Professional Capture Systems * WinCapture * * DosCapture * User's Guide Acknowledgements GIF is a service mark property of CompuServe Incorporated. Graphic Interchange Format is the copyright property of CompuServe Incorporated. For further information, please contact: CompuServe Incorporated Graphics Technology Department 500 Arlington Center Boulevard Columbus, OH 43220 USA IBM, IBM-PC IBM-AT and PC-DOS are trademarks of the International Business Machines Corporation. MS-DOS, Program Manager, and Microsoft Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Paint Shop Pro is a trademark of JASC, Inc. LIMITED WARRANTY AND DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY THIS SOFTWARE AND ACCOMPANYING WRITTEN MATERIALS (INCLUDING INSTRUCTIONS FOR USE) ARE PROVIDES "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. FURTHER, JASC, INC.(JASC) DOES NOT WARRANT, GUARANTEE, OR MAKE ANY REPRESENTATIONS REGARDING THE USE, OR THE RESULTS OF USE, OF THE SOFTWARE OR WRITTEN MATERIALS IN TERMS OF CORRECTNESS, ACCURACY, RELIABILITY, CURRENTNESS, OR OTHERWISE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE RESULTS AND PERFORMANCE OF THE SOFTWARE IS ASSUMED BY YOU. IF THE SOFTWARE OR WRITTEN MATERIALS ARE DEFECTIVE YOU, AND NOT JASC OR ITS DEALERS, DISTRIBUTORS, AGENTS, OR EMPLOYEES, ASSUME THE ENTIRE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR, OR CORRECTION. THE ABOVE IS THE ONLY WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, THAT IS MADE BY JASC, ON THIS JASC PRODUCT. NO ORAL OR WRITTEN INFORMATION OR ADVICE GIVEN BY JASC, ITS DEALERS, DISTRIBUTORS, AGENTS OR EMPLOYEES SHALL CREATE A WARRANTY OR IN ANY WAY INCREASE THE SCOPE OF THIS WARRANTY AND YOU MAY NOT RELY ON ANY SUCH INFORMATION OR ADVICE. YOU MAY HAVE OTHER RIGHTS WHICH VARY FROM STATE TO STATE. NEITHER JASC NOR ANYONE ELSE WHO HAS BEEN INVOLVED IN THE CREATION, PRODUCTION OR DELIVERY OF THIS PRODUCT SHALL BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF BUSINESS INFORMATION, AND THE LIKE) ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE SUCH PRODUCT EVEN IF JASC HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. This Limited Warranty shall be governed and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Minnesota. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT BY USING THE SHAREWARE VERSION OF PROFESSIONAL CAPTURE SYSTEMS YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOU HAVE READ THIS LIMITED WARRANTY, UNDERSTAND IT, AND AGREE TO BE BOUND BY ITS' TERMS AND CONDITIONS. YOU ALSO AGREE THAT THE LIMITED WARRANTY IS THE COMPLETE AND EXCLUSIVE STATEMENT OF AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE PARTIES AND SUPERSEDE ALL PROPOSALS OR PRIOR AGREEMENTS, ORAL OR WRITTEN, AND ANY OTHER COMMUNICATIONS BETWEEN THE PARTIES RELATING TO THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE THE LIMITED WARRANTY. PROFESSIONAL CAPTURE SYSTEMS Welcome to the Professional Capture Systems (PCS). The PCS is made up of two separate programs; one for the DOS environment and one for the Windows environment. The programs that make up PCS are called DosCapture and WinCapture. The following is the guide to using both of these applications. Required Equipment for DosCapture DosCapture requires a 80286 or higher computer system with a VGA video system. Required Equipment for WinCapture WinCapture is a Windows 3.0 or higher program. The required equipment is the same as what is necessary to run Windows 3.0 or higher. DosCapture DosCapture is a program that will "capture" (or "take a picture of" if you will) DOS screens. This capture will be saved as a PCX graphics file. Since the PCX is a standard graphics file format, the DOS screen can now be used with most desktop publishing applications, word processors or other applications that will work with graphics. If your application does not support the PCX format, the image can easily be converted to another format using a conversion program such as Paint Shop Pro. (blatant plug) DosCapture is designed to capture screens when using a VGA card and while running in a standard VGA 16 or 256 color mode. These VGA modes include: Text modes: (Characters per line x Number of lines x Colors) 40 x 25 x 16 80 x 25 x 16 (??? x ?? x 16) - Extended VGA text modes, dependent on your video card. Graphics modes: (Width x Height x Colors) 320 x 200 x 16 640 x 200 x 16 640 x 350 x 16 640 x 480 x 16 320 x 200 x 256 You will notice that none of the "Super" VGA graphics modes are listed. These modes are not standard from one VGA card to the next. To support them would require that DosCapture become a much larger program, and therefore take up more memory. The extended text modes of "Super" VGA graphics are supported for the major VGA chips. To support the various modes DosCapture reads a "MODE" file called DOSCAP.MOD. We have provided various MODE files for the different VGA chips. Configuring DosCapture For Your Video Board ********************************************************************* * * * DosCapture ships with the DOSCAP.MOD file being identical to * * GENERIC.MOD. This means that none of your extended text modes * * are supported until you change DOSCAP.MOD. * * If you do not need the extended text modes you can use * * DosCapture just the way it is. Thus, you can skip over this * * section. * * * ********************************************************************* Before you can configure DosCapture, you will need to know the type of video chip that is on your video board. It is