Notify user after completion - FlashWindowEx

[Marshall Brooks]

@sonic8 - Good catch. Technically, per the documentation:
uCount As Long ' The number of times to flash the window.

So it doesn't say .uCount affects the taskbar, other than higher values make the taskbar flash more times than lower values.

but the Taskbar button continues to flash three more times after the window title stopped

Not consistently. For Colin, it is flashing three more times than .uCount. For me, it is flashing two less times than .uCount. Now, whether the variance is due to Windows Version, Windows Build Date, or some Windows setting, is unknown.

 

[sonic8]

Not consistently. For Colin, it is flashing three more times than .uCount. For me, it is flashing two less times than .uCount. Now, whether the variance is due to Windows Version, Windows Build Date, or some Windows setting, is unknown.

I missed that detail.
So, uCount exactly determines the number of times the window flashes but is only a rough guide for the times the taskbar button flashes.
Actually, while the duration of the flashing would matter, the count of the flashes is completely irrelevant to me.

 

[Marshall Brooks]

Actually, while the duration of the flashing would matter, the count of the flashes is completely irrelevant to me.

Concur - although there should be a rough correlation.

I thought a saw a duration setting, but I don't see it now - I thought it was in the original AllApi code and not the code you posted.

However, there is:
.uCount - the number of times to flash the window.
dwtimeout - The rate at which the window is to be flashed, in milliseconds.

Note that dwtimeout is actually the half-cycle, while .uCount is a full cycle, i.e. if I set dwtimeout at 1000 the icon flashes on for one second and then off for one second, but if you specify .uCount = 5, with window (but not necessarily the icon) flashes ON and OFF five times.

You can (I just tested it), set dwtimeout to 1000 and .uCount to 30 and both the window and the taskbar icon will flash for a minute. Might be off slightly between them, but from a visual it didn't seem to be so.

 

[arnelgp]

on sonic8, copyright? 2024.
while the code on http://vbnet.mvps.org/index.html?code/forms/flashwindowex.htm has copyright 1996-2011.
while the code on chatgpt doesn't provide copywrite, who then has the right for the copywrite?

 

[sonic8]

Disclaimer: I’m not a copyright lawyer. These explanations are not intended as legal counsel.

on sonic8, copyright? 2024.
while the code on http://vbnet.mvps.org/index.html?code/forms/flashwindowex.htm has copyright 1996-2011.
while the code on chatgpt doesn't provide copywrite, who then has the right for the copywrite?

For the readers who didn’t download my module, @arnelgp is referring to this copyright notice in my code:

' Module copyright 2024 by Philipp Stiefel (https://codekabinett.com/en)
' You are free to use this module without restrictions as long as this copyright notice remains in place

Anyone’s code using this Windows API will be based on Microsoft’s implementation/documentation of FlashWindowEx and FLASHWINFO and thus must at its core do the very same things.

Other than in patent law, in copyright law there is no “preexisting work” clause. The copyright of a work belongs to its creator. Should there be a legal dispute, it would be about whether I wrote that code myself from scratch (which I did!) or copied relevant parts from someone else. The similarity of the results is irrelevant; aside from being potential evidence in answering the previous question.

In my jurisdiction (Germany) the copyright of the creator is inherent to the work and applies regardless of whether a copyright notice was added or not.

By adding the above copyright notice with the “free to use” clause I give anyone downloading the module *more* rights than they would have had without the notice. By demanding that the copyright notice remains in place, I ensure that any recipient also has these rights, should someone else redistribute my code.

In my jurisdiction there is also a clause for the “level of creation” (Schöpfungshöhe). If some creation is too trivial, it will not be protected by copyright law.

It is likely that my work in this module is too trivial to deserve copyright protection. Something that can only be decided definitively by a court of law in case of a dispute. By adding my “free to use” clause, I relieve you of having to reason about this matter.


Copyright in the context of AI LLMs is a complex topic with many aspects still left to be clarified by lawyers, courts, and laws in the future. I’m not going to comment on that.

