Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

GoldWave general discussions and community help
gibeltarik
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 08, 2009 3:27 pm

Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

Post by gibeltarik »

I have been using Goldwave for many years and in earlier versions I was able to access the manual from the Help menu. However, when I've tried to do this from recent versions including latest version 5.50, my browser (IE8) launches and tries to connect but shuts down unsuccessfully after 20 seconds. Is this perculiar to my PC or has the facility been discontinued? :?:
GoldWave Inc.
Site Admin
Posts: 4372
Joined: Wed Mar 10, 2004 6:43 pm
Location: St. John's, NL
Contact:

Re: Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

Post by GoldWave Inc. »

The Manual is installed on your hard drive, so Internet access is not required at all. Perhaps you have a third-party IE plug-in installed that is causing a problem (the Manual is a large file). Whatever the problem is, it is something specific to your computer.

Chris
gibeltarik
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 08, 2009 3:27 pm

Post by gibeltarik »

Thanks, Chris. I have located the Manual file, which has an Internet Explorer icon, and to overcome the problem I have changed the "open with" to Microsoft Office Word, which works OK, as I can't find the problem with Internet Explorer which only misbehaves with Goldwave! I'm hoping this doesn't transfer the problem somewhere else! :roll:
Kilmatead
Posts: 38
Joined: Thu May 29, 2008 4:15 am
Location: Dublin

Post by Kilmatead »

gibeltarik wrote:...to overcome the problem I have changed the "open with" to Microsoft Office Word, which works OK
As a bit of experimentation (and hoping not to step on any copyright toes :)), the above suggestion gave me an idea.

With 24-inch (and above) screens becoming more common, one discovers that often .htm text can stretch interminably across the screen, so reading tech-manuals in a browser with rather long lines can be tiring.

Often I'm more comfortable reading/printing in the milieu of a PDF reader - and as Word 07 now (as of Office SP2) directly outputs PDF files, it's easier to just convert the manual and reference it that way.

For example, instead of this:

Image

...you end up with this:

Image

Conveniently preserving all the internal links, etc, without needing to use the full resources of Word each time. This also has the added attraction of allowing one to correct Chris's spelling anomalies. :(

You lose the ability to access it from the Help menu of course, but for casual perusal PDF might be preferable for some. (Like I said, this is primarily to subvert the awkward way browsers display Widescreen .htm - the filesize is quadrupled to 1.2MB as well, but that's not as important as it used to be once upon a time.)

Anyway, just a suggestion.
gibeltarik
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 08, 2009 3:27 pm

Post by gibeltarik »

Thanks Kilmatead, it's a good suggestion and I'll be using it! Incidentally, I solved the original problem by removing all extraneous toolbars from my browser. Obviously one was interfering with Goldwave.
DewDude420
Posts: 1171
Joined: Fri Mar 11, 2005 11:15 pm
Location: Washington DC Metro Area
Contact:

Post by DewDude420 »

Provided you don't redistribute that manual PDF to anyone else, I don't see where you'd be stepping on many toes with the copyright issues. The only limitation the manual has for redistribution is only registered users are allowed to have the screenshots that accompany the manual.
gibeltarik
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 08, 2009 3:27 pm

Post by gibeltarik »

I had no intention of supplying any material to people who do not buy the software legally, or to anyone else for that matter! It is in the interest of all of us who abide by the rules not to distribute material to the scroungers.
GoldWave Inc.
Site Admin
Posts: 4372
Joined: Wed Mar 10, 2004 6:43 pm
Location: St. John's, NL
Contact:

Post by GoldWave Inc. »

Kilmatead wrote:This also has the added attraction of allowing one to correct Chris's spelling anomalies.
If you could point them out, I'd appreciate it.

Chris
Kilmatead
Posts: 38
Joined: Thu May 29, 2008 4:15 am
Location: Dublin

Post by Kilmatead »

GoldWave Inc. wrote:If you could point them out, I'd appreciate it.
Nothing major (bear in mind I merely said "anomalies"), and not to be anal about these things, but the essence/image of professionalism speaks to the devil in the details, so every little bit counts.
  • 1. Under 'Recording', 'February' is misspelled as 'Febuary' in the Specifier table under %B.
    2. Under 'Edit Menu Commands', 'Redo', the second sentence reads "It restores the the" (double word).
    3. Under 'AutoTrim', instructions for using, the third step reads "threshold for the the silence" (double word).
    4. Not sure if it's an error or not, but under the 'Volume' section, 'Match Volume', it reads "Unlike the 'Maximize Volume' volume effect..." As Maximize Vol is a link, it's logical to refer to it as a "Volume Effect" but to read "volume volume" in a sentence is redundant and awkward.
    5. Under 'Compressor/Expander', the "Anticipate Attack" paragraph misspells 'smoothes' as 'smooths'. Yes, I know Merriam-Webster finds it acceptable, but you just can't trust an American Dictionary for efficacy or élan. :?
And just for taste, I find the spelling of 'Analog' as opposed to 'Analogue' to be just weird, even if it isn't technically wrong. :D

