newsbin.com

The latest version of Newsbin works well and I like it, but, I recently had to re-install Windows and all of my programs, and it reminded me of some things that could be a little better.

When installing Newsbin I have to enter information for my Usenet newserver. Right now, I don't have one. I'm shopping around and will pick one in a few days. But I want to go ahead and install Newsbin and get it ready to go. But, there is no option to skip this and do it later, so I just had to put in old information from a previous server. Not a major problem, but a little annoying.

I have Newsbin configured to put its data folder on a different drive from the program. (I'm using E:\Documents\Newsbin )

When re-installing Newsbin, it detects that there is already a Newsbin.nbi file there and renames it and creates a new file. This doesn't make any sense. That's where most of the program's settings are stored. Why wipe out my settings and make me start over? So I have to manually change it to using my existing settings file.

Also, most of Newsbin's settings are kept there, but not all of them. After re-installing Newsbin I have to manually change a few things -- put the tabs on the top where I like them, change the color to the "Office 2003 Outlook" setting, change the width of the columns. Again, not a big deal, but a little annoying. It would be nice if all the settings were saved.

For #1, A skip button probably isn't a bad idea. It would need to make it clear that a server is required to do anything with Newsbin

#2 - If you re-installed windows, all indications that you ever installed Newsbin a tossed so, the installer assumes fresh install. In the future, you'd probably better off just using the default data folder path during the install, then after install, double-clicking the old NBI on the other drive to use it instead of the default NBI. All of your settings from that data folder will then be used.

You could also rename the renamed NBI back, then double-click it to start Newsbin with that NBI. I can ask Dex whether there's some more elegant way to handle it but the installer scripts are kinda dumb. You can't expect too many complex things from it.

#3 - #2 would also keep the GUI settings.