Marcovelo

Hi Andreas, Can you give us more details about the problem you exeperience with FlashPTE Demo ? What is your OS (Windows version ) ? In which screen resolution do you work ? Can you try the following test: 1) rename "show.xyz" in "demo.exe" 2) run "demo.exe" Does the problem still here ? Thanks for your help. Marco

Do you want to display 3D text effects on your slide ? Do you want to pan, zoom in and out on your image ? Do you want to rotate your image ? Do you want to display animations in your show ? Coming soon, a new PTE Demo show by Marco and Granot...

Hi, Thank you Al and Stu for your answers. I understand I cannot use parameter currently (as extention association can be different on users computers). So I also vote and wait for PTE to support this feature which seems to be not so complex to add, and really important for me. (in "Run external application" on a specific slide, but also "Run appliction after last slide"). Igor, what do you think ?. Marco

Hi ! Is there a way to call an external application with parameters ? (in Customize Slide/Advanced options/Run external apllication). For example, how to call: Notepad.exe "readme.txt" Thanks. Marco

Granot, OK, I send it again right now. This is strange because it was already zipped and sent to the same address... And no "mail delevery error"... The zip attatched is 1,08 Mb, and may be it is to big. If it doesn't work again, I'll try to make a smaller example. Tell me. Thanks. Marco

Hi Granot, Did you correctly received the example show I sent you yesterday by email ? Does it work on your system ? Thanks. Marco

Hi Granot, Sorry, I didn't notice you have updated your file. Esc key issue is fixed, but the taskbar is still here when line 4=999 and line 10=no. I prepare an example and send it to you by email, because I don't want to "pollute" Beechbrook with only example and "junky test shows" (not even tested on other systems) . I hope I can have time to build a real show (with nice images, music and synchro) and share it on Beechbrook site (I will try !). Also, I plan to create a download area on a personnal site for this purpose. But I have not enough time !!!!!! (How do you do ?????) Thanks ! Marco

Hello, I vote for it ! Does it handle background (gif) transparency ? In any case, this is a great improvement for PTE users... Marco

Granot, I also feel I have to share some examples now, but I was waiting (sorry, I really don't want to put pressure on you !) for your finalized version, with no taskbar when scroll is disable. Moreover, I've no personnal web site (for the moment, it is a "todo" task for me...) to download from, but I can send you an example by email, for sure ! This will be only an example or "demo" show, because I have not enought "free time" dedicated to PTE right now ! (my baby cry... !). But may be this can also help (or convinced) other PTE users... I want to build a zip file, includind 1 PTE show, and using 2 Flash animations, stored in 2 separated folders (I have to copy ShowFlash twice, in each folder). Please tell me if a version with "no taskbar when noscroll" is available, I'll will test it. Also, what is the attachment maximum size I can send you by email ? (I can also send you the show and swf files, plus instructions...). Thank you again for all... Marco

Granot, Thank you for all your fixes. No problem in setting real dimension for the movie, it works perfectly. I agree with you when you say that the movie should be smaller than show. I think this is the more usual way for intros, titling, etc... But because your utility permits to play the movie at full screen, this allow a very interesting effect (in my opinion), which is to simulate "transparent background" on text (or even image) animation. The trick is to use the same image on both Flash movie background and current displayed PTE slide, with same dimension. In this case, the user even doesn't now he is watching a Flash movie (you cannot notice the appearance of the flash movie because it is the same image displayed in the beginning of the swf movie), and he can see "flying letters" or 3D animated text on current displayed slide. Then, the next slide can appear in a nice fade in and the show can continue with PTE. Of course, it requires to test the exact timing and to prepare the show for fixed screen resolution (800x600 and 1024x768 is enough in my opinion, as most users use these 2). The result is very very good ! Other interesting effects in fullscreen Flash movies are zoom and pan (for example) on whole image, and I'm still testing this. I've already obtained nice effects. But may be I'm using your utility in a strange way, I admit ! I'm not sure ! I've just tried to execute ShowFlash on my second computer (with clean Win 2000 Pro install), which has no Flash.ocx in the system folder, and it displayed a dialog box saying "Macromedia Flash Player is not installed, do you want to download it ?". I replied "No", then, I copied Flash.ocx, registered it with Regsvr32, and ShowFlash runs perfectly. May be I miss something, what do yo think ? I'm really sad about this. I personnaly think that one software like PTE cannot handle all "graphic technologies", so, if a third party utility like yours can provide animation (like Flash or PannoRunner or animated GIF) and can be smartly executed from the show, this is really great. Even if I'm not using GIF, I saw several posts asking Igor to support it. And I really understand too that Igor is working on other tasks, with actual software architecture of PTE. BUT YOU ARE OUR WORKAROUND ! Thank you for all. To Maureen: I hope you achieve to download ant test this nice utility. It would be great if you can share your feeling about it. Thank you in advance ! Marco

