How can I purchase your software? Can I get it from online retailers or stores?

We use two respected and well-known companies to handle our secure order forms, to make things as convienent as possible for you:

The first is called Kagi, who allow you to pay by check (in US dollars), cash (many currencies), and by credit card. You can order products using our secure online store, or by phone.

The other company is PayPal, a service that allows you to conveniently pay for things with many vendors on the Internet, either using your existing PayPal account, or using your credit card. We have a separate store for customers who prefer to use PayPal.

We sell our software directly to you to save you money -- no margins to retailers means lower prices. Dejal software is only available via our secure online store, backed by our 100% satisfaction money-back guarantees, or you can download FREE trial versions to ensure that you'll find the software useful before paying anything.

How do I contact Dejal?

There are a number of ways to contact Dejal. See the contact page for details.

How do I pronounce "Dejal", and where did the name come from?

The name "Dejal" is pronouced "DEE-JILL". It is not a French word, so should not be pronounced as "DAY-ZHAL" or other variations.

The name originated from the former initials of the founder of the company, David Sinclair. He used to be David J. Lambert, but both he and his wife changed their surnames to "Sinclair" when they got married, being people who like to make their own conventions. Anyway, back around 1983 he needed a password, so an obvious (if simplistic) choice was something based on his initials. D.J.L. with some vowels to make it pronounceable gave "DeJaL", and thus "Dejal" was created.

Interestingly, it turns out that "dejal" is a word in some other languages. "Dejal" is a Slovene verb, the past participle of the verb "reci", meaning "to say, tell." An example: "He told her that she was beautiful" = "On ji je dejal, da je lepa." ("je dejal" = "told"). Kinda appropriate for a software publisher! It appears that "Dejal" is also a Yugoslavian or Czech name equivalent to "David", which is also fitting given the name of the company founder. If you have any other examples, or corrections, please let us know.

I lost my serial number, how can I find out what it is?

Open the Licenses window in the application. If it has a Licensed Email field, simply enter your name and the email address you used when you purchased, then click Find, and the serial number will be looked up for you. Otherwise, you can email us and we'll be happy to manually find it for you. It would help us if you can tell us approximately when you bought the software (e.g. "late 1998"), but all we need is your name.

Is a Windows version available?

No, we believe that Macintosh is the best computing platform, so we only write software for Macs.

Is my information private? Is my credit card information secure?

Yes. We will never disclose any information about you to third parties. To tell you more about how we treat your information, please refer to our privacy policy.

Kagi and PayPal both use industry-standard SSL secure connections to ensure that third parties cannot "eavesdrop" and steal your credit card number. If you are still concerned, you can check out Kagi's FAQ or PayPal's Security Center for more information.

Tell me more about these free trial versions of your software.

The free versions of our software are fully working versions. Some of them display a reminder message every time they are run, and some display a message at other times, no more than once per day. They use a use-days concept, where only the actual days you use the product count towards the trial period. After the trial period has expired, some features will be restricted. Once you have purchased the software, you will receive a serial number that you can enter to unlock the software and allow you to use the full version without limitation.

What is "shareware"?

Shareware is a method of distributing software that allows users to try the full version of a product for a period of time before they are required to pay for it.

Shareware publishers encourage users to copy their products and give them to their friends; asking that they pay only if they decide to keep the product past the evaluation period.

Most people realize that it is in their best interest to support a company that is offering quality software at a fraction of the price of commercial software, and thus send in their shareware registration fee.

Ultimately, you decide whether shareware authors will continue to distribute low cost, high quality software as shareware.

What is your upgrade policy?

There are four kinds of release: major releases, minor releases, bug fix releases, and beta releases. Major releases include significant new features, greatly enhancing the product, and are relatively rare - no more than one per year; often less. Minor releases add some new features, but not as significant, but more frequent than major releases. Bug fix releases do not add any new features, but correct problems with existing features. Beta releases include new or changed features for early-adopter users to test, to help us improve the product prior to a general release, i.e. a major, minor or bug fix release.

We may charge a small upgrade fee for major releases, if the amount of work put into it justifies it. However, to help you have the best software available, it is our policy that minor, bug-fix and beta release updates are always free for licensed users.

When will I get my serial number?

If you order from within an application, the serial number will be automatically added for you, and you'll receive an email receipt shortly afterwards.

If you order via our Kagi store, you'll get your serial number soon afterwards in the payment confirmation email - it is completely automatic.

If you order via our PayPal store, your payment will need to be manually processed, and so you will get your serial number within 5 working days of receiving a payment confirmation. Usually you will receive it within 24 hours, but circumstances at times can cause a delay of several days.