important that you don't confuse this with the name brand of the video board. There are numerous name brands for video boards (mine happens to be a XYZ Super Ultra VGA), but the video chips that are used on these boards are limited to just a handful of manufacturers. In order to find out the type of chip on my video board, I first called XYZ. Guess what? XYZ is out of business. No problem, I just opened the machine and looked at the big square chip on the board. It said ATI. Thus XYZ was buying video chips from ATI to build the XYZ Super Ultra VGA. If you do not know what type of chip is on your video board, you will need to consult your video board user's guide, or other documentation that came with your computer. If you cannot find this information, please contact your hardware dealer. By displaying the contents of your directory (type DIR at C:\DOSCAP>), you will notice that there are a number of "mod" files. These "mod" files are your mode files. They are used by DosCapture to specify the type of video chip that is on your video board. When DosCapture is first started it will read the DOSCAP.MOD file and support the modes that are described in this file. DosCapture ships with the DOSCAP.MOD file being identical to GENERIC.MOD. This means that none of your extended text modes are supported until you change DOSCAP.MOD. To make this change, simply copy the "MODE" file for your VGA chip to DOSCAP.MOD. This is done as follows: (In the example below, we will be using the file for an ATI chip. You can substitute "ATI" with the name of the chip that your video board uses.) At the hard drive prompt, get into the Doscap directory (CD\DOSCAP "enter") and type in the following: COPY ATI.MOD DOSCAP.MOD DosCapture is now ready to run. Starting and finishing DosCapture To use DosCapture, get into the Doscap directory and type: DOSCAP DosCapture will now be installed and resident in your computer memory until it is unloaded or the machine is shutdown. Note: If you are running in a DOS window, under Windows, DosCapture will be removed from memory when you shut down the DOS window. When you are done with DosCapture, simply type the following at the prompt: DOSCAP UNLOAD (Note that DOSCAP must be in your path or you must be in the DosCapture directory to type this command.) This will remove DosCapture from memory (This does not delete the files from the hard drive. DosCapture and the screen captures already done will remain in the DOSCAP directory). Screen Capturing While DosCapture is resident in memory (see Starting DosCapture above), start up the DOS program you want to do a screen capture of. When the desired screen is displayed, press the "ALT" and the "." keys at the same time. You will hear one low toned beep followed by a series of clicks that let you know a capture is in progress. When DosCapture is finished with the capture, you will hear one high toned beep. If DosCapture does not support the video mode that your video system is in when the "Alt" and "." keys where pressed, then you will hear a high tone immediately followed by a low tone. Your capture will be saved as a PCX file and saved to the directory that was current when you started DosCapture. Files are named CAPxxxx.PCX (x's representing digits) and will start from CAP0001.PCX and ascend by one digit for each capture. When DosCapture is reloaded after being shut down, it will scan the PCX files in the directory and begin the count at one higher than the highest xxxx value. Other DosCapture Commands DosCapture recognizes the following commands: Help Status Reset Commands are given by typing: DOSCAP[space][command] Help -- will give you general information about Dos-Capture. Status -- will give you information about the last capture you made. The information will probably be pretty useless to you, but very important to us if you need technical help. Reset -- will reset the filename that the next capture will be saved to. It will rescan the directory that the captures are saved to and determine what the next filename is that should be used. This is handy if you want to delete some of your prior captures while DosCapture is still resident in memory (the same thing happens when you unload and reload DosCapture, reset just eliminates the extra steps). About the MOD files: DosCapture is configured for your video board by reading the file DOSCAP.MOD. When you setup DosCapture, you should have copied the MOD file for your video board to DOSCAP.MOD. The following is an explanation of how a MOD file is laid out. For the purposes of this example, we will be using the file GENERIC.MOD. All of the mode numbers listed in this example are standard for all VGA boards. Super VGA modes however are non-standard, so that a #33 for one board may be completely different from a #33 of different board. That is why the MOD file of the board you are using must be copied into DOSCAP.MOD. In a text mode, the BPP field is used to control DosCapture. It should normally be set to 0 (zero) or left blank, but can be set to other values to change the look of the text as it is saved out as a PCX file. Anytime you enter a value in the BPP field you will need to enter values for the HRES and VRES fields. When making changes to these files there are some do's and don'ts... Do not remove or add the semicolons at the beginning of each line. The absence of a semicolon indicates that DosCapture needs this information and can find it here. A semicolon says that the line is descriptive and should be ignored by DosCapture. When entering values in the fields other than BPP, they must always be followed by a comma to separate them from the next field. On the following page is the file GENERIC.MOD. It not only shows the layout of the file, but also describes the various components of the file. ;The following line is the text description of video board GENERIC VGA CARD ; ; The following table is information that is used by DosCapture. ; ; This is a description of how the table is organized. ; ; The FIRST column is MODE#. This is the video mode that the card is running ; in. Note that the MODE# is in hexadecimal. ; ; The SECOND column is TYPE. The type must be either 0 or 1. 