Just Great Software Newsfeed

AceText 3.2.0 is now available for download.

This release brings improved compatibility with Windows 10. Windows 10 now allows Windows Store applications (previously known as Modern UI or Metro applications) to run on the desktop. This makes it possible to use AceText with such applications. The best know example of such an application is Microsoft's new Edge browser. Sending clips directly to such applications (through AcePaste, for example) was unreliable with previous versions of AceText. Sometimes the pasted text would appear in the target application. Sometimes it would not. We've now tweaked AceText's method for sending clips directly to applications to make it just as reliable for Windows Store applications as it already was for Windows desktop applications.

On Windows 10, window borders appear to be very thin. But the area where you can grab the window border with the mouse to resize the window extends quite a bit beyond the visible part of the border. Technically, this entire area is part of the border and thus part of the window. This complicates things for applications like AceText that preserve window size and position while ensuring the entire window is visible when you restart them. Previously, AceText would make sure its entire window including the entire border is visible when you restart it. On Windows 10 the window would appear to be shifted away from the edge of your monitor if you had previously positioned it against the edge or even beyond the edge of your monitor. Now, AceText only requires the visible part of the border to be on-screen. If you shut down AceText with its window partially off-screen and restart it, then AceText now places its window so that the visible part of the window border touches the edge of the screen.

When deleting clips, AceText now maintains the scrolling position of the clip tree. This makes it easier to keep track of what's happening. The URL button on the Appearance page in the Preferences now changes the color of highlighted email addresses in addition to changing the color of highlighted URLs.

• If you have already purchased AceText, you can download this free update for free.
• Buy AceText now.
• Complete Version History.

RegexMagic 2.4.0 is now available for download.

This release brings RegexMagic up-to-date for all the applications that it supports. Newly supported versions are Visual C++ 2015, Delphi and C++Builder 10 Seattle, PCRE 10.20, PHP 5.6.14, Python 3.5, XRegExp 3.0.0, and R 3.1.2. Microsoft Edge has been added as an additional browser option for JavaScript and HTML5 Pattern.

Under the Copy button there are new items for copying the regex or replacement text as a C++11 raw string literal. C++11 raw string literals do not require backslashes or quotes to be escaped and can contain literal line breaks. This makes them much better suited for adding regular expressions to your source code than normal C string literals because there's no doubling up of all those backslashes. RegexMagic automatically adapts the raw string delimiter to make sure it does not occur in the regex. The std::regex source code templates for all C++Builder versions and for Visual C++ 2013 and 2015 now use C++11 raw string literals. Earlier versions of Visual C++ do not support them.

Some cosmetic changes were made to RegexMagic's menus and toolbars to better fit the style of Windows 10. These changes only take effect when PowerGREP is actually running on Windows 10. Screen shots and videos have been updated to show RegexMagic running on Windows 10.

• If you have already purchased or upgraded to RegexMagic 2, you can download this update for free.
• If you own RegexMagic 1, you can upgrade to version 2 at a special price.
• Buy RegexMagic now.
• Free trial download.

RegexBuddy 4.5.0 is now available for download.

This release brings RegexBuddy up-to-date for all the applications that it supports. Newly supported versions are Visual C++ 2015, Delphi and C++Builder 10 Seattle, PCRE 10.20, PHP 5.6.14, Python 3.5, XRegExp 3.0.0, and R 3.1.2. Microsoft Edge has been added as an additional browser option for JavaScript and HTML5 Pattern.

Under the Copy button there are new items for copying the regex or replacement text as a C++11 raw string literal. C++11 raw string literals do not require backslashes or quotes to be escaped and can contain literal line breaks. This makes them much better suited for adding regular expressions to your source code than normal C string literals because there's no doubling up of all those backslashes. RegexBuddy automatically adapts the raw string delimiter to make sure it does not occur in the regex. The std::regex source code templates for all C++Builder versions and for Visual C++ 2013 and 2015 now use C++11 raw string literals. Earlier versions of Visual C++ do not support them. There are no items for C++ raw strings under the Paste button. The item for pasting C strings now recognizes the R prefix so it correctly pastes C++11 raw string literals in addition to normal C string literals.

