Shoutbox

Hi everyone,

   Not sure if anyone has asked this before. A search turned up nothing, so here goes...

  Is it possible to get MSN Messenger to accept Ctrl-Enter to send a message, rather than just Enter?  I'm a whore for the ICQ way, and when I'm forced to run GAIM I use it there too.  Switching over when I get back to my Windows machine is just annoying

  I've has a play with ResHack (found in the multi-line nick threads... what an amazing little util!) but I couldn't see anything that looked like the main conversation window to fettle.

(If there's something in Plus to do this already, I humbly bow before the tirade of abuse I deserve   If not, maybe it's a wishlist item)

Thanks in advance,
QWasson

As far as I know you cannot change the way it works. Microsoft created it that way to allow the use of multi line messages. So unfortunatly no it cannot be changed. (Unless CookieRevised knows a hex edit for it)

Well, Plus! could do this but unfortunately I won't do it, Ctrl+Enter and Shift+Enter are standard stuff in Windows, othersoftware shouldn'T change the way they work.

Sorry!
Patch

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Originally posted by Patchou
Ctrl+Enter and Shift+Enter are standard stuff in Windows, othersoftware shouldn'T change the way they work.

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1: I always believe that it should be up to the users. If we left things the way they were, we'd still be using arrow keys for playing Doom, rather than W, A, S and D

2: And if we're going to leave things standard, why bother writing MsgPlus? (But please don't stop writing, it rules!)

That aside, it's a valid point.  The option would still be nice though, pretty please?

QW

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Originally posted by QWasson
1: I always believe that it should be up to the users. If we left things the way they were, we'd still be using arrow keys for playing Doom, rather than W, A, S and D

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1) ermmm... using arrow keys for playing Doom is a good thing if you ask me, because they are standard on every keyboard and standard put in a certain way so up is up and down is down... W, A, S and D are placed differently on many different keyboard types... Also, if I want to press the up key, I'm not going to press on W (or whatever), I'm going to instinctivly press the up arrow...

2) That doesn't have anything todo with "standards"...

"leaving something standard" and "using a standard" both use the word "standard", but the word means something different...

* "leaving something standard" => Leaving it the way it is; don't add anything...
* "using a standard" => using something that is defined and has certain rules (like the use of "enter" and "ctrl-enter"), so that everybody instinctivly knows how to use it or what the meaning is...

Windows wouldn't be Windows if there was no standard among programs and how they use certain key-strokes.

Imagine: Word uses the tab-key to enter spaces instead of the spacebar, Paint uses only the right mousbutton and not the left mousbutton, Excel uses the function keys to enter a digit between 1 and 12, and in Windows Explorer you have to use the minus-key to delete a file instead of the "del"-key..... It would be total chaos....

Apologies in advance for how off-topic this is getting.

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
1) ermmm... using arrow keys for playing Doom is a good thing if you ask me.... Because they are standard on every keyboard and standard put in a certain way so up is up and down is down.... W, A, S and D are placed differently on many different keyboard types...
Also, if I want to press the up key, I'm not going to press on W (or whatever), I'm going to press the up arrow...

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Well, OK, I suppose that people using left-handed US Dvorak [1] wouldn't get anything except a severe case of cramp from those exact keys, but using the keys that correspond to W, A, S and D on a standard QWERTY keyboard is amazing for FPSing. Left hand there, right hand on the mouse. It's an ideal set-up.  I accept that, for some people, the arrow keys may be better (left-handed people, with the mouse on the other side, mayhap). Giving people the choice to re-map keys means that everyone can be happy.

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2) That doesn't have anything todo with "standards"...

"leaving something standard" and "using a standard" both use the word "standard", but the word means something different...

* "leaving something standard" => Leaving it the way it is; don't add anything...
* "using a standard" => using something that is defined and has certain rules (like the use of "enter" and "ctrl-enter"), so that everybody instinctivly knows how to use it or what the meaning is...

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I was being more than a little facetious with that comment

Instinctively, I use Enter as a line feed.  In a word processor, pressing Enter doesn't send your document to the printer, does it? It moves the cursor down to the next line.  In text boxes in HTML forms the same happens. I've used it a number of times while writing this.  So when this standard doesn't seem to have any consistent application, where is the harm in offering both options (Or all n options, if you let the user define their own keys)?

QW


[1] http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/reference/keyboards.aspx

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Originally posted by QWasson
Hi everyone,

   Not sure if anyone has asked this before. A search turned up nothing, so here goes...

