Pending Screengrab release February 15, 2007
Posted by andy in : coding, screengrab , trackbackSo I’m working on a new Screengrab release (which will coincide with changing the look of the website, so that it’s a little less bloggy and a little more about Screengrab).
The new release will feature some new features and bug fixes.
1) Fixed horizontal scrolling bug. Somehow horizontal scrolling got lost along the way. Either I stuffed up or it was changed in Firefox. Either way, it’s fixed now.
2) Grabs using Canvas. Firefox 2.0 (possibly 1.5) has full canvas support (notably toDataUrl) so I can now use the canvas instead of Java to do the grabs. We lose the funky scrolling around the page, but we gain much better performance. The Java version will still be kept as an option, as it is required in order to take complete grabs of pages that use plugins (swf).
3) Copy to clipboard. This feature will only work using Canvas, but you can now copy an image to the clipboard instead of saving it to disk.
4) Select a portion to grab. There is now a drag box allowing you to select only a portion of the window to take a shot of.
5) File type choice. This isn’t done yet, but it should make it in. You will be able to select whether you want a JPG or a PNG - we’re limited by what Firefox provides in this regard.
6) File extension bug. There’s currently a problem with ever growing extensions on files. I’ll try to squash this one.
The new release requires changes to lots of text, which will obsolete many of the current locales. I can’t decide whether to hold back the release while I wait for translations or to just go ahead and inconvenience a whole bunch of users.
People don’t talk about how annoying locale maintenance is, but it does hold development back, which is frustrating. I personally feel bad when I go to the Babelzilla guys and say “I’ve re-written the entire interface. Can you please re-write it 15 times too?”. Obviously I completely support it (I don’t want everyone speaking English. Otherwise it would be no fun visiting other countries) I just wish there was an easier way to do locales than bundling them into the extension itself. You have to make a new release every time you want to include a new locale.
Comments»
File type choice is definitely making it in. I just finished it.
And I fixed that extension bug too.
I will also try to get the update url working again.
Great news! Can’t wait
I use Screengrab almost daily. Thanks so much for your work on this awesome add-on.
I used it a lot too with Firefox v1.5.0.*, but it doesn’t work with v2.*, and I can’t downgrade Firefox for work reasons, so I REALLY REALLY do miss this extension!
So, it’s great news you’re still working on it, I for one am very happy with your decision.
Many thanks
I just gave in and finally upgraded to Firefox 2, so Im doing some extension upgrade searching (yours being one of them). 0.8 works about 50% of the time. So far I havent gotten the same error twice, its a new one each time it decides to poop out.
Anyway, I will be watching for the new version. I can’t say I use the extension all that often, but when you need to capture something larger than the viewport it sure is a great tool to have on hand!
Good luck with the new version.
A feature I’d love to see: the ability to grab a screenshot for every page I visit during a browser session. (I write documentation for applications with Web-based GUIs, where there are fairly long procedures I must do for which I need screenshots for most pages. It would be simpler to just grab everything and sort it out later than to manually say ‘grab this one’, ‘grab this one’…)
Hey Andy — gives a Paypal button so we can all stick a dollar/quid in the jar! Screengrab! has changed my working life. Seriously. I’m no longer pasting together screengrabs. I just resize my browser and fire away. It’s a dream!