Author Topic: V2 Beta of Clipboard Help+Spell With Support for Images (Read 90,644 times)

IainB · « **Reply #25 on:** April 27, 2011, 11:43 AM »

@mouser:
ß testing problem: When I right click an image in my browser and "copy image", it goes into the current clipboard buffer OK (and can be pasted from there), but it does not appear or get retained in CHS.

I think I shall re-install the ß setup you give above.

mouser · « **Reply #26 on:** April 27, 2011, 11:57 AM »

What browser?

ewemoa · « **Reply #27 on:** April 27, 2011, 12:01 PM »

FWIW, I tested with FF4 and IE8 successfully (CHS v2.00.01). I see copied images via the pop-up menu as well as in CHS' main window.

IainB · « **Reply #28 on:** April 27, 2011, 12:09 PM »

@mouser:
I reinstalled it, setting in Properties for the .exe file to be run in Compatibility mode for XP SP3, and "Run as administrator" for all users (I had not changed those settings before) - and it works a treat.
I noticed that the duplication copy avoidance works well too.
By the way, my main browser is Firefox v4.0, but I also use IE9, Chromium (latest nightly build) and Google Chrome (Dev channel build).

Question: Are the images in CHS held as files in a single folder, or are they stored in the database?

mouser · « **Reply #29 on:** April 27, 2011, 12:28 PM »

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Question: Are the images in CHS held as files in a single folder, or are they stored in the database?

They are standard image files that by default are sorted into subfolders by year/month and named by day. you can customize this in options.
See the "explore" button on the toolbar when looking at an image clip to jump to the image folder for the image.

I don't think you should have to change any compatibility settings.. But maybe there is some permission/security thing i don't know about?

IainB · « **Reply #30 on:** April 27, 2011, 01:31 PM »

@mouser:

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They are standard image files that by default are sorted into subfolders by year/month and named by day. you can customize this in options.
See the "explore" button on the toolbar when looking at an image clip to jump to the image folder for the image.

Thanks for explaining to me what I should have read (but missed) in the new Preferences/Options settings.
You really have done a nice job with this update.

I noticed the icons of the application (i.e., within which the clips were captured) now appear in the "Quick" CHS clip list. That is a rather handy visual piece of information. I like it.

mouser · « **Reply #31 on:** April 27, 2011, 01:37 PM »

Minor update uploaded; just redownload if you want it -- it now shows image dimensions in popup menu and saves image dimension in clip image filenames.

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You really have done a nice job with this update.

glad you like it!

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I noticed the icons of the application..That is a rather handy visual piece of information.

Thats so even the people who disable image capture have something new to enjoy. It was suggested by superboyac in this thread as a feature of ArsClip that should be added to CHS.

tomos · « **Reply #32 on:** April 27, 2011, 01:51 PM »

Working fine here

(havent gotten the last minor update yet)

I notice it converts vector clips to bitmap images - I mean 'pixel' images. I've seen this in other clipboard extenders as well.
It uses a very low resolution though - the clips are useless really.

I presume it's not possible to save vector clips "as is"?
If not,
my ideal would be to convert them to a much higher resolution, but also give the option to disable saving of vectors

mouser · « **Reply #33 on:** April 27, 2011, 01:57 PM »

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I notice it converts vector clips to bitmap images - I mean 'pixel' images. I've seen this in other clipboard extenders as well.
I presume it's not possible to save vector clips "as is"?

Actually what's happening here, i believe -- is that the application puts multiple kinds of data on clipboard -- probably the full vector image, and a smaller draft bitmap.

Right now, CHS only knows how to grab the bitmap data on clipboard -- and doesn't know how to deal with the vector clip.

How easy it will be for me to add support to capture the vector image will depend -- there is code now in CHS to grab windows metafile images, which may be sufficient to grab your vector data -- i just haven't fully enabled or tweaked it yet.

The same goes for more advanced image editing tools -- CHS is only going to capture the bitmap data copied to clipboard, not the more advanced internal formats used by programs like photoshop, etc.; so things like transparency will probably be lost.

However, now that the infrastructure is in place, it's likely i will be able to add an option that will tell CHS to capture and paste ALL formats of the clipboard data by in effect saving multiple files associated with each image, and restoring those on paste. I think this should be pretty easy to do and would let CHS preserve all the native data for copy+paste from any image-related app.

what app is it that you are testing vector stuff on?

tomos · « **Reply #34 on:** April 27, 2011, 03:15 PM »

Quote from: mouser on April 27, 2011, 01:57 PM

what app is it that you are testing vector stuff on?

well I'm using FreeHand which is defunct as a piece of software - but illustrator** works (roughly) the same way AFAIK - I've pasted basic vectors between the two - without problems - so I think windows seem to be able to cope with them...

