2.1 System Requirements

• Intel Pentium Processor or equivalent
• Windows 9x/NT/2K
• Windows Media Player and Internet Explorer 4.0 (or above)
• Windows 95 requires Winsock 2 installed.
• Windows NT 4 requires SP4 or above installed.

2.2 Installing Inpic

Download the installation program from the Internet and run the program. A wizard will guide you through the process.

2.3 Registration and Purchase

You may evaluate Inpic 1.1 for 30-days. After this time you must purchase a licence to register and continue using it. You may purchase a licence key online with your credit card. You will be instantly issued with a special licence key code which will immediately unlock the demo version when entered into the registration dialog.

• Visit our website at www.vanillasoftware.com to register using your credit card.
• Enter the issued serial key code into the "Registration Dialog"
• Restart Inpic

3.1 Starting Inpic.exe

• Choose Start/Programs/Vanilla Software Inpic Professional/Inpic Professional
  from the Windows taskbar menu
  
  
• OR simply run Inpic.exe from the filesystem.

3.2 Login Dialog

The login dialog allows you to open a new or existing volume database. It will also require you to enter a password if the volume is secured.

3.3 Overview of the Inpic Interface

The main program interface contains four control "tabs" in the interface; volume, file, news and web. These can be seen on the top left corner of the application window. The application interface is driven by these tabs.

1. The Volume View

The volume view contains a tree control with a root node called "My Categories". This provides the interface for browsing and managing the multimedia database called a volume.

2. The File View

The file view contains a tree for navigating the file system and network, similar to Windows Explorer.

3. The Newsreader

The news tab is the interface to Internet's NNTP news. This is a global, public bulletin board where millions of Internet users around the world post articles and file attachments on thousands of different topic groups (newsgroups). Inpic allows you to easily download and automatically decode these files attachments and transfer them to your volume database.

4. The Personal Web Spider

The web tab is your personal web spider. You can extract filtered files from a website, such as "all images" for instance without having to browse over the site and "save as" images. It builds a dynamic tree of the site, even pages you don't normally see.

5. The Thumbnail View

The thumbnail view is a thumbnailed or report view of files matching whatever was selected in either the volume or file view.

6. The Preview Window

The preview window displays selected multimedia files. It has multiple layout and tiling modes and can display images and movies.

7. The Media Control

The media control is used to control currently playing movies or music.

 

4.1 The Inpic Volume - a multimedia database

At the heart of Inpic is a multimedia database called the volume. The volume is used to categorise all of your existing files and new downloads. It is similar to the catalog in your local library. Without a catalog, it's impossible to find a book you're after without searching through each and every each book in a particular section. The Inpic volume is like a library catalog for all your PC files and lets you quickly find the files you want.

Categorisation

The volume categorises and indexes your files. It maintains a set of automatically managed categories as well as a set of custom categories that you define. Additionally, it maintains a keyword index so that you can search for files by keyword on properties such as filename, and description. Files are automatically categorised using various intrinsic properties such as file type, file size, file format, resolution, creation date, bit depth and so on.

For instance, a file called nicole_kidman.jpg could be stored under "Index/Files By Type/JPEG" and also under "Subject/Celebs". The file can either remain on disk and linked to via the volume OR it can alternatively be imported directly into the volume database itself. A thumbnail is calculated for the file and stored inside the volume.

Note that these are logical categories, not physical ones. Your files are indexed in a database, but the files on disk do not change location (unless imported into the volume via copy or move).

Stored in a .vol file

The volume database itself is stored in a file with a .vol extension. Inpic includes a default.vol file for you when you install it, but you can create others as well. The volume database file can be opened and closed using the login dialog or inside of Inpic itself.

Subject Categories

You can also create your own "Subject" categories, or manually managed categories. For instance, the volume will automatically index all your MP3 files by type, but if you'd rather sort your digital music files by genre, my top 40, mood, artist, album and so on, you can do that too. Just create some new categories under the subject node and recategorise your files into those categories.

Security

Inpic supports a host of powerful security features, including Blowfish file encyrption, multi-overwrite delete (file scrubbing), password protection, inactivity screensaver and filename mangling. The volume stores all the information required to implement security in Inpic.

4.2 Default Category Containers

By default, you will see the following standard category container structure in the volume view tree:

  + My Categories
      + Directories
      + Downloads
      + Web Favorites
      + Uncategorized
      + Index
      + Subject
      + Welcome

Categories are defined underneath these containers in a hierarchy. The containers themselves cannot be removed and are always present in the volume. Each container has a fixed set of categories, however the Subject container is where you can define your own categories.

Each container has a special task:

Directories
Contains paths to all directories where files were originally imported from.

Downloads
Categorizes downloaded files by download source, date and sequence.

Web Favorites
Contains imported Internet Explorer or Netscape favorites (bookmarks)

Uncategorized
Contains files that do not currently belong to any category in the volume.

Subject
Contains all user-defined categories for manual categorisation.

Index
Contains a set of automatically-defined categories.

Welcome
Contains files that are to be displayed when the volume is opened on Inpic startup.

4.3 Browsing the Volume

To browse the volume database, expand the tree and click on the category node checkboxes to select a category. Whenever you click a checkbox, the volume is queried and returns the matching set of files for all selected categories. The matching files are then displayed in the thumbnail view. Multiple selections are queried using the current Matching Mode (see Matching Modes in the next section). You can search on keywords using the keyword search dialog under the volume tree.

TIP: The first time you use Inpic, you will have an empty volume. You must manually import files into the volume to see anything, or use the news or web tabs to download some files.

