Screen Tester Utility Version 2.1 2/07/95 Introduction: Screen Tester is an utility designed to assist the VB programmer in designing and documenting forms at different screen resolutions. It places a floating form on the screen the size of a VGA, SVGA, or 1024x768 screen. This can be useful when designing forms that need to fit into a particular size screen without going to the hassle of changing Windows screen resolutions every time a design check needs to be made. In Version 2.0, Screen Tester will capture the area of the screen it's currently over to the Clipboard or a BMP file. This makes it easy to do screen captures for documentation, particularly in circumstances where you need to show more than one form at a time. Also, in Version 2.0, you can move the floating screen form around using the keyboard. This program is Freeware. There is no charge for using it. Please see the Disclaimer & Legal Stuff section of this document for further information concerning distribution. Installation and Program Requirements: Screen Tester is written in Visual Basic 3.0 and requires the CMDIALOG.VBX custom control that comes with Visual Basic 3.0. How To Use Screen Tester: Screen Tester displays as a free floating form without any title bar. You can move Screen Tester about the screen just like you would the Windows Clock program, just press down the left mouse button and drag it about the screen. In addition to moving the form with the mouse, you can move it with the keyboard. The directional arrows move the floating form in the specified direction, just like selecting the Move option from a system menu. Pressing the Home key will move it to position 0,0. If you press the right mouse button, you'll get the Screen Tester menu. The first three choices on this menu allow you to chose either standard VGA size (640x480), Super VGA size (800x600), or 1024x768 resolution. The background color of the floating form can be set by chosing the 'Background Color' selection from the menu. The standard common color dialog will be displayed and you can set the form's color to your favorite background color. The 'Grab Screen' selection sends the floating form to the back and captures the screen area. It then sends the image to either the Clipboard or to a BMP file, depending on which option is checked under the 'Capture Destination' selection. Sometimes you may want to place the floating form in a particular position and then send it to the back so that your design arrangement can show in front of it. Using the 'Send To Back' menu selection will do this for you. You can minimize the form or close the program by selecting these from the menu. The form size, position, color, and capture destination option are saved in SCRNTEST.INI and are read, set, and saved each time you run the program. Programmer's Points of Interest: Screen Tester contains code that new VB programmers often ask about. Here are some examples you might be able to use: + Moving a form without a title bar + Using popup menus, particularly across forms + Saving and retrieving user preferences in an .INI file + Using the color and file common dialogs + Positioning windows + Capturing a portion of the screen + Using Windows messages Version Information and Other Technical Notes: Version 2.0 corrects some problems found in Version 1.0: 1. Version 1.0 made assumptions about the screen sizes that were not applicable for all systems. Version 2.0 uses calculations instead of constants for this purpose. 2. Version 1.0 would not save settings to the .INI file if it was closed by Task Manager or by ending a Windows session. 3. The icon for version 1.0 did not look right. 4. The Alt-F4 exit didn't work quite right Version 2.0 adds the screen capture functions and the keyboard movement functions. Version 2.1 corrects the following bugs from 2.0 1. The VBAssist DLL file reference was left in the .MAK file. This has been removed. 2. The screen capture was off by one pixel. This has been corrected. 3. Extra text was left in the SCRNTEST.BAS file Disclaimer & Legal Stuff: Screen Tester is Copyright 1995 by J. Frank Carr. All rights reserved. Screen Tester is FreeWare. You can use it and modify it as you wish for your own personal use. You may incorporate portions of the provided source code into your own programs as long as the resulting program is not essentially the same as Screen Tester. You may upload it to free BBS systems or give it away as long as the entire UNMODIFIED program, text files, and source code are distributed as a whole. For permission and information about including and distributing Screen Tester in a disk/CD collection of shareware/freeware programs or on a pay-for-use BBS system, please contact J. Frank Carr at the address given in the Comments & Suggestions section of this document. J. Frank Carr makes no warranty of any kind with regard to this software or its documentation, including, but not limited to, any implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. J. Frank Carr shall not be liable for errors or for incidental or consequential damages in connection with the furnishing, performance, or use of this product. The software and the information contained in the documentation are subject to change without notice. Comments & Suggestions: I had a limited number of screens and systems to test this program. Please let me know if your particular system has a problem with sizing the form, displaying it correctly, or capturing the screen image. I would particularly like to know if the program functions correctly with color resolutions greater than 256 colors. I would like to hear from anyone who gets any use out of this program, or who encounters any problems or bugs with it, or if there are changes or enhancements you would like to see. Should I get enough feedback on this program, I'll probably make enhancements to it. I am also available for programming projects, training, code reviews, and consulting in Visual Basic. Contact me as listed below for information regarding my availibility and prices. You may contact me at: J. Frank Carr 685 Kenneth Lane Norcross, GA 30093 USA Voice Mail: (404) 880-5762 CIS: 75120, 2420 America OnLine: JFCarr