0 means that the ; mode is a text mode. 1 means that the mode is a graphics mode. ; The THIRD column is HRES. In text mode this is the character width in pixels. ; IT MUST BE EITHER 8 or 9. If you set it to anything else, DosCapture will ; use 8. This field does not have to be filled in text mode unless you set ; the BPP field. ; In graphics mode this is the width of the screen in pixels. ; ; The FOURTH column is VRES. In text mode this is the character height in ; pixels. This field does not have to be filled in text mode unless you set ; the BPP field. ; In graphics mode this is the height of the screen in pixels. ; ; The FIFTH column is BPP. In graphics mode this is the number of bits per ; pixel of the mode. It must be either 4 or 8. A 4 means 16 colors. An 8 means ; 256 colors. ; In text mode this field is used to control DosCapture. It should normally be ; set to 0 (or left blank), but can be set to other values according to the ; following list: ; a 0 means operate normally, getting all information from your video card. ; a 1 means override the video card's character size information and take ; the information from this mode file. ; ; ;MODE# TYPE HRES VRES BPP 0, 0 1, 0 2, 0 3, 0 D, 1, 320, 200, 4 E, 1, 640, 200, 4 10, 1, 640, 350, 4 12, 1, 640, 480, 4 13, 1, 320, 200, 8 About the Captured Screens: Characters displayed in text modes are normally made up of 8 or 9 pixels in width. The height of the characters vary widely. We will just talk about the width. The same logic follows for the height (only in the other direction). When DosCapture captures a text screen it queries the video board for the character characteristics. It also gets the currently used font from the video board. These characters are turned into graphics and saved as a graphics file. If your video board is running in a mode that allows 80 characters across the screen, and the character width is 8 then the resulting graphic would have an 80 times 8, or 640 pixels wide. Thus you could then use an image viewer to view the resultant graphic and the graphic would fit onto the screen in a graphics mode. If instead of a character width of 8, we had a character width of 9, the resulting graphic would be 80 times 9, or 720 pixels wide. Thus, viewing it with an image viewer, we would not be able to see the entire width of the image at one time. This situation is more pronounced when you start getting into the extended text modes of 132 characters across. Although you can display 132 characters across in text mode, it would take a graphics mode that had a width of 1056 to display the entire graphic on the screen. (This is assuming the characters had a width of 8 pixels.) WinCapture WinCapture is designed to take care of your screen capturing needs while running under Windows. It is an invaluable tool for quick capturing your choice of area, full screen, client area or window. Starting WinCapture To start WinCapture, simply click on the WinCapture icon. At first you may think that WinCapture has not been started, since no window will open. WinCapture will always reside as an icon at the bottom of your screen. Using WinCapture Once you have WinCapture configured the way you want, it is unnecessary to open the menu to make your captures. Simply start WinCapture, press your designated hot key to make your captures, and that's it! WinCapture will remain running until "Close" is selected from the WinCapture Menu or until Windows is exited. WinCapture Menu Items To activate the WinCapture menu, click once on the icon. In addition to the standard system menu items you will find the following menu items: Capture Setup Printer Setup View Last Capture Help About Each of the menu items and their associated dialog boxes are described on the following pages. Capture Setup Use this selection to configure the way WinCapture is to work. 1. From the WinCapture Menu select "Capture Setup". This will activate the "WinCapture Setup" dialog box. 2. In the "Capture" area choose the type of capture you will be doing (area, full screen, client area or window). 3. In the "Hot Key" area choose the key that is to activate WinCapture. You must pick one of the function keys. In addition, you can designate the "Ctrl", "Alt", or "Shift" (or any combination of these) as keys that must be pressed with the function key to activate WinCapture. 4. In the "Image Processing" area select any image processing that should be done to each image captured. The available options are; Greyscale and Invert Colors. 