WhereIs It? is a shareware program written for 32-bit Windows operatingsystems, designed to help users organize and maintain a catalog ofcomputer media collection, including CD-ROMs, diskettes, audio CDs,DVDs, removable drives, hard drives, network drives or any other mediathat Windows can access as a drive.
The most basic goal for Where Is It? is to provide access to thecontents of any media you have from a cataloged database, even if themedia itself is not available on the system - you can browse lists offiles and folders, search by any criteria, use descriptions,thumbnails, categories, flags, etc.
Where is it? is a successor of successful DOS program Floppy Master,extending its capabilities to new and larger media storage devices andproviding even more comprehensive access to stored data.
WhereIsIt can be used to handle any kind of data, including downloadedprograms, magazine CD-ROMs, music collections like MP3s or audio CDs,graphics collections, document backups, etc.
Where Is It? can handle lots of them, too, a couple hundreds orthousands disks in a catalog is nothing unusual, yet catalogs remainreasonably small, single-filed and easy to transfer or send to otherusers.
You can also create more than one catalog, and at any time open and work with as many catalogs at once as needed.
WhereIsIt is easy to use for both beginners and advanced users. Itfeatures a familiar and well thought-out, Explorer-like user interface,combined with strong searching and reporting capabilities,multi-language support, automated description and thumbnails importingthrough extendable plugins from more than 70 different sources, andmuch more.
Here are some key features of "WhereIsIt":
Suitable for beginners and advanced users
WhereIsIt was designed to be a very adjustable program with lots ofoptions for power users, as well as quick and easy to use withpredefined default settings and wizards for all those who don t want toget their hands dirty.
Well thought-out user interface with multi-language support
WhereIsIt s user interface is one of its most praised qualities. Easyto use, familiar Explorer-like user interface with clear overview ofavailable functions, adjustable toolbar, columns to choose between, andextensive use of object menus (right mouse click) to let you quicklyaccess command you need. Want to see item s description or assignedthumbnail image? Just leave mouse pointer on it for a moment, it willpopup as a tool-tip.
Not just that, WhereIsIt s user interface can be used in any of thesupported languages, dialogs will adjust to translated text. Supportfor new languages can be downloaded in a form of small language files,or even created by users themselves by translating the program to a newlanguage.
Manageable catalog files
WhereIsIt doesn t use large and complex databases, all information isstored in a single catalog (.ctf) file, easily transferable to anothercomputer, a friend, a public forum... as well as easy to backup. Shareyour data the easy way. Catalogs don t need to be installed in any way,they can just simply be opened in the program as document files, evenon someone else s computer, while still retaining full functionality.Internal catalog file structure is optimized for very efficient accessand small total size, allowing fast searches and small memoryfootprint, even with very large catalogs. For example, 30.000 files andfolders (that s about five heavily populated CD-ROMs) will result in acatalog file approximately 1 MB in size - details may vary, depending on data structure and selected scanning options.
Detailed information about every file, folder, or disk
Every item in catalog includes detailed basic information about filesand folders you would come to expect, like name, size, date, fileattributes and similar, but WhereIsIt adds to that its own informationit provides as a catalog program. For example, every item can includeup to 32 KB textual description, a small thumbnail image, you canassign items custom-defined, multi-level categories or flags, you caneven assign them so-called alias names, under which are they known incatalog - for example, if the real file name is to cryptic. Whendisplayed in WhereIsIt, items can be colored according their type,assigned categories or flags... All of those can be used to find itemsyou are looking for, or just make browsing your disk images a lotsimpler and more fun.
Internal support for many compressed file formats
Many of the often used compressed file formats can be handled duringmedia scan, including ZIP, ARJ, RAR, CAB, LHA/LZH, TAR, ARC, ACE, ZOO,GZIP, BZIP2, 7ZIP, CBZ, CBR, PAK, HA, JAR, SFX... If so selected,compressed files can be presented as folders, showing their contentinside. Files compressed inside archives can be extracted right outfrom WhereIsIt to any folder, or they can be viewed or launched withassociated program with one click!
Automatic description and thumbnails importing
Description Plugins One of WhereIsIt most powerful features aredescription and thumbnail plugins, in charge of importing descriptionsand images while media is being scanned and stored in the catalog. Thisway, you can have your files and folders equipped with descriptionsright after scanning completes. Based on source type, descriptions areautomatically attached either to files themselves, to their parentfolders, other files in the folder, etc. Standard description pluginshandle importing from more than 60 file types and other sources,including files like File_id.diz, Descript.ion, 00index.txt, Files.bbs,they can browse and extract details from most documents, graphics andaudio files, including MP3s (sampling, play time, ID3 tags...), AudioCDs (CDDB database, Cdplayer.ini), MS Office documents, Adobe Acrobatfiles, executable files and fonts, and many many more. Details aboutgraphics files not only include their size and color depth, a smallthumbnail can be imported in catalog as well, possibly together withdigital camera info and other comments embedded inside.