Can I get Simon to periodically e-mail me to reassure me it is still working?

Yes, you can do this by using the Pulse service, with the Change filter. The Pulse service simply outputs the current date and time, so the output is always different. Then the Change filter detect that difference, marking the test as Changed.

You could also do this by adding a test for a frequently-updating page, like http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/, which changes every second.

Either way, check it at whatever frequency you want to be e-mailed, and have an E-mail notifier for changes. You can customize the e-mail message to say "I'm alive!" or whatever you like.

Can I get more voices for the Speech Notifier, or voices in different languages?

Yes! A third-party company called Cepstral LLC supplies several high-quality voices, both in US English and several other languages. See the Narrator Voice Talent page to hear samples, and for links to download or buy the voices.

Can I word notifications differently based on status?

Yes! There are two ways to achieve this:

Firstly, you can add two (or more) notifiers (e.g. email), each with the desired text, and assign one to changes, failures and/or recoveries, as appropriate.

When adding notifiers, you can specify on the Options page what kind of status they're available for (they can be for multiple kinds, too), then in the Edit Test window's Notifiers page you add multiple rows, each specifying a different status and notifier.

Secondly, you can use variables to use one notifier for different statuses.

For example, the variable {TestStatusPhrase} will output a word or phrase like "failed" or "recently recovered".

See the Service variables, Filter variables and Notifier variables in the Simon Help for lists of available variables.

Can Simon check that an application is still running on a different computer?

The Application service can only check for applications running on your local machine. But if you enable the Remote Login option in the Sharing system preferences on the other computer, you can use the SSH service to log in to the other computer and execute commands on it by modifying the SSH service to issue the "ps -A" command after logging in, then use filters to look for the application you want.

You can try it in the Terminal to see what such a session might be like, or just use Simon's Capture Session feature to generate the session.

Can Simon give a success or failure based on essential text missing?

Yes! The Filters feature includes Find Required and Find Unwanted default filters.

So for example, if you do a telnet Script-based check, you'd want it to be considered a success only if this is output:

Escape character is '^]'

Then if that text isn't found (as would occur if telnet couldn't connect to the server), Simon will log a failure.

How can I check that a Notifier is set up correctly?

You can quickly test any notifier by clicking the Notify Now toolbar button in the Notifiers window. It will perform the notification with placeholder variable values, so for the E-mail notifer, it will send the message, if set up correctly.

Is there a shortcut to enter URLs for Web (HTTP) tests?

Yes, you can enter URLs with very minimal text, and Simon will fill in the rest when you click OK. It automatically adds the default protocol ("http://") and the "www." and ".com" if necessary.

For example, typing "apple" (without the quotes) will be saved as "http://www.apple.com/". Similarly, entering "dejal/simon" will end up as "http://www.dejal.com/simon/".

What do the status icons mean, and can I just make it green and red?

By default, Simon uses time-sensitive status icons to indicate whether tests are successful, a failure, or recovered.

These icons start off as gray upwards-facing triangles, which turn bright green () when a change occurs, and gradually fade through shades of green back to gray over time if no further changes occur. If a failure occurs, a red downwards-facing triangle () is used. When the test recovers from the failure, an orange upwards-facing triangle () is used, which also slowly fades back to gray over time.

These icons provide a lot of useful information just from their colors. But if you'd prefer to keep things simple, you can do so. Go to the General Preferences, and choose the Use simple status icons option. That will make Simon display a green icon when the test is successful, or the bright red icon when it is failing.

What does "active test configuration" mean? Is it a subscription?

No, it isn't a subscription. You're licensed for life, for the current major release version. (When there's eventually another major upgrade, e.g. to version 4.0, that'd likely be a paid upgrade... but you don't have to upgrade, of course.)

A "test" is a configuration or setup, containing a URL, location, or other attributes. Basically saying what to look for.

A "check" is what Simon does with a test: it periodically runs the test to see if it is successful or a failure, and optionally if it changed.

If you have a license with 40 active tests, that means that you can have up to 40 tests that are not paused. It doesn't count paused tests. Each test can be checked any number of times; there's no limitation on checks.

What's the equivalent of Smart Change Detection in version 3?

The old Smart Change Detection feature in version 2 has been replaced by the more flexible Filter feature in version 3, but it still supports the same change detection functionality, plus much more.

You can read about the Filters feature in the help book.

