think(box)

Why is the file order not name-sorted? What you get in All_exe right now is a creation date sort, not a name sort. Granot, see if you can select files by name sort when you scan to create the list. PTE History about creation date sort vs. modified date sort (remember this???):

Nice one Harvey! I like using pause/resume on a mouse button instead of key press or object click. I have recently extended this beyond PTE's built-in features by using mouse movement detection to pause and then do other slideshow and sound control functions. All controls and indicators auto hide for unobstructed view. The many photo additions are very, very nice. I do use the right mouse to "pause the show to read the extensive text," but you might add "or to appreciate the out of this world sights." They are quite impessive, as are the from this world sights pictured that bring us the photos and more. Thanks!

Set options the way you like and create a template from the file menu. Almost every setting is restored when you begin with that template.

Welcome Jim! Sorry that you are having difficulty. I had difficulty figuring out just what you were doing, but maybe this will help. If not please tell us more: When nothing appears in the window, what window are you describing? The window to to left is simply the explorer window. It has whatever path you last explored, and not necessarily anything of interest. The window to the right is the slide list. In this window you *should* see something after reopening a work-in-progress. It sounds like you are opening a .PTE project file that describes work-in-progress, and then when you click OPEN it is already open, so nothing happens. It may help to know that whatever the last project you worked on is, it opens automatically when you restart PTE. It is difficult to keep this from happening (in my experience). You should be able to stop the automatic reopen of previous projects upon PTE restart by unchecking the option, Options --> Advanced Options --> Load Last Used Project. In my experience the checkbox keeps reappearing even though I want it permanently OFF. Usually when you start PTE from the Start --> Programs menu, if anything appears in the slide list, or if anything other than Project1 appears in the PTE title bar at top of screen, you have reopened a previous presentation. Finally, to avoid overwriting .PTE files, keep using SAVE AS... until you know where things are being saved. Each time you use SAVE AS... be sure it is the correct project. The fact that PTE remembers what you were working on previously can cause confusion.

Graham, we would all like to just have the answer to give to your customer, but this is just too vague to solve without some idea of what went wrong, as in the error message. If it is not too much trouble could you ask your customer to put the CD in their Win98 machine and read the error screen to you (for us)? Thanks!