5. In the "Send To" area select where WinCapture should send your images. The available options are; Clipboard, Printer and Disk. 6. If you have selected "Disk" from the "Send To" area of the dialog box in step 5, the "File Format and Directory Setup" button will activate the File Format and Directory Setup dialog box. Choose the directory where the image is to be sent and the image file format it is to be saved as. Note: If "Disk" is not selected from the "Send To" area in step 5, this button will not be available for use. The WinCapture Setup Dialog Box The "Capture" area The Capture area will allow you to select the type of capture that is to take place. To select one of the options, click on the desired option button. The allowable options are: Area -- This option will allow you to define the area that is to be captured. Full Screen -- This option will capture the full screen. Client Area -- This option will capture the client area of the active window. Window -- This option will capture the active window. Include Cursor -- This option will be available only when the capture area is Full Screen, Client Area or Window. When selected this option will include the cursor in the captured image if the cursor was within the captured area. The "Hot Key" area The Hot Key area will allow you to select the hot key combination that will be used to activate the capture. You must pick one of the functions keys by clicking on its option button. In addition, you can select "Alt", "Ctrl" and/or "Shift" to be used in conjunction with the function keys by clicking on the appropriate check box. The "Image Processing" area The image processing section will allow you to select any image processing that should happen to each capture. To select one or more of the image processing, you can click on the associated check box. Your available options are: Greyscale -- This option will convert your colored image to a greyscaled image. Invert Colors -- This option will create a negative image of your capture (change each color to its compliment). The "Send to" area The Send to section allows you to designate the various places that the capture should be sent to. To select one or more of the options, click on the associated check box. The different places that the capture can be sent to include; clipboard, printer and the disk. Clipboard -- This option will save the captured image to the clipboard. Note: Since only one image at a time is stored in the clipboard, only the last capture will be available. Printer -- This option will send the captured image to the printer. Disk -- This option will save the captured image to the directory and format that you have specified. Use the "File Format and Directory Setup" Command Button to select the directory and format to be used. The "File Format and Directory Setup" Command Button This will activate the File Format and Directory Setup Dialog Box. This will allow you to select the directory and format to use when saving a captured image. The "Cancel" Command Button If you change your mind and want to back out without saving the changes you have made click the "Cancel" command button. The "OK" Command Button Click the "OK" command button (or press "Enter") to save the changes that you have made. The File Format and Directory Setup Dialog Box The "Directory:" Display This displays the current directory that the image will be saved to. If you change the drive and/or the directory (by using the "Directories" list box), the "Directory:" display changes accordingly. The "Directories" List Box The "Directories" list box displays the drives and directories available for saving images. If you want to save to a different drive or directory, double click on the drive, or directory, of your choice. The "Format" List Box The "Format" list box lists the formats that are capable of holding your captured images. For example, if you are using a video driver that is running at 16 million colors, then the GIF format would not be displayed since it can not hold this type of image. To change between the available formats, click the mouse pointer on the type of format you want to use. The "Cancel" Command Button If you change your mind and want to back out without saving the directory or format changes, click the "Cancel" command button. You will be returned to the WinCapture Setup dialog box. The "OK" Command Button Click the "OK" command button (or press "Enter") to save the directory and the file format of saved images. Printer Setup Use this selection to change the active printer, and/or to set up the way the active printer is configured. To change the active printer... 1. From the WinCapture Menu select "Printer Setup". This will activate the Printer Setup dialog box. It will display the printers that are installed for Windows. 2. Highlight the printer that you want active. 3. Click the "OK" button (or press "Enter"). To change the configuration of a printer... 1. From the WinCapture Menu select "Printer Setup". This will activate the Printer Setup dialog box. It will display the printers that are installed for Windows. 2. From the "Printer Setup" dialog box, click the "Setup" command button to display a configuration box applicable to your selected printer. This configuration box will be arranged differently depending upon which printer type you have selected. Refer to your printer's manual for information about the various configuration selections. 