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CD/DVD and Music Software
Music Software There is plenty of free and trial version (shareware) audio software available for download these days. You can convert, encode, rip, edit, burn, and even record audio off LPs or in some cases, you can record any sound you...
Event Planning Software: A Beginners Guide to Journaling Management
As I said in the first article in this series, when you enter
the world of event planning, the one thing you realize very
quickly is that flexibility is a necessity. Your event planning
software will need to track appointments, events, journaling...
Remote Collaboration Is Now A Service On The Internet
Easydesk is a new way to co-operate: a user-freindly instrument for the creation of a “virtual office”, designed for professional use, equipped with all the features and and the services needed to assure high performances and above all the...
Types of computer infections
Computer Infections can be broken up into 4 main categories which are explained in detail below: Viruses Computer Viruses are small pieces of software that attach themselves to real programs. An example would be a virus that attaches itself onto...
What Tablet PCs Can Do for You
Tablet PCs are great. If you are a mobile person, and you have never considered getting a tablet PC in the past, now is as good a time as any to start checking them out - the technology is cutting-edge, the usability is superb, and prices are...
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WEB PICTURE QUALITY - knowledge over style over content
FORMATS bitmap, gif and jpeg. picture formats are commonly used.
I use jpeg format for converting most big pictures, and reduce the dots per inch (dpi) to 70 or below, for a web page.
To keep jpeg file sizes under 50k, I use 30 to 60 on the 'compression' scale for jpegs ( a scale runs from 2 as high quality, to 255 for low quality. )
Because many users employ a 256 colour palette, gif's are still much in use, but they only handle up to 256 colours. I use gifs for icons and small pics.
I use 24 bit colour bmp's for archiving (I use 300 dpi in case I might print them later), they can be used as a source for both gif and jpeg. -------------------------------- THE FORMATS -------------------------------- 1.bmp (bitmap) This is a pixel-mapped format. I scan pics at 300 dpi -this is about the maximum for a printer, but too good for the web.
300 dpi 10 by 8 inch pictures, take around 20 megabytes file size. 300 dpi bitmap scans are ideal for archiving, as the place to start processing.
NOTE - Netscape Browser does not appear to handle bmp's! ----------------
2.gif.
Gif's are useful for small pics like icons, and also come in 'animated' form useful for websites.
Any scanned colour pic should be processed to 256 colour FIRST, then the dpi reduced to a maximum of 72dpi for screen use, then saved as the gif.
The basic colour palette options are (in PhotoPaint) : 'uniform palette' - keeps to colours that a 256 colour screen uses. This is good where multiple pics are on one webpage, because the browser might have only those colours to use, (someone correct me if that's wrong?)
'adaptive palette' and 'optimised palette' These both select the 'best' 256 colours from the picture itself -. Pics done with these options may not look well on pages with many pictures, as the browser page may be limited to 256 colours in total. A picture on its own on a page will look ok.
---------------- 3. jpegs (jpg)
The jpeg compression works directly from a 24 bit colour palette if necessary, whereas gifs are 256 colours maximum.
The standard compression method is type 4:4:4 on Photopaint. There is a scale 'compression' from 2 to 255. 2 is highest quality, biggest file, 255 is lowest quality, smallest file.
Here are the pic filesizes I got from different compression of a 70 dpi, 10 by 8 inch
scan of a full colour (24bit) photograph:
Original bmp file .. appx 20mb jpg compression 2: 217kb jpg compression 15: 79kb jpg compression 30: 51kb ..reccommended jpg comression 50: 36kb ..reccommended jpg compression 150: 20kb.
Even the 20kb version was adequate for pictures say up to 5 by 3 inches on an 800 by 600 pixel screen resolution. 30 to 60kb seems a good trade off between file size and quality, but the file size you get relates to the picture composition. This would seem a good range for 'average' sized jpg web pictures without noticably losing quality.
----------------------------- 4. jpg versus gif gifs are good for icons and small pics - these can be in 16 colours which makes very small files.
jpeg is a compression facility and does not do so well with 16 colour or small pics, unless the compression number is increased. jpeg is really for compressing big pictures, lots of data, 24 bit colour.
With gif you do not get the options for palette selection and compression levels that jpeg gives.
I use gifs for icons and small pics, jpeg for the rest. ------------------------------
5.Black and white. For texts, scan textual material in B&W even if there are colour pics on the page. Separately scan the colour pics, in colour. Black and white is 1 bit not 8 bit - file sizes are much smaller than the equivalent in colour.
