************************************ JC&MB Quicknote Copyright © Jens Müller ************************************ 1. What is Quicknote? 2. How do you use Quicknote? 3. Support ------------------------------------ See also for an online demonstation of Quicknote's main features: http://www.quicknote.de/help 1. What is Quicknote? Often you do not need an advanced text processor but a virtual scrapbook to write down an occasional thought, a plan for the day or an Internet URL. With a plain text editor, which can be used for this purpose, you have to run the program first, then create a new file, then type a line or two and save the file. Too many things to do in order to simply write down a thought? With Quicknote, it does not matter which programs you are currently using; whenever you want to write something down that comes to mind, just 'wake up' Quicknote by touching a small line on the top of your screen with the mouse or by pressing shortcut keys. In its resizable window you can jot down your notes and organize them in categories or even sketch small drawings. Still, this tiny tool has much more possibilities than it seems on the first thought! Beneath the normal text functions, it can convert units, let you directly access frequently run programs, encrypt secret texts, change the system volume by hotkeys, manage windows tasks, and even send notes through a network. It has also a powerful reminding tool, which can remind you of your notes at certain times, run programs or shutdown automatically your PC. 2. How do you use Quicknote? The first time you start Quicknote you are shown this file. If you should not find Quicknote on your screen, it's probably in the Sleep-Mode. Look for a small line on the top edge of your desktop. Touch it with the cursor and Quicknote will wake up. Now you can write your notes. You can choose between the main note that is saved in a file on the hard disk or a Quicknote ("Zx") that is automatically saved and opened internally. If you click the "M" button or right-click on a free place in the main window, a menu will appear. You can click on "Options" to change the different settings: I General 1. Run on start-up If this option is selected, Quicknote will automatically start with Windows. 2. Warn if removable media in drives at shutdown: If you shut down Windows and Quicknote is in the sleep-mode, it will alert you so that you can eject the CDs or DVDs as long as the computer is on, if you want to do so. 3. Save clipboard on Exit If you shut down Windows Quicknote will save the content of the Windows clipboard and restore it at the next start. 4. Set focus on wakeup If you check this option, Quicknote automatically sets the focus into the textbox so that you can start to type immediately on wakeup. 5. Reset original focus when going into sleep mode This option ensures, that the window that had the focus before Quicknote was activated, is re-activated after going into sleep mode again 6. Sleep if Escape is pressed If you check this option, pressing the Escape key while in Quicknote will automatically put Quicknote into sleep mode. 7. Open Internet URL when double clicking it If this option is activated, you can double click on an Internet address in the note and Quicknote will open it in the default web browser. 8. Show Quicknote in the context menu of *.txt files If you check this box, there will be two entries added to the file context menu of .TXT files. The first entry, "Open with Quicknote" opens that file normally with Quicknote. The other entry, "Add to Quicknote" just appends the content of that file to the current note in Quicknote. 9. Focusless imput: Ignore control characters (backspace, cursors) This option changes the behaviour of the focusless input mode. If focusless input is activated (button "L" in main window), every text you enter on the keyboard will be copied into your note, regardless if the focus is in Quicknote or not. If you check this option, characters as backspace or the cursor keys will be ignored. 10. Default note Here you can specify which note should be shown at the start of Quicknote. You can choose several options including the last one that was shown in Quicknote. You can also determine here, if you want Quicknote to be run in sleep mode or not. II Interface 1. Language: Here you can choose the language. To change it you will have to restart Quicknote. 2. Text-cursor size If you cannot see the caret (insertion point; cursor) very well, you can enlarge it here. 3. Colors Allows you to choose the colors for Quicknote. You can select a different color for the Quicknote title bar, the text background, the text color and the color of the wake up line. 4. Transparency With this option Quicknote's window can be displayed transparent on Windows 2000/XP or newer. 5. Animation If this is selected, Quicknote switches to sleep mode and wakes up with an animation. This is not recommended on slow computers. 6. Always on top: If this option is selected, Quicknote will always be in front of any other windows. 