2.

5.1 The Volume View

The Volume View interface is used for browsing and managing the volume database. The database maintains files obtained from several sources:

1. Import Files to the Volume
2. Add Files to the Volume from the File View
3. Using the Newsreader to view articles
4. Using the Web Spider to download files

5.2 Importing Files into the Volume

The first time you use Inpic, you start with an empty volume. The first thing you must do is either Import Files or Add Files to Volume.

A. Importing Files into the Volume

To Import Files:

1. Choose "File/Import Files"
2. Select a set of files in the dialog file view
3. Select the "Import Method"
4. Choose Automatic OR Manual categorisation
5. Choose OK

Import Methods

1. Link to Original
   Creates a link to the imported file in the volume. The source file remains on disk.
   
   
2. Keep Original
   Copies the file contents into the volume database. The source file remains of disk but is not used by the volume.
   
   
3. Delete Original
   Copies the file contents into the volume database. The source file is deleted.

B. Adding Files to the Volume

To Add Files:

1. Choose the File View Tab
2. Select a set of files in the thumbnail view
3. Choose right-click/Add Files to Volume or choose "Add" in the toolbar
4. Choose an Import Method (see above)
5. Choose Automatic or Manual categorisation

TIP: Hold down Ctrl- or Alt- when clicking files in the thumbnail view so that they are not previewed.

5.3 Browsing Files in the Volume

Checkbox Selection

Click the category node checkbox to display all files in that category.

• Clicking Subject, Web Favorites and Downloads Categories
  Will also select all contained sub-categories. To display only the single category, de-select each contained category.
  
  
• Clicking Other Categories
  Will only select the single category.
  

Multiple Checkbox Selection

If you click multiple category nodes, the files are matched according to the current Matching Rules (see below).

5.4 File Tree Operations

Create New Category

• Select a category node and choose right-click/Create New Category to create a new category underneath it.
  
  Note: This operation is only valid under the Subject container.
  

Delete Category

• Select a category node and choose right-click/Delete.
  
  Note: This operation is only valid under the Subject container.

Rename Category

• Select a category node and choose right-click/Rename.

Note: This operation is only valid under the Subject container.

5.5 Toolbar Operations

• Volume
  New and Open Volume, Import Files to Volume
  
  
• Refresh
  Refreshes the thumbnail view
  
  
• Properties
  Opens the file properties dialog for the selected file.
  
  
• Slideshow
  Run a slideshow sequence.
  
  
• Views
  Change the current thumbnail view mode to thumbnails, list or report
  
  
• Layout
  Toggle the current layout, as defined in View/Layout/Defined...
  
  
• Tile
  Change the tiling mode for the preview window.
  
  
• Magnify
  Pop a magnifying glass window.

5.6 Sorting

The list can be sorted by columns {Name, Size, Date, Type}. Choose right-click "Sort" or click the column header in the report view.

5.7 Categorising Files

The volume is a kind of logical "view" on your files. Under the Subject category container, you can categorise your files in many different ways without affecting the physical file's location in any way. How you categorise is up to you. Remember that a single file can be stored in multiple categories. This means that you can make several different kinds of "views" on your files.

For instance, you could import a set of image files from your digital camera. This could contain a mix of beach, forest, people and landscape photos from various holiday spots. All excellent quality of course! But how will you categorise them? You took hundreds of photos and don't want to mess it up. Well, don't worry. If you don't like the way you've categorised it at first. You can simply create a new view later on. The files can stay where they are on disk. We just change the way we look at them.

Here are several different Subject "views" on these files:

+ Subject 

      + Holiday Destination
           + Paris
           + Austria
           + Sydney 

      + Genre
           + Landscape
           + Beach
           + Architecture
           + People
           
      + People
           + Ross
           + Lars
           + Russ
           + Graeme 

As you can see, we've created a) Holiday Destination - sorting pics by location, b) Genre - sorting pics by the type of content, and c) People - sorting pics by who is in them. Note that a single picture called snowboard00.jpg could be stored in all three views, or just one.

Categorisation Techniques

• To categorise files, you must first create the target categories, for instance "Genre" by right-click/Create New Category on the volume tree
  
  
• Next, you must import files or add files to the volume. Often it is simpler to import all files into the volume and then re-categorise them into other categories.
  
  
• Recategorisation can be done via:
  
  
  • Drag and Drop. Selecting thumbnails and dragging them into a subject category node
    
    
  • Tools/Categories/Recategorise from the menu. This is useful for performing bulk recategorisations.

5.8 Matching Rules

The current matching rule is shown in the drop-down box at the top of the thumbnail view. This is applied to the volume query whenever you select multiple categories. The options are:

1. Including Any (default)
   
   Show files that match any selected category.
   
   In the example provided in the "Categorising Files" section above, you could click "Paris" and "People" and you would get a list of files that are contained in any of the Paris and/or People categories. ie. "Show me the Paris and People files"
   
   If there are no files in Paris, it will still show the People files and visa versa.
   
   
2. Including All
   
   Show files that match all selected categories.
   
   In the example, you could click "Paris" and "People" and you would get the list of files that are contained in BOTH the Paris AND People categories. ie. "Show me the files in both Paris and People", or "Show me all the photos containing People in Paris".
   
   
   
3. Exact Match
   
   Show files that match exactly the selected categories.
   

TIP: To avoid unexpected results, ensure that you know exactly which categories have been selected. Often folders can get collapsed and you do not realise you have selected something. For instance, make sure the "Welcome" category is not selected.