When you select a programming language based on .NET as your application, there is now an additional regex option called "flavor choice". You can switch this between "default flavor" and "ECMAScript". This corresponds with not passing or passing RegexOptions.ECMAScript to the Regex() constructor. The topic about .NET in the Regular Expressions Tools part in the help file has a new section that discusses the effects of RegexOptions.ECMAScript in detail. The flavor choice is also available on the Convert panel. You can convert a regex that uses RegexOptions.ECMAScript to one that does not use RegexOptions.ECMAScript or vice versa. To see this in action, try converting the regex \d, which normally matches Unicode digits in .NET but only matches ASCII digits in ECMAScript mode.

Applications differ in how they treat an unescaped hyphen in a character class when the hyphen is between two tokens that cannot form a range. The hyphen can be treated as a literal or as a syntax error. Previously, RegexBuddy emulated the behavior of the selected application in both Helpful and Strict mode. Now, RegexBuddy does this in Strict mode only. In Helpful mode, unescaped hyphens that don't form a valid range and that aren't the first or last character in the character class are now always treated as an error. This encourages you to write regular expressions that are easier to read and easier to convert between applications by escaping them or by positioning them as the first or last character in the class.

Some cosmetic changes were made to RegexBuddy's menus and toolbars to better fit the style of Windows 10. These changes only take effect when PowerGREP is actually running on Windows 10. Screen shots and videos have been updated to show RegexBuddy running on Windows 10.

A bunch of minor bugs were also fixed. The version history has the complete list.

• If you have already purchased or upgraded to RegexBuddy 4, you can download this update for free.
• If you own RegexBuddy 2 or 3, you can upgrade to version 4 at a special price.
• Buy RegexBuddy now.
• Complete version history.

PowerGREP 4.7.0 is now available for download.

This release brings some cosmetic changes to PowerGREP's menus and toolbars to better fit the style of Windows 10. These changes only take effect when PowerGREP is actually running on Windows 10. Screen shots and videos have been updated to show PowerGREP running on Windows 10.

This release also fixes a bunch of bugs that occurred in very specific circumstances, which are different for each bug. The version history has the complete list.

• If you have already purchased PowerGREP 4, you can download this update for free.
• Upgrade from PowerGREP 2.x or 3.x to 4.x.
• Buy PowerGREP now.
• Complete Version History.

DeployMaster 4.3.0 is now available for download.

This release brings full support for Windows 10. The only real change is that the Platform page now has a separate checkbox for Windows 10. The actual installation process didn't need any changes. Installers created with DeployMaster 4.2.2 and 4.2.3 work correctly on Windows 10 as long as you ticked "future versions of Windows" on the platform page. Installers created with earlier DeployMaster 4.x.x releases work correctly if the latest Windows version supported by your version of DeployMaster is ticked on the Platform page. Like Windows 8.1, Windows 10 lies when an application asks which version it is unless that application indicates specific support for Windows 10. DeployMaster 4.2.1 and prior therefore misidentify Windows 10 as Windows 8 or 8.1. Installers created with DeployMaster 3.x.x also work correctly on Windows 10. Installers created with even older versions of DeployMaster (released between the years 2000 and 2006) will have the same issues on Windows 10 as they had on Windows Vista, as they predate Windows Vista and its tighter security system.

On the Project page, there is a new checkbox to skip the license agreement. An installer built with this option does not show its license agreement if the same application is already installed. It doesn't matter if that is the same or a different version of that application. If your license agreement doesn't change between releases, you can save your users the click to agree to it once more when installing new versions of your application. The installer for DeployMaster itself uses this option too.

