My Scrapbook Builder©

Version 1.4

Information

 

A User’s Guide in the form of a FAQ

 

Can I change the colors in my scrapbook?

What is the My Scrapbook Builder© program?

How many photos can be put into my Scrapbook?

Can I copy the My Scrapbook Builder© Program and give it to friends?

How do I start building a scrapbook?

Can I have more than one scrapbook, and how do I select which one I want to use?

What images can I put into a scrapbook?

How do I tell the program where my images are located on my computer?

I’ve named my scrapbook and identified my image folder, what do I do next?

How do I manage the list of names which may be associated with my images?

How do I associate a name with a photo or image?

How do I navigate among the images that are in my image source folder?

How do I associate text with an image in my scrapbook?

Is there any way I can see all of the images in my image source folder?

How can I speed up the display of images from my source folder?

The images in my source folder are in random order.  How can I control the order in which they appear in my scrapbook?

I’ve associated names and text with my images, and sorted them into my desired sequence, what’s next?

Can I put my scrapbook onto a CD?

How do I look at my completed scrapbook?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can I change the colors in my scrapbook?

 

Yes, the colors can be changed for both the background and the text.

 

What is the My Scrapbook Builder© program?

 

My Scrapbook Builder© associates image files with names and text, constructing scrapbooks that are viewable using Internet browsers such as Netscape and Microsoft Internet Explorer.  The scrapbook pages contain hyperlinks so that viewers may follow a single person (name) through the scrapbook, or jump to another person whenever they appear in a group photo.  The first page of the scrapbook is a clickable index of all the names in the scrapbook. The viewer is never more than two mouse clicks away from any name’s images.

 

The process of constructing a scrapbook is organized into four primary activities.  These are:

1.      Associating names and text with images

2.      Sorting images for a single name into a display sequence

3.      Constructing internet browser readable pages

4.      Publishing the pages to CDRom.

 

Steps 1 and 2 require user action.  Step 3 is fully automated by My Scrapbook Builder.  Step 4 is an optional automated activity.  It is not necessary to copy the scrapbook pages to the Internet or place them on CDRom in order to view the scrapbook on your computer.

 

The program can construct more than one scrapbook subject at a time, and copies of your completed scrapbooks can be freely distributed.

 

 

How many photos can be put into my Scrapbook?

 

My Scrapbook Builder© is distributed in an unregistered demonstration version.  The unregistered version allows you to familiarize yourself with the program and its capabilities at no cost to you.  It has all of the functionality of the registered version with the following exceptions

 

Property

Unregistered Version

Registered Version

Maximum number of images

Twenty

One Thousand

Lifespan of scrapbook pages

Thirty days

Unlimited

 

To register your copy of My Scrapbook Builder©, send $24.95 US (check or money order)  to the following address along with your name and addresses (Postal and eMail). 

 

                                                Karl Bambas

                                                Crystal Turtle Holdings

 

52B1 Sandra Circle
Westfield, New Jersey
07090		 OR 2701 Broadmoor Lane
Spring Hill, Florida
34606
                                                                

 

You will be sent a registration code that will unlock the full potential of My Scrapbook Builder©. 

 

 

Can I copy the My Scrapbook Builder© program and give it to friends?

 

Yes, you may freely distribute unregistered copies of My Scrapbook Builder©.

           

 

How do I start building a scrapbook?

 

At this point, you have installed the program and started it for the first time.

 

 

 

 

 

After registering, or choosing to register at a later time, you are presented with the task of giving your new scrapbook a name. 

 

Click on the [Start a New Scrapbook] button.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An empty (blank) text box will appear.  Type your choice of scrapbook name into the blank text box, and click the [OK] button.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can I have more than one scrapbook, and how do I select the one I want to work on?

 

Yes, you may create an unlimited number of scrapbooks. 

After you have given a new scrapbook a name, that name will appear in the listing.  Click on the name to highlight it. 

 

This will reveal the [Use this Scrapbook] and the [Delete this Scrapbook] buttons.

 

If you click the [Delete this Scrapbook] button, a warning message will give you the opportunity to cancel the deletion.

 

Click on the [Use this Scrapbook] button.

 

What images can I put into a scrapbook?

 

The images that will be placed into your scrapbook may be located anywhere on your computer system.  However, all of the images going into a single scrapbook must be located in a single folder on your computer. 