The replacement for the old Smart Change Detection feature is the Block filter. It works the same way, with Start and End text blocks, but has some extra options for more flexibility (hidden away till you need them). Your version 2 tests will have been automatically upgraded to use the Block filter if you specified Start and End text, or the Change filter if you didn't. (The Change filter is actually based on the Block filter plug-in, but omits the Start and End text fields, so it just looks for any change.)

Read about the Block filters in the help book.

Where is the Simon data stored on my computer?

The data is stored in a folder within your Application Support folder. The preferences are stored in your Preferences folder, naturally. The locations are as follows, where "~" means your home directory:

"~/Library/Application Support/Dejal/Simon/"
"~/Library/Preferences/com.dejal.simon.plist".

Why isn't my E-mail Notifier working?

I seem to get more queries about the E-mail notifier than any other feature. Usually, it comes down to not filling in all of the fields, or setting the wrong authentication.

So the first thing I'd recommend is checking that both the To and From address fields are filled in with valid e-mail addresses.

If that doesn't help, check that the Outgoing Mail Server is correct in the E-mail Transport Options panel - if you use .Mac, make sure you enter just "smtp.mac.com" (without the quotes), and not the colon and username following.

If still not working, try each of the Authentication options in that panel, with the appropriate User Name and Password entered. Also try turning SSL off. It's not always easy to tell which will work.

Why isn't the Automatic transport for the E-mail Notifier working?

Firstly, you need to have set up a valid mail configuration in Apple Mail (or possibly other mailers). You also need to make sure that the From address you specify uses the same server as one of your Mail configuration, as it finds the configuration based on the server domain.

I have another question about Simon; where can I find out more information?

Check out the Simon Help; it includes lots of information about the application.

Does Time Out have breaks while the computer is idle?

No, Time Out automatically pauses the breaks when you aren't using your computer. So when the screensaver is active, or the computer is otherwise sitting there without being used, Time Out won't do anything.

When you return to your Mac, if you've been away for longer than the interval set in the preferences, Time Out will reset the break timers, so the next breaks will be the full work interval from that time. You can change this amount or disable this feature in the preferences.

I have another question about Time Out; where can I find out more information?

Check out the Time Out User Guide; it includes lots of information about the application.

How can I add text in another app to Caboodle via a keyboard shortcut?

Caboodle has a couple of handy commands in the Services menu for all apps that support it. A command to add text selected in another app to Caboodle as a new entry, and another to do the reverse.

Follow these simple steps to add a keyboard equivalent of your choice to the Add Entry with Selection command:

1. Open the Keyboard & Mouse system preferences.
2. Go to the Keyboard Shortcuts tab.
3. Click the "+" below the list.
4. Select Application: All Applications.
5. Type Menu Title Add Entry with Selection (exact wording and case is important).
6. Press Keyboard Shortcut Cmd-Option-Ctrl-C (or a shortcut of your choosing).
7. Click Add.
8. Launch a new application that supports Services.
9. Select some text, press Cmd-Option-Ctrl-C, and it appears as a new entry in Caboodle.

Note: the new keyboard shortcut won't show up in applications that are already running until after you quit and re-launch them.

How can I add/remove the Save PDF to Caboodle print workflow?

When you first start Caboodle (version 1.3 or later), it asks you if you want to add the Save PDF to Caboodle command to the print workflows — i.e. via the PDF button in print panels.

This is a very handy feature, enabling you to print from any application "to" Caboodle.

If you chose not to add it, you can do so at any time simply by choosing the Install PDF Workflow... item in the Caboodle menu.

If you decide that you don't want this feature (e.g. if you want to stop using Caboodle for some reason), you can remove it by deleting the alias file in the Finder. It is located in the path "~/Library/PDF Services/Save PDF to Caboodle", where "~" means your home folder.

How can I alias a file to a Caboodle entry instead of copying it?

Normally when you drag a file into a Caboodle entry it copies it, allowing you to delete the original. But often you want to keep the original in place too, and want to avoid bloating Caboodle's data with large files (or folders).

The solution is to hold down the Control () key when dragging the file or folder to the Caboodle entry: the mouse pointer will change to include an alias symbol instead of the green plus. It will then make an alias (link) to the original. Then when you double-click on the file (or view it inline for images and PDFs), the original will open.

How can I change the entry icons, and where can I get icons from?

You can drag or paste icons from any image. For example, if you see a cute icon on a web page, you can drag that image to the image well in Caboodle. Tip: you can switch applications in the middle of the drag, if you can't see the image well when the other window is on top of it: start dragging the image, then (with the mouse button still down) press Cmd-Tab to switch apps, and complete the drag.

You can drag any size image to Caboodle's image well; it will be resized appropriately.

How can I create a top-level entry?

