ghostwriter

Post details of freeware that are found to be not portable here. Posts in the submissions forum relating to freeware found to be not portable should also be moved here.
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webfork
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Re: ghostwriter

#16 Post by webfork »


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Midas
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Re: ghostwriter

#17 Post by Midas »

With some bad news(?):
Windows Download

A volunteer has kindly stepped up to provide a Windows installer here:

https://github.com/michelolvera/vs-ghostwriter

Since I will no longer be able to provide new releases of ghostwriter for Windows personally, please consider helping out our volunteer at issue #367 if you are interested.

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Re: ghostwriter

#18 Post by webfork »

Midas wrote: Mon Feb 18, 2019 4:38 am I will no longer be able to provide new releases of ghostwriter for Windows personally
Ouch.

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Re: vs-ghostwriter

#19 Post by Midas »

There's hope, still... :)

vs-ghostwriter [is] a fork of Ghostwriter. A beautiful cross-platform markdown editor, however this fork is intended to be compiled into VS 2017 (MSVC) x64 for Windows only. This repository arises from the need to have a Ghostwriter functional Windows version because, as announced by wereturtle, will no longer provide updates for Windows.


Latest vs-ghostwriter is v1.8.0, dated 2019-05-15 (https://github.com/michelolvera/vs-ghostwriter/releases).

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Re: ghostwriter

#20 Post by hamasaki »

Yes, Ghostwriter isn`t portable. Cutemarked portable is also not portable.

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Re: ghostwriter

#21 Post by webfork »

hamasaki wrote: Thu Aug 29, 2019 10:09 am Yes, Ghostwriter isn`t portable.
Earlier posts seem to suggest that it was. Where is writing settings now?

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Re: ghostwriter

#22 Post by hamasaki »

Yes, it definitely used to be. For me it was writing to both 'AppData/Local' and 'AppData/Roaming'. I`ve ditched it now.

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Re: ghostwriter

#23 Post by Midas »

FYI, I found no traces at either location after running Ghostwriter v1.6.2, one of the last official portable versions -- only v1.7.0 and 1.7.1 were released afterwards, which I haven't tested.

Are you sure it doesn't keep its settings when moved?

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Re: ghostwriter

#24 Post by hamasaki »

I`ve just downloaded the so called portable version of '1.8.0'. Added it to my portable drive, ran it and it creates a load of files/folders at:

AppData\Local\ghostwriter\ghostwriter\*
AppData\Roaming\ghostwriter\*

So, totally not portable.

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Re: vs-ghostwriter

#25 Post by Midas »

So you now confirmed that we are talking about vs-ghostwriter, the forked version of the previous ghostwriter.

What you haven't confirmed is that vs-ghostwriter v1.8.0 leaves its settings behind when you move computers.

You see, having traces in '%APPDATA%' is not at all the same as not being portable.

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Re: ghostwriter

#26 Post by hamasaki »

Understand. If I plug the drive into my other laptop, the appData folders remain on the previous laptop. And the settings aren`t transferred.

Actually, there are a number of things that happen with my external drive that I can`t figure out. For example, Thunderbird portable. If I run it on laptop A it's ok, I then unplug the drive and plug it into laptop B, still ok. But then I plug it back into laptop A and the setup dialog appears as though it's the first time I'm running Thunderbird. This happens with Google Chrome, Firefox, KeePass etc. Permissions?

QOwnNotes, whenever I run the exe the setup dialog appears. With the --portable flag it's ok.

I can`t figure these issues out at the moment. Sorry for going slightly off topic. :(

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Re: ghostwriter

#27 Post by Midas »

No problem, it's good to share info. 8)

You can test this in the same computer, too. Suppose you open up vs-ghostwriter, make changes to the default configuration, and close it. After this, you go to '%APPDATA%' and manually delete all the traces it left there.

Now, when you open vs-ghostwriter again, are your configuration changes gone? If this is the case then it's definitely a portability problem.

If not -- and while they may still be stored somewhere else outside of the program's folder -- it's probably just a matter of the program not being fully stealth.

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Re: ghostwriter

#28 Post by hamasaki »

Thanks Midas. :)

OK, so cleared all folders and started from scratch.

1. On opening 'Ghostwriter', it creates the following the following in 'appData/roaming':

roaming.png
roaming.png (1.76 KiB) Viewed 14076 times

and the following in 'AppData/local'

local.png
local.png (4.66 KiB) Viewed 14076 times

2. If I change the settings and save, it adds one more file:

appData/roaming/ghostwriter.ini

3. I then delete 'appData/roaming/ghostwriter' and 'appData/local/ghostwriter' folders, run again and all settings are gone.

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Re: ghostwriter

#29 Post by Midas »

Yep, contrary to the original ghostwriter, vs-ghostwriter is definitely not natively portable, especially considering point 2. :|

Let's approach the next steps.

Was there a mention about running vs-ghostwriter with a "--portable" parameter or am I mistaken?

If this is the case and all else fails, a batch command file (BAT/CMD) or a yaP launcher will ensure that vs-ghostwriter is always run with the "--portable" parameter; if not, there'll be other ways.

What about if you just place an empty 'ghostwriter.ini' in the program folder, the one where 'ghostwriter.exe' is? Or move the one created in '%APPDATA%' to the program folder?

Please, remember to remove everything in '%APPDATA%\ghostwriter' between tests.

hamasaki
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Re: ghostwriter

#30 Post by hamasaki »

Midas wrote: Tue Sep 03, 2019 8:28 am Was there a mention about running vs-ghostwriter with a "--portable" parameter or am I mistaken?
No, nothing. No mention in the readme or anywhere else. I tried it, but same result.
Midas wrote: Tue Sep 03, 2019 8:28 amWhat about if you just place an empty 'ghostwriter.ini' in the program folder, the one where 'ghostwriter.exe' is? Or move the one created in '%APPDATA%' to the program folder?
Same result. Moving the data or creating a ini file before launch does nothing, everything still gets created in the appData folders.

But, the previous version had a 'data' folder, so I tried creating a 'data' folder and moving the files there, that has had a result. Now the 'appData/roaming' folder doesn`t get created and settings are saved to the 'data' folder. :)

The 'appData/local' folder still gets created, but I can live with that, at least the settings get saved now to the portable drive.

Thanks for the help Midas, really appreciate it.

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