Several new command line parameters were added to the installer. The /appfolder, /appcommonfolder, /appmenu, and /userdata command line parameters can be used to change the actual folders used for files placed under %APPFOLDER%, %APPCOMMONFOLDER%, %APPMENU%, and %USERDATA% on the Files page. If your installer uses a support DLL to define additional installation folders, then those folders can also be changed by using the name of the folder as a command line parameter. The purpose of these parameters is to allow the installation folder to be changed when using the /silent command line parameter. If the software was previously installed, using these command line parameters changes the installation folder, just like the Advanced Options Installation button can be used to change the folders of an existing installation. These command line parameters can be used without /silent. In that case, when using the Advanced Options Installation button, the default folders will be those specified on the command line. Selecting different folders via Advanced Options Installation overrides the command line parameters.

The /silent parameter can now be abbreviated as /s when passed to the installer or the uninstaller.

The setup.exe that DeployMaster generates is a stub with the installer and the files to be installed as its payload. When the stub runs, it extracts the actual installer into the temporary files folder and executes it. Only then does the installer appear on the screen. Running from the temp folder is a legitimate technique that has been used for a long time by installers and self-updating software. But recently some companies have implemented a Software Restriction Policy that blocks executables in the temporary files folder in the belief that this can block malware. In this situation, installers built with previous releases in DeployMaster fail to run without showing an error message. Installers built with DeployMaster 4.3.0 show an error message indicating that the temp folder is restricted and that the user should run the installer with the /temp command line parameter followed by the full path to a folder that the user can write to and run applications from.

• If you have already purchased DeployMaster, you can download this free update for free.
• Buy DeployMaster now.
• Complete Version History.

RegexMagic 2.3.0 is now available for download.

This release brings RegexMagic up-to-date for all the applications that it supports. Newly supported versions are Perl 5.22, PHP 5.6.10, and R 3.2.1.

One new feature was added. At the bottom of View menu you'll find a Custom Layouts item. If you've rearranged RegexMagic panels, you can use the Custom Layouts submenu to save that layout or switch to a previously saved layout.

On the Regex panel, the Modifiers button (purple tick mark) is explained in the Assistant panel and help file as generating a regex that does not depend on regex options set outside the regular expression. Now this button does exactly that, as long as the chosen regex flavor supports mode modifiers in the regex for turning options on and off, so the regex will work regardless of which options are turned on or off outside the regex. There will be no "required options" listed on the Regex panel. Previously, this button would only add mode modifiers for options that need to be changed from their defaults, so the regex would not work correctly if it required an option to be in its default state and that option was toggled outside the regex. If you do not use the Modifiers button, or if the regex flavor does not support mode modifiers, there may be "required options" listed on the Regex panel. In that case you should generate a code snippet on the Use panel which will set the necessary options.

On the Samples panel, the "show samples and/or action results" drop-down list allows you to choose whether RegexMagic should display your sample text, the results of a search-and-replace or split operation, or both. Previously, this setting would automatically revert to showing only the sample text when there is no search-and-replace to be performed (because you changed a setting on the Action panel or no regex was generated). Now, the setting is preserved at all times. If there are no results to be displayed, RegexMagic displays only the sample text. As soon as results become available again, RegexMagic again displays what you selected in "show samples and/or action results".

A bunch of minor bugs were fixed too. On the Match panel, the "select field" drop-down list wasn't cleared immediately when deleting the last field. On the Regex panel, the Generate button could not be turned off if the formula resulted in a blank regular expression without any errors. On the Samples panel, clicking on a sample after loading a formula from a library marks the formula as modified, enabling the Save Formula button and triggering a prompt to save when loading another formula without having made any actual changes. Undoing changes to the sample text could lead to access violation or invalid pointer operation errors later on. View|Dual Monitor made the floating window take up the size of the entire second monitor, which caused it to appear behind the taskbar if the taskbar was on that monitor.

• If you have already purchased or upgraded to RegexMagic 2, you can download this update for free.
• If you own RegexMagic 1, you can upgrade to version 2 at a special price.
• Buy RegexMagic now.
• Free trial download.

RegexBuddy 4.4.0 is now available for download.

This release brings RegexBuddy up-to-date for all the applications that it supports. Newly supported versions are Perl 5.22, PHP 5.6.10, and R 3.2.1.