  Is it possible to get MSN Messenger to accept Ctrl-Enter to send a message, rather than just Enter?  I'm a whore for the ICQ way, and when I'm forced to run GAIM I use it there too.  Switching over when I get back to my Windows machine is just annoying

  I've has a play with ResHack (found in the multi-line nick threads... what an amazing little util!) but I couldn't see anything that looked like the main conversation window to fettle.

(If there's something in Plus to do this already, I humbly bow before the tirade of abuse I deserve   If not, maybe it's a wishlist item)

Thanks in advance,
QWasson

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Can You Please Tell Me Whats So Hard About Just Pressing Enter? Some people are just to lazy,even if the CTRL thing did exists it's useless

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Originally posted by Vantage
Can You Please Tell Me Whats So Hard About Just Pressing Enter? Some people are just to lazy,even if the CTRL thing did exists it's useless

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Of course, having a modifier key to press makes one lazier

It's pure force of habit.  Call it lazyness if you want to.  When you do something one way a goodly portion of the time and it works without you paying any attention, it can be niggling when it has to be done another way.  Ask any number of drivers who have to use another car for some reason, and the indicator control is on the wrong side, or people who switch mobile phone and then have to get used to a new way of entering punctuation and such.  Yes, they are little things, but you can't argue with the little things... It's the little things that make up life.

And as for the ctrl thing being useless, having a ways to both send messages and insert new lines might be usless to you, but other people do use it.

QW

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Originally posted by QWasson
Instinctively, I use Enter as a line feed.  In a word processor, pressing Enter doesn't send your document to the printer, does it? It moves the cursor down to the next line.  In text boxes in HTML forms the same happens. I've used it a number of times while writing this.  So when this standard doesn't seem to have any consistent application, where is the harm in offering both options (Or all n options, if you let the user define their own keys)?

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If the ability is needed to invoke something automaticly AND to write multiple lines, then Enter is ALWAYS used for invoking the action and Ctrl-Enter for the next line, not vice versa. Ctrl-Enter is NEVER used to invoke something! This is very consistent in all Windows applications...

PS: and on the "doom"-keys... even for righthanded people (keyboard on left hand, mouse on the right) the arrow keys are number 1 choice! There is nothing ackward about it... Keys like "AWSD" in games are made because of the possebility of playing with two people at the same keyboard (player 1 uses the arrow keys, and player 2 the laternative keys (eg awsd"))

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Originally posted by QWasson
When you do something one way a goodly portion of the time and it works without you paying any attention, it can be niggling when it has to be done another way.

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And that is just the reason why things are standarized and Patchou wont change this...

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
If the ability is needed to invoke something automaticly AND to write multiple lines, then Enter is ALWAYS used for invoking the action and Ctrl-Enter for the next line, not vice versa. Ctrl-Enter is NEVER used to invoke something! This is very consistent in all Windows applications...

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Open Internet Explorer. In the address bar, type 'google' (just that, no 'http://', no 'www', no '.com') and press ctrl-enter. Et voila, you are taken to www.google.com. You have invoked the AutoComplete feature

Open Outlook Express. Compose a little email, remembering to fill in the address field. Now press ctrl-enter.  The email has been sent.

Now, I'm not expert in Windows application development, but I'd say that if Microsoft decide you can use ctrl-enter to invoke something, or send something, then it's OK to do so, from a convention standpoint.

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PS: and on the "doom"-keys... even for righthanded people (keyboard on left hand, mouse on the right) the arrow keys are number 1 choice! There is nothing ackward about it... Keys like "AWSD" in games are made because of the possebility of playing with two people at the same keyboard (player 1 uses the arrow keys, and player 2 the laternative keys (eg awsd"))

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You muct be much narrower across the shoulders than me, or have a much bigger desk to have a comfortable amount of room to manage that.   And having two people playing a FPS on the same computer is something I'd really like to see... 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q...2+keys&btnG=Search

I know you can make Google say anything you want it to, but I think some of those links show that FPS players like the W, A, S and D keys. Rainbow Six comes preconfigured to use them.

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And that is just the reason why things are standarized

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Isn't the MSN9 protocol a standard? Doesn't MsgPlus add features on top of that protocol for the benifit of its users?  Standards are a great thing, I'll not dispute that. But attempting to standardise the human element in computing is never going to work.

QW