It's easy: either de-select any currently selected entry, or click one of the top-level entries, then click New Sibling, and a top-level entry will be created. De-select an entry by Cmd-clicking on the selected one, or by clicking in an empty area of the list.

If there is an entry selected, the New Child button will create a new entry within it, inheriting its icon and custom fields - a very handy feature.

You can also drag any entry to any level: make it a top-level one, or within an existing one. The drag destination indicator is a black box when dragging onto an entry (to drop it within), or a black line with a circle on the left to drag to that location. The circle indicates the level to drag it to; move the mouse to the left and right to choose the level if ambiguous.

How can I create an outline in an entry?

Assuming you're using Tiger or later, simply use the List feature. Show the ruler, if not already, and choose a list style from the Lists menu in the ruler (or the Text > List... menu command, or the List toolbar button). You can then add items to the top level of the outline. To indent an outline item, hit Tab at the start of a line (an existing line or a new line). To outdent a new item, hit Return twice.

If I update the Caboodle application, will I lose my entries?

No, you won't lose anything. The data is stored in a different location, so updating the application won't affect it. So go ahead!

The entries list has vanished!

Don't worry, it's still there, just hidden.

Perhaps you accidentally double-clicked on the divider.

You can show it again by choosing Window ▶ Show Entries List, or by double-clicking the left margin of the window when the mouse pointer changes to arrows (the menu command might be easier, though).

What encryption algorithm does Caboodle use? Is it safe?

Caboodle uses the standard Blowfish algorithm for encryption. There are no known exploits of Blowfish, so it should be plenty safe, provided of course you choose a password that people couldn't easily guess.

To quote Wikipedia:

Blowfish is a keyed, symmetric block cipher, designed in 1993 by Bruce Schneier and included in a large number of cipher suites and encryption products. Blowfish provides a good encryption rate in software and no effective cryptanalysis of it has been found to date.

Read about Blowfish on Wikipedia.

Where is the Caboodle data stored on my computer?

The data is stored in a folder within your Application Support folder. The preferences are stored in your Preferences folder, naturally. The locations are as follows, where "~" means your home directory:

"~/Library/Application Support/Dejal/Caboodle/"
"~/Library/Preferences/com.dejal.caboodle.plist".

Why are the Link, List and Table functions disabled?

These features are only available when you are using Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" or later.

I have another question about Caboodle; where can I find out more information?

Check out the Caboodle User Guide; it includes lots of information about the application.

Can I change the keyboard shortcut for the Services command?

BlogAssist has a handy command in the Services menu for all apps that support it. This command takes the selected text and any text in the clipboard, and displays them in a small window similar to the floating one. When you click OK, it applies the selected operation to the text and replaces the selection in your document. Very handy.

By default this command has the keyboard shortcut of Cmd-<, (i.e. Cmd-Shift-,) but you can change it via the System Preferences. Follow these simple steps:

1. Open the Keyboard & Mouse system preferences.
2. Go to the Keyboard Shortcuts tab.
3. Click the "+" below the list.
4. Select Application: All Applications.
5. Type Menu Title BlogAssist (exact wording and case is important).
6. Press Keyboard Shortcut and the desired shortcut of your choosing.
7. Click Add.
8. Launch a new application that supports Services.
9. Select some text, press your chosen keyboard shortcut, and the BlogAssist window will appear.

Note: the new keyboard shortcut won't show up in applications that are already running until after you quit and re-launch them.

How can I uninstall or update BlogAssist?

If you no longer wish to use BlogAssist, or want to update it to a new version, you need to quit the application. Although BlogAssist doesn't show up in the Dock, it is still a normal Mac application. It uses a small system menu on the right-hand-side of the menubar.

The last item in this menu is the Quit BlogAssist command. Choose this, and BlogAssist will quit (optionally with a confirmation).

You can then either trash the BlogAssist application from your Applications folder, or replace it with a newer version.

If you replace it, double-clicking on the new version will add the system menu back again.

Where is the BlogAssist data stored on my computer?

The data is stored in the preferences file, in your Preferences folder. In version 1 the operations were stored externally, but that file is no longer used after upgrading to version 2. The location is as follows, where "~" means your home directory:

"~/Library/Preferences/com.dejal.blogassist.plist".

I have another question about BlogAssist; where can I find out more information?

Check out the BlogAssist User Guide; it includes lots of information about the application.

Where are the questions?

Tweeps is a new product, so there aren't any frequently asked questions yet! The Tweeps FAQ will be updated once a pattern of questions is established.

In the meantime, if you have a question, check out the Tweeps forum.