When you move the cursor while editing the regular expression, the Create panel now selects the node that corresponds with the regex token to the right of the cursor, unless there is a selection that starts to the left of the cursor. Previously, it always selected the node for the token to the left of the cursor. This makes the Create panel's selection correspond better with the edit control for the regular expressions, as the cursor in text editing controls on Windows points points to the character to the right of the cursor.

The History and Library panels did not correctly load the "^$ match at line breaks" option. Regular expressions in Replace or Split mode were always loaded with this option turned on if the target application supports it. Regular expressions in Match mode were correctly loaded with the option on or off as it was saved. If you have libraries that store regular expressions in Replace or Split mode that are intended to be used with "^$ match at line breaks" turned off, then you will need to update those regular expressions to turn the option off as it will have been turned on when the library was loaded and saved by previous RegexBuddy 4.x.x releases.

In Python replacement strings you can use \g<name> named backreferences and \g<1> numbered backreferences. The Just Great Software applications also support these. Previous RegexBuddy releases already emulated this correctly. RegexBuddy now also correctly emulates that Delphi does not support \g<1> even though Delphi supports \g<name>. When you use the Insert Token menu to insert a numbered backreference with Python as the target application, RegexBuddy now inserts \g<1> instead of \1. The Insert Token menu prefers to insert backreferences that separate the number from any literal text that follows, so there are no issues with backreferences that are immediately followed by a digit.

When you convert a replacement string from one application to another, the Convert panel now prefers preserving the syntax used for backreferences if supported by the target flavor and there is no following literal digit to prefer a different syntax. If the target flavor does not support the same syntax, or if there is a literal digit after the backreference, then the Convert panel now prefers generating a backreference that separates the backreference's number from literal digits that may follow the backreference. Essentially, these changes eliminate needless syntax conversions and make the converted replacement string easier to read and maintain in case of literal digits after backreferences. Replacement string conversions by previous versions of RegexBuddy were all syntactically correct. It never generated \g<1> for Delphi replacement strings, even though the Create and Test panels incorrectly allowed it.

• If you have already purchased or upgraded to RegexBuddy 4, you can download this update for free.
• If you own RegexBuddy 2 or 3, you can upgrade to version 4 at a special price.
• Buy RegexBuddy now.
• Complete version history.

EditPad Pro 7.3.8 is now available for download.

EditPad Pro can handle files of any size, including files larger than 4 GB. Files larger than the huge file threshold you specify in Options|Preferences|Open Files are swapped out to disk, so they can be edited with minimal memory usage. You can increase this threshold to 10% of your PC's RAM. If you edit the files, then edited parts of the file are kept in memory until you save the file. So with lots of large files open, a high threshold for swapping files to disk, or making changes throughout a huge file, EditPad's memory usage can quickly grow beyond 4 GB. If a single EditPad Pro instance actually ends up using more than 4 GB of RAM then random crashes could occur in the 64-bit builds of EditPad Pro 7.1.0 through 7.3.7 due to a bug in the user interface library. These crashes did not corrupt any files, but would cause you to lose any unsaved changes. If you want to be able to keep large numbers of large files open in EditPad Pro, you should upgrade to version 7.3.8 immediately.

Making lots of changes, like a Replace All command replacing millions of search matches, can cause EditPad's undo history to use a lot of memory. You can configure the amount of memory that the undo history can use per file and for all open files in Options|Preferences|System. Previously, setting one of those limits above 2 GB caused "list index out of bounds" and "access violation" errors while editing. Setting the limit this high is only possible when using 64-bit EditPad Pro on a PC with lots of RAM.

You can change the colors used by EditPad's editor by customizing the color palettes that you can select for each file type in Options|Configure File Types|Colors and Syntax. Clicking the color buttons shows a color picker. This color picker now scales correctly on high DPI systems (high resolution monitors). The button for the background color is now hidden when "Editor: Folding icons" is selected in the list, as this item does not have a background color. The default color for bookmarks and folding icons is now the margin color rather than the plain text color.

