ACDSee Pro 2 and 2.5

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Adding more edges for Borders

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  • Tony
    Developer, ACD Systems

    If anyone is interested in Adding more edge masks or textures to use with the new Borders feature, here's how to do it.

    You can make your own edge masks or download files from the internet.  A lot of good free ones can be found here: http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/freedownloads/l/blframesmain.htm

    Once you've got them on your computer just drop them in this folder:

    C:\Program Files\Common Files\ACD Systems\borders\edges

    The next time you load up the Borders tool you'll see all the new edges in the list.  The same can be done for textures.  There are also lots of seamless texture files on the internet for free or for sale.  Just drop them in this folder:

    C:\Program Files\Common Files\ACD Systems\borders\textures

    Tony.

    Posted On September 29, 2008 - 09:02 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Marc Sabatella
    Moderator

    Wow, that's great!  Might be just the impetus I need to start using this feature more!

    Posted On September 30, 2008 - 01:08 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • losch
    Member

    Great!

    Posted On September 30, 2008 - 06:48 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    tony, that is excellent!  Thank you!

    Too bad this forum doesn't have a sub forum under 'ACDSee Pro 2.5' called "User Tips" or something like that so the community could find this stuff quickly and easily.  The old forum was organized so much nicer.

    Posted On October 1, 2008 - 06:26 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Marc Sabatella
    Moderator

    kthompson said:

    Too bad this forum doesn't have a sub forum under 'ACDSee Pro 2.5' called "User Tips" or something like that so the community could find this stuff quickly and easily.  The old forum was organized so much nicer.

    Of course, there was no "tips" area there either.  But what the new forum does have are tags.  So I'm tagging this thread with the word "tips".  I assume the hope is that we all get in the habit of using tags in this manner.

     

    Posted On October 1, 2008 - 04:02 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    Yeah, if everyone that posted would properly tag all their posts with whatever possibility someone might search for, then we could search for exactly what we want and find it without fail.  And the chances of that happening?   :)

    Of course, if you built the sub-forums into the structure of this 'blog thingy', then people should be able to see where to properly post, and when they don't, the moderators could move them to the proper forum/sub-forum.  I'm not saying that you are denying that structure would be good, but the whole concept that it's ok to just dump everything into one bucket and then search for what you need... well the mentality that decided that was the way to go when creating this forum would probably think it's ok to get rid of all the directories on your hard drive, dump everything into C:, and then search for what you want.  And I also dont understand what someone was thinking when they approved it.  Again, not pointing fingers at you Marc, just someone really screwed up here, especially by doing it at the same time as releasing a new 'update' that has caused so many customers, so many problems.

    Posted On October 3, 2008 - 07:09 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Tankred
    Moderator

    Noone has to to tag all their posts with whatever possibility someone might search for. If you are asking for a subforum called "user tips", just use "tip" as a tag. That's really no big deal and has been done already.

    Posted On October 3, 2008 - 07:57 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • JohnL
    Member

    How do tags work on this new blog?

    Posted On October 3, 2008 - 02:58 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Tankred
    Moderator

    Above every thread, you'll find a headline called "Tags:". Below you can see the tags that have been already assigned to the current thread. In this case it's the tag "tips". If you want to assign a new tag to the thread, just type it into the entry field below and click on the button "add" right of the field.

    1. If you want to see more threads with the tag "tips", you could just click on the tag above this thread.

    2. If you, e.g. like to have a subforum "Tips" like kthomson, then bookmark the page you were browsing to in 1.

    3. You can also access all threads with a certain tag by writing the standardized URL in your browser's address bar:

    http://community.acdsee.com/forums/tags/[tag]

    In this case it would be:

    http://community.acdsee.com/forums/tags/tips

     

    Posted On October 3, 2008 - 03:07 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • JohnL
    Member

    Thats what I thought but its horribly ham fisted. Much easier to use the favorites tab, they are then all nicely listed with the relevant headings. Or if you are in Firefox use the scrapbook tab.

    Posted On October 3, 2008 - 11:15 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    Tankred said:

    If you are asking for a subforum called "user tips", just use "tip" as a tag. That's really no big deal and has been done already.