5.9 Keyword Search

You can also enter a keyword search against all files in the volume. The results are combined with the selected category nodes to form a complete query. You can enter a partial keyword search against the filename, title field or description fields.

• To enter a keyword search, type the phrase in the search box and hit [Enter]
  
  
• To remove the search, blank the search box and hit [Enter].

5.10 Accepting and Rejecting Downloads

Inpic tracks your downloads. Whenever you download a file using the news or web interface in Inpic, your downloads are categorised in the volume under the "Downloads" container category, by source. The files themselves are placed into a temporary cache directory (as defined under Tools/Options).

In order to provide a mechanism for filtering what you want to keep, Inpic enforces an Accept/Reject process where you can explicitly "accept" files to keep them or "Reject" files in order to discard them.

Acceptance process:

1. Select the "Downloads" category to see the list of files in the temporary cache.
2. Select the thumbnail(s) in the thumbnail view
3. Choose right-click/Accept to keep the file, or Reject to delete it permanently
4. Accepted files are then recategorized into a different physical directory and categorised under the Subject container automatically.

TIP: It is possible to select files in the "Downloads" container and files in other containers. However, only files that have not

5.11 Category Aliases

Aliases are used when files are imported into the volume in order to sort known filename patterns into pre-defined categories.

For instance, ferrari and porche are both cars, so if a category called "cars" was added to the volume, two aliases could be set up - ferrari and porche so that files with this pattern will be sorted into the "cars" category automatically whenever they are imported.

Category Aliases are accessed via:

• Tools/Categories/Category Aliases...
• Right-click on a category node/Edit Aliases
• Tools/Options/Volume/[Auto Categorise]/Edit Category Aliases

This is also useful for collecting and organising series of images from newsgroups and the web. For instance, the series of fractals "blue swirl" consisting of bswirl01.jpg, ..., bswirl30.jpg could be sorted into a category "fractals/blue swirl" by creating an alias "bswirl" for category "fractals/blue swirl".

5.12 File Properties Dialog

The file properties dialog allows you to view properties for the file, edit title and description fields for the file, edit the category list for the file and add annotations. Right-click on a thumbnail list item and choose "Properties" to view it's properties.

• The title and description fields can be searched on using the keyword search in the volume view.

6.1 Using the File View Tree

The File View is a thumbnail browser for the file system. It is similar to the standard Windows Explorer. It has the following functionality:

• Browse Thumbnails and files
  View thumbnails of multimedia on disk
  
  
• File Operations
  Rename, move, copy, create new folder.
  
  
• Drag and Drop
  Select files and drag-and-drop them into other folders. If the files are linked via the volume, the volume is updated with the new location. Ctrl-drag is a copy, move is the default

TIP: Use Alt- or Ctrl-Click to select thumbnail to prevent previewing/playing them.

6.2 Toolbar Operations

• Volume
  New and Open volume, Import Files to Volume
  
  
• Refresh
  Refresh the thumbnail view.
  
  
• Properties
  Open the File Properties dialog on the selected file
  
  
• Up
  Go up a directory level (cd ..)
  
  
• Add
  Open the Add Files To Volume dialog for the selected files in the thumbnail view.
  
  
• Slideshow
  Invoke a slideshow sequence.
  
  
• Views
  Change the thumbnail view mode; thumbnails, list or report.
  
  
• Layout
  Toggles the current layout of the splitter panes, as defined in View/Layout/Define...
  
  
• Tile
  Toggle the tiling mode for the Preview Window.
  
  
• Magnify
  Open the Inpic Magnifying Glass.

6.3 Sorting

The list can be sorted by columns {Name, Size, Date, Type}. Choose right-click "Sort" or click the column header in the report view.

 

7.1 Viewing and Playing Files

When you select a thumbnail item in Inpic, the output will go to one of three target windows. This is based on what is set in the Tools/Options/Display settings. You can have different settings for single click and double click. Audio files are not displayed in a window.

7.2 Target Window

By default, the output goes to the preview window on single click. However you can change the target setting to:

• Preview Window
  Output is displayed in the main preview window.
  
  
• Popup Window
  Output is displayed in a seperate popup window.
  
  
• Full-Screen Window
  Output is displayed in a full-screen borderless window with black background.

7.3 Target Window Tiling Modes

In the Preview Window and Full-Screen window, multiple files can be displayed, each in their own containing window. These windows are positioned according to the current tiling mode. There are several tiling modes in Inpic and these can be toggled using the Tile toolbar button.

• Single Image
  A single, centred, borderless window.
  
  
• Cascade
  Multiple windows (up to max. windows) are positioned over each other, offset across and down the page by a small amount.
  
  
• Mosaic
  Multiple windows (up to max. windows) are arranged across the screen avoiding overlap.
  
  
• Fixed
  Multiple windows (up to max. windows) are displayed. Fixed tiling always uses the same aspect ratio for the displayed files, and files are always displayed in a particular order as they are selected for display.
  
  
• Dynamic
  Multiple windows (up to max. windows) are displayed. Dynamic tiling always reorders and repositions the files so that the best aspect ratio is achieved for the displayed images. This often means files are not displayed in a predictable order.
  

7.4 Zooming

Inpic supports images and movie zooming features.

• Interactive Zoom
  Hover over an image or movied and click on the left mouse button and drag across. This will zoom in to the image. To zoom out again, choose right-click/Zoom Out.
  
  
• Magnifying Glass
  Pop the magnifying glass tool from the toolbar to get an interactive magnifying glass window. This can be dragged over an image to inspect it a various magnification strengths. Right-click on this window for further options.
  
