Cthulhu Software

Apst

Apst = Application Starter.

Apst is used to open documents with other applications at times adjustable to within 24 hours in the future. You drag and drop document files onto the Apst application. You are asked what application you want to open the document with and the time when you want it opened.

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Requirements

This application was built on Mac OS 10.5. Read more.

Usage:

The core way to use Apst is to drag and drop document files onto the Apst icon. The Apst icon can be in the Finder or on the Desktop or on the Dock or wherever you find it convenient dragging files to.

To see the Apst icon in the Dock you either need to keep it in the Dock by dragging the Apst application icon onto the dock or double clicking on the Apst's application icon to start it and make it appear in the dock.

Once you have dropped documents onto the Apst application you will see the following dialog:

This dialog shows you each document that you want open (by displaying its path in the Document box) and how you want it opened.

Beneath the Document is a path to a suggested Application that you can use to open the document with. You can use the Browse button to change the application that you want to open the document with. Note that this is how you associate a file type with an application. Over time Apst will learn which application you use for which file type.

Next you can set the time. This is the time in the next 24 hours. When this time is reached the Application you selected will trying to open the Document. It should be noted that if you move the files that you dropped onto Apst before Apst tries to open them then nothing will happen as Apst will have no reference to the files.

Then there are some buttons. To understand these you need to be aware that you can drop many files at once onto Apst and these will be held in a queue until you process them.

Clicking Cancel or OK will move to the next item in the queue if there is one. If you choose the All varient then that action will apply to all the documents in the queue that you haven't yet explained how you want them processed.

Thus Cancel All will do nothing with the documents that you dropped onto the Apst icon.

Thus OK All will accept all the documents and give them the same time as selected.

If you clicked the OK buttons you will then see results in the main window:

This shows you the time that a file will be launched and the Application-Document pair that will be started.

If you select jobs in the table and press the Remove Selected button then the selected jobs will be removed and not processed until you add them again.

If you hide the Apst application, you can still see if Apst has anything to do by looking at the Apst icon in the dock. You will see a red area with a number on it showing you the jobs that are waiting.

Windows are controlled through the Window Menu:

If you close the Main Window you can use this window to make it visible again or to bring it to the front if it has fallen behind other windows.

You can also use this menu to bring up the info panel:

If you click on any item in the Main Window you will see the information about this job appear in the Info Window. You can change the Application and time if you want but if you want the changes to stick then you need to hit the Apply button.

You also have the Apst menu:

This lets you bring up the Preferences dialog:

The preference dialog lets you change a few ways that Apst works.

There are two groups of settings: general settings and those that change how the application works when you first drag files onto the Apst icon. Firstly, consider the General Settings area.

The first change is how Folders are processed. You can either recursively scan through all contents of the folder using all the files found as documents, or you can use the Folder path itself as a Document path for applications that take folders as input.

You can choose to show the full path to the Application or just its name.

You can choose to show the full path to the Document or just its name.

The final area is the "On file open..." area. In this area you control the actions of Apst when documents are dropped onto it. The first option will bring up a dialog asking how you want to process every path. The second won't show any dialog and just use the last settings.

Notice that if you haven't used Apst before then it will use the default values. These probably aren't what you want. Before using this last option you should used the first one a few times until you have set your prefered opening application and starting time. Once Apst has learnt these values you can then use this option and have Apst open paths the way that you want.

On the Apst menu you also have access to the Support menu:

This lets you re-register the application. This is so you can show your appreciation for software that you really like by registering it repeatedly. This is a great way to tell the author of the software that you really like this piece of software.

Then there is the Help Menu:

Selecting Help will bring up the user manual, while selecting Web Page will take you directly to the Apst home page so that you can check for updates.