Created
July 19, 2003 © Copyright Moon's Designs
Property of Moon's Designs
This is my creation, any similarity
to other tutorials on the Internet is unintentional.
Please do not copy or place this tutorial or any
graphics to any other place without written permission
directly from me. Thank you.
This tutorial is written
in and for PSP8 and assumes you have a working knowledge
of PSP.
YOU
WILL NEED:
JASC's PSP8 (30
day free trial) - You can get it HERE
Screenshots
are resized and compressed for faster loading.
Scripting is one of the more
powerful new features in PSP8, and I have had a
lot of e-mails asking for help understanding this
feature a little better. I thank those who have
encouraged me to write a tutorial explaining this
feature as simply as possible.
Please be advised that I am doing
this tutorial to show you about scripts. I will
NOT be doing tutorials where you only click on a
script and the tutorial is done. To me, that doesn't
teach you a thing. This is one reason that I will
not allow any of my tutorials to be scripted. My
desire is to teach you how to accomplish something
in PSP8, not just click a button and have it done
for you. If you enjoy something I have taught you
to do, and wish to script it, I don't have a problem
with that - as long as it is for YOUR personal use
ONLY and not to share with others.
Some of the statements are my
own opinion about scripts, others come from what
I learned during the private beta process, and still
others from reading the help section, the manual,
and newsgroups.
A script keeps track of your
keystrokes as you do them. You may be more familiar
with the older term, Macros. PSP8 has a full featured
scripting engine based on the Python programming
language, which is a very powerful language. You
can write your own scripts using the Python Syntax.
In the Learning Center folder, in your Programs-->JASC-->
PaintShopPro 8, there is a PDF folder that has a
How To Script guide along with a user manual for
writing your own scripts.
However, JASC provides a built-in
script recorder that can do the work for you, allowing
you to script almost any action within the application.
This is something that tutorial writers have been
requesting for ages and I think that this is a wonderful
new feature for someone's personal use. Having the
ability to write a script or activate a premade
script is totally awesome. Is there something that
you frequently do in PSP? For example, adding corners
to a frame you have made or resizing a lot of photos
from your digital camera? Simply write a script
for it!
Caution!
You should be cautious about running a script from
an unknown source. I only run scripts that I have
made or that someone that I trust, such as JASC,
has made. The reason for the caution is because
Python is a full featured programming language.
It CAN be used to execute malicious scripts ~~ such
as formatting your hard drive. Due to this potential
danger, PSP8 includes two explicit directory folders
that reside the the JASC's PSP8 folder and also
in your MYPSP8 folders. These folders are named
Scripts Restricted and Scripts Trusted. I personally
would keep any scripts that you get from someone
else in the restricted folder and check them out.
I will show you how to "read" a script
later in this lesson.
Now that we have that out of
the way, let's talk about the scripting toolbar.
The screenshot below shows the first half of the
toolbar. I will review each part below.
1. Select Script Dropdown; 2. Run Selected Script;
3. Edit Selected Script
4. Interactive Script Playback Toggle; 5. Run Script;
6. Stop Script
1. Your select script is a dropdown
list that shows the scripts saved in the Scripts
Restricted and Scripts Trusted folders, as well
as any additional folders that you have in your
File Locations.
2. Runs the script that is displayed
on your drop down list.
3. Edit selected script. Click
on this button and will show you the author, copyright,
and description along with the script commands.
The script I am showing is the Bevel Selection script.
1. Author; 2. Copyright; 3. Description; 4. Script
Commands; 5. Text Editor
Click on the Text Editor (5)
and it will bring up script in programming language.
There can be copyright information
in either the script editor box and/or the text
editor information. For example, in the Art script,
written by Angela Cable, the copyright states that
it is for free distribution only. There is no additional
information in the text editor.
Checking out the Bevel Selection
from Joe Fromm, it states that the copyright is
Jasc Software, All Rights Reserved and additional
information goes off the menu. If you click on the
text editor, it additionally states "Permission
to create derivate works of this script is granted
provided this copyright notice is included."
This tells me that we can edit the script, give
it a new name, however you must keep the JASC Software
copyright information included. If you should happen
to modify a script written by JASC, change the author
name to yours. This was by request of Joe Fromm
in the Beta Newsgroup as he wouldn't know what changes
you made and wouldn't be able to help someone that
was having a problem with the script.
4. The interactive script playback
toggle allows you to switch in between the silent
and interactive mode when running scripts. Let me
explain silent and interactive. Many of the scripts
have actions set at default. If you run this silently
then it will run the script with the default settings
of those actions. If you choose to run it interactively,
when the script gets to a default action is will
stop and you can change the settings if you so desire.
5. You can also run a script
by clicking this icon, it will bring open to your
PSP8 Scripts Restricted folder. You can choose a
script from there, navigate to the trusted folder
or to one of your folders. You can run the script
by Default, Interactively, or Silent by choosing
for the dropdown list where the arrow is pointed
to.
6. You can stop a running script
if you would like. This button is grayed out if
there is not script running.
Let's move on to learning how
to record our own scripts, just click the link below.