  
• Resize the Target Window
  If the image or movie is output in a target window with a border, you may resize the window and its contents by dragging on the right-bottom corner of the window.
  
  
• Full Size
  You can make the image display in full-size aspect (fit to screen) by choosing right-click/Full Size over the target window.
  
  
• Original Size
  You can make the image display in it's original size by choosing right-click/Original Size on the image or movie.

7.5 Keep Image

In the case of multiple target windows, once max. windows has been reached, target windows are recycled. To keep an particular window from being recycled, choose right-click/Keep Original over the target window.

7.6 Layouts

The proportions of the Inpic main window interface splitter bars can be saved into three layout slots; Layout 1, Layout 2 and Layout 3. This allows you to pre-define three layouts with different viewing proportions. You can then toggle through the saved layouts to select the one you need for current viewing purposes.

For instance, if you are viewing the news, you probably want to have the thumbnail list wide open, and no tree control. You can save this as a layout. Alternatively, if you want to browse through a set of MP3 music files, you might want the preview window out of the picture so that you can have the tree control and thumbnail list wide open.

To Define Layouts:

1. Move the splitter panes to the desired layout
2. Choose View/Layout/Define/Layout n
3. Repeat 1

To Choose a Layout:

1. Choose View/Layout/Use/Layout n
2. Choose Toolbar/Layout
3. Choose Toolbar/Layout/Layout n

 

8.1 Using the Web Favorites Category

The "Web Favorites" category container in the volume tree is used to manage a view of your Internet Explorer favorites or Netscape bookmarks. You can view a set of thumbnail snapshots of each web site.

This feature is similar to the Vanilla Software Visual Favorites product, except that changes made in the volume are not synchronised with your actual favorites. You must import and export favorites instead.

• Importing Web Favorites
  Select File/Import Favorites from the menu and following instructions.
  
  
• Exporting Web Favorites
  Select File/Export Favorites from the menu and follow instructions.
  
  
• Adding Web Favorites
  Click on the "Camera" icon in the taskbar and click on a browser window using the special mouse cursor. This will added the URL to the favorites and take a snapshot of the site.
  
  
• Visiting a Site
  Click on a thumbnail for the site, or right-click it and choose the navigation option.

9.1 Managing Linked Files

If a file is imported to the volume via a link, the volume links to the file on disk and it's physical path is saved with the link. Whenever you recategorise linked files in the volume, the physical location does not change. If you move, rename or delete files using the File View, the volume database is updated with the new information. However, if you use an external program to do the same, for instance from Explorer, then the volume link is outdated causing a "broken" link.

9.2 Repairing Broken Links

If you access a linked file and Inpic cannot locate the source file on disk, you will receive a "File Access Error" dialog.

File Access Error Dialog

The dialog allows you to repair the broken link (hit Apply/Retry to apply changes):

• Edit a new path for the file
  
  
• Browse to a new directory, when Inpic will look for the old file name
  
  
• Repair the link, using the "Volume Link Repair" dialog.
  
  

Volume Link Repair Dialog

This dialog allows you to select one of two possible repair actions:

1. Delete the link from the volume (remove it altogether)
2. Repair the link (it's been moved or rename, so fix it!)

These operations apply to:

• The selected link only (the broken link you clicked)
• OR All files referencing the old path (it will scan the volume for all links to the old broken path)

9.3 Deleting Volume Files

When deleting files managed in the volume (via right-click or Del button) keep the following in mind:

• If the file is a Volume File, the file will be deleted
• If the file is a Linked File, only the Link will be deleted

10.1 What is Security?

In terms of Inpic security, it means password protected file contents and filename encyrption and multi-overwrite deletion.

Encyrption is a mathematical technique to scramble information. In Inpic, you can encrypt files in the volume or on disk so that noone can ever read them without knowing the secret password that was used to encyrpt them in the first place. Even if someone obtains access to your files, they may not read them and will only see scrambled data. Inpic uses a very powerful algorithm called Blowfish to encyrpt information for a high level of security.

The Inpic interface makes file encryption easy to use. You don't have to explicity decrrypt files to view them as this is done automatically for you once you "login" to your volume, supplying the password. You just view the files as normal. However, the files are never decrypted "on disk" meaning noone can browse your files even as you are looking at them.

10.2 Turning Security 'On'

• To enable security on your files, you must set a password on your volume using the Tools/Options/Security dialog.

10.3 Login Dialog

If security is enabled, you will be prompted for a password when opening the volume from the login dialog.

10.4 Volume, Linked and External Files

In Inpic, there are three types of files to consider. It is important to understand these when dealing with Inpic Security.

1. Volume Files
   Files imported via move or copy.
   
   
2. Linked Files
   Files imported via a link.
   
   
3. External Files
   Files that are not in the volume at all.

It's important to note that file do not have to be imported to the volume for you to be able to encrypt them. You can use the File View to encyrpt any file you have access to.

10.5 Using Security

Securing Files

There are several ways to secure your files in Inpic.

1. On Import
   Files are encrypted when the are imported to the volume.
   
   
2. Secure Selected Files
   In either the volume view or file view, you can choose a file or set of files and choose to secure those files via right-click/Secure over the thumbnail item(s).
   
   
3. Secure Volume Category
   Select a volume tree category and right-click/Secure All to secure all files in that category and sub-categories.
   
   
4. Secure Folder
   Select a file view folder and right-click/Secure All to secure all files in that folder.

Secured files are denoted by a special encryption symbol in the thumbnail frame. Mangled files also have a mangle symbol on them. You can view these files are normal, however you cannot access secured files from external programs.