I also have a funny feeling I may have corrected a few more and then overwrote the original, so I can't seem to find them now. Will have to download it again to see.
donrandall
Posts: 550
Joined: Wed Dec 01, 2004 11:06 pm
Location: Denver, Colorado

Post by donrandall »

I don't know about others, but American dictionaries tend to document word usage and trends over time.

If and when enough of us decided that the word "Up" actually means "Wet" then by golly, our water will then be "up".

It's a strange world at times.
Kilmatead
Posts: 38
Joined: Thu May 29, 2008 4:15 am
Location: Dublin

Post by Kilmatead »

donrandall wrote:I don't know about others, but American dictionaries tend to document word usage and trends over time.
Not my intention to flame sensitivities... we could end up with an endless off-topic rabble of semantic sword-fights; let's just say "trends" in usage are less important/interesting than the original etymological base.

I have all the respect in the world for language being a living thing, and in the interest of creativity (rave on e.e. cummings) the grammatical police be damned - yet if "trends" or extensive "common usage" were to be given excessive credence, we'd all end up using kiddie-speak like text-lingo and spurious abbreviations.

Sometimes you just have to rebel in a reactionary way, and not go-with-the-flow of cultural decline. Fighting entropy is much harder work than accepting common decay.

Nothing wrong with a drink of up from time to time either. :D
GoldWave Inc.
Site Admin
Posts: 4372
Joined: Wed Mar 10, 2004 6:43 pm
Location: St. John's, NL
Contact:

Post by GoldWave Inc. »

Those will be fixed in the next update.

Chris
Kilmatead
Posts: 38
Joined: Thu May 29, 2008 4:15 am
Location: Dublin

Re: Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

Post by Kilmatead »

Not to be too pedantic, but two small textual errors in the new 5.53 manual...

1. Under 'Volume - Auto Gain' the sixth paragraph contains another repeated word: "the the".
2. Under 'Command Line Parameters - Outfolder' the word 'preserved' is misspelled 'preseved'.

Anoraks are not just for cold weather. :wink:
The Great Watbol!
Posts: 34
Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2008 5:07 am
Location: In the back of your mind(s)

Re: Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

Post by The Great Watbol! »

I hate to be a Dic' but I have v-5.54 and the 2 above are still in there, as well as the volume, Auto-gain: the 2 the's are still there.
But I'm not gonna re-read the manual just to find mistakes, when I read it the first time I knew what was trying to be said.
It didn't dawn on me to point them out.
------------------------------
¿¿¿-:·}~ «-{Watbol}-» ©2000® ☆*★*☆
(•¿•)
Kilmatead
Posts: 38
Joined: Thu May 29, 2008 4:15 am
Location: Dublin

Re: Accessing the Manual from the Help Menu

Post by Kilmatead »

The Great Watbol! wrote:...when I read it the first time I knew what was trying to be said. It didn't dawn on me to point them out.
And yet you took the time to notice they're still extant? :)

We've all used software designed/maintained in "foreign parts" where, thankfully, English isn't the common tongue - just recently I've been playing with a few applications from Switzerland which have a notably obscure and highly entertaining take on grammar. No bad thing that, and considering that most Swiss (that I've ever met) speak in the range of 5 languages, humility is a word that comes to mind.

How or never - for those "evaluating" software an inattentive take on a manual echoes a doubt about the integrity of a project. The Goldwave manual, being presented in English (and expecting a price-tag for the application), might as well present a cohesive whole. Besides, as pointed out above, in the conversion to PDF these things jump out all by themselves, so it can't hurt to mention them.

Of course, on the flipside, we've also all used applications which have impeccable presentation - yet remain buggy after numerous iterations. One never knows where the heart of a developer lies.

Askance that, the English language, under attack from youths of all centuries, needs all the help it can get to maintain some semblance of being a legitimate form for communication - even though it's not well suited to technical issues, despite it's Greek/Latin base. :D

(In the end, as I can't seem to convince Chris to do anything about the painfully empty in-programme right-click context menu, I make what small useless contribution I can, as any voice in the wilderness might do. :wink:)
Post Reply