Macro Editing Reverse Engineering

mvealey · Post by **mvealey** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 3:54 pm

I don't understand why Helios hasn't listened and added macro editing considering all the requests but that's neither here nor there. Fact is, they haven't.

With that in mind, has anyone tried to reverse engineer the macro files and create an editor for them? I'm more of a business systems programmer so I'm not going to get too far but if anyone out there who has the skills can do it, we'd all be mighty grateful!

Bob Hansen · Post by **Bob Hansen** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 7:59 pm

About four or five years ago, a group of about five of us started to undertake that as a project. We had made some progress, but ran into some roadblocks that really needed Helios input, but we could not get what we needed. I don't recall the issues that caused us to stop, but it seemed to be correct at the time.

Some of our notes and progress are probably still here on the forum. I can't look for them now, but this lasted for a few months and should be obvious when you see them. I remember that Jeffy and Al ??? were involved. We may have done a lot of emails off-forum

Wait .....

This looks like the link I was referring to: http://forums.textpad.com/viewtopic.php ... sc&start=0 It is from Jan 2003, longer than I thought. I have just adapted myself to using Macro Scheduler ( http://www.mjtnet.com/macro_scheduler_pro.htm ), and I have no more issues with TextPad macros because of that.

mvealey · Post by **mvealey** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 11:11 pm

I figured as much but I didn't find anything when I did a search. Well, retro-kudos for the attempt. I have a copy of the code so I might fiddle with it in VB if a get a chance.

Anyone else up for the challenge?

Thanks!
Mike

webber123456 · Post by **webber123456** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 8:17 pm

you'll be better off spending time with a third party macro tool.

all will allow means of building and editing your own macros which can be applied on tp files.

I use this a a tool for organizing my own executables.

http://www.aspkey.net/aspkey/_store/asp ... #quickbars

Ryck · Post by **Ryck** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 2:00 am

Bob Hansen wrote:About four or five years ago, a group of about five of us started to undertake that as a project. We had made some progress, but ran into some roadblocks that really needed Helios input, but we could not get what we needed. I don't recall the issues that caused us to stop, but it seemed to be correct at the time.

...

Incidentally, I tried to do something like that too. Even reverse engineer TextPad's macro compiler. But ran into too many unknowns and then my time became very limited as I got busy with other things.

Ryck · Post by **Ryck** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 2:08 am

By the way, Bob. I just realized something. Although you are the community board admintrator you have no access to the TextPad programmer and had to branch out on your own on this difficult project some five years ago?

I'm shocked!!

I'm curious - do you have any idea why the TextPad programmer won't even consider this enhancement? Is the TextPad programmer even around to answer questions?

Bob Hansen · Post by **Bob Hansen** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 2:40 am

I am just an end user like yourself. I volunteered many years ago to be a moderator since I get the opportunity to browse the forum frequently. Helios does reply here a few times a week, but I have no direct contact with them.

I have been able to work around most TextPad shortcomings and still find it better than most other text editors. May not be perfect for all, but is close enough to perfect for my needs.

I love TextPad, still use 4.73 vs. 5.x. I use Macro Scheduler ( http://www.mjtnet.com/macro_scheduler_pro.htm ) to handle my macros on all programs including TextPad. I use these two products daily to support my needs of supporting my customer base problems.