Note: due to massive spam issues, the forum registration is now closed. If needed, you may still contact me at the following address: 
A new beta of Appetizer is available for download here: Download Appetizer 1.4.4.148 Beta
This is a bugfix release which should address the last few problems before the official release. If you find any bugs or issues, please post back here.
Here are the last changes:
Version 1.4.4.148 Beta (2010-01-23)
- Fixed bug with "Start on system startup" option when app was installed using PortableApps installer
- Fixed bug where app was always starting on system startup even after the option has been unticked
- Fixed bug with Appetizer closing procedure (wasn't closing at all anymore, just crashing)
- Set default window transparency to 235 (looks nicer)
- "Kill locking apps on shutdown" option no longer kills Appetizer and allows it to close properly
Version 1.4.3.103 Beta (2009-06-12):
- Support for web links
- Fixed crash when saving config dialog, because no value was assigned to label position
- Improved closing of Appetizer, which hopefully should no longer crash
- Updated Dutch locale
- Updated Swedish locale
- Start on system startup feature
Version 1.4.2.22 Beta (2009-05-25):
- New: Icon labels can now be displayed below or to the right of the icon.
- Fixed minor plugin issue
Version 1.4.1.1 Beta (2009-05-24):
- New: plugins can now have a Configuration dialog
- New: many new plugin functions (possibility to change button icons, file functions, dialog functions, skin functions, new events, etc.)
- New: Vietnamese translation (Tam Vo Le)
- New: "Securizer" plugin to encrypt / decrypt important documents on a USB key (separate download)
- New: option panel is now open on startup if it was open last time Appetizer was closed
- New: support for icon labels
- New: support for PNG icons
- Fixed: Vista issue with special items
- Fixed: File / Folder browse dialog now also shows hidden files and folders such as PortableApps's folders
- Fixed: Dropping a file onto an icon should now works as expected, and launch the app with the file as a parameter
- Updated Polish translation (MT)
- Login to post comments
I tried the new beta, and had a couple of issues. (Some are minor, I'm just noting them.)
I just dragged in onto my existing version (after copying a backup) so if that is the issue, let me know.
1 When I started it, the menu came up horizontal, when I had it set vertical.
2 It loaded some of my shortcuts, but not all, and some of the ones that did appear had blank icons, which when clicked on, claimed that the target didn't exist. The proper program name appeared on mouse-over, however.
3 More oddly, some programs that were in my portable apps folder, but not listed on the menu previously, did appear. (Keepass, for one)
4 I have a sub group, and it seemed totally gone on the new version. (no icon, just a space int he menu.)
I appreciate your efforts to develop this, and use this as my main portable menu. My current version works fine, except for the "Open on startup" bug.
My main suggestion (which I may have mentioned before) is that the minimize and eject buttons are too small and/or close together. (Minimize maybe shouldn't be an X, but it doesn't bother me.)
Thanks again, and keep up the good work1
Thanks for the feedback. It's actually quite worrying if icons and groups are being deleted when updating. I will do some tests by overwriting files like you did to see if I can replicate the issue.
By any chance, could you send me the parameters of one of the shortcuts that showed up as a blank icon? (i.e. the value of the "Location" and perhaps "Parameters" fields)
Does something happen when you click on the empty space where there used to be a group on the menu? I'm wondering whether it is just a problem with the icon not being displayed, or if the group is really gone.
As for the "Open on startup" feature, there was indeed a problem with it but it should be fixed in the new release.
I've made some screenshots. Hopefully this will work. http://www.box.net/shared/hhfa4kzfln Note that I do have all of those apps, just not on the menu. And oddly, Media Monkey has two icons, one blank, one normal. Let me know if I can help. grant us joy (one word) is my google mail address.
Hope I helped.
Grant
UPDATED: I forgot to mention, the only change I made to the beta in the screenshot was to make it square. (it was long and skinny, only showing a few icons)
hello.
I write the link address to the latest Japanese language.
(Mail seems not to arrive. )
http://tiltstr.up.seesaa.net/tmp/appetizer.zip
I hope we'll stay in touch.
Tilt.
That's great, thanks Tilt!
Hi Laurent! Great to see that the best launcher is alive :)
I tried the new beta and the closing problem is worst than ever. Something is seriously wrong with appetizer closing when shutdown or close a session.
If I shutdown, appetizer will close but the pc does not shutdown, if I press shutdown again then it works.