As if all this wouldn t be enough, there is even more - you can developyour own description and thumbnail plugins to handle additional typesof sources and files WhereIsIt doesn t handle yet at this time, or youcan download plugins others have written and made them available forothers to use.
Built-in media recognition system
WhereIsIt supports any media type Windows can access as drive,including diskettes, CD-ROMs, DVDs, removable disks like iomega Zip,hard disks, network drives etc. It will recognize by name and collectuseful data for most of them, too. WhereIsIt is compatible with allWindows-supported file systems, including FAT, FAT32, and NTFS.
WhereIsIt does not use drive letters to reference cataloged disks, itis able to recognize them by their key properties, like type, serialnumber, formatted capacity, and similar. This way, it doesn t matterwhich drive your media is in, WhereIsIt will find it, even on someother computer over the network. In the unlikely event that mediachanges that much that it can no longer be recognized (for example, byreformatting it), you can still manually update its existing disk imagein catalog.
Powerful searching finds what you are looking for
WhereIsIt features a powerful multi-threaded searching, with detailedsettings on what to search for, where to search and how to search. Useeither Quick Search to quickly find your items by name or description,or start up Advanced Search with Search Expression Editor, allowing youto write complex search queries using the full rich set of availablesearch criteria and Boolean logic operators. WhereIsIt provides quickshortcuts to search only in selected disks or folders, or you cansearch through previous search results or user list items, resulting incountless capabilities to combine multiple searches, narrow downresults...
Searching for duplicate items is in there, too, as well as comparingcataloged disk image to actual files on the media, and comparingcataloged disk images allows for tasks such as version tracking, ifcomparing disk images of the same media taken at different points intime.
Professional report generator
Adjustable and professional report generator adds a final touch to yourcatalog collections. Report generator is usually used together withextensive search capabilities or report wizard, allowing you to firstcollect the items you want in the report, while report generatorhandles processing items themselves, such as specifying layout anddetails to be included, optionally sorting and arranging items by theirlocation etc. Needless to point out, you can use the built in printpreview, with adjustable zoom and full-screen capabilities.
Report generator not only allows you to print your reports on yourprinter or send them by fax using the Microsoft Fax, it is also usedfor exporting cataloged data to other formats, including ASCII files,Excel tables, rich-text RTF documents, HTML documents, externaldatabase formats like SQL, XML, CSV, SYLK, or just send it directly toclipboard for pasting to some other application...
Requirements:
5 MB free hard disk space for program installation and catalogs.
Mouse or other Windows-compatible pointing device strongly recommended.
Limitations:
14-day trial
The total allowed capacity of all media in a single catalog islimited to 2 GB. You will not be able to add more disk images to thecatalog if the total sum of all media capacities in the catalog alreadyexceeds this limit. If you want to add more data, you will have to opena new catalog.
Only one catalog can be opened at the time. If you would like to workwith another catalog, you must close the current one first.
Auto-loading catalogs on program startup is disabled. Registeredusers can setup a list of catalogs to load automatically when programis starting, or select to open all catalogs that were opened in thelast session.
All reports will include a visible message saying they were generated with an unregistered version.
Tips on program startup can not be disabled in the unregisteredversion. The first tip will always remind you that you are working withan unregistered shareware program.
Script language is only available in registered version. Scriptlanguage is mostly used for unattended catalog updates, or it canperform special tasks on program startup, for example, updating thecatalog data when program starts, so you always have the latest stateto work with.
What s New in This Release:
Completely rewritten and redesigned the Properties dialog, with someadded functionality. The new designed does away with crowded controls,subdialogs etc., and uses about five times less system resources.
A disk icon is now shown in top right corner for currently selecteditem when in categories view mode, offering quick access to disk sdetails.
When scanning NTFS formatted drive, reparse points and symbolic linksare no longer followed and re-cataloged, avoiding data duplication andinconsistencies on disk size/usage.
Files that are compressed using file system compression (i.e. NTFS)are now marked as such in catalog, and show both compressed and realsize in the Properties dialog.
Update Wizard now checks if application folder is writable, and requests administrator privileges when necessary.
Added documentation related to using the program in Windows Vista,with emphasis on User Account Control (UAC) restrictions likely toencounter.
Changed the default locations for catalog files, templates etc.Default folders are no longer set as subfolders on the location whereWhereIsIt is installed, as this would typically place them inside"Program Files" folder, causing problems on Windows Vista with UAC.Note that this only applies to new installations, existing settingswill remain unchanged.
Eliminated slowdowns when updating disk images with extremely high count of subfolders within the same parent folder.
Adjusted detecting Recycle Bin folder in Windows Vista.
Updated IMDB plugin for changed search results formatting on the IMDB web site..