    I understand the use of tags, the problem lies in the fact that, if JohnL has a tip he wants to share, if you have a subforum called UserTips, then he knows that is the place to put user tips.  Otherwise he dumps it into here and maybe knows to use tags or maybe doesn't.  If he does know to use tags, he maybe chooses to and maybe chooses not to or maybe forgets.  If he doesnt add the tag 'tip', sure I can add it myself when I read it, but I'm back to the hunting for tips that may or may not be in this big bucket, because no one added the tag yet.

    Now in a structured forum, yes users will sometimes post in the wrong area, for various reasons, tho if they see the structure and know there's a proper place to post, they 'most likely' will.  When they don't, it's the mod's job to move the post when he finds it so that it is in the proper place.  So if we are throwing out the idea of good structure, and going with just tags, then who's responsibility is it to make sure everything gets tagged when it doesn't get properly tagged to begin with?

    One more thought...  everyone knows to use tags, so now I want tips.  JohnL had a tip about using borders, so he tagged it 'tip' and 'borders'.  Marc learned something special in using import formats that he wants to share, so he, because it's what he's accustomed to, tags it 'tricks' and 'import'.  So I'm using my little tips bookmark because I want to see all the new tips, and i never see Marc's tip on the import wizard, but he tagged it similarly, but different none the less.  If he had seen a subforum called UserTips, even tho he calls them tricks, being a human capable of reasoning, he would know that was the place to put it.  :)

     

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 08:40 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • JohnL
    Member

    kthompson -  hey, thanks for the praises but it was Tony who posted the original tip re borders - lol

    but you make the point well. Tags seem to be unorganised, where do they go once tagged, where do you find them once they have been tagged. At the moment you have to find a tagged thread - say tips, to find more. Strange!

    and why does this type face seem to be in bold and in a different typeface to the rest of the thread? and no I havent changed anything - wow - this is wide!  he he he  - but great to see the time and date a post is made. Much better!

     

    and why does this type face seem to be in bold and in a different typeface to the rest of the thread? and no I havent changed anything . . . . .  ah, it doesnt once posted!

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 03:43 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    JohnL..

    No I just scrolled up the page until I found a name I could use for a hypothetical situation... that's why I grabbed yours.  I shot a wedding last night, was the last one to leave the reception, got home, unloaded, downloaded, presorted, noise-processed photos, then tried to go to sleep, but was way to hopped up on Mt. Dew to close my eyes, so I started going through the blog thingy again.  At that point I was grabbing the first things I could find for my post, and you won!  hehehe

    And thanks for pointing out the date/time change, didn't notice that one.  I did notice the preview post button, that is nice for those doing formatted posts, and it is now wider...  don't know if it's a max width, the width changes as I shrink my browser, but typically run firefox maximized.  Right now my usable browser screen width on this laptop is about 1420 pixels, and the post area is about 710 pixels, so that is only half the screen width devoted to post area.

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 04:07 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Marc Sabatella
    Moderator

    kthompson said:

    One more thought...  everyone knows to use tags, so now I want tips.  JohnL had a tip about using borders, so he tagged it 'tip' and 'borders'.  Marc learned something special in using import formats that he wants to share, so he, because it's what he's accustomed to, tags it 'tricks' and 'import'.  So I'm using my little tips bookmark because I want to see all the new tips, and i never see Marc's tip on the import wizard, but he tagged it similarly, but different none the less.

    Yep, that's a "controlled vocabulary" issue - exactly the same thing that comes up when keywording images.  That' one reaosn it is nice that there is a (sort of) predefined set of tags on display to select from, if people could get into the habit of doing that.  is that really reaosnable to expect?  I don't know.  Lots of things seem like they might be hard to get used to first, and now we can't imagine how we do without them.  I personally had to be dragged kicking and screaming into using a mouse or a window-based interface, so accustomed to the keyboard / command-line based OS interfaces of the 70's and early 80's.  Now I couldn't imagine going back.  On the other hand, I'm about the heaviest user of keybaord shortcuts in ACDSee there is, and the only aspect of the new forum that bugs me personally is the WYSIWYG editor...

     

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 05:13 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Admin
    Key Master

    Marc Sabatella said:

    and the only aspect of the new forum that bugs me personally is the WYSIWYG editor...

     

    Try out the HTML tab in the right hand corner of the editor! You may find it more to your liking.