 

[arnelgp]

Should there be a legal dispute, it would be about whether I wrote that code myself from scratch (which I did!)

i asked because chatgpt has Exactly the same answer but does not include any Attribution.

 

[sonic8]

i asked because chatgpt has Exactly the same answer but does not include any Attribution.

In principle my elaborations from the previous post also apply here.

The question that must be answered for AI LLMs is whether they "learned" the information they ingested and now produce new original work with the AI being the creator, or whether they merely reproduce the work of others.

This question must be addressed by lawyers, courts, and laws and is beyond what I feel qualified to discuss here.

 

[Gasman]

i asked because chatgpt has Exactly the same answer but does not include any Attribution.

Well even ChatGPT would have got their results from somewhere, wouldn't they?

 

[arnelgp]

Well even ChatGPT would have got their results from somewhere, wouldn't they?

yes, mr.gasman. that is exactly my point. someone has written the same code in the past.
and same code was fed on the AI.
i also check the code using Online Code Plagiarism, and it yield 98%.
so we must be cautious on adding "copywrite" to any piece of code, (not knowing
someone in the past has written the same). the AI is so powerful tool.

 

[sonic8]

so we must be cautious on adding "copywrite" to any piece of code, (not knowing
someone in the past has written the same).

As written previously, it is irrelevant if someone has written the same code before.

The questions of copyright is whether the code was written (mostly) from scratch and just by chance is similar to someone else's, or whether someone else's code was copied. - And yes, the fact of copying someone else's work can also be fulfilled indirectly by using the output of an AI LLM. That's the reason why Microsoft declared that they are liable for any copyright infringements deriving from the use of their Copilot AI LLM.

Of course, it is difficult to prove the original creation if the result is very similar to existing work. - In my case, I would have had someone sitting next to me while writing the code, witnessing that I only used the Microsoft documentation and not any previous VB(A) implementation.

 

[arnelgp]

As written previously, it is irrelevant if someone has written the same code before.

but to ethical coder, that is relevant.
the same with any article you write on a thesis or something (when it was written and published before, that is plagiarism).

anyway, you own it as you wish.

 

[sonic8]

but to ethical coder, that is relevant.

So, for an ethical coder to publish anything, they must read every single line of code that was ever written by anyone before to make sure it is not similar to the code they are about to publish?

anyway, you own it as you wish.

I get the impression you didn't read what I wrote here in previous posts.

 

[Marshall Brooks]

the same with any article you write on a thesis or something (when it was written and published before, that is plagiarism).

Negative. IANAL, btw.

If I create a 5,000 word thesis freely as my own work and it matches word-for-word what someone else wrote 5-years ago, which I never read and was not aware of, it is not plagiarism. (Now the odds of that happening and the odds of my being able to defend my claim in court against a plagiarism charge by the previous author would be pretty slim.)

OTOH, if I am aware of the 5-year old work and have a copy of it and change the order of the paragraphs so that it does not match word for word, - it is plagiarism.

It becomes questionable if I develop my 5,000 word thesis by taking 50 words from 100 different authors on a similar subject and combining them into a new work. "Plagiarism is stealing from a few, while genius is stealing from many."

It is more complicated in the case of software than text b/c there are only so many ways to write software without creating syntax errors. And it is even worse when we are talking about a small (25-line) code snippet. And probably only 11 lines of that could be considered original - guessing. As @sonic8 said, (Reply #25), it is likely that this would be considered too trivial for copyright protection - which doesn't to me take away from the fact that I tried to do the same thing and failed and found his code VERY useful in my situation.

If the copywrite clause bothers someone, they are free to use the alternative code posted in Reply #15.

@sonic8 - Minor suggestion. Would you have any objection to posting your code in this thread? I downloaded it, but Chrome complained about it not being a secure connection and possibly being tampered with and I had to tell it "I'll take the risk." I probably would have pasted it into this thread, but since it did say it was copyrighted ... (Although free to use without restrictions probably also allows for redistibution as well.)