 

My Scrapbook Builder© version 1.4 recognizes only images stored in the Joint Photographic Engineering Group (JPEG) format.  These are stored on you computer as .jpg files.  If your images are in another format (.bmp, .tif etc.) it is possible to convert them to JPEG format using any of many readily available programs.

Be careful that the file names of your images do not contain blank spaces

 

 

How do I tell the program where my images are located on my computer?

Clicking on the [Use this Scrapbook] button reveals the “Image Source Folder” input text box and the [Browse] and [Confirm] buttons.

 

Type in the path to your images and click the [Confirm] button. 

 

Or, click the [Browse] button to reveal a file path selection window.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Navigate the file tree until you find your image folder and then click the [OK] button.

 

Once you are satisfied that the source path to your images is displayed in the “Source Photograph Folder” text box, click on the [Confirm] button.  If My Scrapbook Builder finds JPEG files in your source folder, several new action buttons will appear.

I’ve named my scrapbook and identified my image folder, what do I do next?

 

 

Click on the [Collect Names and / or Text to Associate with Images] button. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The [Collect Names and / or Text to Associate with Images] button leads to the screen shown below, with the exception that the image will be the first one in your image source folder and the list of names will be blank.

 

 

 

 

This image/name/text association screen is the primary working screen in My Scrapbook Builder© .  It is where the connection is made between the names, the images and the text in your scrapbook
.
How do I manage the list of names which may be associated with my images?

 

  You can start by building a list of all the names in all of your images, or names can be added to the list one at a time as they are needed. 

 

Space is provided for a first and a last name.  Just type the names into the first and last name text boxes and click the [Add] button.  The name will then appear in the list.

 

 

 

When the list box is full, a scroll bar will appear allowing you to reach all of the names in the list. 

 

Names may be removed from the list by clicking to highlight the name and then clicking on the [Remove One Name from List] button.  Note: more than one name may be highlighted at a time.  If the [Remove One Name from List] button is clicked while in this condition, only the first (uppermost) highlighted name will be removed from the list. Highlighting is a reversible process, just click on the name again to extinguish the highlight.

 

The sort order of the names in the list may be reversed from first-name-first to last-name-first order by clicking on the [Reverse Sort] button.  A second click restores the original sort order.  Names may be highlighted for association with the current image under either sort order.

 

 

How do I associate a name with a photo or image?

 

Simply click on a name to highlight it.  (A second click removes the highlight and releases the association).  More than one name may be highlighted for each image.  Associations are preserved for the scrapbook when you move to the next image or return to the previous screen.
How do I navigate among the images that are in my image source folder?

 

Six buttons immediately below the image on this screen are provided so you can easily navigate through the images in your source folder.  Whenever one of these buttons or the [Return] button is clicked, My Scrapbook Builder© remembers and associates any highlighted names with this image.  When you navigate to a previously unselected image, all of the names in the list will be un-highlighted.  When you return to an image with which you have previously associated one or more names, these names will be highlighted.

 

When you press the [Next Image] or [Previous Image] buttons, you will usually see the images in the sequence in which they have been added to the source folder, not in the alphabetically ordered sequence you may see when browsing the source folder.

 

Two buttons, [<10%<<] and [>>10%>] allow you to jump forward and back a number of images equal to 10% of the images in your image source folder. 


 

How do I associate text with an image in my scrapbook?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At the bottom of the screen is an input box for adding any text which is to be associated with this image.  Only your computer’s resources limit the space available for this text.  In a manner similar to the names, the text is remembered when you navigate away from this image, and redisplayed when you return.

 

Since the text is to be eventually displayed on pages formatted for Internet browsers, advanced users may insert Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) in the text.  In this way you may embolden, change the font size, color, italicizing and other features, as well as insert scripts to modify web page performance.

Is there any way I can see all of the images in my image source folder?

 

Below the image navigation buttons on the image/name/text association screen is a [Thumbnails] button.  Clicking this button displays a screen containing up to thirty images from your image source folder. 

 

 

Clicking on any of the thumbnail images should redisplay the image/name/text association screen, with the clicked image as it’s subject.

 

If there are more images in your image source folder, a [More Images] button will appear on the thumbnails page.

 

 

 

 

 

How can I speed up the display of images from my source folder?

 

Pixels, Screen Resolution and Image Sizes

 

Pixel is short for 'picture element'.  It is a dot that represents the smallest graphic unit of measurement on a screen or in an image. A screen pixel is screen-dependent; that is, the dimensions of screen elements vary with the computer display system and resolution.  An image pixel is dependent on the camera, scanner, or software that generated the image.