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 05:17 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    Marc Sabatella said:

    Yep, that's a "controlled vocabulary" issue - exactly the same thing that comes up when keywording images. 

    but usually when keywording images, you are using your keywords for your own use, so you will (most likely) re-use the same words.  (depending on how much you had to drink before a particular keywording session.)  :)

     

    That' one reaosn it is nice that there is a (sort of) predefined set of tags on display to select from, if people could get into the habit of doing that.  is that really reaosnable to expect?  I don't know. 

    Lets look at what we are doing already with the pre-defined set.  First, this topic has been tagged 'tips'.  The pre-defined set has 'how to' as the closest representative option to 'tips'.  So now we have seperate how-to's so already I have two different places to look for the same thing.  Suppose you need a pair of jeans, you go to Walmart and tell the associate "I need some new jeans, where can I find them?"  "well we keep some in aisle 27 and there are a few in aisle 4, think I saw one associate putting jeans in aisle 88 (must be a super-walmart eh?) and we've got the sale one's near the back and...."  You want some flippin jeans, you don't want to have to run around looking several places...  same with tips, how-tos, tricks, etc.

    You might be thinking, ok isolated instance...  how about 'pan lock' and 'panlock' up there...  same exact thing but whoever setup the pre-defined set, they did it to ways and now you will find 4 posts in one, but 3 posts in the other...   or 'crash', 'crashes', and 'crashing'. again same thing, but only one post is duplicated in two of the variations and the third variation has completely different posts.  So this has been up what, 3 weeks?  Can you imaging the rat's nest this will be in a year if someone doesn't go 'duh! what were we thinking?' and do something quickly?

     

    Lots of things seem like they might be hard to get used to first, and now we can't imagine how we do without them.

    Personally, I could get by without having to get used to looking in 5 different places in one store just to pick out one pair of jeans.  I like efficiency.  And it doesn't happen by accident, you have to design for it.

     

      I personally had to be dragged kicking and screaming into using a mouse or a window-based interface, so accustomed to the keyboard / command-line based OS interfaces of the 70's and early 80's.  Now I couldn't imagine going back. 

    Some new things are good, I agree. But do you remember having your program entirely in one directory, not having files here and there after installing your program because 'installing' was just copying into it's very own directory?  You needed to copy that program to another computer, you copied everything in the directory and copied them into their own directory on the new computer and everything worked like it did before?  And no one knew or cared what the system registry was and how it got corrupted?  I like the GUI and the mouse and all that, but man, there was a lot to be said for the old days of DOS.  You could install 20 more graphics programs and ACDSee still ran just like when it was fresh installed (hypothetical here).   :)

    And ya know what else?  All of this effort of discussing all this may be just a moot point, because no one from ACDSee is willing to post a list on here of the things they have approved and are working on, or are they willing to become actively involved in their own blog thingy enough to give real answers to the customer asking and making requests, etc.  I use Zenfolio as a photo sharing site. They are a relatively new player in that area, growing and evolving as quickly as they can, and have a lot of customers making requests and asking questions in their forum areas.  And in most of those, you will find the top two persons at ZF are actively involved in the forums and they keep a list of items they are working on and towards so customers are informed.  Really makes you feel like they care about you as a customer.

     

    Posted On October 4, 2008 - 08:26 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Marc Sabatella
    Moderator

    kthompson said:

    but usually when keywording images, you are using your keywords for your own use, so you will (most likely) re-use the same words

    Oh, definitely,  I didn't put a name on the problem to say it wasn't a problem.  Just to say that the problem does have a name :-)  I agree, tags don't automatically solve the problem.  but they do give a new set of tools that we may even come to find we like, once we get used to them.

    Some new things are good, I agree. But do you remember having your program entirely in one directory, not having files here and there after installing your program because 'installing' was just copying into it's very own directory?

    Oh yes, I remember the days when newly installed fonts would only work with the program they came with, when it was impossible to partition one's disks to put read-only files that can be shared between suers in one place and ones that need to be written to per user in another place, etc.  Just another spin on the same phenomenon :-)

    And ya know what else?  All of this effort of discussing all this may be just a moot point, because no one from ACDSee is willing to post a list on here of the things they have approved and are working on

    I'm not sure why you interpret their reluctance to post a list as indicating there is no point in discussing this.  On the contrary, discussing is important, as it is the only way to let the folks at ACD know what is important and why.  Just because they are not posting a list doesn't mean they aren't listening...