Hi Cindy, In summary, regarding the jumpy slideshow fades that you experienced: You have used the highest required performance fade scenario that can be defined: You used the most extreme contrast that can be, from jet black to 100% white or back between slides You used an intermediate fade time of 2 seconds, while several seconds will be smoother (or effects OFF) You used fullscreen display (the highest pixel count for a given screen area setting. FYI - the jpeg image size, 800x600 for example, has no bearing on fullscreen fade performance) Solution: You said you want fullscreen, so your only options to fix are to not use fade from black to 100% white, but instead use fade to gray or some other lighter shade, or to limit screen pixels (see fullscreen tip at end of this reply) When I originally viewed your Daydreams Demo slideshow I may have noticed jumpy fades but didn't make note if it. I just now watched your slideshow again and sure enough I found jumpy fades. But why are the fades jumpy? Normally we see just a smooth and continuous fade that doesn't appear to be made of many screen repaints, even though it always is(!) When it is smooth it is just subtle and not perceivable. I can say for sure that I viewed your slideshow under the same system and screen settings used for other slideshows that display with smooth fades. Technical reference information regarding fades, and tips for fullscreen slideshow fade success: Jumpiness is visible when a computer is too slow. Screen repaints, when visible, are slightly irregular in repaint timing and this makes the effect stand out even more noticeably. The irregularity is because screen repaint rate varies slightly while a system is being maxed out for the fade. Fades generally max out a computer as they are happening. The rate of repaints is simply fast enough to be invisible on a fast enough computer. For any computer a higher screen area setting requries a faster processor speed to perform fullscreen fade repaints as smoothly. For fullscreen slideshows it does not matter to fade performance whether you use 800x600 (0.5 megapixel) or 2560x1920 (5.0 megapixel) jpeg photos, as long as you are allowing enough time for the system to decompress and convert the jpeg image to screen size between slides. Having to allow enough time between slides is a sync slideshow issue only. Non-sync slideshows just slow down and take more wall clock time, although I would prefer that they just make fades more coarse and preserve slide to slide timing.... The fullscreen fade effect performance is limited within your computer by the number of pixels it takes to draw a visible image frame on your computer screen and by your system color settings. It is further limited as perceived by the degree of contrast between the two images involved. Once P2E adjusts your jpeg photo image to fit fullscreen, the original pixel count and color resolution is irrelevant to subsequent fade performance. In summary the parameters that do affect fullscreen fade performance are: Increased screen area settings --- because they have increased pixel count in each fullscreen frame Increasing the system color setting from 24 to 32 to 48 bit color --- more stress to fade effect performance FYI, beyond 24 bits color setting there is no visible color shade resolution improvement to most people The degree of contrast between the two images involved For a given slideshow and computer without other app's running, the only option for improvement when fades are jumpy is to use a lower screen area setting. On many systems, 640x480 is as low as you can go. And when at this setting the fullscreen images are not as sharp as at higher settings. This is because 640 pixels or segments horizontally is more coarse and lower resolution than 1024 pixels, for example. For the widest majority audience viewing success the slideshow developer can only limit contrast between images or the image pixel count as displayed on screen, since the screen area setting at time of viewing varies widely and is usually controlled by the person viewing your slideshow. Jet-black or otherwise high contrast background tip for fullscreen slideshows: If you place smaller pictures on a background using a photo tool and then display fullscreen, the fade performance is limited by not only the photo content pixels, but by all of the background too (even if unchanging). You can have small pictures (placed variously) fade more smoothly by simply making the jpeg take less pixels during fullscreen display. Two ways to do this are: Make jpegs small and place them using visual object editor so that they do not scale. Pro: Smooth fades --- Con: Image appears different relative size at different viewing screen area settings (unscaled) Modify jpeg so that it has width or height, but not both, that includes slideshow background color to edge of screen. Pro: An image that you do not want to display fullscreen can have higher contrasts with smooth fade --- Cons: You have to edit your jpeg, and this works best with single-color backgrounds The latter technique is a good one because P2E will not waste system performance updating the background color in some fraction of the total screen view. Fade performance is better because the screen is repainted only where your jpeg exists on screen, and this is not 100% of the fullscreen view.

OK Al, here is my translation of Oleg's note. Oleg doesn't give himself enough credit for his English. He does very well in my opinion:

Link to Medwyn's web site: Medwyn Goodall Barry and Ron, I just researched Medwyn and can give you an answer as to why I didn't do anything until now. You didn't give us a link, you didn't say that we could download music samples at his site and you didn't describe the music for those not familiar. After checking out Medwyn's site and music I offer this help, with pleasure: Use the link provided above for Medwyn's site. It is definitely worth a look. I have downloaded a small sampling of music. The music that I sampled is categorically New Age. It is inspirational, pleasant and of very high quality. This is top-shelf music! If Medwyn is looking for interest in royalty-free CDs please count me in. Thanks Barry!

I agree with Al. Igor is taking all reasonable steps to make PTE have the most sophisticated, professional quality effects. Al's request is totally within reason and it may not have such a minority usage once all of the pro- and semi-pro level developers get their hands on it. I also respectfully disagree with Guido regarding the performance demands for many such effects, although I do agree that not all multi-projector effects will be achievable. To blend three images in an effect instead of two requires some additional memory and an incremental increase in processor speed demand. Given only a modest increase in P2E effects generation efficiency the performance cost of a three-way blend could be mostly absorbed and thus have minimal effect on the minimum speed system for a given slideshow.

A note to Igor: By any chance could you add a windows Tool tip to all PTE graphic buttons? The slide_screen/loaf_of_bread/who_knows graphic will be used much more often if a tool tip displays when someone holds the mouse cursor over it. There are about five graphics-only buttons that could use this in main PTE screen, four in the Visual Object Editor and several in the Customize Slide screen tabs. Thanks!