If I close a session, appetizer will close but the session is not closed, so I need to close the session again to get it closed, but this go worst, to my surprise when the login screen appear the user password inbox is totally locked and I cannot initiate the session (this does not happen nor even with the previous beta)
If I close appetizer manually before do any of the process mentioned above (shutdown, reboot, close session) all works fine including the login screen.
I really don't know what could be happening, I mean, I've many apps running in my tray at time to shutdown and none of these cause problems. Appetizer is not running as a service or a heavy process so why this happen?
Using Apettizer 1.4.4.148 with 32 shortcuts, running on WinXP SP3, 512 RAM, no external units at all.
Otherwise I'm wondering if could be possible to change the behavior regarding to the alignment when show/hide the side panel.
I've appetizer centered in my desktop but when I unfold and then hide the configuration side panel appetizer ends aligned to the left, what is a bit annoying, see this capture sample;
http://depositfiles.com/files/wyorxafen
Hi TGB72,
I think I found the issue was the closing procedure. I was doing something not very standard, which works well in Windows 7 (and possibly Vista) but apparently not XP. I've uploaded a fixed exe here: http://app.etizer.org/temp/Appetizer-debug.zip
Could you give it a try and let me know if it's any better? Just put the exe in the same folder as appetizer.exe. Note that's it's a debug version so it will show the debug window.
Regarding the alignment issue, unfortunately there's no easy way to fix that. Appetizer is mainly designed to run in a corner of the screen but not in the center. If you move the window a bit to the left (about 30 pixels), it should work as expected though.
Laurent
Thanks for reply Laurent.
I tried the fix and now the login screen is not locked anymore :) Anyway I still need to press twice the button shutdown, reboot or close session in order that these processes are carried out :( Like I said before this does not happen if I close appetizer manually before shutdown.
Ok I gave it a try in my XP virtual machine and I managed to replicate the issue. What was happening is that Windows was, for some reasons, trying to close Appetizer twice, which was making the app cancel the shutdown procedure.
The new version should work properly by ignoring any close request beyond the first one: http://app.etizer.org/temp/Appetizer-debug2.zip
Please give it a try and let me know how it goes.
Well, I tried it and really weird things happened, now at shutdown appetizer closes and the procedure is not canceled but in 2 occasions when I pressed "reboot" the pc shutdown suddenly (I also heard for first time some strange continuous beep during the shutdown and reebots), and in subsequent reboot this strange entry was add to the startup;
KernelFaultCheck %systemroot%\system32\dumrep 0 -k
And this is what I found about this on MS site:
The Dumprep.exe tool is a Windows XP fault logging program. If a serious error occurs, Dumprep.exe writes the error details to a text file. The Dumprep.exe tool then prompts you to send the error information to Microsoft. The Dumprep.exe tool is a non-essential system process that is installed for third-party use.
To be honest all this thing scare the hell out of me, my pc is 10 years old and the only one that I've to work (I can't take to much chances) so by the moment I'll stick to v1.3.2 and close it manually.
Thanks a lot for your work Laurent, in spite of this little problem your program is the best launcher ever.
Prevx 3.0 (2010.02.05) reports as "High Risk Cloaked Malware"
Could it be fixed?
I cannot fix this because it's a false positive. However, I've contacted Prevx and they suggested that you do the following:
- Double click on the item in the scan results screen.
- A website will open, with a description of the program
- You will see "Disagree with this determination?" on the right of this page.
- Click this link and submit any information you believe relevant.
That would be great if you could do that. It would allow them to investigate further and hopefully change the determination.
Feature Request - Icon Caching (slow on startup, no icon if the target is on a removed disk)
Hi Laurent,
I gave this a little try and all went well until I added the green and orange glass themes. I changed to the orange one and my dock was set as horizontal. Now it starts vertical then crashes. Dont know if this is to do with the theme though as it was fine on first run after changing theme.
Have you tried the official 1.4.6.497 ?
Scott, I've uploaded a debug version here. It's still 1.4.6 but with debugging enabled so if it crashes it should hopefully give additional information that would help fixing the issue.
Could you try to run it and see what happens? You just need to put it next to appetizer.exe and run it. Then if you could copy and paste (or better - take a screenshot) of any error message and post here, that would be great. Thanks!