7. Show status bar Turns on/off a bar in the lower part of the window that shows you how many characters there are in the current note along with other information. 8. Allow Drag & Drop out of the text It can be useful to select fragments of text in Quicknote and move the text or drag it into another window. If this happens unintentionally, you can disable it here. 9. Show date and time in title bar If this is activated, the current date and time will be shown in the title bar. 10. Show Quicknote in taskbar If this option is checked, Quicknote will be visible in the taskbar, on the right of the Start button. 11. Use Windows XP Styles If you use Windows XP or newer, you can choose here if you want to use the Windows XP graphical Styles in Quicknote. III Sleep Mode You can set here how Quicknote should be like when in sleep mode. It's possible to use a small line on the top of the screen that will wake up Quicknote if it is touched with the mouse ("Wake-Up Line") or you can wake up Quicknote by pressing a certain key combination (hotkey/shortcut) on the keyboard. Of course you can combine both possibilities. Wake-Up line: Position and size: Determines the length, height and position of the Wake-Up line. You can either change the numbers or drag the blue rectangle. Delayed Wake-Up: To prevent accidental Wake-Up you can enter a minimum time that the cursor has to be over the line before Quicknote wakes up. Hotkey: Click on the input box and press the desired key combination at which Quicknote should wake up. Examples: CTRL+SHIFT+Q or ALT+W or F9 It is possible that Quicknote automatically enters sleep mode as soon as its window loses input focus. If you activate this option, and you want to prevent this once, hold the shift key on your keyboard while deactivating the window. IV Misc 1. Volume Hotkeys Here you can change the keys that change the system volume. Make sure that this feature is activated with the speaker symbol in the "B" bar. Logarithmic volume scale: For the human ear, if you double the volume of a sound, it's not heard twice as loud. If the log volume scale is selected, each step with the volume hotkeys will have the same intensity. 2. Automatic saving You can select here the interval of the automatic saving to prevent data loss at a computer crash. 3. Saving Paths You can determine here the directories, where the Quicknotes and the temporary files (security savings) are saved. The other entries of the main menu: -New, Open, Save, Save as, Save Picture, Print: These should be obvious. - Sleep If you click on this Quicknote will go into sleep mode. You can wake it up by touching the Wake-Up Line at the top of your screen or by pressing the key combination defined in the Options. (You can also press the button at the right of the Quicknote top bar to put Quicknote into sleep mode.) -Remind: With this feature Quicknote can remind you. An assistant will guide you to create a new reminder's task. You can choose to be reminded by opening an existing file in Quicknote or by alerting a text. It is also possible to shut down the computer or to run a file. For the time to be reminded you can choose a certain moment or a reminder date as "every day in March" or "the 21st August of every year". This is e.g. good for birthdays. As another trigger for reminder tasks, you can choose an interval (e.g. every 90 minutes) or a time of inactivity (e.g. if you are not using your computer for 10 minutes). If you missed a reminder's task, Quicknote can alert it. -System Information This window shows information about your computer. -Tools: 1. Calculator: Starts the Windows calculator. 2. Calculations: This Window allows you to do different kinds of calculations, like the least common multiple or the greatest common divisor of two numbers. It also has some tools that may be useful for programmers, e.g. linux timestamp calculation, HTML color code and hash algorithms for strings and files. 3. Unit converter: Here you can convert different units of measure like pounds to/from grams or number systems. 4. Measure screen distances: This window allows you to measure the length of objects on your screen. Drag the pencil to the starting point of your measure and press CTRL once to start the measure. Drag the pencil to the next point and press CTRL again. To stop measuring, go to the end point and release the mouse button. The distance in pixels and approximately in centimeters on your screen is displayed. 5. Receive text from another computer With Quicknote, it is possible to send messages to other computers who have Quicknote installed via a network. Before you can receive a text you have to activate receiving here. To send a text, select the text and right click on it, then select "Copy text" -> "to other computer". 6. Task Manager: If a program does not respond anymore you can force it to end with the Task Manager. You can run other programs, too. This is mainly a feature for experienced Windows users. 