*Words of Wisdom From The Elder

A new version of Witty Twitter has been published via ClickOnce (0.1.8.5).  You can install Witty Twitter by clicking the link below or if you already have it installed, simply launch it from your start menu.

http://keithelder.net/software/witty/witty.application

Witty Twitter Now With Skins

Witty Twitter now supports skins via ClickOnce updates.  Alan checked in the changes this morning around 6:33 AM CST and I picked them up, tested them, fixed some settings / app.config files and then made a new ClickOnce deployment.  Thank you Alan!

Right now there are only three skins:  Aero, AeroCompact and CoolBlue.  The majority of users will probably like the AeroCompact skin the most since it fits more tweets on the screen.  Here are the differences in the three skins. 

Aero

AeroCompact

CoolBlue

To change skins click on options at the top of the application:

Click on the appearance button:

Select your desired skin:

Enjoy and don’t forget to thank Alan!

I just published a new version of Witty Twitter via ClickOnce.  Things have been a little slow lately but some progress has been made.  Everyone has been really busy.  Alan had a baby (congrats!), well Alan didn’t have the baby but he’s a daddy now.  Jon and Scott are still recovering from the MVP Summit in April and Brian just switched jobs and is moving.  As for me I’ve been working on a little something something that I’ll officially announce in a week or two.  Stay tuned!

Here’s a screen shot from the log that covers what’s been done.

As you see, we have not resolved the issues with skins getting deployed via ClickOnce yet.  We’ll get it though, don’t worry.

There are several ways to get the latest version.  If you have the app running you can either wait until the auto update alerts you or you can go to the update options screen and click the button to update.  You can get the latest version by clicking this link (make sure Witty isn’t running).

http://keithelder.net/software/witty/witty.application

If this is your first time to install Witty just click the link and enjoy but make sure you have the .Net 3.5 framework installed before doing so. 

Never Installed The ClickOnce Of Witty?

If you’ve never installed the previous version, no worries just click the link below to download and install the app.

Download here:  http://keithelder.net/software/witty/witty.application

Previous Install

If you happen to be running the ClickOnce version of Witty I created, the new update I just put out is going to break the automatic update.  If you are running the following version of Witty, via the ClickOnce install I published, you will need to uninstall this version to upgrade to the latest release.

Why?

Answer:  Because my idiotness knows no boundaries and I deleted the certificate I had originally created when I deployed the application.  Thus, the application won’t update since the certificates do not match.  Here are the steps you need to go through.  It is really simple, I promise.

Uninstall 0.1.6.2 Witty

Open the control panel and select “Programs and Features”.

Once your applications show up, select Witty and then click the “Uninstall/Change”.

You should get the following screen.

Click OK to uninstall Witty.

New Version Features

A lot has changed from the previous version, lots, too much to even mention but I’ll throw out a few highlights.

Witty options screen has gotten a lot of work.

And of course context menus were added.  Yeah!

Another feature is Popups when new tweets come in.

Lots of people have contributed a lot of time to bring new features.  And it will just keep getting better!

Install It

To install the new version which is published as version 0.1.7.9 click the following URL:

http://keithelder.net/software/witty/witty.application

The following screen will appear.

Click Install and you’ll have the latest version of Witty Twitter as of this morning.

Once you get it downloaded, checkout the options screen and setup things the way you want.

Will I Have To Do This Again?

At some point yes.  The plan is create an official Witty Twitter site where we can host the ClickOnce install of it and do regular pushes.  However, that takes time to get setup and built out.  In the meantime, I’ll continue posting updates of Witty Twitter to make it easy for those that like to live on the cutting edge to do so with relative ease.

How Often Are You Going To Do Updates?

I plan on starting to publish new versions of Witty Twitter at least once a week or when new cool functionality is added into the source tree.  At some point, we’ll make an official cut over to the new site once that is up and ready to roll.

UPDATE 4.5.2008 12:11 PM:  There was a bug I found that if you had sound enabled, the popups would cause a threading issue.  The new version is now 0.1.7.11. 

Head over to http://www.powertogether.com and watch 3 web casts and you get a copy of of Vista for Business and Office 2007.

In Part 3 of this series we learned the x64 ISO of Vista originally uploaded to MSDN was corrupted As a result of this I installed the 32bit version of Vista on my AMD machine.   Once the DVD nightmare was over,the installation of Vista went really smooth and offers some new features that are welcomed. 

During the install I was happy to be able to load drivers for RAID controllers via USB drives.  The installation is completely visual this time around (no more dos looking boot screens) and even things like formatting and partitioning are done with a mouse.  One time I forgot to plugin my USB mouse and even though I was in the middle of the install it detected it.  Very nice. 

Once the install was completed I wanted to checkout my machine’s Vista rating.  This seems to be a common practice among those who want to see how there system stacks up.  Here’s a screen shot:

As you see, the overall score is the lowest score which in my case is the AMD 3400+ processor.  Apparently Vista loves my BFG 6800 GT video card since it gave the highest possible rating of 5.9.  My hard drives running in a RAID 0 configuration faired very well with a rating of 5.9, the highest. 

Overall the system is running very fast, and the interface looks gorgeous.  If you have Vista installed and if you have a windows key (which is between alt and ctrl on most keyboards) press the window key then tab combination. You’ll get something like this:

There are tons of enhancements to Windows Vista, too many too mention.  Start by looking at the Windows Vista Home Page.  There you will find a lot of information on the various versions of Vista and which features they include as well.  Here are some nice haves that I am enjoying on Vista:

• Address Bar – Right click on the task bar and then go to the Toolbars tab.  From there choose “Address”.  You can see it in the above screen shot.  It allows you to jump to any URL quickly.  And just like in IE 7, the shortcut keys work there as well.  For example you can type in “msn” then press ctrl-enter.  It will automatically add http://www.msn.com as the URL and launch IE 7.  If IE 7 is already open, a new tab will be created.
• Windows Photo Gallery – One of the things I missed from my Powerbook was iPhoto.  Windows Photo Gallery is now included with Vista so you can easily organize photos.  Someone hurry up and write a Flickr plugin!
• Search – Search is baked into the start menu and I haven’t noticed any slow down in the PC.  I also find myself using it all the time to lookup emails, programs (instead of the old start->run), pictures, etc.  For example, I knew I had this email from a vendor the other day, but I couldn’t find it.  A quick hot key of windows key -> “cajun turkey” and I found it instantly. 

There are tons of other features  and little niceties that I’ve noticed here and there but you’ll have to get busy installing Vista for yourself to really get the feel of it.    By the way, I also installed Vista on my Media Center PC and have been running Media Center on Vista Ultimate for the past several days.  I’ll try to write something up on it later on.