aplman

Thanks John ... I agree entirely! I suppose I've never had more than 6 or 7 text objects on a slide, so was not too bothered by the non-unique names. Now that you have mentioned it, I will no doubt be conscious of your point, and may even become annoyed by it! Normally I complain about any software aspect that I feel needs improving. However, with PTE it's been different, because it's such an impressive and lovable product, and Igor seems very responsive to our wishes. Thanks again for taking the opportunity I presented! Ken T.

Hi John ... I'm intrigued as to what other shortcomings annoy you. I've been happy so far with the text facilities, apart from lack of a default font. It probably means I'm not doing fancy stuff, so I'm sure I could learn from your experience. Best Regards Ken T.

With respect, I think you are wrong on two counts. Firstly, you appear to have your own meaning of the term "File extension". Throughout the life of Windows (and DOS before that), "extension" has meant the part of the name after the dot -- e.g. the ".PTE" part of "MYNAME.PTE". It does not mean the extra info that makes Detail View different from List View. Neither of your screen shots in the previous post shows file extensions. For the benefit of anyone who is unaware, both Detail View and List View can show file names with or without the extension. See Folder Options, View tab, "Hide extensions for known file types". I very strongly advise NO TICK on that item. Secondly, point (3) ... On a new project, the first "Save" behaves the same as "Save As". Whether you use Save or Save As on a new project, you can change the file name and/or extension from the default PROJECTNAM.PTE to whatever you want. It's all very well to say "Enough said" -- but let's get it right first! Cheers and Best Wishes to all Ken T.

Hello Jose ... I'm glad you have the same approach to file names as I do. I apologise if I made any wrong assumptions as to how people work. It really was because Brian's carefully documented screen shots were lacking file extensions. He is much more experienced with PTE than I am, so I guessed if that's how he works, possibly others who are less experienced work the same way. We all have our own golden rules, don't we? What's golden to one may not be so golden to another!!! Nice to be in touch and in tune ... Regards from Down Under Ken T.

My apologies -- that link insertion did not work. Please copy/paste this one: http://www.granneman.com/techinfo/windows/showextensions/ Ken T.

I have been reading this topic with interest, but with decreasing interest. I have resisted the temptation to throw in my "two-pennyworth". May I offer just one thought. Windows allows the user to see file names WITH or WITHOUT the file extension. In my opinion, ANY user is better off seeing the file name WITH extension. MYTRIP.PTE is far clearer than MYTRIP as an identification of a file. Why hide the extension? It gives at least a clue as to file type. I absolutely abhor file listings which do not show the file extension - they can be confusing and/or misleading. As an example, consider a Panasonic Lumix digital camera that allows a sound comment to be recorded with each image. The image file P1010123.JPG is accompanied by a sound file P1010123.MOV - the first part of those names shows that they correspond, and the second part - the extension - shows which is which. Yet if a file listing does not show file extensions, both files would appear to have the same name. That, in my view, is asking for big trouble! Here is one opinion on the matter: http://www.granneman.com/techinfo/windows/showextensions/ So I would nominate it as a GOLDEN RULE -- think of any file in terms of name.extension (e.g. MYTRIP.PTE). If this golden rule is followed, there would be no chance of thinking that a .PTE file is a .DAT file. I sincerely hope some members (especially Jose) get some value from my comment. Ken T.

Summing up, I meant this topic to be about how we specify the font we want. Certainly not about the merits of particular fonts. We can already choose any font we want, it's just that it requires user action for EVERY TEXT OBJECT. To specify our preference once per project would be really good. To specify our preference once and once only - for ALL future projects - would be even better (templates to the rescue!) If I really must labour the point ... a DVD of 8 projects, 120 slides per project, just 10% needing a couple of text objects, that's about 200 text objects. Multiplied by 5 (?) clicks per text object -- a thousand clicks where just a few could do the job. As for the merits of specific fonts ... the web is of no concern to me. I am producing shows for PC or DVD. Discussion of web-safe fonts surely belongs in some other topic. Thanks to supporters! And thanks in anticipation to Igor! Regards Ken T.

Hi Jose! May I make two points ... Firstly, the message is not false. Whether they exist or not, these are two different folders: E:\PTE\109-PTEs\...\101-Slides JPEG and E:\PTE\101-Slides JPEG Secondly, you might try to fix the PTE file by editing it with Notepad (or any text editor). It should be an easy matter to fix the file or folder name of the offending slide - but be careful to find all occurrences of the name. Regards Ken T.

Hi John! Thank you for reminding me of the relevance of Templates. I realise that I have not made full use of that facility, and I shall now do so. However, templates provide no help with a default font for text objects. Captions, yes, but not text objects. If we had a way of nominating a font for new text objects, then that choice would presumably be encapsulated in a template. Cheers! Ken T.