With View|Split Editor you can see two parts of the same file. The submenu of that menu item allows you to select whether the scrolling of the two views should be linked or independent. When it is independent, adding or deleting lines in one part of the file does not scroll the other part of the file. Previously, when word wrap was off, the other part would scroll by the number of lines that were added or removed.

EditPad 7.3.7 fixed some issues with minimizing EditPad's window on Windows 7, 8, and 8.1. Unfortunately, these fixes introduced a new bug. Minimizing EditPad when the option to hide the taskbar button is turned on in Options|Preferences|System left a non-functional taskbar button instead of hiding it. This bug has now been fixed, while retaining the fixes made in 7.3.7.

If you accidentally double-click the same text file twice in Windows Explorer while EditPad is not yet running, you will now always get one EditPad instance with one tab for that file. Previously, depending on the timing of the second double-click, you could end up with one EditPad instance with two tabs for the same file.

• If you already purchased EditPad Pro 7.x.x, you can download this minor upgrade for free.
• If you have EditPad Pro 4, 5, or 6, you can upgrade to version 7 at a special price.
• Buy EditPad Pro now.
• EditPad Pro version history.

EditPad Lite 7.3.8 is now available for download.

EditPad Lite can handle files up to 2 GB in size. It always reads files into memory entirely. If you need to work with larger files, or don't want huge files to be read into memory entirely, you should consider upgrading to EditPad Pro.

EditPad Lite does not limit the number of files you can open at the same time. If you open a lot of huge files in EditPad Lite, then memory usage can quickly grow beyond 4 GB. If a single EditPad Lite instance actually ends up using more than 4 GB of RAM then random crashes could occur in the 64-bit builds of EditPad Lite 7.1.0 through 7.3.7 due to a bug in the user interface library. These crashes did not corrupt any files, but would cause you to lose any unsaved changes. If you want to be able to keep large numbers of large files open in EditPad Lite, you should upgrade to version 7.3.8 immediately.

You can change the colors used by EditPad's editor by customizing the color palettes that you can select for each file type in Options|Configure File Types|Colors and Syntax. Clicking the color buttons shows a color picker. This color picker now scales correctly on high DPI systems (high resolution monitors).

EditPad 7.3.7 fixed some issues with minimizing EditPad's window on Windows 7, 8, and 8.1. Unfortunately, these fixes introduced a new bug. Minimizing EditPad when the option to hide the taskbar button is turned on in Options|Preferences|System left a non-functional taskbar button instead of hiding it. This bug has now been fixed, while retaining the fixes made in 7.3.7.

If you accidentally double-click the same text file twice in Windows Explorer while EditPad is not yet running, you will now always get one EditPad instance with one tab for that file. Previously, depending on the timing of the second double-click, you could end up with one EditPad instance with two tabs for the same file.

EditPad Lite is free for personal use. Business and government users can purchase a license.

Download EditPad Lite.

HelpScribble 7.9.0 is now available for download.

Project|Export to Web Help now adds a viewport meta tag to each exported HTML file. This makes mobile devices render the pages at the appropriate size. If your customers may use mobile devices to read your documentation on your website, then you should use HelpScribble 7.9.0 to export your help files to web help again. From 21 April 2015 onwards, Google will rank pages that it considers to be mobile-friendly higher than pages that it does not when people use Google Search on a mobile devices. With the changes made in HelpScribble 7.9.0 Google now considers HelpScribble's web help to be "Awesome!" when it comes to mobile friendliness.

We also fixed a bug that caused some tags in the exported HTML to be nested incorrectly. All browsers still displayed the pages correctly, but HTML validators would complain.

HelpScribble's HelpContext property editor now supports Delphi XE8 and C++Builder XE8. HelpScribble's installer will automatically install it if it detects that you have Delphi XE8 or C++Builder XE8 installed. HelpScribble's HelpContext property editor can assign HelpContext properties to controls in VCL applications and Multi-Device applications.

• If you have already purchased helpscribble, you can download this update for free.
• Buy helpscribble now.
• Complete version history.