TESTING...any volunteers? (The Official Release )

IT'S HERE!-- Link This is my latest widget. It is called ATW! Global Clock.

Features:

-16 color styles
-4 Analog clocks (System time and 3 others)
-4 Digital clocks
-Customizable clock labels
-30 Time zones
-Display of sample countries from each time zone
-Ability to pause display of time zones
-Ability to choose how many clocks to display
-Daylight Savings Option (Only for countries in Northern Hemisphere that observe DST)
-Links to websites with Time Zone information
- Quick reference time zone list


Thanks to all who participated in the beta test!




156,321 views 25 replies
Reply #1 Top
Respond here, then?

I tried out ATW!GlobalTime, and it looks great. It really does look cool, I like several things very much, such as the multiple colored skins and ability to show or hide the different bits of info (Digital, analog, location).

I only ran as a widget executable, but everything seemed to work.

I found the Daylight Savings Checkbox a bit confusing - I was expecting the clock to tell me it was time to add or subtract an hour.

When I chose the vertical layout, the buttons along the bottom were a misaligned - too low it looks. Then I restarted widget in vertical state, and buttons aren't visible at all. Maybe being drawn out of bounds? Only happens on vert display.

I love your about box with the multiple panels, and not just because of the tip o' the hat! Perhaps you could simulate "tabs" across the top, to give user an idea of what appears on each page, and where they are in the stack. Not sure how you are doing this (HTML? Flash? I should look ) so not sure how easy it would be.

All in all looks fantastic and runs very smoothly. Great combination of controls, like menus, buttons, check boxes, and a scroll bar to display info. I don't know DX Clocks--could second hand sweep instead of jump? Hour and minute hands could maybe be a bit more distinct and visible? Just suggestions.

The use of the exclamation point in file names scares me, but I didn't have any trouble.
Reply #2 Top
I tried but the link came up with all types of warning errors. Oh well..
Reply #3 Top
Fairyy~

if you have a javascript blocker (NoScript etc), you need to let f-forge and adbrite access to download the file on the link...i got the warning errors too, but they went away after allowing JS to run..

hope this helps
Reply #4 Top
I got it to download on 3rd try.

Works very good - I like the ability to use vertical or horizontal. The color change option is nice and the hue slider still works in widget properties too. Nice job - easy to configure.

Good job and I found nothing that didnt work as promised.
Reply #5 Top
if you have a javascript blocker (NoScript etc), you need to let f-forge and adbrite access to download the file on the link...i got the warning errors too, but they went away after allowing JS to run..


I dont know what I did but on 3rd try I got a download box finally - it fixed itself.
Thanks liquid
Reply #6 Top
Great work.

On vertical the buttons overshot the bottom edge, then on second load they disappeared completely. Otherwise functionally it works great.

Just a few feature thoughts.

-any way to pause the timer scrolling through the various cities
-ability to resize to smaller (within limitations)
Reply #7 Top
 Thanks for the feedback everyone. I'll get right on that vertical button problem. Not sure why it works for some and not for others. I do recall having trouble setting the object.top for the buttons they always seemed to be too high or too low.  

Great suggestions, too. I like the tabs idea for the about menu, and I'll try to work on the ability to pause the city listings. Thanks again!


If anyone else has suggestion/problems let me know.
Reply #8 Top
sViz
Great work on this!
Sure, I'll beta-test it. Everything seemed to set up o.k. and it seems to run fine. All the bells and whistles seem to work as advertised, just as the posters described above..only...
...I DLed it to a new file I made on my desktop for new arrivals like this.
From there I unzipped it, read the .txt file, and ran the .exe
I got the popup at the bottom-right of my dt, typical of my
McAfee Security Suite for this type of object/widget, clicked
said popup, as usual, to "Allow Internet Access this time"...
...and the glitch appeared(for me):
  Hovering over the words of the McAfee popup, they highlited
as usual, but did not respond to my left-click...[hmm,o.k.]...  
After I tweaked a bit(between my ears)  , I accidentally dragged
the popup from McAfee to the side...and there was (!) another (!)  
under it!! I dragged that one away...and found a third! and a fourth!?...
...a fifth, and, finally, a sixth.  
By now, they were scattered around my dt like frisbees, but at least there
were only six to deal with...the widget itself had yet to appear...
I clicked them away, one after another, but had to do that in some sort of order,
I guess the order in which they were hooked or called up.
Finally, the widget appeared, ran as wished for, and I am able to mod it with the
widget form that comes from (right-click)>"Properties".
I have it set to "Run when Windows starts up", but gotta go get the kids from school first...so more later.