3. You can change the configuration of the printer as you desire. When finished, return to the "Printer Setup" dialog box and click the "OK" button (or press "Enter"). If the printer that you have selected is using a Windows 3.x printer driver, the changes you make to your printer's setup will only be effective for WinCapture. The "Printer Setup" Dialog Box The "Printer:" List Box The printers already installed to Windows will be listed here. If multiple printers are installed, you can select which printer will be active for this WinCapture session. The "Setup" Command Button Click the "Setup" command button to produce additional dialog boxes containing various options for the selected type of printer. You can change the configuration of a printer's operation for this WinCapture session. The "Cancel" Command Button If you change your mind and want to back out without changing the current printer selection, click the "Cancel" command button. The "OK" Command Button Click the "OK" command button (or press "Enter") to activate selections you have made for this WinCapture session. View Last Capture Use this selection to display the last image that was captured. 1. From the WinCapture Menu select "View Last Capture". The last capture that was made will be displayed. 2. Press any key to return to Windows. Help Use this selection to activate the WinCapture on-line help system. 1. From the WinCapture menu select "Help". This opens the "WinCapture Help" window containing an index of topics you can select for viewing. 2. Close the help window when you are through. You will be returned to the WinCapture icon. About Use this selection to display general information about WinCapture and your video system. 1. From the WinCapture menu select "About". This opens the "About WinCapture" dialog box. This describes the copyright and the version of WinCapture you are using. The box also provides information about the video system you currently have installed. 2. Click the "OK" button (or press "Enter"). Professional Capture Systems Technical Support Technical support for Professional Capture Systems can be obtained from: USA --------- JASC, Inc. 10901 Red Circle Drive Suite 340 Minnetonka, MN 55343 USA (612) 930-9171 (9am to 5pm USA central time) England ------------------------ The Thompson Partnership Church Croft, Bramshall, UTTOXETER, Staffs. ST14 5DE 0889 564601 Purchasing the Licensed Version You may use the shareware version of Professional Capture Systems for a 30 day trial period. If you would like to continue to use Professional Capture Systems after the 30 day trial period, you are required to purchase the licensed version of Professional Capture Systems. When you purchase the licensed version of Professional Capture Systems you will receive a disk with the licensed version and the printed user's guide. Professional Capture Systems may be purchased from a number of sources. You are free to purchase your copy from where ever you desire. You may also want to check with your local software store to see if they carry Professional Capture Systems. The vendors include: The Thompson Partnership - England JASC, Inc. - USA 6 JASC, Inc. (USA) You can order from JASC, Inc. by payment with check or credit card. The credit cards accepted are MC and Visa. The numbers for ordering are: Voice (612) 930-9171 or FAX (612) 930-9172 Professional Capture Systems 1.02 (or latest version) NAME______________________________________________ COMPANY___________________________________________ STREET____________________________________________ STREET____________________________________________ CITY______________________________________________ STATE_________________________ ZIP____________ COUNTRY_________________ TELEPHONE NUMBER_____________________ Disk Size Prefered 3.5"_____ 5.25"_____ Where did you hear about Professional Capture Systems? ________________________________________ Professional Capture Systems....................$39.00...______ Minnesota residents add 6.5% sales tax...................______ Shipping/Handling - US or Canada.................$4.00...______ Shipping/Handling - Outside of US or Canada.....$15.00...______ ========== Total in US Funds drawn on a US Bank.........______ Make checks payable to: JASC, Inc. Mail to: JASC, Inc. 10901 Red Circle Drive Suite 340 Minnetonka, MN 55343 USA The Thompson Partnership (England) You can order from The Thompson Partnership by payment with cheque or credit card. The credit cards accepted are: MC, Visa and American Express. The numbers for ordering are: 0889 564601 (Voice) or 0889 563219 (FAX) Please use this form when ordering by mail. Professional Capture Systems 1.02 (or latest version) NAME______________________________________________ COMPANY___________________________________________ ADDRESS___________________________________________ ADDRESS___________________________________________ TOWN______________________________________________ CITY______________________________________________ COUNTRY_____________________ POST CODE____________ TELEPHONE NUMBER__________________________ CREDIT CARD TYPE__________________________ CREDIT CARD NUMBER________________________ EXPIRATION DATE___________________________ Disk Size Prefered 3.5"_____ 5.25"_____ Where did you hear about Professional Capture Systems? ________________________________________ Professional Capture Systems...........œ26.00 (UK Pounds) *VAT (at current UK rate)..... ........œ_____ Insured Shipping.......................œ 3.00 ======= Total _______ * VAT is Value Added Tax. If you are a resident of a European Community Country, then you are required to pay the current UK rate. If you are unsure of the current rate, you can contact The Thompson Partnership. Make cheques or EuroCheque payable to: The Thompson Partnership (remember to put your card number on the reverse of the cheque) Mail to: The Thompson Partnership Church Croft, Bramshall, UTTOXETER, Staffs, England ST14 5DE