Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by Khoth 1333 days ago
On Windows, when you Copy the program supplying the data decides whether to send the data to the clipboard manager straight away, or whether to defer. If it defers, then yes it does a "last call" on closing. If it crashes you lose the clipboard.

Some programs will ask you when you quit them if you want to keep the clipboard contents, if you'd copied a large amount of data.
1 comments
ygra 1333 days ago
Annoyingy, in Excel's case that question "Do you really want to quit? You have copied large amounts of data to the clipboard." even occurs when you have a single cell's worth in the clipboard. But that's also a confirmation question that no one really understands unless they understand how the clipboard works (or can work).
link
boole1854 1333 days ago
I just tested this on the latest desktop version of Excel on Windows 10, and I did not get the 'large amounts of data' warning with only a single cell copied in the clipboard (the cell contained the word 'foo'). Increasing the number of cells copied to a large number did cause the warning to appear. I did not investigate further to see exactly how many cells need to be copied to cause the warning to appear.
link
the_mitsuhiko 1333 days ago
> in Excel's case that question "Do you really want to quit? You have copied large amounts of data to the clipboard." even occurs when you have a single cell's worth in the clipboard

That's not correct. You need to have quite a few cells in the clipboard for this to happen.

> But that's also a confirmation question that no one really understands

The dialog tells you exactly what it is asking for. It gives you three options: keep the app open, store the data in the clipboard, discard the data from the clipboard. I am not sure how a user could not understand what to do in that situation.

link
wheybags 1333 days ago
Most users know about copy paste, but have no idea what "the clipboard" is.
link
wizzwizz4 1333 days ago
Doesn't Microsoft Office still have a button in the bottom-right of the Cut, Copy, Paste section of the Ribbon (subtitled "clipboard") that opens a big Clipboard side panel?
link
ygra 1333 days ago
Oh, indeed. I misremembered then. Seems to be that way in my ancient version already as well.
link