There used to be a disk cloning tool called Ghost which was written by an independent developer (I think named Ghostsoft) and amazingly useful in the late 90's. They were bought by Symantec who turned it into more of a backup tool - useful, but not the same thing.
Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
751–760 of 891 posts
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#752Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#753A few things: Everything not being 4:3 screens. I found it better for programming than everything being cinematic screens. Back when monitor manufacturers were racing to make better / higher resolution monitors, instead of just leaving it at 1080p / 4k / whatever the current standard good enough for movies is. The GMail interface before it started auto-converting the textarea to HTML when edited externally. Console g…
Get a monitor like a Dell u2715 and turn it sideways. Basically a double tall square resolution monitor.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#754A few things: Everything not being 4:3 screens. I found it better for programming than everything being cinematic screens. Back when monitor manufacturers were racing to make better / higher resolution monitors, instead of just leaving it at 1080p / 4k / whatever the current standard good enough for movies is. The GMail interface before it started auto-converting the textarea to HTML when edited externally. Console g…
Get a monitor like a Dell u2715 and turn it sideways. Basically a double tall square resolution monitor.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#755MultiEdit, dos version
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#756* IBM ThinkPad T41p/60. Lenovo T410/X210 where still somewhat fine. But these newer ultrabooks nowadays have less powerful specs than 5 year old notebooks. The Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon isn't bad, but a far cry given it's ultrabook less powerful specs than an 5 year old high end notebook. And these shitty keyboard nowadays, give me back the old keyboard layout like grouped F1-F12 key, better placed Home/PgUp/PgDn/End…
Microsoft Comfort Mouse 1000 fan here. Simple, higher quality, well fitting. Hard to believe they were released so long ago (2003). Like someone else said, designers have went a bit nuts. I've got a Apple Magic Mouse and for all of its nifty features, it is not comfortable to use. I've went through a few of the Comforts but luckily I still have a couple functional and a spare in the box.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#757The xBase family of languages/development environments. They are still around - Harbour (open-source multi-platform Clipper implementation) and Ashton-Tate dBase which changed many hands and is now dBase LLC. They were one of the fastest environments to build business software in till the early 90s. Then Client/Server and Windows happened. Visual Basic and Delphi occupied the niche with support for SQL based database…
FoxTales sounds like an interesting book; thanks!
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#758Crossties. It was a relational desktop for Windows 3.1 which could replace progman and allow you to set up associations with projects, contacts, etc -- for example, opening up someone's contact info would pull up the documents you were working on for them, etc. 20 years later, we still really don't have anything that can provide that sort of context on the desktop, or even worse, we don't have those kinds of relation…
That spiked my curiosity. If anybody has more on this, I believe it should be shared somewhere. Besides a PC Mag excerpts and a listing on some russian utilities compilation CD page, the interwebs look devoid. https://books.google.com/books?id=LYp7r6OrMdIC&pg=RA1-PA172&...
Not sure this would focus much on the OP's favorite features but this sounds like the same software (starts around 11:20):
https://archive.org/details/VirtualM
This program looks at several early examples of virtul meeting technology. Demonstrations include Cross Ties for Workgroups
Much better luck searching for the software company: https://www.google.com/#q=crossties+software+corp
Buy Crossties today for $55: http://www.amzn.com/dp/B000LUXSH6
An expired patent, cited 26 times: http://www.patentbuddy.com/Patent/5787440
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#759Earlier quoted context omitted.
4:3 screens: yes, but on laptops. Given an equally wide laptop 4:3 gives much more space to work on. I wonder if there would be space for large touchpads but the Thinkpad/stick fans won't care. My personal sweetspot on laptops was 16:10. For standalone monitors, nobody was making screens as wide (in cm) as the ones we have now, at a reasonable price. You could have two 4:3 monitors side by side which is 8:3 or 16:6,…
My sweet spot for laptops is 4:3 @ 14in, but 16:10 @ 15.6in is a reasonable choice as well. 16:9 on the other hand has no place in anything but very large desktop monitors (say 27in and above). Whenever I have to use someone's 13in notebook - inevitably 16:9, even expensive ones - it makes me want to scream. It's like peering through a mailbox slot.
One of the great things about Mac laptops... The default 16:10 everywhere (with the exception of the mba11").
Re: Ask HN: What's the best tool you used to use that doesn't exist anymore?
#760I'm worried that DownThemAll and other major add-ons will be abandoned with Firefox's changes soon.
what do you mean? are they switching their engine? I can't endure another tragedy like opera :(