Hi Granot, My report about ShowFlashTaskBar: 1) Restore Flash.txt: OK, it works perfectly. 2) Hidden TaskBar: works OK when using a scrolling option (line 3), but the taskbar is still visible when setting 999 at line 4 (no scroll). 3) ESC key issue: during playback, pressing ESC exit from ShowFlash, but the taskbar is not restored. I think it would be better to completly disable the ESC key during ShowFlash execution, if it is possible (also to not disturb the show). 4) Movie size (Line 5 + Line 6): I don't now exactly how it is supposed to work, but if you specify bigger dimension in Line 5 and 6 than your real movie size, the movie is correctly displayed (with Line 5 and 6 dimension), but ShowFlash seems to be crashed (no scroll, and never end). But may be it is not allowed to set other dimension than original movie... Suggestion for the Readme overview (please make changes and correct my poor english !): "This utility will enable you to open a Flash movie (SWF file format) over your show. You can scroll it from it's start position out of screen, or display it for a specified time. All configurations are done on "Flash.txt" file. ShowFlash does not display any interface elements (no buttons or menu), so the Flash animation can be harmoniously integrated to your show, even in fullscreen mode. This utility requires Macromedia Flash Player to be installed on your system. Otherwise, a dialog box will propose you to download it from the Internet (about 900Kb). It's free. Note: Flash is a graphic animation format created by Macromedia, and originaly designed for the Web. It allows text and image animation with amazing effects. Several animation softwares exist on the market, providing .SWF export format." Remark: I'm still surprised that your utility does not cause more reaction from other PTE users. I wonder if it is because it requires Flash to be previously installed on the system, or for other reasons (because Flash is associated with Web ?). In the first case, may be we can add Flash.ocx in the zip file to be copied in Window system folder, and then registered with Regsvr32 ? It is just an idea... Any comment about this from other PTE users ? Somebody else has tested ShowFlash on his system ? (what about performance on a 1Ghz CPU with Pan or Zoom on image ?) Thank you again. Marco

Ok Granot, I'll check this new version and let you know as soon as possible. I'm completly stupefied about your reactivity ! Also, I'll try to help in suggesting an overview. Thanks ! Marco

Hi Granot, I've tested your last version and it works OK. Now, the movie is correctly centered whatever its dimension, using x=0.5 and y=0.5. Diagonal scrolling works too. Really nice ! One of my test was to simulate "a transparent background" with text animation in the middle of the show: I used the same large image in the Flash animation and in PTE, displayed exactly at the same position on the screen, so the text seems to be displayed with a transparent background. And the result is perfect ! (to everybody: we can have incredible intros or 3D text effects in our show now !). Moreover, the animation with text is smooth and fast, (even on my old PC: 350 Mhz), and does not disturb PTE at all ! This is great ! The only problem is the taskbar, which appears during Flash playback. Is it possible to hide the taskbar when ShowFlash is running ? (when the movie dimension is the same than screen resolution, the taskbar is overlapped and it's OK) Thank you Granot for your great job ! Marco