 

[arnelgp]

If I create a 5,000 word thesis freely as my own work and it matches word-for-word what someone else wrote 5-years ago, which I never read and was not aware of, it is not plagiarism. (Now the odds of that happening and the odds of my being able to defend my claim in court against a plagiarism charge by the previous author would be pretty slim.)

it would be very slim, yet it is plagiarism.
you already checked and did nothing? it is said that there are many ways to check your work.

plagiarism

www.law.cornell.edu

There are many free online plagiarism checkers to ensure that a person’s work is free of plagiarism.

 

[Marshall Brooks]

it would be very slim, yet it is plagiarism.
you already checked and did nothing? it is said that there are many ways to check your work.

We are getting into semantics and somewhat off topic, but ...

From the link you posted:
"Plagiarism is the act of taking a person’s original work and presenting it as if it was one’s own."

In the hypothetical I posted, I never took another person's original work - more semantics - I never INTENTIONALLY took another person's original work.

If I am just creating my own document, I don't think (but I could be mistaken) that it is my obligation to check whether someone else wrote the same text. (However, if I wanted to copyright my thesis to protect it from other people using it, I would probably be obliged to do so.)

FWIW ...

 

[sonic8]

If the copywrite clause bothers someone, they are free to use the alternative code posted in Reply #15.

I fully agree with what you wrote in that post before.
One comment on this line though: A copyright clause that gives you permission to use a piece of work is much safer than no copyright clause at all!

As mentioned before, in German copyright law the copyright is inherent to the original work. The creator has the copyright! Fullstop! Whether he wants it, claims it, states it, and/or registers it, is completely irrelevant. The act of the creation alone establishes the copyright and it even cannot be transferred or relinquished. The owner of the copyright can only grant others rights to using the work.
This website is hosted in the UK. UK copyright law is similar to German and other European countries' law in this regard and also automatically assigns an enforceable copyright to the creator.

US copyright law, which appears to require an explicit copyright claim for the copyright to be enforceable is an exception and not the norm. Even in US copyright law, there is an automatic copyright assigned to the creator. It is just not as easily enforceable without a copyright notice.

@sonic8 - Minor suggestion. Would you have any objection to posting your code in this thread? I downloaded it, but Chrome complained about it not being a secure connection and possibly being tampered with and I had to tell it "I'll take the risk." I probably would have pasted it into this thread, but since it did say it was copyrighted ... (Although free to use without restrictions probably also allows for redistibution as well.)

Thank you for pointing out the issue with the non-secure download link. This was an error on my part. I corrected the link URL to https and there should no longer be a warning.

I prefer to host generic code samples on my site and only link to them because then it is easy to update them with bug fixes or enhancements.

Of course the "free to use without restrictions" clause also grants you the right to redistribution, either here or elsewhere.

 

[sonic8]

it would be very slim, yet it is plagiarism.

plagiarism

www.law.cornell.edu

You could at least read the references you link to. Your link proves your own statement wrong.

 

[arnelgp]

There are many free online plagiarism checkers to ensure that a person’s work is free of plagiarism.

that was also mentioned, so the burden is for you to check every code you write (before finally putting your own "copywrite" mark, which is really annoying when you know in the past you have encountered same code, dejavu?).

 

[Marshall Brooks]

I am US-based, but please do NOT take any of my comments as representative of US Copyright law. As I said before, IANAL.

You could at least read the references you link to. Your link proves your own statement wrong.

I thought so too until I read it carefully.

MY interpretation was that plagiarism was KNOWINGLY taking someone else's work (words, specifically) and claiming it was your own.

The link states that plagiarism would be taking someone else's work (knowingly or unknowingly) and claiming it was your own.

The gray area - IMHO - becomes when and to what extent does the author have an obligation to verify that his words haven't been printed by someone else. (And if we want to get philosophical, that his words weren't thought of by someone else who never bothered to write them down or publish them.)

 

[Marshall Brooks]

I prefer to host generic code samples on my site and only link to them because then it is easy to update them with bug fixes or enhancements.

Makes sense - the link is in this thread and if you ever close your website, you have given permission in the code and in this thread for the code to be re-posted.