     

    Posted On October 6, 2008 - 05:11 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    Marc Sabatella said:

    I'm not sure why you interpret their reluctance to post a list as indicating there is no point in discussing this.  On the contrary, discussing is important, as it is the only way to let the folks at ACD know what is important and why.  Just because they are not posting a list doesn't mean they aren't listening...

    Simply because maybe they have alreadly listened and are working on it.  Why spend alot of time convincing someone why they should do something they are already doing?  Why would it be so hard to put up 'the list' as another mod has referred to it, or at least for someone ACDSee to say, "we have approved this idea and are currently working to implement it."  ???   It's just a matter of being responsive to your customers.  I had posted a suggestion for 2.0 when it came out, and it hasn't been implemented in 2.5.  There was never a response, so does that mean they read it and said 'no, not worth the effort to us'  or that they never read it and I should try posting again and finding the people that agreed to re-agree with me again so maybe this time they'll see it, or does it mean they don't know how to do it and it's taking a long time but they want to do it, or it's easy and they want to implement it but it's way down on the list...  who knows?  I just think they are very poor in being responsive to their customers, could improve greatly, and it would solve alot of the communication issues going on in this blog thingy.    :)

     

    Posted On October 6, 2008 - 07:04 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Anonymous

    Marc Sabatella said:

    kthompson said:

    One more thought...  everyone knows to use tags, so now I want tips.  JohnL had a tip about using borders, so he tagged it 'tip' and 'borders'.  Marc learned something special in using import formats that he wants to share, so he, because it's what he's accustomed to, tags it 'tricks' and 'import'.  So I'm using my little tips bookmark because I want to see all the new tips, and i never see Marc's tip on the import wizard, but he tagged it similarly, but different none the less.

    Yep, that's a "controlled vocabulary" issue - exactly the same thing that comes up when keywording images.  That' one reaosn it is nice that there is a (sort of) predefined set of tags on display to select from, if people could get into the habit of doing that.  is that really reaosnable to expect?  I don't know.  Lots of things seem like they might be hard to get used to first, and now we can't imagine how we do without them.

    OK, I wanted to look for more tips in this blog thingy so I go to the 'tag cloud' to click on tips.  NOT THERE!  Ok, so I'll just go to where I can search for a tag that's not listed in the tag cloud... uh huh... good luck finding that... great!  well then I'll just type 'tips' into the "forum search" and what comes up?  a search form with a field for tags...  sweet!  so I type 'tips' into the tags field, and I get a blank page.  nothing.  well lets try 'tip'.  nothing, nada, zip.  OK, well "batch" is in the tips cloud, and it returns 6 posts, so thats gotta work.  but nope, same thing.  Blank page.

    I'm sorry, but this blog thingy is a hacked up poc.  And for all those that have been talking in this blog thingy about wanting some structure back, some "sub-forums", I have it on inside information today that they were not listening to our complaints and are not planning on adding functionality into this blog thingy.

    I actually love Pro 2.5.  A few things I would like to see corrected, a few things I would like to see enhanced, but half my life is spent on this computer, and 80% of that time is using ACDSee Pro 2.5.  I have taken college level courses on photography AND Photoshop, sold the instructor on how much easier and faster it is than Photoshop for most post-processing needs, and he displayed it to the class as a cheaper alternative to Photoshop.  And it really is.  Of course, I have not had all the problems with Pro that I hear about on here... mine runs well, seldom crashes.  I love the software, I just don't like the company because they just don't care about their customers.

    Posted On October 15, 2008 - 02:38 AM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

  • Marc Sabatella
    Moderator

    kthompson said:

    well then I'll just type 'tips' into the "forum search" and what comes up?  a search form with a field for tags...  sweet!  so I type 'tips' into the tags field, and I get a blank page.

    Confirmed.  Obviously, something isn't working right with the search function.  Hopefully that will be fixed.

    Note that simply typing "tips" into the Forum search box at the top of each page does work - returns a list of all threads containing the word "tips", including this one.  Not limited to those in which "tips" is an actual tag, of course.

     

    Posted On October 15, 2008 - 02:59 PM (1 year ago) (Permalink to this post)

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