That sounds great Igor. While those who have specialized photo tools may not print as often directly from a slideshow, there are many people to whom we give unprotected slideshows who want to print photos to their liking. I like the list of features that you mentioned. In the Print dialog do you plan a percentage of page or other magnification capability? Perhaps instead of percentage magnification a stretchable and shrinkable outline could be used that starts at actual photo size(?) on virtual paper background and that maintains photo aspect ratio. If you support dragging the outline to desired position on paper graphic, you will make it easy to print multiple passes to fill a page with photos. An additional feature that I would especially like to see in the Print dialog is to preserve original photo file name when Save picture to photo file is selected from the Print dialog (and for Save slide to .bmp too). If this is not too much trouble it would be very nice to have. As you know, right now the name is arbitrary with sequence numbering - e.g. LIFE IS LIFE_Picture1.jpg (name example inspiration credit: Oleg). Thanks!

Ok Paul, it looks like you are all set. For sure the best way is integrated PTE sound volume and muting support. There are many ways to implement any needed feature. The method that I described, using the Mute.exe utility, is preferable to me because there is no visual content at all to the sound control. If a given sound control is to have a visual presence, I prefer that it remains hidden unless recalled by a simple keyboard key or mouse movement. The method that I described operates with the greatest simplicity for the non-sync slideshow audience: Click anywhere in the slide at any time during slideshow to toggle the function, mute or restore. Nothing is left running when the slideshow is closed. The only visual aspect of this sound muting method is a simple note on the first slide, Click anywhere in slide to mute or restore sound. This method is fully compliant with the KISS principle, but it is not a volume control knob or slider. If it better suits needs, Granot's VolumeSlider and MuteSound utilities offer more than just sound mute/restore, as they can modify the sound level setting. They also have a visual presence on the screen. I think that these sound utilities should have an Auto hide function as with PTE's mouse cursor hiding function, such that if you are not moving the mouse they vanish after a few seconds. Move the mouse and they appear. Mouse movement detection is fairly easy to do in software. Perhaps a new utility can be created to perform generic Auto hide for any helper utility that has an unwanted visual presence during a slideshow. I appreciate the concern about where the Mute.exe utility and slideshow .exe files are, but if you place both in the same folder and code the slideshow Run application box with only Mute.exe as described (without drive or folder) it always works. And it works on any windows platform, from hard drive and from CD-ROM. This is because when no drive or folder is specified in the Run application box during slideshow creation, P2E's Run application feature looks in the drive & folder where the P2E slideshow was started.

Paul, I agree that native sound support would be great. For now, I have an idea to consider that could do exactly what you want today. Just create your non-sync slideshow this way: Download a free utility that I have used a lot. It works great and is bug-free: Click for PC World free download of Mute.exe, toggle on-off muting application When descriptive web page appears, click the Download link and enjoy the ads. That is the only price you pay to have this handy and free utility. Granot hasn't had to make this utility because it was already out there in cyberspace. Next, make a master slide as follows: 1. Add any photo as first photo in Slide list (no others yet) 2. In Visual object editor, add a Button 3. Right click the button and select Properties 4. Set Width to 1600 and Height to 1200 pixels 5. Delete the caption text 6. Check the box Transparent background 7. In Action on mouse click select Run application or open file... 8. In Enter program name type in just Mute.exe 9. Click OK and again OK to close Visual object editor Don't worry that your picture looks bluish in the object editor. This is because the whole image has a highlighted transparent button on top of it. You will not see the giant button at all during slideshow playback. And you can add additional (visible) buttons on top of the giant one and those buttons' actions will take precedence if clicked. It works fine. Now duplicate the master slide repeatedly and then substitute your photo file names for the placeholder name: 1. In the Slide list select the master slide, slide 1, by clicking once on it 2. Press Ctrl-C to copy this slide to clipboard 3. Press Ctrl-V repeatedly to paste master slide copies in the Slide list, one per slideshow photo 4. For slide #1, in Show image click the button to the right to select new image file (the navigating folders tedium happens only once) 5. Select each additional image on each successive master slide copies, and replace placeholder image file name until done Finally, do whatever other slideshow definition you want and Create your slideshow. When you play it, you can mute or resume sound at ANY time by simply clicking anywhere in the slide except on visible buttons, hyperlinks or small clickable object photos that you may have placed. They will operate as they were programmed. You must place a copy of the Mute.exe utility in the same folder as the slideshow .EXE file for P2E to be able to find it during playback. On a CD they can both be in root (top) folder or any sub-folder as long as they are both in the same folder. FYI, I have successfully used this whole-screen button technique in many slideshows as a way to return to the clickable thumbnail photo directory from a special clickable slide (by giant button) at the end of each photo set, where there are many sets in a single slideshow. In that case I programmed the giant button to go to a specified thumbnail set slide number near beginning of slideshow. It works great!