Un-securing Files

To un-secure files, you choose Unsecure instead of Secure.

10.6 Recovering Files

You should endeavour not to lose your secret password. Without this, you cannot recover secured files. However, in the case where you lost the volume database file itself and wish to recover Linked Files or External Files or wish to access secured files from a new volume, you can UnSecure them if you have remembered the password that was used to secure them initially. You must create a new volume, using the old password and browse to the files to UnSecure them.

TIP: If the "random" password option was selected for Security settings, NO recovery is possible using a new volume as a random seed is generated at the point of encryption and stored within the original volume.

11.1 Setting your own Preferences

Inpic is highly configurable to your personal preferences. Choose Tools/Options from the menu bar to change default settings for display, viewing, volume categorisation, slideshow, news, web, speech and security.

11.2 Display Options

[Display Tab]

The Display tab defines preferences for thumbnail generation within Inpic.

• On Single-Click, On Double-Click
  Specifies the action that will occur on a single click or double click on a thumbnail item. This determines the target window to display in, the tiling mode to use, the default size and whether to show a window border or not.
  
  
  • Max Simultaneous Windows - the number of output windows to use before cycling back to the first window.
    
    
  • Native Size for Moving Images - whether to use the native size for movie files.
    

[Area Tab]

• Display Area
  Set the geometry of the output pane for either the desktop display area or the full-screen window.

[Thumbnails Tab]

• Stored Thumbnail Size
  Determines the native size of thumbnails stored in the volume. Larger thumbnails consume more disk space, but are higher quality and easier to read. The default size is 64 pixels.
  
  
• Displayed Thumbnail Size
  Determines the size of the displayed thumbnail in the thumbnail view. The default size is 64. The stored thumbnail is scaled to fit the displayed size.
  
  
• Thumbnail Style
  Determines style of the displayed thumbnail.
  
  
• Thumbnail Edge
  Determines the edge style of the displayed thumbnail.
  
  
• Page Size
  The page size determines the number of thumbnails that will be displayed at one time in the thumbnail view list before pagination occurs. Max = 999
  
  
• Thumbnail Color
  Choose thumbnail base color.
  
  
• Border
  Change the border slider to set the size of the thumbnail border.
  
  
• Spacing
  Change the spacing slider to select the amount of pixel space between thumbnails in the grid.

[Slideshow Tab]

• Display
  Determines where/how the slideshow will be displayed.
  
  
• Number of windows
  Determines the max. no. of display windows that will be used during slideshow.
  
  
• What
  Determines what file types can be shown in the slideshow.
  
  
• How
  Determines how the slideshow sequence will be advanced:
  
  
  • Manual Advance - you must use the forward, next, back buttons in the media control or the right-click options on the target window to advance the slideshow to the next in the sequence.
    
    
  • Automatic Advance - will advance the sequence every n seconds (default option).
    
    
  • Synchronise Audio with Images - plays audio files synchronised with images.
    
    
• Prompt for Category Selection
  When you start the slideshow, the "Category Selection" dialog will be opened to enable you to choose a set of source categories from which the slideshow sequence will be made.

[Play Tab]

• Movie Play Action
  The action that occurs at the completion of displaying a movie file - repeat, stop or close window.
  
  
• Animated File Action
  The action that occurs at the completion of displaying an animated file - repeat, stop or close window.
  
  
• Audio Play Action
  The action that occurs at the completion of playing an audio file - repeat or stop.

[Gamma Tab]

• Gamma Correction Slider
  Gamma correction calibrates your graphics display with your monitor to ensure that images are displayed correctly on dim or bright monitors. To ensure proper calibration, adjust the gamma slider until the inner rectangle most closely matches the outer rectangle.
  

[Colors Tab]

• Tint
  Modify tint settings for displayed media.
  
  
• Brightness
  Modify brightness settings for displayed media.
  
  
• Contrast
  Modify constrast settings for displayed media.
  

[Magnify Tab]

• Shape
  Choose a square or circular magnifying glass window.
  
  
• Properties
  Determines viewing properties for the magnifying glass.
  
  
• Defaults
  Set the default size of the magnifying glass window and magnification.
  
  

11.3 Volume Options

[Directories Tab]

The Directories settings define the rules for how and where files will be physically stored once imported into the volume.

• Base Directory
  The base directory plus the file sorting path (below) creates the full path to where the files will be sorted and stored.
  
  
• File Sorting
  Create a file path pattern that can be appended to the base directory.
  
  
  • Sort on Group Name
  • Sort on File Type
  • Sort on Download Date
  • Sort on First Letter
  • Number of files/dir.
    
    
• Example Paths
  Shows an example sorting path for the currently selected options.
  

[Auto-Categorise Tab]

Defines the rules for automatic categorisation of files imported to the volume. This determines how files will be added under the Subject category. The filename and/or file path is used for this purpose.

• Categorise From Path
  Specifies how categories are created from the path of the file that is being imported. For example, one can set it up to create a category for the parent directory, or several successive parent directories. The options allow one to specify how many parent directories to consider and how many root directories to ignore. The graphical display shows which parent directories will be considered. A category is created for each of these considered parent directories.
  
  
• Categorise File Sequences
  When enabled, Inpic will look for file names with numeric extensions and create a category for that name. For example, if you import the following files into the volume - "sophie1.jpg", "sophie2.jpg", "sophie3.jpg", ... "sophie300.jpg", and this option is enabled, then the category "sophie" is created upon import and assigned to each file.
  
