alrobin

You're welcome! And I hope we have convinced you to buy the full edition of PTE!

Hi, Panury, Welcome to the Forum! 1. It should be available - I have no way of verifying this, but try Project Options check "Synchronize slide show ....." and click on "Customize synchronization". If you have added some background music via the "Music" tab, then the timeline should open. 2. PTE has no recording capability itself so you have to use an external sound editing program. You can assign a comment file to each slide via the "Sound" line at the bottom of the main window, or you can add background music for a particular slide via "Customize Slide / Music". 3. The "P" button shows whether a particular slide has been customized. Hope this helps!

Bill, You can put PTE shows on your web page, but you can't run PTE shows over the web without downloading them first. This presumes that the prospective viewers have a broadband internet service, or are willing to put up with long delays in order to download multi-meg files. To put a file on your web page, just upload the PTE show (compiled ".exe" file) to your site and put a link to it on your page.

Welcome to the Forum! Yes, all the source files will be incorporated into the finished .exe file. Not the .pte "project" file, though. And it is not possible to pull them out again from the .exe file for future use, except by copying the screen and re-recording the music from the show while it is playing. So, you would be wise to go through the slide list, make a note of each image used, and copy them over to a separate folder in case you want to make changes to your show sometime in the future.

Al i would like to take that question back at the time it was written i was suffering from PEBCAK ken What in the world is PEBKAK? Sounds like a secret CSIS mission??

Leighton, It sounds like you are not synchronizing your show via the timeline but using the duration values in Customize Slide to control the sync. This will work but you will not achieve a precise timing for all computers unless you synch to the timeline. As far as displaying the times for the music, we have asked Igor for this feature before, as well as an estimate of the total time, in non-sync mode, but he has not yet been able to provide it. The main problem is that on different computers, in non-sync mode, the timing of the slides would be slightly different, due to different processing capabilities, etc. If timing is critical, use the timeline. Note, too, that if you are using the timeline, the program ignores any "Custom" slide duration values.

Hi, Leighton, Welcome! What you describe (i.e. having the sound determine the slide duration) is not automatic now in PTE. However, you can load up a number of sound files in Project Options/Music, without joining them togther, and then drop your slides on the timeline when you hear the end of each selection. In fact you will see a vertical blue line at the end of each music selection, which should help you in locating the image transitions.

Bob, I would say "yes". But by "border" do you mean part of the "background"? I would agree that with odd-ratio images, there would always be part of the background showing.

If you keep different versions of PTE in separate folders, with a complete set of support files in each folder as I have previously suggested, then it is not too difficult to have two or three different shortcut icons, each pointing to a PTE file using different pte.ini scripts. This method would be especially useful for those concerned with the different timing characteristics of the dissolves when re-loading older PTE shows for modifications, until such time as Igor builds the different options into PTE itself.

Mike, Could be that your images are too large (files probably should not be larger than 150 to 200 Kb jpegs). Or perhaps they are too close together. Are you synching via the timeline? Try various file sizes, transition times, and slide duration times until you find something that works on your machine. Also stop any background programs that are running and using up processor resources.

JG, You may be able to get it down to less than 1/2 a second - each situation is different. You really have to experiment with your own setup. Another thing to look out for is that you don't have any other programs running in the background and using up precious processor resources. No problem posting a test case - I would be happy to have a look at it and provide feedback. Don't worry about the copyright on the music - just use some obscure piece that no one will recognize! Seriously, if the distribution is kept small, there is not too much to worry about. If you put it on your own web site, you can keep the distribution small by not publishing the address too widely. I don't think anyone on the forum would tell, anyway. In the end, it's your call, though.

Thanks, Igor and Aleksey! It just keeps getting better!

JG, How close together are your images? For images that size, PTE requires around a quarter of a second or so to process each image. So, to be safe, you should leave around half a second between the end of each transition and the start of the next one. If you are using "cuts" (fast transitions), you may find that the maximum number of slides which your system can handle per second is only 3 or 4. PTE will perform the transitions, but it will take some time for the system to catch up. You need to experiment to determine the precise capabilities of your own system.

Hi, Carol, Den is right about the space bar being used for pausing and re-starting, but this is only part of the procedure. The spacebar repeats the last button pressed, so in order to use it you have to have already pressed "pause" or "play". Then you can pause or play with the space bar until you happen to press a different button, in which case the spacebar will mirror that button. I have suggested to Igor that he program in the "pause" function for the space bar, (both on the timeline and also for navigation), but he hasn't seen fit to implement it yet. Most sound editing programs, for example, use the spacebar for stopping the playback.