Respectfully, without question there are many control freaks out there who like to have, but not give, control. You are not alone by any stretch of the imagination. Control lock-out for those who need it is here to stay. As long as we have it both ways we can all have it our own way.

A global text or graphic that superimposes upon all slides - nice idea! Today, one method is to use a background with text and/or image(s). Use a Project Options --> Screen --> Tiled image photo that will display larger than your photos. Another is to start with one slide and add text and/or graphics in visual object editor. Then copy that slide for as many times as you have photos. Finally add the image name in the Show Image box (button to the right) for each slide in the slide list. Of course a Photoshop action can do a batch modify of your pictures to make the original material have whatever added text and graphics you want, but you probably knew that. There are other ways that should be posted soon enough if you need more ideas.

Assuming that you want to divide the sum of time for both tracks equally per slide, this will happen only if the music duration is, relatively speaking, 96 units of time for first track and 54 units of time for second track. In this special case just check the box Synchronize slideshow to music duration and you're done. If your music is a custom performance or "trimmable" in nature, just trim the music to have the 96 to 54 ratio of playback times. In the more likely scenario you don't have the lucky music timing or don't want to edit the music tracks. In this case you can manually set the timing after calculating slide positions separately. Set slide times in Custom Synchronization to calculated positions by sliding the "slide" graphic indicators around. One other option if you have Microsoft Excel 97 or later is to use Al Robinson's Adjustor model. Here is a link: Click here to go to Al's web page for Adjustor info and download

Stu, Graham --- I would like to add this consideration: It may be necessary to put the text within the bubble first from within the photo app, instead of adding it in the object editor. Then the entire graphic and text will scale together as anyone's screen area setting goes, although it will grow or shrink relative to physical monitor screen dimensions. The text will stay within the bubble this way. Graham --- Igor plans to add support for object (and text???) scaling with next release --- by around year-end if history repeats on release dates. With that support they will not change appearance at different screen area settings. For now objects and text maintain their pixel dimensions, such that for a given object size when compared to physical screen dimensions at 800x600 pixels screen area setting, it has one-half of that relative size at 1600x1200 pixels setting (for example). So if your slideshow will for sure always be viewed at a consistent setting, matching the one that you use within PTE's visual object editor during design, then there is no problem adding text in PTE's visual object editor. One other helpful fact: The objects have a placement "origin" or 0,0 coordinate that is somewhere near their lower left corner (not exactly at the lower left corner). So when you place them think of it as the object origin is being placed at the indicated percentages, x and y on screen. If screen area is changed during different playings of the slideshow the apparent size change of objects and text will make their spacing and position appear different. You can simulate this by using PTE's screen area setting in the visual object editor. This way you can see what things look like in advance of playing back the slideshow at different screen settings. And don't forget that you can "nudge" the position of selected or group-selected objects in visual object editor by using left and right keyboard arrow keys. This allows precise pixel placement.