  
• Categorise Aliases
  Takes a name and determines if the name is matched in any of the specifed aliases. For example, if you import 300 pictures of Sophie, and a category alias has been set up to indicate that "Sophie" is a "Woman", then all "sophie*" images have the category "Woman" assigned to them. The category alias matching can be applied to the filename or parent directory name.

[Cat Index Tab]

Defines the rules for categorising files under the Index category container. Note that Index categories and category bins are not permanently assigned to any file. They are used dynamically to locate files based on certain criteria.

• Index Files On
  Files will be automatically indexed using the selected properties in this dialog.
  
  
• Index Bin Sizes
  When importing files, bin categories are created according to the range preset in this dialog, for fine grained categorisation in the Index.
  
  
  • File Count Bin - specifies the size of the "file count" bin. Bin categories created are "0..n-1", "n..n*2-1", "n*2-n*3-1" (e.g 0..99, 100-199, 200-299)
    
    
  • File Sequence Bin - specifies the size of the "file sequence" bin. For files with numeric sequence patterns (e.g sophie1.jpg, sophie2.jpg, etc), these files are placed in "file sequence" bins up to the specified value before spilling over into a new bin.
    
    
  • File Size Bin - specifies the size of the "file size" bin. Categorises files into "file size" bins according to the specified value (e.g for a value of 50, it will produce bins of 0..49Kb, 50..99Kb, 100..149Kb, etc)
    
    
  • Pixel Width Bin - specifies the size of the pixel width bin.
    
    
  • Pixel Height Bin - specifies the size of the pixel height bin.
    
    
  • Pixel Area Bin - specifies the size of the pixel depth bin.
    

[Files Tab]

• On Duplicate File Names
  If a file downloaded via the news or web is "accepted", and it already exists in the permanent store, then this option defines the action to take at that point.
  
  
• Thumbnails
  If selected, thumbnails will be regenerated before being displayed.

11.4 News Options

[General Tab]

The General settings define the rules for the newsreader.

• News Groups
  Set preferences for notifications about news groups, applied filter and group click settings.
  
  
• News Articles
  Set preferences for downloading and browsing articles.

[Local Cache Tab]

The Local Cache settings define the rules for managing the news cache. Note that article headers and article content are stored seperately.

• Article Header Settings
  Sets days after which article header are delete.
  
  
• Article Content Settings
  Sets cache cleanup settings.
  
  
• Cache Status
  Shows current cache size. You can use this tab to cleanup the header or the whole cache.
  

11.5 Web Options

[Scanning Tab]

The Scanning settings define preferences for scanning websites.

• Filter
  Defines spidering depth and breadth settings. Depth is how deep the folder hierarchy will be traversed on the target site(s). Width means number of hops to other sites via hyperlinks in the scanned HTML pages on the target site. Width = 2 means jump links from the target site, and links from jumped sites also, etc.
  
  
• File Types
  Set known file type extensions for HTML files (e.g .htm, .html)
  
  
• Actions
  When scanning the file, Inpic can additionally:
  
  
  • Retrieve the file size
    
  • Ignore hyperlinks to external files

[Downloading Tab]

The Downloading tab settings define preferences for downloading scanned files from websites.

• Filter
  Set filter settings to filter out or isolate files.
  
  
• Download File Groups
  Sets which types of files to download.
  
  
• File Type Filter
  Additionally filter or isolate known particular file type extensions, e.g *.jpg, *.mpg, *.txt.

[Network Tab]

The Network tab settings define preferences for HTTP network connectivity for the scanning of Internet websites.

• How to Connect
  Depending on your connection to the Internet and ISP recommendations, you can choose to connect directly to websites or via a proxy server. These settings are typically the same as for your web browser's configuration.
  
  
• Proxy Setup
  Sets proxy server settings.
  
  
• Connection Settings
  Sets the max. number of simultaneous TCP connections (thread pool) to scan websites with.

11.6 Security Options

[Simple Settings]

The Security options dialog allows you to turn on security in your volume.

• Password
  Setting a password enables security. Deleting a password disables security.
  
  
• Options
  • Enable Encryption of Files managed by this volume - applies to files imported or added to the volume (default).
    
    
  • Enable Name Mangling of Files managed by this volume - applies to files imported or added to the volume (default).
    
    
  • Enable Secure Deletion - when files are deleted, their contents will also be overwritten multiple times to prevent recovery using Inpic's secure deletion algorithm (a.k.a file scrubbing)
    
    
  • Enable Password on un-iconize - prompts user for volume password when Inpic is maximized after minimization.
    
    
• Connection Settings
  Sets the max. number of

11.7 Advanced Security Options

Click [Advanced] on the Simple Security options dialog for these Advanced options.

[Overall Security]

• Passwords
  Passwords can be set for three security actions - volume file encryption, filename mangling encryption and linked file encryption. Normally you use the same password in each case.
  
  
• What to Secure
  Choose what to secure when security is enabled:
  
  
  • Volume Imported Files - files imported via move or copy into the volume database
    
    
  • Linked files - files imported or added to the volume via a link (still exist on filesystem)
    
    
  • External Files - files that have not been imported to the volume.
    
    
• Connection Settings
  Sets the max. number of simultaneous TC

[Linked Files]

• How to Secure
  Defines how files will be secured when security is enabled.
  
  
  • Mangle File Name - encrypts the file name on disk (using Mangle password)
    
    
  • Encryption option - choose NO encyrption (if you wish to mangle names, but not content), or choose a password to encrypt with, or choose a random password, or prompt for a password on the particular file(s) each time.
    