I have received text scans in colour - usually the black is grey rather than black. If 'ocr' software won't scan them because the resolution is too low (and it usually is!), I do the next best thing and convert the pic to B&W. The process usually involves darkening the colour image as much as possible, to increase the blackness of the characters.
Then convert to black and white using the 'threshhold' control. This threshhold is just the point at which the analyser decides it is a 'black' pixel square, not 'white'.
The threshhold range is 0 t0 255, in the range from 127 to 220 does the trick, dependent on the colour original, and the allowable extra black 'dots' you get if the value is set too high.
File sizes can reduce a text page from 100kb jpg to 20kb gif, just by going to b&w. Somehow I prefer gifs for black and white - I feel gifs are better suited to simpler jobs than jpeg.
About the Author
Paul Hailey, hailey@clara.net and site http://www.hailey,clara.net
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Tucows Downloads - Download Freeware and Shareware Software |
Download freeware, shareware, and demos. Maintains over 45000 software titles that are tested, rated, reviewed and ready to download. |
www.tucows.com |
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Free Software Downloads and Software Reviews - Download.com |
Download shareware, freeware and Demo software for PC, Mac, Linux, and Handhelds categorized into categories, plus software reviews. |
www.download.com |
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Computer software - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
This includes application software such as a word processor, which enables a ... Application software is often purchased separately from computer hardware. ... |
en.wikipedia.org |
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Shareware.com - Search for shareware programs and free software ... |
Search for shareware programs from more than a dozen downloadable software directories. |
www.shareware.com |
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Jumbo: Free & Shareware MP3 files, Games, Screen Savers & Computer ... |
Source of free and shareware computer programs and utilities for PC and Mac. Evaluate software and read product reviews. Download games and screen savers. |
www.jumbo.com |
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Computer Software in the Yahoo! Directory |
Browse categories featuring sites devoted to computer software, including shareware and freeware download sites, operating systems, desktop customization, ... |
dir.yahoo.com |
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IEEE Software |
IEEE Computer Society's magazine covering all aspects of software, including software engineering. |
www.computer.org |
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Free Downloads on ZDNet | Shareware, Trialware, Evaluation Software |
ZDNet's Software Directory is the Web's largest library of software downloads. Covering software for Windows, Mac, and Mobile systems, ZDNet's Software ... |
downloads.zdnet.com |
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FSF - The Free Software Foundation |
Free software is a matter of liberty not price. Think of "free" as in "free speech". |
www.fsf.org |
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Apple - Software |
Software products for your digital life. ... The perfect addition for professional review. QuickTime Broadcaster. Encoding software for live events. ... |
www.apple.com |
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Open Directory - Computers: Software |
In Partnership with AOL Search. about dmoz | report abuse/spam | help. the entire directory, only in Computers/Software. Top: Computers: Software (38471) ... |
dmoz.org |
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freshmeat.net: Welcome to freshmeat.net |
About: The Web browser is probably the most frequently used software today, ... Web professionals can use the software for functional testing and regression ... |
freshmeat.net |
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Software - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation (FSF) |
Listing of the GNU software packages. |
www.gnu.org |
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Sun Software |
Get enterprise-class software--Solaris 10 OS, the Java Enterprise System, ... Sun Java StorageTek Software reduces cost and complexity with a single, ... |
www.sun.com |
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Internet Real Estate.com -- owns and operates a portfolio of the ... |
SOFTWARE.COM · SWEEPSTAKES.COM · PHONE.COM PODCAST.COM ... Software.com | Sweepstakes.com | Phone.com | Podcast.com | Shop.com | Safety.com ... |
www.internetrealestate.com |
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Joel on Software |
A weblog by Joel Spolsky, a programmer working in New York City, about software and software companies. |
www.joelonsoftware.com |
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Amazon.com Software: Computer & video games, business, accounting ... |
Online shopping for computer & video games, business & office productivity software, software from Microsoft, Apple, Adobe & more; accounting, antivirus, ... |
www.amazon.com |
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IBM Software - Home Page |
IBM home page for all of its software products, including Lotus and Tivoli, with keyword search, category browse and AZ product names. |
www.ibm.com |
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Opera web browser: Homepage |
Copyright © 2006 Opera Software ASA. All rights reserved. Skip navigation. Opera Software ... Copyright Opera Software ASA . All rights reserved. ... |
www.opera.com |
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Google Directory - Computers > Software |
Search only in Software Search the Web ... Software Categorized by Letter: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z ... |
www.google.com |
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