Most cameras and other image generators make images that have many more pixels than can be displayed on a computer screen.  In order to display such images, My Scrapbook Builder© automatically computes a resized version of your image to fit the computer screen.  This is done both for the images and thumbnails seen while building your scrapbook and for the images displayed in your finished scrapbook. 

The greater the difference between your source image size and your screen resolution, the greater the time required for displaying new images.  This is particularly evident in displaying color thumbnails and in the generation of your scrapbook web pages.  You can speed up the display of images from your source folder by resizing them to a pixel content closer to that of your computer screen.

Software is available for generating resized copies of your source images.  If all of your images were resized to a maximum dimension (height or width) less than 750 pixels, the thumbnail display delay time may be significantly reduced.  One shareware product that will rapidly generate resized image files is Thotor, a copy of which can be obtained from their website at http://dominativ.com/thotor/.  The folder containing resized images is then used as your image source folder.

 

The images in my source folder are in random order.  How can I control the order in which they appear in my scrapbook?

 

A unique feature of My Scrapbook Builder© is that you may adjust the sequence in which the images associated with any name appear in your scrapbook.  Thus it is possible, for example, to arrange to have photos of a person appear in time sequence or any other order.

 

After associating names with the images in your image source folder, click on the [Return] button to display the following screen.

 

 

 

 

 

Then, click on the [Sort Display Sequence of Images] button.  That will reveal the screen shown next below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The names that you have added to your names list will appear in the list box. 

 

Click on the name for which you wish to sort the images.  A screen with up to thirty images associated with that name will appear similar to that shown below.

 

 

On this screen it is possible to rearrange the image sequence.

 

Place the mouse cursor over an image that you wish to move.  Press the left mouse button down, slide the image to the position where it is to be moved, and then release the mouse button.  This process is known as drag and drop.  My Scrapbook Builder© will create a space to receive the dropped image and slide the other images to fill in the space from which it was moved.  You are arranging the images into the (top left to bottom right) sequence in which they will appear in your scrapbook.  When done with this step, press the [Return] button.  Then, either choose another name for image sorting, or press the [Return] button again.

 

I’ve associated names and text with my images, and sorted them into my desired sequence, what’s next?

 

After names have been associated with images, and images have been sorted into display sequence, the construction of the Internet web pages of your scrapbook is a one-click process. 

 

 

 

 

Click on the [Construct Web Pages] button.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Assembling all of your images and text into web pages may take several minutes.  An indicator will appear on the screen to show progress of this process.  When all web pages have been written, the progress bar will disappear.

 

Construction of web pages may be done as often as necessary as you gather the images and text for your scrapbook.  Each time you press the [Construct Web Pages] button, new copies of each page overwrite old.

 

 

Can I put my scrapbook onto a CD?

 

If your computer has a CD read/write drive, your scrapbook can be copied to CDs for distribution to friends and relatives.  This can be done by manually executing the copy, or by using the [Publish Scrapbook to CDRom] button in My Scrapbook Builder.

 

Clicking on the [Publish Scrapbook to CDRom] button opens a Drive and Folder selection window.  Have a properly formatted disk in your CD write drive. Find your CDRom drive, highlight it, and click on the [OK] button.  A progress bar will appear and advance as the files of your scrapbook are copied to the CD.  Be sure to allow the activity light on your CD drive to stop flashing before you remove the CD from the drive.

 

 

How do I look at my completed scrapbook?

 

The starting point for viewing your scrapbook is a file named Scrapbook.html located in a folder bearing the same name as your scrapbook.  Assuming that you installed My Scrapbook Builder© using its default folder, the path to your starting file would be c:\program files\my scrapbook\scrapbooks\[your scrapbook name]\scrapbook.html.

 

If you published your scrapbook to a CDRom and the CD is, for example, in your e:\ drive, the path to your starting file would be e:\[your scrapbook name]\scrapbook.html.

 

The remainder of the files for your scrapbook are found in three directories (Photos, Text, and Html) located below the [your scrapbook name] folder. 

 

One way to view your scrapbook is to locate the scrapbook.html file name and double click on it.  This should open your default Internet browser and display the scrapbook-starting page.

 

You may also start your Internet browser and then click on the File/Open Page (Netscape) or File/Open (Internet Explorer) menus, and then either browse to locate the scrapbook.html file or type in the full path name of the file.