Marianne, I'm sorry I didn't answer earlier but I just returned to the forum and read your reply. When I read your note I figured out what happened. I was recalling part of an earlier technique on the track name generation. So to be sure I just opened my most recent Music Player in PTE and here is the actual, working setup visible in PTE. There is a lot of detail. I could just email a .PTE file to you, but others may want to see the design ideas too, so here it is. It may help to print this note and use it for reference. Do this by left-mouse drag-selecting the instructional text that you want to print, then right-mouse click the selected text, select Print, and in the Print sheet that pops up click Selection in order to print only selected text and then click OK: I created the background color as a photo file, Music.jpg, and used this for every slide. As a single color jpg that is reused for every track this adds a handful of kilobytes to a player and is insignificant in size. To make Music.jpg, if you know how to define colors in R-G-B, try 0-64-64. This is a deep blue-green. You can make specific colors such as this in MS Paint. In Paint's Colors menu --> Edit Colors, this preset color is four over, five down in the selector. FYI, the background color can also be made in PTE and used with a not-displayed one-pixel image. Use whatever method you want to get the background color. Next, using Music.jpg for an associated music track, make a master slide ONCE as follows(!): 1. Add Music.jpg to Slide List once 2. Click Customize Slide and check the box to Use customized settings for this slide 3. In Main --> Timing, check the box Use own time preference 4. Enter time in seconds for the current music track, picking arbitrary value for the master slide (later get from Media Player or other music app for actual tracks) 5. In Comments --> Customize Comments, check box Use own text preference 6. Click Font and select Arial Bold size 10 7. Click Font color graphic and select color. I used a shade of yellow (over two, down two in selector) 8. Make Shadow color jet black if not already. I used shadow size 1. 9. Set position to Top and click Center for alignment 10. In Effects, check Use own transition effect, scroll down and click Quick (no transition effect) to be sure effects are disabled 11. In Music, check box Play new background music file(s) 12. Click Add and specify a music track (this is the master slide, so you will change music later) 13. Finally, click OK on Customize Slide #1 screen, completing the master slide Next in Project Options set the following: 1. In Main check the box Use your own icon and set a 32x32 icon. I have two I can send you in email if you want - just email me to ask. One is a headphones graphic and the other is a musical notes graphic. Use only a 32x32 icon. The other size is unnecessary. Your icon file should be 32x32 pixels and 256 colors, with a file size of 2238 bytes. FYI some icon creation tools make unusable icons so that is why you should check them. 2. Click Repeat show until escape is pressed so that music player doesn't stop at last track 3. I have Display each slide for (4) seconds checked (should not be needed since custom slide overrides) 4. In Advanced tab, Action for left mouse click should be Prev. slide 5. Action for right mouse click should be Next slide 6. Check the box Always show mouse cursor 7. Check the box Show Navigation Bar. Under Customize Navigation Bar I have everything but Print in use, position Center 8. In Music, I checked boxes Play background music and Repeat music after playing. At least one of these checkboxes used to be required (a bug, since fixed). 9. In Comments, little is used. BE SURE TO UNCHECK Set comments for all slides as box, or else the comments (track names) that you enter in a moment will be erased when you save and reopen Music Player in PTE. 10. In Screen, check the boxes Fit to screen and Use smoothing so that any size single color jpeg fits. Set to 100% if not already. 11. Set Caption of show to Music Player 12. Click Windowed mode 13. Set Width to 400, Height to 80 (I had incorrectly mentioned 100 in previous reply) 14. In Background, click Solid color and select 0-64-64 as four over, five down. This is needed to prevent brief jet-black color at player startup. 15. In Effects you can redundantly disable effects (should not be necessary) 16. In Messages, you shouldn't have to change anything 17. Click OK to close Project Options screen Now it is time to save all of this work! Do File --> Save as and pick a name like Master Player. This is the .pte save, not a slideshow create. You could also do File --> Templates --> Create Template from this Show. Next, copy the master slide for each track that you will include in music player. Select it in the Slide List and press Ctrl-C to copy to clipboard. Then press Ctrl-V to paste as many instances total as you have music tracks to use for the player. Then below the Slide List manually add the Comment to each "slide" (one per music track), as in the following example: Orinoco Flow (Sail Away) - Watermark by Enya Now for each "slide" or music track, select the slide, click Customize Slide and do the following: 1. In Main, enter the correct music file playback time (get from Media Player or other music app for each actual .MP3 or .Ogg track). This becomes the length of time that the (blank) slide is displayed and music is played. When one track (a slide) finishes, the next begins --- due to this setting. 2. In Music tab remove the dummy track and add the actual track for that "slide" or track number, corresponding to the slide comment that you defined below the slide list. Music file name and slide Comment can of course be different (this was listed incorrectly in previous reply). 3. Click OK to close Customize Slide #x screen. If you would like, modify the PTE help screen text in Project menu --> Customize Help Message. It is available during Music Player operation through the F1 keyboard key or the "?" graphic button in the PTE navigation bar included in the Music Player per above instructions. Here is the text that I use, for example (slightly modified to remove references to my scripted mouse activation for music player): Finally click Create and specify a preferred file name for the player. I just use MusicPlayer (no space character in name since some app's have trouble with it). Then do File --> Save as and specify Music Player (spaces are OK here) to save this player's .pte file complete with all track information. By all means, modify any of the above procedure to suit your preferences. If you create any modifications that improve the player it would be great to share them here. Thanks