[I wonder if I need to get a critique of this size approved by Mods here first...  ]

Oh, yeah...thanks!!     
Reply #9 Top
Thanks for DLing the widget, seldomseen. I'm glad you got it to work. I have no idea what might have caused that glitch.


I can't seem to replicate the vertical buttons problem. This is the script that sets the button positions in the Vertical mode or Horizontal mode. It's located in the "color" button object if anyone would like to check it out in DX Builder Mode.


Sub pos
Select Case desktopx.Object("gtback").state
Case "Hmenu"
object.top= 7
desktopx.Object("confOpen").top= 37
desktopx.Object("internet").top= 67
object.left= 600
desktopx.Object("confOpen").left= 600
desktopx.Object("internet").left= 600
Case "Vmenu"
object.Top= desktopx.Object("gtback").bottom-60
desktopx.Object("confOpen").top= desktopx.Object("gtback").bottom-60
desktopx.Object("internet").top= desktopx.Object("gtback").bottom-60
object.left= 10
desktopx.Object("confOpen").left= 40
desktopx.Object("internet").left= 70
End Select
End Sub



The main object is called "gtback". I aligned the buttons -50 from the bottom of the main object so that when the main object grows and shrinks in size the buttons will always be -50 from the bottom.

By how much would you say the buttons are too low? Would a 5px nudge up do it? Or 10px?

I also had the "color" object call this sub procedure on script enter. I think that should take care of the disappearing act on restart.
Reply #10 Top
what might have caused that glitch


..been ruminating over that...six popups re: accessing the net may be the clocks hooking out for current data...
comment #3 sounds like a great clue. thanks, liquidguru,
[still got chicken-bones about restarting the heap...may just ride it for awhile]
...now to go play w/all the adjustments and tweaks in this app!
Reply #11 Top
Okay, I got the tabs in the about menu working.
I added the pause/play feature to the city listings. (Time to add SirSmiley to the special thanks list )
Still nothing on those buttons. They work fine for me. I think I'll check them in different screen resolutions, and just for good measure I'll nudge them up 5-10 px.




Anyone else want to weigh in? Don't be shy.
Reply #12 Top
sViz: Good Morning. Just fired up, Took the usual 10 minutes to splash out my desktop and all the widgets, rainey, sysmetrix, Obj Dock +, and let the AdAware/AdWatch run its check. When all that was done, I went to go about business as usual, i.e: check mail, surf...
...and your clock was sitting in the middle of my dt, I guess a default position, I had shut down last night with it on the left side edge. There was a McAfee popup bottom-right corner, notification of script trying to run, asking me what I wished to do. I usually get these when first starting a weather or time widget/object, and just click the second option, to "allow scripts to run this time".
I clicked the hover-highlighted phrase on the McAfee form, as usual, but instead of the form disappearing and your clock running, nothing apparently happened...remembering last night's experience with the six copies of the McAfee form needing to be dragged out and individually clicked, I began to drag forms...and forms...and more forms...'til my dt was covered with them! A popup asked me if I wished to debug and I said yes. The VB code came up with a yellow arrow, I pushed print-screen, thinking I'd paste it into an email to you. but it erased from Word when I tried to save the document (?). My VB skills are very rusty. I have a screenshot, two in fact, that I could email to you if it would help to figure this out. otherwise, I'll just have to not use your clock,,,
If I set McAfee to "allow scripts to run at startup" or something, would that fix it? Do I then run the risk of McAfee not detecting harmful scripts? Puzzled. Also, if you don't want to deal with this, that's o.k. too
Reply #13 Top
  I'm not a McAfee user (or a comupter expert) so I don't know what's causing the problem.

The only thing I can think of is a piece of code in each of the digital clocks that accesses the registry and finds the difference between the user's system time and GMT. I had to comb the net to find it here: --LINK--

After I used this code to find GMT I can then set all the other time zones + or - according to GMT.