In fact I remember being very surprised one day when I accidentally pasted part of a vector contour map into a FileHamster comment window - which saves comment/text files - I even have a screenshot of that somewhere :-)

** I actually have a recent copy of illustrator, but after a very destructive install, I removed it and still havent reinstalled it. I plan to install it again but seem to be putting it off until really I need to I guess

mouser · « **Reply #35 on:** April 27, 2011, 05:16 PM »

Note you can use the same menus/hotkeys to print image clips.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #36 on:** April 27, 2011, 06:14 PM »

I've had image stuff in and out of Photoshop Illustrator and InDesign (CH+S doesn't 'see' text copied from Illustrator btw) as well as a bunch of other graphics stuff. Haven't bumped into a problem yet. If there is an issue, you can bet it'll occur in the middle of some crucial work and not while I'm playing around

As long as it works with Photoshop I'm happy as that alone accounts for about 70% of my need for clips

This is very nice to have and, in my view, an invaluable addition to CH+S

@mouser, this vector/bitmap (and other formats) is what I mentioned recently and it seems as if you are on the case.
I didn't try vectors in Illustrator as I pretty much knew what to expect.

mouser · « **Reply #37 on:** April 27, 2011, 06:48 PM »

Glad you like it Chris.

ps.
The reason i finally got off my duff and wrote image support into CHS was because it was Chris' request when he won the programming time giveaway in the fundraiser. So he's the one to thank for this feature if it's useful.

mouser · « **Reply #38 on:** April 28, 2011, 12:47 AM »

Minor update uploaded to add some more buttons and info to the image clip view in the main window.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #39 on:** April 28, 2011, 06:44 AM »

Quote from: mouser on April 28, 2011, 12:47 AM

Minor update uploaded to add some more buttons and info to the image clip view in the main window.

Here's an odd one.

Photoshop CS5, which is set as the default image editor in CH+S:

I can copy/paste to/from Photoshop using the usual (CH+S) methods e.g. All clips/clipboard/new, or just ctrl-v, or…
With the self-same image data, however, the button "Launch image editor to edit clip" causes Photoshop to complain "Could not complete your request because it is not the right kind of document".

mouser · « **Reply #40 on:** April 28, 2011, 06:51 AM »

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Launch image editor to edit clip

all that does is try to open the image file for editing.. have you set photoshop as the custom editor? you might try that if not.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #41 on:** April 28, 2011, 10:14 AM »

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all that does is try to open the image file for editing.. have you set photoshop as the custom editor?

Yes, I had done so.

Hey! The files are being saved as .wmf.

I'm set this way (out of the box)

[attach]

mouser · « **Reply #42 on:** April 28, 2011, 12:49 PM »

Chris,

Can you redownload and try new version -- it will now be more aggressive about turning meta files into png files, which may solve your problem.

But do check to see if pasting is still good with the new version.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #43 on:** April 28, 2011, 10:51 PM »

Quote from: mouser on April 28, 2011, 12:49 PM

Can you redownload and try new version -- it will now be more aggressive about turning meta files into png files, which may solve your problem.

On a quick first test that certainly appears to have fixed it

mouser · « **Reply #44 on:** April 29, 2011, 12:08 AM »

So here's a question: How useful would it be to show clip images proportionately in the pop-up menus?

Right now the clip thumbnails shown in the popup menu are all stretched to the preset size you have configured for menu display (64x64 by default).
This has the advantage of giving a nice uniform display.

But it does perhaps make it a little harder to identify clips by their size at a glance from the menu (though the actual dimensions ARE listed explicitly).

So my question is, is this something people think is important to have an option for -- an option to size menu thumbnails for clips to preserve their aspect ratios?

barney · « **Reply #45 on:** April 29, 2011, 01:14 AM »

Proportional icons? 'Twould be a boon to my usage

. These old eyes have enough trouble identifying some icons w/o having to account for distortion

.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #46 on:** April 29, 2011, 02:09 AM »

Quote from: mouser on April 29, 2011, 12:08 AM

is this something people think is important to have an option for

Not important to me but possibly a nice option.
I'm more likely to look through image clips using the main window.

mouser · « **Reply #47 on:** April 29, 2011, 02:17 AM »

Which brings up another possible feature i could add -- a full screen/window gallery of all thumbnails in the current group/entire database.

barney · « **Reply #48 on:** April 29, 2011, 03:15 AM »

Quote from: mouser on April 29, 2011, 02:17 AM

a full screen/window gallery of all thumbnails

That's a thing that would be nice in order to avoid duplications. Not an absolute necessity, but handy. Mind, I'm looking at this from a purely personal usage perspective, so it might not be worth the effort, but methinks 'twould be a very nice enhancement

.

barney · « **Reply #49 on:** April 29, 2011, 03:24 AM »

BTW, I know I've been lax about reporting, but the changes to date have afforded me about a 20% time reduction. That's significant, even though the number seems small. Any reduction(s) from 6-8 hours to ~4-6 hours is meaningful. I know I've been lax about reporting, but that's because I've not found any issues with the program as it stands. One thing that might be useful is a short title, entered at capture time, to define any particular image. Again, that's from my own usage, not necessarily a thing of moment for the overall user base. (Yeah, I know, but still ... )