Hi Ed - I've used Granot's donation link myself. Go to Granot's web page linked from any of his forum entries and look for the words "Make a donation" part-way down the page. Click it and you get a secure payment server to make the donation.

Good point Inna. It is wise to save the order number on paper in addition to the key file when someone makes a backup of PTE registration info. The order number alone provides a way to get the key file in the event of a hard drive crash and the key file was not saved elsewhere. The order number on paper should be more difficult to lose. While the key may be storable on paper, I wouldn't even attempt to transcribe it. And WnSoft's order number based key retrieval makes transcription unnecessary. I hope that you can also just do a search by customer name and location or email address as a last resort when all else was lost.

Marianne, this is a slideshow type that I have created quite often. I suggest using a navigation mechanism since you said there are about 300 slides. You will receive feedback that getting to a slide far from the first is tedious if you do not provide a navigator. Igor is planning a native navigation control in the next release, such that you can jump to any slide. If you want to build one yourself to use now, here are some of the methods that I have used: 1 -- Clickable thumbnail photo index, about 70 thumbs per slide (5 thumbnail slides for your show) 2 -- Clickable thumbs section index, one thumb per subject section 3 -- Left-side vertiical, clickable navigation "bar" (any pic) with adjacent hyperlinks for section starts Methods 1 and 3 are tedious unless you know and use a script or macro to automatically generate the .PTE file. The PTE GUI takes too much clicking to generate navigators using these methods. Perhaps method 2 is best since you do not make lots of this type slideshow. Make a number of thumbs on your first or home slide in the visual object editor and have each use "go to slide #" to get to section starting slides. Teach your viewers to use the following key assignments by simply adding a few words to the first slide: Left arrow key to view previous slide Right arrow key to view next slide Left mouse click to pause/resume slideshow (use 4 sec per slide as Ken suggested) Right mouse click or "Home" key to return to (first) navigation slide Those key and click assignments make it a breeze to control the slideshow, and with the list of key and click definitions on the first or home slide your viewers will know what to do. The left/right arrow keys already work that way in non-sync slideshows, permanently coded that way by Igor. The left/right mouse click functions need your settings. Do this in Project options --> Advanced. Select "Pause" for left mouse click and "Go to first" for right mouse click. Next, use PTE's navigation bar (check the Show Navigation Bar box in Project options --> Advanced). Click "Customize Navigation Bar" button and do the following: On the "Position" selector, use Right-Top for best button location Click "Remove" for all nav buttons except "Print" OK that screen. Then in Project Options --> Advanced check the box "Allow to restore pictures via Print button" This will place only the "Print" button in top-right of screen, least obstructing the view. Teach your viewers that they can save a copy or print the picture using that button. A few words on first slide will cover this, or use PTE's help screen feature as I do, so that you can have a more verbose description of the four Print button sub-selections. Have music in your non-sync slideshow. I use a method in which the music is a separate P2E slideshow, complete with full PTE nav bar, except no print button. This allows full, independent control of the music player. The picture shown is just a single deep color, pleasant background. The nav bar is positioned "Center". The show mode in windowed, 400x100 pixels. Set this in Project options --> Screen --> Windowed mode. While there, set "Caption of show" to "Music Player". Next, enable slideshow comment text. Name your music files as you want track names to appear. In Project options --> Comments, check the box "Set comments for all slides as" and select "Picture name". For text alignment click "Center". For text position click "Top". Select a light color text and common font to go on deep color background that you use for "slide image", selected previously. Make each music track a separate MP3 or Ogg file. If you are making only one of a kind you may choose to not make a separate music player, but the independent control really is a hit with the viewers if you do. Just include a "Start music" button in the slideshow first or home slide that is set to Run application, and name the music player slideshow .EXE file for the action. This way your viewers can optionally decide to have music, and can change the track at any time by recalling the music player from taskbar (I use a more advanced method - just move mouse to top of screen to view or hide Music Player, figured out once and used in all shows). Finally, use PTE's template feature to save the rather lengthy slideshow setups so that new photo and music player slideshows are a breeze to make. I save "blank" templated thumb slideshow as a .PTE file that works with external script/macro to make fully thumbnailed slideshows, but you won't need to do this if you select navigation method #2 from above. Between these ideas and the ones just mentioned by Granot in the other topic thread you have plenty of options. Have fun!

