gestures won't work in explorer window or desktop after deleting anything

This is an extremely useful program - hard to live without once you get used to it.

Everything works fine except that no gestures would work in any explorer/folder window or desktop after you delete any file(s) from it. You need to reopen explorer (or the folder where you deleted files) to make the gestures work.

Is it possible to make the gestures work without having to close and reopen the folder where the files were deleted?

What are the exact steps required to duplicate this problem?

Thanks Scott for offering to help :-)

Here are the required steps - I'm running Windows ME, by the way.

1. Open any folder, e.g. "My Documents".
2. Select a few files and delete them (to the recycle bin, so that you can restore).
3. Now try any mouse gesture, such as minimizing the "My Documents" window (my gesture is / Down).
4. Instead of minimizing the relevant folder, what I see is a rectangular selection box - this is the default windows behavior. The StrokeIt gestures are overridden by the default windows behavior and remain so until I close and reopen "My Documents" folder.

Please everybody. After the answer from Scott I'd like to know if anyone has succeded to duplicate my problem.

It's not necessary to have a solution to the problem to reply - merely success in duplicating the problem would be enough.

Sorry, I cannot, using the steps you list.

Thanks Michael. Now that I know that this problem does not exist for everyone I will do my best to resolve it. However, any suggestions or theories would be welcome.

It could be a focus bug somewhere.

How are you deleting files? Are you pressing the delete key, are you dragging them to the recycle bin, or right clicking and pressing delete?

Do you have any toolbar utilities or add-ons running?

-- Jeff

Wow!!! Am I talking to the Great Jeff!

Well Jeff, despite the minor problem that I'm facing, your program is the one that I use most frequently on a daily basis. Almost all the programs that I use regularly are configured with StrokeIt. A lot of thanks for creating such a useful program and making the life of computer-users so much easier. THANKS.

Now about my problem. Your query about the way of deleting files has led to discovery of new facts. Here's the exact info:

The problem EXISTS when I delete by:
a) pressing the Delete key on the keyboard (my usual method)
b) pressing the Delete button on the Windows Explorer toolbar
c) using Explorer Menu bar (File > Delete)

The problem DOES NOT EXIST when I delete by:
a) right click context menu
b) dragging files to the Recycle Bin

As for toolbar add-ons, there are Flashget and Norton AntiVirus toolbars installed along with the respective programs but I never enable them.

Also, I have KeyLaunch 1.2.2 and Active Keys 1.06 installed which are launched at Windows startup. But the problem remains even when I close these two programs.

Regards...
Arvind

This is an interesting problem and I'm still suspicious of other programs causing some sort of conflict. Do you have any undelete or recycle bin utilities installed?

Try rebooting and starting in safe mode. This should (hopefully) keep other programs from launching at startup. Then run StrokeIt and see if your problem still exists.

You may also want to make sure you don't have any spyware or other junk dlls loading on your system. I'd recommend running AdAware [url=http://www.lavasoftusa.com]http://www.lavasoftusa.com[/url] and SpyBot S&D [url=http://www.spybot.info]http://www.spybot.info[/url]

Good Luck,

Jeff

I had Norton Antivirus 2003 installed which had Norton Protected Recycle Bin as its component. Even though I disabled the Norton Protected Recycle Bin, "UnErase Wizard" still showed in the right-click context menu of Recycle Bin. I therefore uninstalled Norton Antivirus and restarted my system but my problem remained.

The problem persists in the Safe Mode in exactly the same way as mentioned earlier.

I downloaded Ad-aware and Spybot-S&D immediately after getting your suggestion. Now my computer is as clean as these programs could make it but the problem persists in exactly the same way.

I've also found something new. Only two folders are exempt from this problem - the Recycle Bin and the History folder (c:\windows\history). I can use all my gestures in these folder windows even after deleting files from them using all three problematic ways - Delete key, Toolbar, Menu bar.

By the way, does this problem have anything to do with the operating system, i.e., Windows ME. Is there anyone out there running Windows ME and yet not facing my problem?

Regards...
Arvind

I've tried this on a WinME system and have not been able to replicate it. Are you running a GeoShell or any other sort of explorer replacement?

The fact that gestures work in the Recycle Bin and History folders sort of makes sense....neither folder contains "real" files, so deleting anything out of them would use a different "Delete" function than other folders.

If you open a folder and delete some files, StrokeIt stops working until you close and re-open that folder, right? What happens if you have two folders open and delete files in one of them, do gestures continue to work in the other folder?

What happens if you open a folder, delete files, and restart StrokeIt, do gestures then start working again? If it works, then something is setting a hook is intercepting the mouse events before they get to StrokeIt. If that's the case, you may want to get this DOS program: [url=http://www.anticracking.sk/EliCZ/export/ShowGWH.zip]http://www.anticracking.sk/EliCZ/export/ShowGWH.zip[/url] and run ShowGWH after gestures have been broken. This should show you which programs have hooks set and could give us a starting point for tracking down the culprit.

Good luck,

Jeff

Thanks Jeff for taking such a personal interest in my problem. I appreciate it. Your suggestions have been very helpful.

I am glad to say that the problem has been solved - the culprit was FastFolders (version 2.62). Its webpage is [url=http://www.desksoft.com/FastFolders.htm]http://www.desksoft.com/FastFolders.htm[/url]. Now a newer version is available but I haven't tested it.

While trying to solve my problem I had disabled (using StartUp Organizer) the entry it made among the programs run at startup. I thought that that would enough to test the conflict - maybe because I did not want to find FastFolders as the conflicting program! I am saying this because I knew all along that disabling its entry at startup disabled the program's function only partly. I realize now that the problem could have been solved much earlier and I regret the inappropriate delay.

After getting your last reply - that you did not find the problem in a WinME system - I uninstalled FastFolders and found the problem gone. While I am glad to see the problem gone I have to say that sometimes I found FastFolders useful.

However, StrokeIt is much more important and useful to me than FastFolders. So today I am saying good bye to FastFolders with a request to you to check it out. See if you too find this problem with FastFolders and that if the conflict can be resolved. Meanwhile, I would be grateful if you could suggest an alternative program with similar functions.

Finally, I would like to thank you again - first for writing a program that has become practically indispensable for all its users and second for taking a personal interest in the problems of individual users. We StrokeIt users know how passionately you love your program but we love StrokeIt as much as you do - if that is possible!!

With a lot of thanks,
Arvind

Arvind,

I'm glad you finally found the offending program. Unfortunately, I don't think there's much I can do on this end to make StrokeIt compatible with FastFolders. Window Hooks (which is what StrokeIt uses to grab the mouse input) require that all programs play nice. That means that when FastFolders installs its hook after a file is deleted, it should be responsible and pass the mouse information through its own hook so that StrokeIt can proceed - this is something that only the FastFolders developer(s) can fix. I'd suggest writing to them and pointing them to this thread. I'll be happy to work with them to make things work.

As an alternative, you may want to try a program called FileTargets, which looks like it could be similar. I have not used FileTargets or FastFolders, so I can't recommend either; I found FileTargets at [url=http://www.pricelessware.org]http://www.pricelessware.org[/url], which is always the first place I look for good utilities.

-- Jeff

After I open My Computer, My Documents, recycle bin, I cannot close them expect by ctrl-alt-delete. I tried the X, file-close and ctrl-f4 and none of them work. I can open my programs and close them fine and IE6 works.


Any help?

Thanks.

Does this happen only with strokeit installed/running?

-- Jeff

Hello:
My right click function on my mouse won't work in IE. However it does work in microsoft word. How can I get my right click mouse option to work in IE?
The problem is recent.
Thanks.
Marc