Thank you, Peter. Good to have returned to the original very simple point! Ken T.

Apparently Text Objects inserted into a slide in O & A always start life as Times New Roman. I do not like Times New Roman - I do like Comic Sans MS for my shows. I spend much tedious time changing the font for every new text object. However, I would not like my preference to be forced on other people. May we please have a project option to set a preferred font as the default for new text objects? I would like to suggest an additional tab in the Project Options dialog - either "Text Objects", or "Fonts", where fonts for other purposes such as Comments could also be included. Ken T.

Hello Peter! Nice to find you and I are of one accord -- not the first time! I wouldn't call it a "major" weakness, only because I feel the programming involved to fix this weakness would be "minor". But if Igor has another think about this, we might get what we need! Thank you, Igor. If I might extend the idea further ... It would be desirable to have not only "Project Options", but also "Default Options" or "Installation Options". Each user probably has favourite items that he/she would standardise on across projects. Project Options enable us to avoid specifying things separately for every slide. Default or Installation Options would enable us to avoid specifying things for each project. Best Wishes ... Ken T.

All my travel slideshows use animation on just about every slide. Perhaps I am not alone in that. I sometimes use a program I have written to add keypoint objects and Ken Burns effects into the PTE file, but that sometimes causes difficulties. Mostly I have to create keypoints on each slide manually, and that takes a lot of mouse-clicks. Much time and effort could be saved if there was a project option to have certain keypoints inserted into all slides of a project by default. I would sometimes choose to have two (PrevEffectEnd and NextEffectBegin) and sometimes four (SlideBegin and SlideEnd as well). That would leave me the task of adjusting the time offsets if necessary. Would this idea perhaps appeal to many others? Regards Ken T.

May I ask the experts please ... How can I set a "default font" for all new text objects that I create in O & A? I've spent a lot of time changing "Times New Roman" to "Comic Sans MS". Copy/paste of existing objects helps a bit, but ... surely there must be a better way? Thanks ... Ken T.

Is this simply because the screen space available for the preview window is changing? I use "Horizontal View". On my system, with the example I have just studied, the slides list takes a little more vertical space than the timeline. So the preview window is taller in TimeLine View. In either view, the image is centred vertically in the available space. Regards Ken T.

On using the "Startup Window" feature for the first time, I found that the "Preview from Current Slide" button causes the Startup Window to appear. Another user action is necessary before the desired preview begins. I suggest that we don't really want to see the Startup Window when we use the Preview from Current Slide button. It's unnecessary, it's inappropriate, and it's a nuisance! I trust this can be fixed very soon ... thanks. Ken T.

Hello Igor ... I was interested to try PTE 6.0.4 (special edition) in relation to my previously reported problem. http://www.picturestoexe.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=11578&st=40&p=74125&fromsearch=1entry74125 Here is what I found. Previously I had both "Show real slides in Slide list" and "Show real slides in Mini-player" ticked. I disabled "Show real slides in Slide list", and got the same strange behaviour as before. I have a movie picture of the screen behaviour, which you could access at: home.pacific.net.au/~kentravers/PTE-Win7/P1030964.MOV (apologies for the file size - 143 MB, still uploading as I write this) Here is an additional observation from a few days ago. Once when I encountered "the problem", I decided to let the thing run for as long as I could. After a long time (perhaps 20 minutes?) I got a Windows message to the effect that my system appeared to be performing very poorly, due to shortage of resources - would I like Windows to disable the aero interface?". I replied Yes, and the program then continued without a problem. I hope this is useful information for you. Please let me know if I can tell you more. Dell Studio XPS 8000 Core i5 750 4 GB RAM ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series Windows 7 Professional 64-bit Regards and Best Wishes Ken Travers (professional programmer since 1962)

There seems to have been some confusion about the difference between the Folder Tree (display is optional) and the File List (which I would like to be optional, but we're stuck with it). Nevertheless, may I suggest that a far more general facility would be the ability to drag-and-drop images from outside PTE ... for example, from the desktop, or from another open application. Please? Ken T

Peter - I'm totally thrilled that my suggestion has struck a chord with you! Thank you so much for the immediate feedback! I was inclined to send my suggestion as a private message to Igor, as I have found that one or two suggestions of mine have spawned responses that were not in line with my expectations. Now I am more inclined to feel that I have judged the mood of the forum appropriately. Thank you enormously! I'm looking forward to more feedback from experienced PTE fans. Regards to all ... APLman (Ken Travers)