Laurent
Thanks, Laurent. Well, when I launch the debug version of appetizer, appears the debug window:
9:44:09: Debug: Loading: D:\Appetizer/Data/Plugins\AddToGroupOnRightClick\plugin.xml
9:44:09: Debug: Loading plugin: AddToGroupOnRightClick
9:44:09: Debug: Loading: D:\Appetizer/Data/Plugins\RevealShortcutTarget\plugin.xml
9:44:09: Debug: Loading plugin: RevealShortcutTarget
Then I right-click in appetizer and crash again, also the debug window. I also try to save the log.txt before to apply the right click to see if after the crash maybe the log records the problem, but nothing happens, only saves the actions before the crash.
I ran WinXP Event Viewer but the crash don't lefts anything event about the appetizer event.
Something that I see is when I do right click on appetizer, is that the right click is catched by the application behind of appetizer, i.e., if I have Firefox, shows the Firefox context menu, if is other, like the desktop, shows the Screen properties, I mean, the behavior is like appetizer isn't running when I right click on it, because after the crash, the right click is taken by the application that is "in down level" of appetizer.
Thanks for your efforts, Laurent.
I've recently added some new "special items" (WordPad, Notepad, etc.) to the context menu and I'm wondering if this is what might be causing the crash. Could you try these two versions and let me know if any of them work? The first one has more error checks before displaying the special items; while the second has all the special items disabled (if it works we'll know that this is really the problem).
As previously, you don't need to overwrite your current version of Appetizer. You can simply put the files next to appetizer.exe and run them.
Reporting...
The appetizer-morechecks.exe not crashed the first time you press right click on a shortcut, but when pressed again it crashes.
The Appetizer-nosi.exe never crashes, It's good (I think).
Laurent Thanks for fix it.
Estuart.
The same behaviour reported by Estuart:
-morechecks, good point is the option to add special item, bad point: fails with doing right click the second time. (supports one right click only).
-nosi, good point, supports right clicks without trouble, bad point: has not the option to add special item.
Thanks for the feedback guys, it's clear now that the problem is caused by the new special items. I'm guessing that Appetizer is trying to access an icon that perhaps is missing on some configurations or is in a different place, and crashes as a result. So I've made another version which better checks the icons before displaying them. Hopefully that should fix the issue. If you could give it a try and let me know if it works, that would be great - http://app.etizer.org/upload/Appetizer-betterchecks.zip
Laurent, now it works!!!!
With the problem solved, now I found the app that provoques the problem: Wordpad. This app isn't installed in the WinXP that I use.
Talking about right click, I have a suggestion, when I do left click or right click in an app inside of a group it launches. May I suggest that giving right click in an app inside a group, could show the properties of the item as happens when we do right click in an app that it isn't in a menu?
Thanks, Laurent, you and appetizer are great!
Hi laurent.
I tried debug version and it helped but trouble with this version is no text wrap. I couldn't see exact problem but it led me in right direction.
It turns out it was my fault! Due to moving Appetizer after first run. It couldn't locate two icons!
I changed the locations in the FolderItems file and ok now.
Although why is Appetizer closing on starting an app? Options have been checked so its not that.
Also i managed to get Appetizer to add portable apps by changing address in the Settings file.
Thanks
Scott
I forgot to ask, where is the link for version 1.4.6?
Ok, i didn't realise i already had the updates! I checked the version numbers.
Anyway, no problems encountered so far, have created several groups, added special items, right clicked??, but Appetizer still closer on app run, is it meant to? I'd prefer it to minimise or do nothing. Even if all 3 options were possible.
I also think there should be drag n drop rather than right click and move to group, and also should be able to sort groups alphabetically.
Is there any chance you could add systray support? Or at least date and time? Then a plugin for reminders and scheduler!
If u added a plugin to install and update portableapps i might b converted lol.
All the best...
Your doin a great job!
Couple more suggestions:
How bout a right click option to lock the position, size and items.
Launch app on startup.
As Appetizer can have more than one instance, wouldn't it be better to have tabs to change between them? And rather than store each instance as a completely seperate install, have it contained in one folder.
Jus a few ideas to keep you busy lol
Just attempted to switch from rocket dock to portable dock, a clone that adds .paf.exe installation. Trouble with PD is that it doesn't save any settings.
But... It has an app for installing the .paf.exe format which some may find useful. It'll give an error regarding PD but just ignore it.
You may be able to use this or base a launcher of your own on it. Not sure if its open source.