerfreaker
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There's a couple of

There's a couple of possibilities here. If you're willing to help, I need you to run a few different tests to see if we can pinpoint the problem.

* Test #1: Instead of giving the admin password, try canceling out of the UAC prompt and see what happens. You mentioned the regularly installed version of TopOCR works without needing admin rights, so this may work.
* Test #2: In TopOCRPortable\App\AppInfo\Launcher\TopOCRPortable.ini, try changing RunAsAdmin=try to RunAsAdmin=none, then run TopOCR Portable and see what happens.
* Test #3: In TopOCRPortable\App\AppInfo\Launcher\TopOCRPortable.ini, try changing RunAsAdmin=try to RunAsAdmin=force, then run TopOCR Portable and see what happens.

Also, did the regularly-installed version of TopOCR have exactly the same privileges TopOCR Portable got? That's very important.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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Test results

Test #1 result:

After cancelling the UAC prompt (by clicking "No") got a PortableApps.com Launcher message box showing "Some features of TopOCR Portable will not work if you do not run as administrator". After I clicked "OK" to remove the message the splash screen appeared followed by the two TopOCR windows side-by-side.

Test #2 result:

The splash screen appeared followed by the two TopOCR windows side-by-side.

Test #3 result:

At the UAC prompt I entered the admin password and got the splash screen. TopOCR did not start and a new error.log file was created ("Error opening file").

I'm not sure what you mean by "Also, did the regularly-installed version of TopOCR have exactly the same privileges TopOCR Portable got?" I got a UAC prompt when I ran the installer and I entered the admin password. When I installed TopOCR it was installed in C:\WinApps\TopOCR instead of the normal program files folder. I ran TopOCR using the desktop icon the installer created.

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I had been wondering if the

I had been wondering if the regularly-installed version of TopOCR had a different privilege level than TopOCR Portable, but that doesn't matter right now. It looks like you gave me exactly the right information - RunAsAdmin=none works.
Can you repeat Test #2 and see if TopOCR Portable works correctly? If it does, I'll upload Development Test 9 with that fix.

Thanks for the help!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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Test #2 looks good

Repeated Test #2 and tried OCR conversion using a photo of a document.

TopOCR did a pretty good job of converting it to text. Able to save the converted text as a PDF file. Print preview works. Text-to-speech works.

So it seems to be OK with RunAsAdmin=none

computerfreaker
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Thanks for all the testing &

Thanks for all the testing & reporting!
I'm uploading Development Test 9 right now, with that fix and one more on board. Done. If it's not too much trouble, could you please make sure DT 9 is working as expected?

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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DT 9 is better but ...

DT 9 works from a standard account on my Win7 64-bit system but some things still need fixing.

I uninstalled TopOCR from my hard disk and uninstalled TopOCR Portable DT 8 before trying DT 9.

DT 9 started up OK but when I went to the File menu to open a file to test the program the File menu listed the last 4 files I'd used when testing the previous installations. This list should have been empty.

After opening a photo DT 9 was able to do OCR, save as PDF, print preview and text-to-speech.

But DT 9 was unable to generate an MP3 for me. I was able to save the WAV file OK but when I tried to do the MP3 conversion DT 9 displayed an error message:

mp3enc
Could not find Lame encoder \Lame\lame.exe! Please check your installation.

DT 9 has lame.exe in the same folder as topocr.exe so there must be something wrong with the way DT 9 is configured.

computerfreaker
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Re: recent files. I haven't

Re: recent files. I haven't been able to get anything to show up in the Recent Files menu, so I can't reproduce this. Can you give me some steps to get items into the Recent Files menu? (And yes, I've tried a number of things - opening images, performing OCR operations, saving the resulting text, performing text-to-speech on the text and saving the sound files. Still nothing.)

Re: lame. I just installed the regular version of TopOCR and easily reproduced the problem. It looks like TopOCR is looking for lame.exe in [drive letter]\Lame\lame.exe, which is totally weird. I'll contact TopSoft and see what's going on.

Thanks for the feedback!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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How to add entries to Recent Files

Here is the simplest way I've found to add files to the list:

(1) Start TopOCR Portable 3.1 DT 9 from the PortableApps.com Menu

(2) In the ImageWindow menu click "File" followed by "Open" then select a suitable photo file (e.g. photo.jpg)

(3) After TopOCR opens the image click "File" in the ImageWindow and you should see the image file listed between the "Acquire" and "Exit" entries (e.g. 1 photo.jpg)

(4) Select "Exit" from the ImageWindow's File menu to exit TopOCR Portable (when the "Save as" window appears click "Cancel" to avoid saving the PDF file)

(5) Start TopOCR Portable 3.1 DT 9 from the PortableApps.com Menu again

(6) In the ImageWindow menu click "File" and the menu should list the file you used last time listed between the "Acquire" and "Exit" entries (e.g. 1 path\to\photo.jpg)

TopOCR saves the recent file list (and other settings) in TopOCR.ini which is stored in C:\Windows. The Launcher INI file includes these lines:

[FilesMove]
settings\TopOCR.ini=%WINDIR%\

I think I know what the problem is - the launcher is not handling the UAC File Virtualization used in Vista and Windows 7.