I tend to agree with Tom and cc. I find it a little awkward to have to be sure to press the reverse key before the next transition starts in order to move back more than one slide, especially since there is a bit of a lag before the action takes effect. Just because the reverse or forward key has been pressed is no reason to start the show moving again. IMHO, when pause is pressed, the show should stay paused until one wants to start again. It would be a little like having pause stay paused for only 10 seconds and then start up again unless the user pressed pause again. There is no need for the show to start until the user toggles the pause control. On my analogue tape recorder, when I press the pause key, the machine stays in that mode until I release it, whether I play forward, fast forward, fast reverse, etc. One feature that is missing in PTE is a "key" control for the pause function. As it is, one has to use the navigation bar or build in a button control to pause the show, whereas one can forward or reverse even without the nav bar. I suggest the addition of the space bar for toggling the pause control on and off. Just my views on the subject.

Hi, dharvey, Welcome to the Forum! You're right, there is no other way, within PTE - at the moment. There are a couple of ways outside of PTE. You can use a "thumbnail" or "light-table" program such as "Thumbs Plus" to organize your slides before importing into PTE, and rename them so that they will appear in the left-hand "file list" in the proper order. Then they can be copied as is to the "slide list". Or, you can use the Adjustor model to view the already-selected images as thumb-nails on a "dark-table" and then rearrange them so that they appear in the proper order in the right-hand "slide list".

Paul, You are absolutely right. "Page up" and "Page down" keys also have the same effect. And "Home" returns the show to the starting point. Igor has put in all sorts of little surprises. Now I wish I could determine which buttons move ahead 5 slides and back 5 slides. It would also be nice to have a "pause" key, too, (e.g. the spacebar), in addition to the button on the navigation bar. But, as you say, the maker should also be able to neutralize these if he or she wishes.

Hi, Lee, Welcome! You have to use a "work-around" (something that long-time PTE users are very familiar with! ) If you set the "duration" times for those slide transitions that you want to operate only on the mouse click to a large enough value, then they will stay put until you click the mouse. I think the maximum time is around 5000 sec.

And, if your show is synched, make sure you also check "Permit the control of show".

Ken, The easiest way might be to get a video card with a "TV out" s-video port, and connect it up to your TV set.

Harold, Could it be that this feature was available in the old days when external music players were used - before Igor built the music player exclusively into PTE?

JG, One way would be to "drop" the new slides onto the timeline any old way, then import the pte file into my Adjustor model and copy the "delay" timing from the slides already positioned for the initial "chorus" to the new slides. Then export the file and re-load it into PTE. You might have to do this a couple of times, until you get the starting timing for the new "chorus" of slides just right. "Adjustor" is available on Beechbrook. Please let me know if you need more explicit instructions.

Hi, photodux, Welcome! There are ways to do this, but PTE does not have that facility. You can upload slide shows created in PTE to your own site, though, as a few of us have done. It helps to have a broadband internet service, though, as the files can be quite large. The problem with reducing a show to a size suitable for use in an html file is that the image and music files would suffer greatly due to reduced quality. PTE is designed to be primarily a high-quality image-and-sound AV program. This is what attracts most of us users to it.

Thanks again, Igor! (Good move )

glazzers, When using the timeline, there are two main methods for synching your slides: 1. spread all the slides evenly across the total time (using "Timed points / Add arranged points"), and then go back and readjust the times for individual slides. 2. add the slides one by one by starting with the timeline "empty", and clicking "New transition" whenever you come to a place in the music where you want the next transition to occur. This is the method I prefer, as it generally takes only a few "runs" at it to have the last slide end up at the end of the music. Then you can go back in and readjust as in method 1. My "Adjustor" model (available on Beechbrook) may help you in visualizing the timing of the slides overall, and in making adjustments to the times of individual slides. Once you have the slides positioned roughly on the timeline, you can use Adjustor to "pin" certain ones, and divide the time evenly for the slides in between. Re changing the order on the timeline, this is only possible in the Slide list on the main screen. You can change the length of individual picture durations on the timeline by clicking on the blue rectangle representing that slide and "dragging" it with the mouse to the left or right. If you double-click on the little blue rectangles, you will bring up the menu for changing the transition times. Hope this helps.