BigClipper is a program which is designed to let you create almost any size Photo Scrap clipping from a geoPaint file. It was written to overcome some of the limitations of geoPaint in clipping work from a document file because geoPaint will only let you take a clipping of what you can see on the screen. BigClipper will let you take clippings based on the pixel coordinates of the upper left and lower right corners of the picture. This allows you to use geoPaint to create a full width banner and import it into your geoWrite document. Another feature of BigClipper is that the starting coordinates of the upper left corner do not have to be an even multiple of 8 pixels from the edge. This gives a little more flexibility in making your clipping.
Operation of BigClipper is relatively simple. Simply double click on the BigClipper icon from the deskTop. The resulting main menu from BigClipper has four items on it;
Hgeos
Hdone
Hclip
@, and
Hhelp
@. The
Hgeos
@ option allows you to run any desk accessories which are on the same disk as BigClipper. The
Hdone
@ option is used to end BigClipper and return to the deskTop. As a safety measure, Done has one menu entry,
Hquit
@, under it. If you really want to return to the deskTop, click on the Quit option, otherwise just move the pointer off the menu and it will close. The
Hclip
@ option starts the process of taking the clipping from your geoPaint picture (this option is further explained below). The
Hhelp
@ option will provide you with a series of help screens. These screens provide you with a abbreviated set of instructions for using BigClipper.
The first item you will be asked for after you select the
Hclip
@ option is the name of the input geoPaint file. This will be via a scrolling filename window (similar to what geoPaint uses when you OPEN an existing file). Select the input file name the same way you do for geoPaint (click over the name, then click over the OPEN box). The CANCEL box allows you to exit the
Hclip
@ option instead of processing an input file. Clicking on the DISK box will bring up a window which lets you put a new disk into the current disk drive. If you have a second drive, there will also be a DRIVE box in this window. Clicking on this box will let you pick your input file from that disk drive.
Once you have selected the input file, you will be asked for the pixel coordinates of the top and bottom of the clipping you wish to take. Due to the way GEOS handles all clippings the distance from the top to bottom and the distance from the left to right must be an even multiple of 8 pixels. The top and bottom coordinates may be any number from 0 to 720. If the number you supply is not an even multiple, BigClipper will add the correct number of pixels to the bottom figure and present you with a window which tells you how many were added and an OK and a CANCEL box. If you agree with the adjustment click over OK; otherwise click over CANCEL and you will be presented with the window to enter the top and bottom coordinates again.
After you have entered the top and bottom coordinates you will be asked for the left and right coordinates. These have the same limitations as the top and bottom figures, except the range is 0 to 640. Any adjustments or incorrect numbers are handled the same as the top and bottom coordinates.
BigClipper has an 8k buffer set aside to store the clipping. It is still possible to specify a clipping too complex to fit in the buffer (even though it is compressed). This would happen if you select a large area which has a lot of detail. You should also note that geoWrite and geoPaint have a limit on their buffer size for handling a clipping. In at least one test, this was smaller than the BigClipper buffer, but Berkeley does not publish the buffer size for these programs, so you will have to try it. I successfully clipped a 1 1/2 inch full width banner and it fit into geoWrite 2.1. Also, color information applies to an even multiple of 8 pixels (that's the way the VIC-II chip works), but BigClipper lets you take clippings which don't necessarily align with the color information so BigClipper always ignores color information and stores the clipping as being Black on a Grey3 background.
he width of the geoWrite line by the width of the graphic.
The maximum size for each o
HBigClipper --
@by: Nicholas J. Vrtis (C) Copyright 1988
After you have supplied the necessary coordinates, BigClipper starts to process the geoPaint picture. During the initial reading, the left side of the original picture is displayed on the screen. After the necessary portions of the original have been read and the clipping made, BigClipper displays the top/left portion of the clipping (as much as will fit on one screen). It will also display a new menu across the top of the screen;
Hleft
Hright
@, and
Hdown
@ can be clicked on to view the rest of the clipping and make sure it is what you expected. The
Hsave
@ option writes a Photo Scrap to the disk and returns you to the main menu screen. The Photo Scrap is created on the same disk as the original picture. Finally, the
Hresize
@ option is used to select different set of coordinates for the clipping.
BigClipper runs under both GEOS 64 and GEOS 128. Under GEOS 128, it only runs in 40 column mode.
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