Hi Granot, Thank you very much for your upgrade, but you're programming too fast, as I have even not finished to test the new possibilities of your last version !!! The "noscroll" and "timeout" new options work well, thank you ! And also the new positionning using line 11 and 12 is perfect ! This is really great ! But I'm a bit confused, because I think there is a problem with "standard positionning" (line 1 and 2 in Flash.txt) when using my own swf files, with bigger movie size than in your example (your default Flash.swf included in the zip). May be there is an error when detecting movie dimensions in your player. I tried to create a new simple animation with SwishMax, sized to 400x300, with Flash.txt like below: 0.5 0.5 ScrollRight 999 400 300 ========================================================== More free programs:http://www.thailandphotoalbum.com/#programs ========================================================== no 0 0 1024 768 5000 But it's not centered on the screen. When I create my own swf in 150x80, it works OK, like with your example... It seems the problem exists in both versions (ShowFlash and ShowFlashInitialPos), but I can't beleive I haven't notice the problem during my first test (may be it was too late in the night !). Could you try to build another bigger animation and test it on your side with x=0.5 and y=0.5 ? Regarding the restore option (for flash.txt), it is still strange: the file is restored in C:\temp (with no default values, only comments), but ShowFlash.exe is crashed, displaying a white square on the top left of the screen (and must be closed manually in the taskbar). When it is crashed, it is possible to click and drag the "white square" (which is at the dimension of the Flash movie) over the screen. Strange.. Again, it is not an important issue in my opinion: users are not supposed to delete or modify this file ! I'm still testing "size and position problem" and will report to you. Thank you again. Marco PS: I wasn't able to download your last version, the link doesn't work, but it seems to be new exciting features !

Hi Granot, First, thank you for all your great contribution to PTE and for your very interesting utilities ! I'm surprised because there is almost no reaction on the forum about your very good utility "ShowFlash", and it is a great tool for PTE users, opening PTE shows to Flash possibilities...(and animations !). In my opinion, your Flash player is very interesting because it can be harmoniously integrated in our show (no window, no play/stop control, etc...), using the "Run external application" option on selected slide. I've made some tests on several swf files (with text and small image animation, like zoom, pan...) inside PTE shows, with quite good results, despite my old PC (Pentium II 350 Mhz). Also, I would be very very interested in test results and experiences from other PTE users, with more powerfull CPU for example, or other Windows plateform (I use Windows 2000 Professional). Here is my feedback and questions: 1) Initial position of the flash object: I understand your choice to specify position in percentage of screen size (in order to handle different screen resolutions I suppose) and it works OK, but I think it would be interesting to have the posibility to set initial position in pixels too, to be able to place an object with absolute accuracy. Of course, it makes sense only for fixed resolution shows, but can allow interesting effects, like simulating transparency in Flash file (same background in Flash file and current displayed slide at ShowFlash startup, for example). 2) Scrolling speed: Is it CPU speed dependent ? Or is it like with PanoRunner utility ? I have tested different speed values in 1024x768 resolution with your default Flash.swf file on my computer, with X and Y initial position set to 0.5 (from starting ShowFlash to full end): Speed 30= 23s Speed 15= 19s Speed 10=13s Speed 5= 13s Speed 1= 13s Is it same result on all computers ? On my computer, the scrolling is quite smooth (with small Flash animations), even if it's slow. Nice ! 3) Disabling scrolling: is there a way to disable scrolling ? (like a value in line 3 in Flash.txt, for example "NoScroll" ?). I noticed that changing Width and Height (bigger than original Flash size) can disable the scroll, but in this case the program never ends (try with w=600 and h=400). Is it a normal behavior ? I really vote for an option "NoScroll" in Flash.txt ! 4) Suggestion: it would be nice also to have an option in Flash.txt to control the scroll, from a start position, to a final position (this can be in percentage of screen size too, like from x=0,2 y=0.2 to x=0,8 y=0.8) 5) Flash.txt file restore: it is not really an important option (because we still have the original file in your zip file), but I tried to delete Flash.txt file, obtained the restore dialog box, selected "restore" button, and it seems that ShowFlash crashed (only a white square displayed at position 0,0 and nothing else, no restore). But again, it's not an important issue for me... 6) Just a dream ! (and global reflexion...): I'm really not an expert in Flash, nor in Flash player, but I've seen a player using OpenGL hardware acceleration (Swiff Player, available for free at http://www.globfx.com/downloads/swfplayer), providing Flash animation rendering at maximum framerate even in full screen, using the power of the graphic card. The performance is outstanding ! (please, have a look !). Swiff Player cannot be used in PTE shows because it starts in window mode, its hardware acceleration option can't be set at startup, and finally, the player doesn't quit at the end of the animation. Be sure I don't want to compare your player with an other (yours is the only best for PTE, and thanks again !), and I suppose that making Flash (or other animation format) rendered from video memory using double buffering is not an easy task ! In the other hand, I'm still very disapointed when I see the power of our graphic card unused (I think most of our PCs are equiped with powerfull 3D graphic cards now, like mine, a GeForce 256 and 4 years old). I really understand Igor's choice to not use graphic hardware acceleration (for compatibility reason I suppose, and this is a very important point), but I dream in a third party utility (like yours) using this technology and that can be integrated in PTE shows. Just a dream, may be... Thank you very much, Granot, I really like your "approach" of PTE (sorry, I don't now if it's correct in english) and all your "goodies". Marco