    
• Apply File Attributes
  Apply Hidden and/or Read-Only attributes to encyrpted files for obfuscation purposes.

[External Files]

Same as for Linked Files, except applies to External Files.

[Deletion]

Defines secure deletion options (if enabled) for when user chooses to delete a volume file.

• How To Delete
  If the file is linked, you may wish to keep it and delete only the link. Otherwise, it deletes the file as well.
  
  
• Multi-Overwrite Delete
  Choose how many times to overwrite deleted file contents.
  
  
• What to Overwrite File With
  Choose from Zero, Set or Random fill bytes.

[Access Control]

Define minimized and inactivity security. Uses the Volume password.

• Enable Password when Iconized
  If you minimize Inpic, you can make Inpic prompt the user for a password before it is maximized again.
  
  
• Enable Password After the Following Inactivity Period
  Set a timeout for inactivity for if you walk away from the computer.
  

11.8 Speech Options

Only applies if speech is enabled. Normally on Windows 2000 only.

• General
  Defines when Inpic will talk.
  
  
• Advanced
  Set speech options and what to include in speech.

12.1 Overview of Internet News

Internet News, also known as "the newsgroups", USENET or NNTP news, has been a major part of the Internet for many years now. It was around even before the Web existed, in the days when email, ftp, chat and news were all there was.

News is not like the 6:00 news. It's not about current affairs or news bites. It really just a public discussion group system, consisting of about 80,000 newsgroups or topic areas. Each topic area is named by a hierarchical dot notation, e.g alt.binaries.pictures.fractals - a group dedicated to the discussion of fractal images, or alt.binaries.pictures.sports.

News is distributed - many thousands of news servers (computers running NNTP news server software) around the world cooperate to exchange articles and new newsgroups across the Internet. Users use special NNTP newsreader software to connect to their closest news server, usually at their ISP (Internet Service Provider) to read and post articles. Each server keeps it's own copy of the newsgroups and articles - constrained by local administrator policies and system resources. If you post an article to a newsgroup, it is sent via the network of cooperating news servers around the world, and a copy of the article is made on each server and/or passed on to the next server in the chain. Sometimes it takes several days for an article to propogate around the world, but in the end, millions of people have access to your article.

The whole thing is similar to an email discussion you have with friends, except that EVERYONE in the world can see your articles and respond. Articles can also contains attachments, called 'binaries', which means you can send pictures, movies and sounds to newsgroups. Whole groups are dedicated to binaries articles only - for instance the alt.binaries set of newsgroups.

NNTP news is free, like the web (apart from normal ISP access fees and telco charges) and is normally provided as a service via your local ISP. However, due to resource requirements of running a news service, many local ISP news servers do not contain many newsgroups and often do not spool many articles - they don't keep enough disk space and older articles are often deleted quickly as new ones arrive. So, many people choose to sign up for commercial news services in order to get a higher quality of service.

There are also many commercial and free nntp newsreader software applications available. However, the aim of the Inpic newsreader is to make it easy for you to download and decode binary articles and import them into your volume.

12.2 Using the Inpic Newsreader

To use the newsreader, select the News tab. The main elements of the interface are:

• Session Tree
  The left hand pane contains all subscribed news server sessions and news groups per session. Click on a news group to browse.
  
  
• News Articles List View
  The thumbnail view is the articles listing in the news view. This list all the posted articles for the news groups selected in the news groups tree.
  
  
• Preview Window
  Downloaded binary articles are displayed in the preview window.

12.3 Connecting to an NNTP server - Create a session

In order to read news, you need to connect to an NNTP server. Ask you local ISP for the address of the news server (e.g news.myisp.com). If there is none available locally, you can search on the Internet for a list of free or commercial NNTP servers.

To connect to a server, you need to create a Session:

1. Click the session toolbar button OR right-click on the session tree
2. Choose Add News Session
3. A configuration dialog will open. Fill out the details for your news server

12.4 Downloading Newsgroups

Once you have a valid news session configured, it's time to download the list of available groups from the server. This is only required on the first connection and can take some time on slower connections (e.g modem). After you create your Session, you will be prompted to download the newsgroups. This will open the newsgroups dialog.

• All Groups Tab
  All available groups from the particular news server
  
  
• New Groups Tab
  Each time you login to the news server, Inpic checks for new newsgroups and let's you add them to your list of groups in the "All Groups" tab.
  
  
• Subscribed Groups Tab
  The set of groups that you regularly read.

Downloading the groups will fill up the "All Groups" list which will be saved for future reference.

12.5 Subscribing to Groups

Once you have downloaded the set of available news groups, you will need to subcribe to the ones you wish to read. This makes the groups available in your news session tree so you can easily return to them.

To subscribe to a group:

1. Select the All Groups tab on the newsgroups dialog
2. Search for the desired newsgroup
3. Double-Click the group in the list of click the Subscribe button

You may unsubscribe at any time.

12.6 Browsing News Articles

Once you have subscribed to some newsgroups, they will appear under your session in the session tree. Select a newsgroup in the tree to browse. The article headers will be downloaded for the group and displayed in the thumbnail view in report mode. Click on an individual article to download and display it.

Articles consists of a header and body. The header information is displayed in the news article listing. You can see parts of the header, such as the author (from), subject line, size in Kb, the date posted and the newsgroups to which the article was posted. The body contains the content of the article, and cannot be seen until you download the article fully, by clicking it.