7. Add own programs: This window allows you to add your often-used programs to this menu. -Help Shows the file you are reading at the moment. -Exit In contrary to "sleep", Quicknote is completely closed with this command. -Last opened: Here you see the last opened files. Open them by clicking on their name. Hints: -In the top right corner of Quicknote's window, you find five buttons. If you click the one in the right, Quicknote sleeps immediately. Click the button with the caption "M" and the main menu will appear. (You can also just right-click on a free place in Quicknote's top bar.) With the button "N" on the top right corner of Quicknote, you can show/hide an explorer-like navigation bar on the left. Here you can organize your quicknotes in different categories. Right click on it to create new quicknotes or click on an existing quicknote to open the note preferences where you can determine the type of the note (internally saved, use of an external file or image). If you have created different categories, the notes can be dragged into another category with the mouse. If you click the "B" button you show/hide the top bar, which allows you some extra features: You will see the buttons "Z1-Z3", "Zx" and "T". If T is selected, you can write your text and save it as an external file just like in normal text editors. With the Quicknotes Z1-Zx, you need not to save the notes in an external file. The content is saved automatically and re-opened into Quicknote after a reboot. In Zx you have place for up to 999 other Quicknotes. With this toolbar, you can also make small drawings. Click on the brush to draw a line in the text. (Hold CTRL to make a straight line). With the horizontal scrollbar you can change the thickness of that line. Click on "C" to delete your drawing. If you want to write text again, click the "A". With the arrow button, you can run a file. The speaker button lets you activate or deactivate the volume hotkeys. If you press on the clock, you can create a new reminder's task. With the button at the right, you can switch between "on top" mode and normal. If you hide both bars, Quicknote's window is limited to its textbox only and does only take little space on your screen. However, the navigation between the different notes is not as comfortable; you can still switch between them with the hotkey CTRL+T. The B-Bar includes an additional textbox that allows you to write short information that does not logically fit into your current note. It is automatically saved and restored by Quicknote and can be inserted into the current note by pressing the return key. If you are using Windows Vista, this text can also be edited and displayed as a Gadget in the Sidebar. The button labelled "L" activates or deactivates the focusless input mode. If activated, every text entered on the keyboard is copied into the current note, regardless if it was entered into Quicknote or not. -Text menu If you click with the right mouse button on your text you can alter the font of the text, search or replace a word, insert a special symbol from the character map or insert text from the screen (e.g. from a dialog box or list box). You can send text to another computer using Quicknote via a network. You can lock the note for reading only as well. -Wake-Up line menu If you hold SHIFT and click on the Wake-Up line there is a small menu that allows you to close Quicknote, run often-used programs and start the task-manager without waking up Quicknote. -Stop Shutdown If you shutdown Windows and you have chosen the option "warn me if there is still any removable media in the drives" you can still abort shutdown when it shows "There is still a removable media in drive X". -Encrypt If you save an external file, you can choose as file type "Quicknote Encrypted File". This encrypts the file by entering a pass phrase (case sensitive!) so that others can't read the content. If you open it later you'll have to enter the code again so don't forget it! A modified RC4XOR algorithm is used, providing adequate security. You can also specify whether your quicknotes in the category view should be saved in encrypted form, by choosing "Note preferences" in their context menu. These will be displayed as encrypted notes with the symbol "@" next to their name. When opened for the first time, you will be asked for the password. By giving the right password, the note will be unlocked (symbol "_" next to the name) until you close Quicknote or until you lock it again in the context menu of the note. -Drag & Drop Drag a file onto the Wake-Up line or onto Quicknote and it will automatically be opened. 3. Support Being a student without income, I would appreciate to cover my costs - if you like Quicknote - a small voluntary contribution to my bank account in Germany; via paypal (jens-mueller@arcormail.de), or by mail to Jens Müller Pappelweg 13/5 72555 Metzingen Germany More information in the "About" window and here: http://www.quicknote.de/qdonen.html If you have any questions or remarks please look at the FAQ page at: http://www.quicknote.de/quickfaqen.html Or email me at: mueller.jens @ gmail.com Homepage of Quicknote: www.quicknote.de