This is the code:

od = now()
Set oShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
atb = "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\" & "Control\TimeZoneInformation\ActiveTimeBias"
offsetMin = oShell.RegRead(atb)
nd = dateadd("n", offsetMin, od)


Since this is the only unusual code in the whole widget I'd venture to guess that it might be the source of the problem.

For now I guess you'd better not use the widget,seldom. I'll ask around about this and see if the problem can be rectified.
Reply #14 Top
sViz: You're a true gentleman and jedi, sir. Many thanks for the time spent digging and mining on this. I'll pursue this on my own and see if I come up with anything. It only occurs on this widget, but most if not all the weather and time widgets prompt McAfee to ask me if I want to allow a script to run. That's annoying enough to want to eliminate the occurrences...I think I'd best poke around McAfee and see if there's any way to allow only preferred scripts to run, much as I would if blocking/unblocking a mail address in Outlook Express. If I find out a fix, I'll pass it on here to help anyone else who might have this occur.
Screenshots:
Error WWW Link">Link

Splash WWW Link

Normal WWW Link
Reply #15 Top
Hello again, seldomseen. Some good news. A friend of mine has McAfee security on his computer so I am now able to test on there. I see the problem and it is indeed the code I posted earlier. McAfee treats any script that is trying to read the Registry as "suspicious", triggering a pop-up alert.

Thing is, my widget reads the registry every second, thus, triggering a new pop-up EVERY second. Hence the flood of pop-ups.

I am now modifying the clock script so that it reads the registry just ONCE, and should only trigger one pop-up. When I finish the modifications and testing I'll post version 1.01 for you to try. I think this should do the trick.
Reply #16 Top
Hah! Just found your post, sVis. I've been poking and prodding McAfee user interface, restarting ATW WT a lot, and have gotten McAfee to at least just growl instead of gnawing and shaking. When the notification pops up, and it asks for "further information", that will go to a form that has a button for "allow". While choosing that button did not "allow" the ATW WT to run at once, it did so after repeated cycles of my pressing that button and then choosing "more info" on the popup. I am determined to run this app at startup. I like it. Thanks for 1.01   
Reply #17 Top
Hi everyone, I give you ATW GlobalTime version 1.01 !

VERSION 1.01

Updates:

-About Menu tabs and page numbers
-Start/stop feature for city listings
-7 Clear colors
-Adjusted vertical button positions
-Single registry read (this means just one security pop-up on startup for McAfee users)

Please inform me of any further problems. Expect the official release soon.
Reply #18 Top
I'll give it a try and let you know   
Reply #19 Top
One splash, then SURPRISE!: clearness, even!!
Set "properties" to "Run at Windows startup"...rebooted to check it out...ATW didn't remember where it was at shutdown, and I had to re-tune the color and locations from default again. It may be my PC, as the buttons were off the bottom of the object when I switched to vertical, but they were attached to the edge, like tabs. I switched to horiz and back to vert and they were once again properly embedded.
I'm going to reboot again and see if it all works
[Edit: It all works just fine! Remembered settings and X/Y position and everything.         .]
Ready for Official Release.
Reply #20 Top
Cool! Thanks for beta testing seldomseen.

Also, I finally figured out why the buttons seemed to overshoot the main object. As I posted earlier, I was minusing from the bottom of the main object to keep them in position, but the buttons are 'child' objects so I should have been minusing from the height instead. I fixed that now.

I also have one more major feature I'm adding to GlobalTime. So when I finish with that I'll be uploading.

Thanks again everyone! You all helped me make this widget so much better.
Reply #22 Top
The official release of ATW! Global Clock is here. But for some reason I can't see it in the main library.

Link
Reply #23 Top
But for some reason I can't see it in the main library


Widgets and DX Themes need a rating of 3.5 stars to be seen in main library.Wallpaper need 4 stars. You can see it( and WC members ) if you log in to WC. Were you looking at widget gallery not logged in ?

But it will show in the just in Gallery either way ---at this link .
WWW Link
Reply #24 Top
Ohhh. Thanks Fairry.
Reply #25 Top
Great job, sViz! Thanks!