Image Catalogue Builder
by Lee Calcraft

Running this application opens up a directory viewer containing the ImageCat application. The application must be copied onto your harddrive or a working disc as there is not enough space on this disc for ImageCat to create its files.

ImageCat is designed to create a single sprite file containing a miniaturised version of all images stored in a particular directory. An example sprite file is provided in the ImageDemo application.

ImageCat will work with a wide range of image files, including PCX, GIF, TIFF, etc. In fact, any image file that ChangeFSI understands, ImageCat understands. ImageCat can thus be used to catalogue CD-ROM images.

For full information on how to use the program and how it works, you should refer to the article, 'Working with Images' in this months's magazine. The article discusses how to customise the program for different sized sprites and different screen modes.

The program uses ChangeFSI, supplied on the RISC OS 3 Support disc inside the !ChangeFSI application. Before you run the program, you should create a directory called LIBRARY in the root directory of your work disc, open the !ChangeFSI application (by double-clicking on it while holding down Shift), and copy the ChangeFSI Basic program into the LIBRARY directory.

You should then make the directory which contains the original images the current directory, either by using one of the many CSD applications (one was included on the RISC User 6:6 disc), dragging the directory onto the DeskEdit icon on the icon bar (if you have DeskEdit), or else from the command line by pressing F12 and typing:
     
             Dir ADFS::My_Disc.$.PD.Pics
 
or whatever, giving the full path to the directory which contains the images you want to catalogue.

Once you've done this, run ImageCat and it will process all the files in the current directory, saving the miniature versions in the directory Output, which is inside ImageCat. Open the Output directory and double-click on the first file to load it into Paint. Now select the rest of the sprite files inside the Output directory, and drag them all into the Paint window. You will now have a viewer containing high quality miniatures of your original files. Save this new sprite file from Paint's Save option, and then delete all the individual miniature sprite files.

That's it!

 Lee Calcraft 1993  