ClipMate Support Forum

I have obviously set an option that creates a problem for me. When I startup the workstation, clipmate immediately sends the last clip to my printer. And then, may print a number of other prints in the next 10 minutes without my request for it. I am using quick print. I am in ver 7.0. 4build 121. This quick print function has worked well for me for years, now its driving me crazy.

I'm sorry that you are having trouble.
Are these bitmap prints? If so, maybe you have turned on the option to automatically print screen captures? Check the print settings.
That alone won't cause unintended printing, but if you have some other program that is causing unexpected clipboard updates, then that could cause prints to appear.
i.e. there's a bitmap in ClipMate. Something causes a clipboard update event, ClipMate reacts, re-copies the image, and prints it.

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I'm the ClipMate Guy!

Yes, these are bitmaps that reprint seemingly on their own. And, yes, I have 'automatically print screen shots?' selected. So, I expect like you say, a program is calling for clipboard updates event. This is a recent problem [30 - 45days?]. Any regimen for finding the culprit making these calls? Thanks

Try turning off the automatic reprint (temporarily) and make sure that the sounds are enabled. Without the distraction of the printer starting up, see if you can find a correlation to the "pop" or "boing" of the clipboard update, and some other event, such as opening Word or Outlook, checking the e-mail, etc..

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I'm the ClipMate Guy!

I discovered that every time I choose 'reply' in Outlook, the first clip in clipmate prints. I was looking through 'app profile' to see if there is an option I need to select/deselect. Any suggestions on how I can disconnect the link between my Outlook 'reply' choice and Clipmate auto print?

No, it won't work. ClipMate is responding to a clipboard update. It doesn't know/care that you hit "reply" instead of cut/copy. The application profile filters by application, but in this case, I don't think there is any actual data coming from Outlook. You can try though. Copy something from your browser, and observe the "Source" name in ClipMate (either the "Source" column in the ClipList, or the "creator" field in the Clip Properties dialog).
It should be either IEXplorer or FireFox.

Now do a reply in Outlook, and look at the properties of the new clip. If it says something like "Outlook Reply", then you can filter those out with the application profile. If it says "Outlook", then you can, if you choose, filter out everything from Outlook. If it still says "FireFox, "IExplorer", or perhaps "Windows", then you're out of luck.


This is, of course, the real problem here. There's no need for this. And it breaks proper rules of programming. I expect you've got a mis-behaving plug-in or add-on in Outlook.
Suppose you're an airline pilot, and every time the flight attendant named Sheila goes to the restroom, the smoke alarm goes off. No other time. Maintenance has swapped the smoke detector 3 times. It's still happening. Do you write up another maintenance ticket, or do you think maybe it's time to confront Sheila?

You've got something that's hammering the clipboard whenever you reply. It may be well-intended, or it may be spying on you. Whatever it is, it's poorly written. Nothing should be updating the clipboard without your knowledge/consent.

These articles may help:
http://www.thornsoft.com/hwp/question.php?qstId=88
http://www.thornsoft.com/hwp/question.php?qstId=32

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I'm the ClipMate Guy!

Thanks, I will pursue these lines.

I recently ran across a similar issue on another forum (someone else's issue, not mine). The thread describes an Outlook plug-in (Plaxo Contact Manager) taking over the clipboard:

http://www.broadbandreports.com/forum/r ... =clipboard

While not exactly the same situation, it may be of some help / interest (I noted that your link in the quote above also has Clipmate user, G. Patel, mentioning the issues with Plaxo in the "Comments" section of that page).

What I also find interesting is that the developer of Plaxo defends such behavior and considers it to be completely benign from a security standpoint. I disagree.

I disagree too! Aside from security, what about walking all over people's data? Imagine that you had something important on there, and Plaxo wipes it out. Well, thank goodness we all have ClipMate so that it isn't lost forever.

These folks seem to agree with us:

"Programs should not transfer data into our out of the clipboard without an explicit instruction from the user." -- Charles Petzold, Programming Windows 3.1, Microsoft Press, 1992

And The n Habits of Highly Defective Windows Applications page. http://www.flounder.com/badprogram.htm#clipboard

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I'm the ClipMate Guy!

Hi, folks! I'm a developer at Plaxo, and I just wanted to give a little more info on Plaxo's use of the clipboard here. I agree that this is not the ideal way of using the clipboard, and we are looking into a better way to do this.

Just to alleviate security fears, Plaxo uses the clipboard for Outlook Express (not Outlook 2002+, more on that below) just to display the name and e-mail of the sender of the currently selected message in our handy "click-to-connect" button. OE doesn't really have a good plug-in API, and this was apparently the most efficient way to get this info when this code was written (pretty old code). The newest version of Plaxo will also restore the clipboard after using it.

As mentioned above, Plaxo does not write to the clipboard for Outlook 2002 and above.

Oddly enough, in Office 2000, the standard way to set a toolbar button image was to use something called PasteFace, which puts whatever image is in the clipboard onto the button (see the example code from Microsoft in http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/defau ... 221095.asp which I believe will actually destroy an image the user may have placed in the clipboard). So a lot of older Outlook plug-ins end up putting their toolbar button images into the clipboard. Plaxo has code to restore the clipboard after using PasteFace (and we don't use PasteFace at all in Outlook 2002 and up).

We realize though that this kind of clipboard usage can be a headache for tools like ClipMate - in future versions we hope to have a different method for getting this info for Outlook Express. Apologies for any inconvenience this is causing...