When I run TopOCR Portable from a standard account in Windows 7, the TopOCR file is actually created in the C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Windows folder (even though it appears in C:\Windows folder). When TopOCR exits the launcher leaves the C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Windows\TopOCR.ini file behind.

Here is some information from MSDN:

File Virtualization

File virtualization addresses the situation where an application relies on the ability to store a file, such as a configuration file, in a system location typically writeable only by administrators. Running programs as a standard user in this situation might result in program failures due to insufficient levels of access.

When an application writes to a system location only writeable by administrators, Windows then writes all subsequent file operations to a user-specific path under the Virtual Store directory, which is located at %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore. Later, when the application reads back this file, the computer will provide the one in the Virtual Store. Because the Windows security infrastructure processes the virtualization without the application’s assistance, the application believes it was able to successfully read and write directly to Program Files. The transparency of file virtualization enables applications to perceive that they are writing and reading from the protected resource, when in fact they are accessing the virtualized version.

(This extract can be found about half-way down the page found at
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb756960.aspx
There may be better descriptions available but that page seems to be a good place to start.)

computerfreaker
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Thanks for the lengthy &

Thanks for the lengthy & helpful reply!

Re: adding Recent File entries. I followed your procedure and nothing was added to the Recent File list. All I have is a single entry, Recent Files, and it's disabled. It's clearly a placeholder.

Re: file virtualization. That would be some really, really bad news. I'll bring this to Chris Morgan's attention immediately, as it would definitely require fixing before the official PAL release.

Re: lame. I contacted TopSoft and received a reply.

Yup, it's a bug in TopOCR 3.1. You'll need to find the cwenc mp3 encoder, download and install it, then it will work.

I believe the cwenc MP3 encoder in question is located at http://cwenc.sourceforge.net/, but I'm not totally sure. I have requested clarification from TopSoft, and will post their reply.

Thanks for all the testing & feedback!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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Using custom code in launcher may help

I've managed to see a disabled/greyed-out Recent Files entry in the File menu ... but so far it has always been updated with a filename as soon as I open a file.

I think it may be possible to add some custom code to the launcher to work around the problem. I've started reading the launcher manual and trying some experiments with modified launchers.

Detecting when VirtualStore is being used seems to be quite easy.

computerfreaker
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I'm not sure what's up with

I'm not sure what's up with the Recent Files menu; it may be a problem with my system. I don't have time to look into it atm, though.

Could you please head over to the PortableApps.com Launcher thread and give Chris Morgan your suggestions for VirtualStore detection & handling? I wasn't able to find much info, and Chris's only suggestion has potential issues.

Thank you!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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Not sure about that

I'm not convinced that detecting that would be easy. Consider that the PortableApps.com Launcher doesn't get any of that happening, as it's a proper Vista/7-compatible executable (with the proper manifest entries and all), so you can't use the VirtualStore directly in itself.

I'm not sure; if you can propose some custom code for computerfreaker to use, great. However I don't think it's the sort of thing I'm going to be putting in the PortableApps.com Launcher; proper applications will never need it, and I think an application should be fixed rather than have its difficulties worked around.

I am a Christian and a developer and moderator here.

“A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” – Proverbs 15:1

xuesheng
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Some progress has been made

My custom code seems to work on Windows 7. The next step is to see what happens when I try it on Windows XP.

There are probably some cases I've forgotten to consider, but it looks promising.

xuesheng
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Here is the current version

Here is the current version of my custom code solution to the File Virtualisation problem encountered when running TopOCR Portable from an account in Vista or Windows 7: http://pastebin.com/AybmbrE8 (it seems I was a bit careless with the tabs; it looks better in my editor than it does on the pastebin page).

My original idea relied upon the launcher's [FilesMove] code being unable to store TopOCR.ini in %WINDIR% so I used the PreExec hook to ensure my code ran after [FilesMove] had been processed. The Post hook is used as that is the first "clean up" hook in the list.

The current custom code no longer checks the result of the [FilesMove] processing so some other hooks may be more appropriate now but this is the first time I've used the launcher so I don't know much about how it does its magic.

The code is based upon the launcher's FilesMove.nsh file so it probably could be further simplified, if I was more familiar with the launcher.

In addition to the custom code I made one other change to TopOCR Portable. The target for the [FilesMove] entry in TopOCRPortable.ini has had its trailing slash removed:

[FilesMove]
settings\TopOCR.ini=%WINDIR%
computerfreaker
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Looking good, thank you!