Life is Life! Oleg and team RSS, as always your slideshow is a true pleasure to watch and is so entertaining! To think that I just watched and really enjoyed a presentation about ... insects and arachnids! Amazing

John, in case you have not yet solved the mystery.... Is your Internet Service Provider Tiscali by any chance? If so, here is help for Tiscali users, plus a way to make it work: Click for Tiscali topic and help

Larry, in case you haven't yet successfully captured the PTE key from the Windows registry as described, I have a utility PTEkey.exe that can capture the key and save it for you, as long as the key data has not been lost on the failing hard drive. I will send email to you through your forum Email button. Please reply with your return email address and then I'll send the utility to you directly. Just run PTEkey.exe and it will recreate the 231 byte pte.txt key file in the same folder where the PTEkey.exe utility is located. You can then save the pte.txt key file to a CD-R disc or other safe storage medium. PTEkey.exe will read the PTE key from the Windows registry official storage location and write out the exact syntax as WnSoft mailed the key to you in a file created with pte.txt file name. This matches the key file name that WnSoft has used for key attachments. For anyone who has lost their key file, PTEkey.exe will recreate it for you so that you can safely store it. Just send email to me from the button below and request the PTEkey.exe utility. This utility will not generate a key from thin air to make an unregistered copy of PTE work. You must have a working, registered version of PTE on your system for a key to exist in the Windows registry storage location and thus, for this utility to work.

SLIDESHOW PAUSE AND NAVIGATION, OPTIONALLY IN SYNC SLIDESHOW Igor, my expectation is that you want to "checkbox-eliminate" the distinction between sync and non-sync slideshows, in terms of PTE navigation features. The nav bar would become available in a slideshow that today we call "synchronized". Left, right and home (etc.) will work as they do today in a non-sync slideshow. The complication lies in the music control. Either you have to make the choice for us, or give us the choice to do the following: Continue playing music until slideshow is resumed, then resume music at correct time in track - OR - Halt music gracefully with pause, and resume it at correct track time when slideshow is resumed I prefer that we are given the choice by checkbox in project options (or whatever new user interface you make, since you said you may make changes). Regarding Al's suggestions for jump to any slide, and to provide fast forward or fast reverse: These are far more significant changes, but are most welcomed! "Jump to any slide" will work best with a GUI navigation mechanism. Fast forward and reverse as Al describes it is likely to demand too much performance (sampled sound skip ahead/back and rapid video changes!) But if you can compromise and give at least a "no-sound" option to rapidly advance or rewind images temporarily without effects this would be great. The performance demands of including sound samples may not be excessive, but to do rapid movement from image to image without temporarily eliminating effects is prohibitive. One final note - if you include sound in a fast forward or reverse feature, please do successive sampling method so that the PITCH of music is preserved. Al suggests making the sound "squeal" at high-speed playback. The best A/V devices made today use successive sound segments appended during fast forward or reverse, so that you simply miss some of sound but can still recognize it, and a voice or musical note's PITCH is unmodified. PROPORTIONAL SCALING To have all images optionally always scale to appear relatively the same at any screen area setting is a most welcomed feature. This would be a valuable change to the visual object editor features. Making it optional, as you suggest, will be helpful. Please give us this feature! As always, THANK YOU IGOR!