So development stalled...

[tamar]

...and I get it that David has gotten busy.

I'd pay for this. I just wish David saw the value in that.

That said, I'm wondering if the code is out there somewhere, so that someone somewhere can build on it and enhance it to fix bugs and whatnot.

Is it a long shot to salvage this project? This tool is by far one of the most used apps on my computer and I would love for someone to pick up on the project.

[rpsgc]

Busy is an understatement...

Viewing profile - David
Last visited:
Wed Nov 25, 2009 1:09 am


I fear for the future of Everything.

[tamar]

yeah, it's a real shame. I know there's another admin on the forums - is he a friend of David's? I wonder if David can give up the code. If he doesn't seem to care, I know there are plenty of users who do.

Or David could get back into the game and sell the app. I'd eagerly pay for it.

@therube, do you know David personally?

[hsrstud]

I agree, its a major disappointment that David went MIA. I check in from time to time, but haven't seen him respond to anyone in ages, let alone update the application. It's been almost two years since he responded to my post about working on the program. Quickly frankly, I wonder if something serious happened to him (I hope not!). Otherwise, I don't know why he would have totally abandoned this website.

In any event, two years is a super long time not to have any updates, so I can't imagine he's working on this anymore. I have a hard time understanding why he hasn't share the code with the community as a public good unless something unfortunate happened to him. He can't be viewing this as a proprietary opportunity anymore. I'm certainly not going to donate another dime to a program that has been totally abandoned.

[tamar]

well, last year or so, I nagged him and he eventually replied to an email. But he fell off the face of the planet again, so I guess real life does take priority. Still, I agree that it would be awesome if he could share the code.

I'd donate if I knew he was actually putting this project on the forefront - but I'd also recommend just making it shareware, because obviously he wasn't motivated by making it donateware...

Either way, I hope that the other admins here may be able to 1) talk to him 2) get access to the code. Come on, admins!

[drorharari]

>> I'd pay for this
>> I'd donate if I knew he was actually putting this project on the forefront
>> This tool is by far one of the most used apps on my computer

Well, Tamar, then put your money where your mouth is (http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/put ... e+mouth+is) and donate something. By your own words, Everything is one of the most used apps on your computer so you would not really be hurt should David never get to further advance Everything. At least you'd be showing gratitude for this marvel of his. Maybe if enough people did donate, he'd be more inclined to put more work (and maybe not - maybe his in some kind of trouble, imprisoned by some dark wizard or something).

Anyway, I did donate and though there was no new version since then, I am happy as I have shown gratitude to someone who made my life better, even if in just one little aspect.

Regards,

Dror

[tamar]

Shalom Dror, let me be clear since the messaging between the lines is missing:

I'm not going to pay for a program that hasn't been developed for 2.5 years and still exhibits flaws.

I would pay for it and encourage it to go shareware if it was continually maintained. If the owner of the app has no intention of doing so, I shouldn't be expected to donate just because I said it's worth paying for. It is if there weren't issues. I created an account here because there are.

I have to add, I've debated internally about giving David money for over a year, but I'm just not convinced that it will do anything to motivate him. He's not interested. It sucks for us who have become dependent on the app. It's a bummer. If I knew that giving him $ would make a difference, I would gladly do that, but he doesn't respond to emails either.

Also, let's not go on a tangent - I posted about something else. To be clear: development shouldn't stop because the owner has gone MIA. Will it ever continue or are we SOL?

[tamar]

btw here's the exact issue I created the account for -

So right now I am using 1.21.452a. I have the process running but it won't open at all. I can't terminate it from the process tree. I even downloaded a third party process killer app and it didn't terminate it.

The only way I can get Everything to start up again is by rebooting. I do this every few days, unfortunately.

[drorharari]

I am using 1.21.452 (based on Help->About) and it has been pretty solid for me. I could get the UI to crash when deleting many selected files in some cases but recovering was as easy as re-running it.