Hello Igor ... SUGGESTIONS RE ANIMATION IN PTE I am using PTE 6.02. I think PTE is a wonderful program, and in general the animation features are implemented brilliantly. However, I gather from some recent discussion on the forum that some users do not find those features as exciting as I do. I have only one complaint, and that concerns the way keypoints are relocated when the duration of a slide is changed. Here are my suggestions as to how things might be enhanced. Specification of Keypoint Location I note that keypoint objects in a PTE file have their locations defined by the Origin= parameter and the Time= parameter. Origin can be SlideBegin, PrevEffectEnd, NextEffectBegin or SlideEnd (Let us call those the four “special points”). Time is a number of millseconds relative to the specified Origin. For keypoints that do not lie at one of those special points, the PTE user interface appears always to generate a time relative to SlideBegin. However, I have successfully edited PTE files to have keypoint locations specified relative to the other special points, and both positive and negative time values appear to work. However, if I subsequently move the keypoint (in Objects and Animation), its Origin reverts to SlideBegin (with the Time value suitably adjusted). The present behaviour has some unfortunate effects. For example: (1) if a slide’s duration is reduced, and “Scale keypoints” is unchecked, keypoints that were within the main viewing time of the slide (between transitions) can end up in the next transition; (2) if a slide’s duration is increased or reduced, and if “Scale keypoints” is checked, keypoints that were placed at PrevEffectEnd or NextEffectBegin are no longer located at those special points; (3) keypoints can get out of sequence, when those at the special points remain there, while others move past them. I suggest a change to the PTE program could free us users from these problems. It would be better if each keypoint had its Origin set to the nearest one of the four special keypoints, and its Time value as a positive or negative offset from its Origin. This should apply both to the initial creation of the keypoint, and to its new position after a move. This way, we would get the following benefits: (1) keypoints that are placed at one of the four special points would remain there, (2) keypoints that are supposed to be within a transition would remain within that transition, (3) keypoints that are supposed to be between the transitions would remain there. All these are true whether “Scale keypoints” is in effect or not. Scale Keypoints It remains useful to keep the option “Scale Keypoints”. Scaling should be applied within the range of adjacent special points, not across the whole range from SlideBegin to SlideEnd. In other words, scaling should apply to keypoints within a transition when the transition duration changes. Keypoints between PrevEffectEnd and NextEffectBegin should be scaled within that range only. If the user wants to adjust the duration of a slide, by extending or reducing the main viewing time (between transitions), but wants to keep the timing of the animations near the start and near the end, then Scale Keypoints would be unchecked. If the aim is to adjust the duration of a slide and the animations within the main viewing time, then Scale Keypoints would be checked. In neither case is any animation within a transition affected. On the other hand, if there is animation within a transition, then its keypoints should be adjusted when the transition duration is changed. This would have no effect on animation within the main view time. Potential Problems A reduction in slide duration, without keypoint scaling, could cause keypoints to “collide” or cross over in the centre. This should provoke a message to the user, with the option to cancel the change or drop the keypoints. Removing a transition should cause any keypoints within the transition to be dropped. Possible extensions It might be worthwhile to allow a right-click option on keypoints to enable them to be “anchored” to any one of the four special points. Different colours could be used to give visual feedback. It might be beneficial to have one more special point: Centre - Half way between PrevEffectEnd and NextEffectBegin. Thank you, Igor, for giving this your consideration. APLman (Ken Travers) - Moss Vale NSW Australia

Thank you, Pedro, for bringing a smile to my face! It's always good to find someone who has heard of APL! Ken

Hello Igor ... Seems to me that most of the posts in this topic describe other problems, but not the one you first mentioned on 23 December. I think I have some useful information for you. I too was finding that I could not add a slide to a small project, nor could I move a slide to a different position in the slide list. I would get a very striking effect of task bar buttons blinking and shrinking/expanding, multiple buttons in the task bar, and even the Task Manager window flickering when I tried to investigate. Here is what I have discovered, using PTE version 6.0.2 on two different machines: Desktop: Windows 7 64-bit, Dell Studio XPS 4 GB machine with ATI Radeon HD 4350 video card (512 MB). Notebook: Windows 7 32-bit, Toshiba L300 (Celeron) 2 GB machine. Toshiba notebook Windows 7 32-bit ... No problem of the type described. Dell desktop Windows 7 64-bit ... Yes, problem exactly as described. BUT: Turn off the Aero interface, use Windows 7 Basic Theme ... PROBLEM DISAPPEARS!!! I sincerely hope [A] this information is useful to you, and I can continue to be trouble-free on both machines! Igor, thank you for such a marvellous program ... and good luck in tracking down the reason for this annoyance. Best Wishes APLman (Ken Travers) Moss Vale NSW Australia

Thanks for your comment Xaver. I had not found that previous post. I noticed there that some folks think the scaling option is not very useful in its present form. I hope to see it fixed properly, because PTE's animation is a great fun, flexible feature. As I see it, there are several problems to be addressed ... if we users can agree on what we want! I'm working on a suggestion document for the "Ideas and Suggestions for Next Versions" sub-forum. Regards (APLman) Ken