If an article is bigger than around 10Kb, it is probably an attachment. However, the NNTP protocol is an old protocol and it is not possible to tell until the article has been downloaded. Usually the subject line gives it away, if the poster has followed the informal 'standard' for naming attachments, which is normally:

<poster's name> - <filename> - <description> - (i/n)

e.g. A sample set of article subjects

• Jimbo's - red01.jpg - Nice picture of a Ferrari 360 Modena (1/1)
• re: What does everyone think of this pic?
• Freddy - elle143.mpg - Movie capture of Elle's fashion shoot (0/3)
• Freddy - elle143.mpg - Movie capture of Elle's fashion shoot (1/3)
• Freddy - elle143.mpg - Movie capture of Elle's fashion shoot (2/3)
• Freddy - elle143.mpg - Movie capture of Elle's fashion shoot (3/3)

The set of articles in the example consists of red01.jpg (a JPEG picture of a Ferrari), a plain text article containing nothing but some text message, and a movie clip of Elle with a short description. Once you get experience reading the subject lines, in conjunction with looking at the article size you'll get a feel for what is a binary attachment and what is not. If you wish to read the articles that are not attachments, go ahead! That's part of what NNTP news is as well. Simply right-click/Display Article to view the contents.

12.7 Combine and Decode

File attachments are binary files and must be encoded as readable text, in special formats, including MIME/Base64 and UUENCODE for proper transmission over the Internet. You can see this if you view an article containing an attachment. For example:

begin 666 At The Seashore, 1898.jpg
M_]C_X `02D9)1@`!``$`E@"6``#__@`?3$5!1"!496-H;F]L;V=I97,@26YC
M+B!6,2XP,0#_VP"$``,"`@,"`@,#`P,$! ,$!0D&!04%!0L(" 8)#0P.#@T, 

As you can see, it's fairly cryptic. However, authors will often place a text comment above an encoding to describe the attachment, so sometimes it's worth checking the article body.

Large encoded files are often split up into multiple parts to get it through the network. An article in several parts is said to be a "multipart" article (elle143.mpg in the example above).

Inpic inspects each article and decodes it if necessary. Further, Inpic can detect if an article is part of a multipart sequence and will download all associated parts automatically if you wish, or allow you to manually recombine it.

Remember, if you are missing a part of a multipart set, you will not be able to correctly piece together the complete file. Most of the time articles are posted as a single part however, so you don't have to worry.

To view the complete file again, you must join all encoded parts, in order, and decode the encoded file as one.

Inpic offers three ways for rejoining, decoding and viewing multipart articles:

1. Preview
   
   If you click on the first part of a multipart set, you can often sneak a preview at the contents. This works well if the images is a file, and sometimes if it's an MPEG or MP3. However, often you will see nothing at all.
   
   
2. Automatic Multipart Combine and Decode
   
   Select an article, and Inpic will automatically detect all other available parts in the set. It will detect whether all parts are present in the article list. If all parts are available, Inpic will ask if you wish to download all parts to view the file. If a part is missing, Inpic will warn you to see if you wish to abort and look at other articles.
   
   
3. Manual Combine and Decode
   
   You can also select the parts yourself, to combine and decode. This is useful for previewing purposes. You can choose a partial set, for instance the first three parts of a 30 part set, to perform a manual combine and decode. This lets you view part of the original file to see if you wish to continue. This is also useful if you know that an article is an attachment, but the subject line does not contain consistent naming or braces (i/x) - you can choose the parts yourself. Simply right-click on the article list and choose "Combine and Decode".

12.8 Filters

You can set a filter on a session to filter on articles in that session's groups.

1. Click on the Session node in the session tree and right-click to choose Properties
2. Select the Filter tab.

Using the filter features:

• Toggle Filter
  Click on the radio button to turn on/off the filter
  
  
• Size
  Set the min. and max size in KB for articles. Setting a value of min = 10Kb will filter out many non-binary attachments.
  
  
• Exclusive
  Set keywords to be excluded from download for the subject and author fields.
  
  
• Inclusive
  Set keywords for a restrictive set to downlad only for the subject and author fields.

12.9 Sorting

• Click on column header to sort by that column.

13.1 Using the Web Spider

The web spider is a tool for downloading filtered files from websites. It enables you to scan a web site's pages then presents you with a hierarchy of the site and all it's files. This makes it easy to quickly extract multmedia from a website without having to browse through it manually.

13.2 Breadth and Depth

The web spider scans each HTML page and folder on the site. It builds the site hierarchy and follows embedded hyperlinks to other web sites as well. The breadth setting defines how wide the search will go across hyperlink jumps. A breadth of one (1) means follow only one level of hyperlinks away from the target site. A breadth of two (2) means the spider will also follow hyperlinks in the linked site as well, and so on. Depth means how far the hierarchy will be followed on each site (how deep the folder tree goes).

• You can configure your depth and breadth settings in the "Settings" toolbar dialog, or the Tools/Options/Web options.

URL To Scan

• To scan a site, enter it's URL into the top left text box labelled "URL To Scan" and hit Enter.
  
  
• The site will be scanned and the interface will temporarily be locked while it does so. You can hit Stop in the toolbar at any time.
  
  
• The resulting list of files is displayed in the report view. Click one to download it.

Tree View Viewing Modes

1. Directories
   The tree view shows the site hierarchy as folders only. Click a folder to see it's contents
   
   
2. Pages
   The tree view shows HTML pages in the site, so that you can see content linked from each page.
   

Report View Filter

Filter the report list using the filter drop-down above the list.