IconPlucker Help
June 2002
Definitive Solutions, Inc.
Introduction
IconPlucker © searches your system for icons, and allows you to copy them to the Windows clipboard, or save them as ICO or BMP files. It should probably run on Windows 95 or later, and has been tested on Windows NT 4 and Windows 2000.
Installation and UnInstallation
To install IconPlucker, just put the "IconPlucker.exe" file anywhere you want.
To uninstall IconPlucker, just delete the "IconPlucker.exe" file, the "_IconPlucker.log" file (if it exists), and the "IconPluckerHelp.html" file (if it exists). Also, there will be a tiny amount of information stored in your Registry by IconPlucker. This is neither a vast conspiracy nor the result of sloppy programming; it is simply a side-effect of the way the Registry works. Despite what you may have read, leaving this information in the Registry will do your system no harm. (However, if you wish, and we do not recommend this, you can delete the "HKCU \ Software \ Definitive Solutions \ IconPlucker" value in the Registry. If you decide to do this, you should be aware that playing around with the Registry is a good way to damage your system's software beyond repair, and do so at your own risk.)
Features
Yeah, there are a lot of programs like this in the world, so why did I write another? Because of the others I tried, all of them either (a) were crappy, (b) cost too much, and/or (c) didn't work the way I wanted.
What I wanted to do was, I thought, simple: tell the program to scan all my hard drives (and CD, ZIP, network drives, whatever) all at once, go get a cup of coffee, and then automatically (using the middle mouse button) scroll through the list of images until I found one I liked. I wanted to be able to leave this list of images up all day long – I didn't want to have to exit the program or reboot just to get any work done. Also, it had to have these features:
- Doesn't suck all the resources out of your machine. Most programs like this, if you scan a large hard drive, will eventually use up the GDI heap, and cause your PC to act funny and eventually crash. IconPlucker doesn't do that, no matter how big the drives are, or how many drives you scan.
- Doesn't leak memory or resources. Surprisingly, although it's pretty easy to write a Windows program that doesn't leak memory, it's fairly hard to write one that doesn't leak resources (like icons), which is why most programs like this are unusable. IconPlucker doesn't leak either.
- Has a minimal memory footprint. That is, it doesn't use an enormous amount of virtual memory or resources to run, no matter how it's used, so you can leave it running while you do real work. IconPlucker has been written to use as little memory as possible.
- Automatically eliminates duplicate icons. Why waste time looking at 6150 icons on your system if 2261 (or 37%) of them (actual numbers from my system) are duplicates? IconPlucker can be set to automatically eliminate duplicate images, based not on their filename, but on the actual image of the icon.
- Can scan all file types, not just EXE, DLL, ICO, PKG, ICL, etc., because who knows what kind of file might have the icon I need? IconPlucker looks in all your files - except as described in the next bullet.
- Automatically
knows which file types to ignore. For example, INI files don't normally have icons in them; the program would run faster if it could ignore them and all the other file types that don't contain icons. Yeah, but who wants to key in the 151 (actual number from my system) different file types that don't contain icons? IconPlucker automatically finds which file types on your system don't have icons, and ignores them; this speeds up processing by about 40 per cent on my machine.
- Allows you to search more than one folder (or drive, or subfolder) at once. Rather than having to search the "C:" drive, then the "D:" drive, then the "E:" drive, etc., IconPlucker lets you select as many as you want (using the Windows standard mouse and keyboard shortcuts) and search them all at once.
- Displays both the large (32x32) and small (16x16) icons in a file. And ,if a files only has one size, IconPlucker displays it in both sizes for you.
- Has the option to search subdirectories or not, because sometimes you know the exact folder the icon is in. IconPlucker makes this as easy as clicking a toolbar icon.
- Has the option to display files in the tree or not. Sometimes you just want to see all the icons in one particular file, and IconPlucker lets you do it.
- Runs at "Idle" (also called, "Lowest") priority, so that you can do other work while IconPlucker runs unobtrusively in the background.
- Makes it easy to copy to the clipboard or save to a file. IconPlucker has three different ways to copy to the clipboard: you can right-click on an icon, and choose "Copy" from the context menu; you can double-click on an icon and click the "copy" button; or you can use the "Control-C" or "Alt-E-C" keyboard shortcuts. Saving to an ICO or BMP file is just as easy. And, if you select multiple icons, IconPlucker will give the choice between naming each file, or accepting an automatically generated filename.
- Provide a way to set the background color for the icon to anything the user wants. Most programs just set it to light gray, or maybe let you choose between black and white. IconPlucker lets you pick any color from the standard Windows color chooser dialog box.
- Support the standard right-click context menu on the tree. IconPlucker will display the same context menu for, say, the "C:\TEMP" folder that the Windows Explorer does.
- Provide continuous scrolling using middle mouse button, just like Microsoft's Internet Explorer. In IconPlucker, just click the middle mouse button, and an icon will appear. If you move the mouse, the list of icons will scroll in the direction you moved. The farther from the original position you move, the faster the scrolling. This feature makes it easy to view the icons "hands-free".
Registration
Here's the deal. Try IconPlucker for as long as you want. If you decide you can use it, use the "Help | Register" menu item to register it. When you register it, you'll get an email back that gives you a "Registration Key". When you enter the Key into the program, it makes those annoying "Register" screens go away. (It's only $4.95, for heaven's sake!)
If, on the other hand, you decide you can't use it, you can uninstall it (or not).
Known Bugs
A couple of things don't work, so don't try them:
- Selecting "My Computer" or "Network Neighborhood" and clicking the "Pluck!" button to begin scanning does nothing. You must select a drive (local, network, CD, ZIP, etc.) or folder to scan. This may get fixed in a future release.
- Certain third-party items under "My Computer" can be expanded infinitely (if it happens to you, you'll know it when you see it). Since you can't scan on items like these, this isn't much of a limitation.
Bugs and Suggestions
Due to the infinite combination of hardware, firmware, wetware, operating systems, device drivers, patches, service packs, DLLs, and system settings present in the world, there is no way to guarantee this program will work on your machine. If you're running Windows XP, Windows 2000, or Windows NT 4, it should work fine. If you're running Windows 98, Windows 98SE, or Windows ME, it probably will work fine. If you're running Windows 95, it's time to upgrade, but IconPlucker might still work.
That being said, if you find a bug, let me know at IconPlucker@DefinitiveSolutions.com. It may be fixed in some future revision. (If it's easy to fix, I'll do so and send you a new version to try.) NOTE: If you email me about a bug, save us both some time: tell me what operating system you're using, and exactly (don't paraphrase) what the error message says. Also, use the "Help | Enable Logging" menu item to enable logging, run the program again and re-create the problem, and then email me the "_IconPlucker.log" file that was generated when the problem occurs. (For the paranoid: the "_IconPlucker.log" file is a plain ASCII text file, so you can use NotePad or whatever to view it before sending it to me.)
If you have an idea for a feature, let me know.
Conclusion
Thanks for trying IconPlucker. Visit our website at www.DefinitiveSolutions.com for more inexpensive software.