I'll put out another DT, probably tomorrow, with that custom code. I ended up with a couple of minutes more than I expected, so I just uploaded the new DT. Thanks!
It's easy to tell you modeled this after PAL - the code style is the same, and the {DebugMsg} calls are in all the right places. Smile
Nice work!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

xuesheng
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Thanks for your kind words.

Thanks for your kind words. The main reason the code style is the same is that most of the code came from FilesMove.nsh; all I did was change a few lines.

DT 10 looks good but... I was a bit surprised by what happened the first time I ran it.

TopOCR is no longer installed on my hard disk and before I installed DT 10 on my flash drive I uninstalled DT 9 from it. When I used the File-Open command, TopOCR Portable opened the last folder I'd used with DT 9. I'm not sure why this happened. I'll try to investigate this later today or tomorrow.

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Windows Explorer?

I'm pretty sure the recent folder thing is due to Windows Explorer; it's weird that DT 10 would get DT 9's most recent folder, but perhaps Explorer saves the most recent folder based on the executable's filename?

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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Updated, 2010-06-11

Updated, 2010-06-11; see above for details.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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Better, but not quite right

In WinXp it starts minimized to a button just above the Start Button.

Can maximize it, but if then click on minimize, it goes back to being a button just above the start button, which it shouldn't do on Xp.

computerfreaker
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Yeah, that's definitely

Yeah, that's definitely unusual behavior; I'm not sure why it's doing that, and I'm 99% sure I can't change that. It seems to be a TopOCR problem, as opposed to a TopOCR Portable problem, since I was able to reproduce it on the installed version of TopOCR.
You may want to contact TopSoft to see about a fix.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

RogerL
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e-mail to TopSoft sent

"Just wondering why, in WinXp, minimizing TopOCR 3.1 displays a button above the Windows Start Button?" - lets see if they reply

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reply from TopSoft

Hello Roger,
My guess is that XP just puts the icon in the lower left corner. It handles our program a little differently, because we're actually two windows and not one.

best regards, Mark Seidner TopSoft, Ltd.

Kim_Wood
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Proposed fix for Development Test 9 works

I have tried your suggested fix for Development Test 9 (RunAsAdmin=none), and am happy to confirm that TopOCR Portable now runs successfully,

Thanks,

Kim

Kim

computerfreaker
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Thanks for confirming the

Thanks for confirming the fix!
DT 9 is on its way. Done. If you could please confirm that DT 9 is working as expected, I would be very appreciative.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

computerfreaker
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Updated (again), 2010-06-11

Updated (again), 2010-06-11; see above for details.

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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Confirming Dev Test 9 is good

I can confirm that DevTest9 is good. I have tried both an overwrite of a previous DevTest, and a fresh install.

Regards,

Kim

Kim

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Thanks for testing! I

Thanks for testing! I appreciate it!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

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Tested again

Hi computerfreaker,

I have tested it again on Windows 7 64-bit with both admin rights and normal user rights.
I can say that it works properly.
I did not apply a Regshot, but the settings are kept in the data successfully.

Thanks for the application.

computerfreaker
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Thanks for the test & the

Thanks for the test & the feedback!

"The question I would like to know, is the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. All we know about it is that the Answer is Forty-two, which is a little aggravating."

JonBoy
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Discontinued

I got a 404 when running the online installer which appears to be a consequence of the following statement.

"With deep regrets we must announce that as of October 8, 2010, TopOCR and Babel Reader are discontinued and no longer supported or available from our web site.":
http://www.topocr.com/topocr.html

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A Shame

Well that's a bummer! Sad

solanus
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Dangit.

I like TopOCR, it's reliable and accurate.
There really aren't a lot of complete OCR packages out there in the FOSS world.

Of course there are the Tesseract and GOCR engines, which would be fine if someone implemented a really good front-end.

This sounds like a good wishlist thing to toss out to the LibreOffice people, I think. If they could integrate that into Write and Draw, it would be extremely useful.

I made this half-pony, half-monkey monster to please you.

solanus
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Possible replacement?

FreeOCR is in beta test, and scheduled for release this year.
The license is not explicit, but in the about it says free for personal and commercial use.
http://www.freeocr.net/

I made this half-pony, half-monkey monster to please you.

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Dot Net

FreeOCR says that it requires .Net under the recommended minimum specifications.

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Open Question

Just a question for someone out there. If a person finds a download of TopOCR from a different site, is there a way to get the online installer to use the copy you downloaded? Is this even allowed if development for TopOCR has ceased?

Bill G.
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land of the frozen mosquito

m0d
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404 | File Not Found

Is there any archived versions of last release ?

Or any other options available?

marglar
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Found this one...

Hi there, i had just the same problem and found the original topocr (v3.1) installer there: http://www.4shared.com/file/U_-4f9Op/topocr.html

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