The problem you describe is a classic example of a program invoking system code (a driver) and not getting a response back. In such case, Windows will simply not let the process terminate as that may result in the active driver code writing back to the memory it got on the call but that memory would no longer be associated with that late process. For this reason, no utility would help you to kill the process.

Why does it happen? Whose fault is it? I do not know - it could be a defective 3rd party driver. It could be some unfortunate combination of hardware/software etc. Pinpointing exactly the driver that holds your process hostage is for real wizards... still, you could try to do some basic troubleshooting like limiting the volumes you work with (assuming you have more than one), etc.

/d

[tamar]

I can replicate this on two computers with completely different software.

The computer is occurs on most often is a Windows machine with 2 hard drives - one SSD and one HDD.

For me, the process just died again and I reopened it and it's hanging now on "Loading database." I'm not entirely sure that's a third party driver issue anymore.

It's time to reboot again...

[tamar]

btw, another issue that recurs without fail.

On one of my computers with Everything (the primary one), I have Dropbox.

My computer boots up, but Dropbox files aren't loaded. I guess Dropbox opens *after* Everything runs, and Everything doesn't recognize it. When I first start up, I always have to terminate the Everything process and restart it to get Dropbox's files loaded.

So you see, it's a great tool. I use it a lot. But it's not perfect. However, if I can't be confident in its long term viability and reliability, I just don't want to pay for it right now. Trust me, I'd gladly give of myself if I knew it was something its creator cared about. The users seem to care more than the app's creator, and he's holding the source files hostage.. or rather, he doesn't seem to want anyone to take on the development. I see it vouched for on reddit ALL the time and I bet someone (or many someones) would gladly take on the development. If only David realized that.

[stevelon]

Anyone know of another program that takes a similar approach, that is currently being developed?

I only know of one program even remotely similar: Ava Find. But that has not been developed for years either. Also it uses a different approach in that it builds a catalog (and monitors the file systems for updates) and looks up in there. It's fast but not instantaneous. I dropped it when I found Everything.

Was David using unpublished inside knowledge of how the NTFS file structures work? Or is there no reason why anyone could not do what he did with the published apis?

Hence my question: Anyone know of another program?

[Metavoid]

yes, others have use $MFT for searching

http://sourceforge.net/projects/ntfs-search/

[stevelon]

Thanks. I'll check that program out.

[therube]

@therube, do you know David personally?

No.
I only know as much or as little as you, only from what I can read in these forums.

[vurtikas]

Nov 2012: It seems that the great Everything search engine/indexer is abandonware. And the chance of communicating has also been crippled since there seems to be no forum admins created by the developer and registration is closed, as far as I can see.

Really sad, since this is a great piece of software.

If the developer is still around, I wish that some (perhaps even minimal) effort could be made to open for other committers and/or delegating leadership to someone else.

(The bug that bothers me most is that it does not play well with dropbox.)

[rpsgc]

Maybe someone (from Australia) could try contacting him using the WHOIS information? There's a phone number.

http://whois.domaintools.com/voidtools.com

[deepdvd]

Can we petition David (void) to make open-source the code? Everything is my favorite software for Windows, hands-down. I use it CONSTANTLY. I feel utterly dependent on it because it's so good. To be clear, I am referring to version 1.2.1.451a. I really don't understand why he hasn't made this version the one on the home page. It is solid and SO much better.

It works perfectly with mounted VHD files in Windows 8 as well.

[rawmania]

David is back!

[deepdvd]

David is back!

Awesome!!!

[tamar]

I just want to thank David for returning. YOU ROCK.

[benblo]

Oh my GOD he's back!! Donating right NOW, then downloading!
I just wanted to share that we've used Everything extensively for over 3 years in a 100-person game project with a god-awful file structure. Everything was a mandatory install for everyone (even though we had to use the 1.2.1.451a beta because we used virtual drives, and it had to be manually setup on every single machine)... anyway thanks for saving literally thousands of man-hours sifting through folders, for free! I can't wait to discover the new features!

[void]

Thanks for the support benblo!