Ian, I've tried (quickly) Mediashow, and in my opinion, the "push effect" wasn't so good on my computer (flichering). Proshow (already discussed in previous thread) seems to be really better on this kind of transition effect (smooth and better resolution). But this is not really "panning" or "zooming", this is "push" from 1 slide to another, like many slideshow programs. I was dreaming on some effect like in GlobFx, where you can define speed of the pan, direction, zoom amount (and with audio synchro !)... The problem is that Globfx is not really designed to work for big show (100/150 slides), and not maintained anymore (and no great forum like this one !). I really don't want to promote GlobFx or any other software vs P2E (my prefered), as this is P2E forum, but if somebody want to have an idea on Pan/Zoom possibilties, you can try it (http://www.globfx.com/downloads/composer) and see tutorial examples (200 ko .exe output file). Imagine such features added to PicturesToExe ! My dream ! Azmi, I've also tested Still motion Creator, but this is "video software", with video output format, large files, very long encoding process... This is not Slideshow, but video program ! Guido (and others), did you tried this program (GlobFx) ? What do you think ? Is there any idea we can pick up ? -> I'm interested in your reactions. Thank you Igor and everybody for this great forum ! Marco

Thanks Guido and Ian for your reply. I will have a look on Mediashow with my 3 years old graphic card (GeForce 256, older than GeForce2) to see how it runs. Does Mediashow requires powerfull 3D Graphic card ? I've already tried GlobFx, and it runs Ok on my P2 + GeForce 256 (your Xmas card is great Ian, it is animated and with very nice effect !) Like Ian, I'm wondering if zoom/pan are so demanding for "actual" graphic card. I mean, we are all using pictures, Photoshop or PSP or equivalent software, using audio editors, etc.. and our PCs, even old, are almost all equiped with 3D card now. Today, all computers are sold with very powerfull 3D graphics, and even more than necessary for us. Which PC cannot run Open GL apps today ? I know the goal is to make shows that run smoothly on all computers, with synchro, but we can also imagine an option like "enable Pan/zoom transition" (only for "fast" computers, even only for unsynchronized shows ) ? Or a new special "object" ? May be this is a big task to implement this in P2E (using Open Gl or DirectX or direct win32 primitives ?), but this would be a revolution for this software. I'm sure Igor can give us more answer about this point. Marco

I would like to push out the idea of Stigt in his post on Feb 2 regarding "Pan & zoom" feature, as a separate thread (I was surprised the discussion died on this important point). I'm really really really interested if this feature could be added to PicturesToExe, and in my opinion, this will make PicturesToexe the best slideshow software (if not yet !), with no rival. Yes, we all love P2E for its outstanding dissolve, and high quality "statical" image show features. But imagine introducing panning and zoom ! This will make your show like a real movie, just using statical source images. It's like breaking the traditionnal slideshow idea, not only displaying a picture (even with transition effect between pictures), but making the picture live ! I think this is one of the main reason for me about choosing numerical slideshow vs classical slideshow (with projector, as projectors still provide better dissolve and fade !). GlobFx offered a solution, but it is not maintained anymore. Igor, you said on Feb 3 you were really interested and completing tests: what about results ? Is it technicaly possible with actual P2E architecture ? What about CPU or graphic card requirements ? What do you mean Guru by saying "both pan and zoom should demand movie-like images, very difficult to have with a really high picture quality" ? Who has an idea how to add this feature in actual P2E interface ? (this is not exactly a transition effect between 2 slides, but 1 slide with animation) I have time for doing tests if needed (I'm programmer), can I help you Igor ? Any idea folks ? Marcovelo