Very good, still requires hard work

Pros: Import from Mealmaster and some other formats it done in a jiffy

You can select between imperial and metric measurements

You can choose which nutritional information to present

Ingredients can be linked to the nutritional database, and they show as blue links if so.

You can print to a number of formats, including double sided

You can change the quantities, the yield.

You can check for duplicate recipes. When you import or add or copy-paste a recipe, you can get the program to immediately check and detect whether it is a duplicate. It lets you put many recipes of the same name (because you might have different recipes of Apple pie, for instance) The program lets you choose if you want it to mark as duplicates if they share the title and ingredients, or everything, including preparation. Then it marks one of each couple of duplicates, and you can choose to immediately delete them or whether to check them first (of course you'll want to do this, and it's not easy. See below)

Cons: 1. It doesn't convert imperial to metric (and viceversa) measurements

2. Moving recipes from one cookbook to the other is not easy When you import a mixed cookbook and you want to sort the contents into different ones (e.g. Vegetarian, Desserts, Breads etc...), it's a daunting task. You have to first open the one from which you take the recipes, then select them screen by screen (you can scroll, but not select the first item, then scroll to the end of the category, press shift and select the last to have them all selected), then copy to clipboard with CTRL+C, then open the destination cookbook, paste them with CTRL+V. Then go back to the previous one, and again painstakingly select all of them and delete them. (it is possible that you can delete them while they are still in the clipboard, before pasting them to their new location? I didn't dare do this!!!)

3. The compare and delete duplicates isn't easy. When the programme detects them, you have to check them before deleting one. You cannot open two at a time and compare, you have to rely on memory (or notes!). Suppose that it found 10 couples of duplicates, You look at one couple, you decide one is indeed a duplicate, so you close it and press Del. It asks "Do you want to delete all marked files?" No, "Do you want to delete this one recipe?" "yes". And then, you get an error message, saying that it couldn't delete the file, try again later.

4. Inserting or adding a recipe from word format. I copy-pasted everything (title, ingredients, preparation) into the preparation box, and then tried to drag and drop things into their proper place. Surprise! Drag and drop is not enabled. You have to select, cut (CTRL+X) and paste (CTRL+V) each item. For each ingredient there's the quantity, the name and maybe the details (e.g.chopped.). Moreover, when you put your cursor into a field to type or paste something in, you have to click it first, and only then you can type or paste into it.

Posted: 06-Apr-2008 12:30:08 AM

Kept getting "Runtime error" messages

Cons: First of all, the opening screen asks you for personal details like name and surname, username and password. If it's a programme based on your PC, why ask all these things? A username and optional password (in case of shared computers) should be enough. And of course it encourages you to go sign up at their website, but this IS optional, so... ok.

The next screen is where you put your weight, height, body type, and other measurements. At each thing I tried to put I got a little window of "Runtime error, do you wish to debug" The error was "line 44".

So I couldn't input any information, I couldn't create a user, and therefore I cannot further comment on the programme. I'm uninstalling it. Obviously there is more bug fixing needed.

Posted: 15-Jan-2008 11:58:35 AM