Using Images in FF&EZ within a Citrix Environment

Transcription

1 1 Using Images in FF&EZ within a Citrix Environment This document explains how to add images to specifications, and covers the situation where the FF&E database is on a remote server instead of your local PC. The basic procedure for attaching an image remains the same, but working within the Citrix environment changes what you think of as a local disk The document is divided into four major sections: 1. Basic concepts and preparation 2. The basic Single-Spec procedure 3. The multi-spec Auto-Image Wizard 4. Other scenarios you may encounter Basic Concepts and Preparation Anyone who has spent time trying to organize their own photos knows that an image collection can quickly become difficult to manage and may also consume large amounts of your disk space with photos that you may not actually want. When using images in the context of FF&E projects, you also have the issues of 1) wanting to know if a particular image is already in the image collection and 2) wanting to save space by using the existing image file when the same item is used in multiple projects. Further, if you find that it is more efficient to collect all or most of the images needed for a project in one work session, you will also have the issue of making sure you remember which image went with which specification so you can easily select it. FF&EZ addresses all these issues (if you let it) by encouraging a procedure that includes the following features: Automatically renames images using the Vendor ID and the Catalog # fields, which together create a unique identifier (if used correctly) that can be used from one project to the next without worrying about naming conflicts. Stores all images in a single folder that, because of the automatic naming, can be sorted by vendor by simply sorting by file name. Automatically looks for an image with FF&EZ s automatically determined file name to see if it already exists in the collection. Allows you to override the automatic name when dealing with custom products for which no Catalog # exists (more on this later, however). Allows you to stage scanned or downloaded images in a temporary folder and use a product s current FF&EZ Spec ID as a temporary name for the image. There are two prerequisites for this procedure to work smoothly, both in your current project and in future projects: 1) Although you can stage images in a temporary folder at any time, before you attach one to a spec, the spec must have the vendor selected and the vendor s unique Catalog # (model #, style #, SKU, etc.) entered into the Catalog # field. 2) If you have custom items with an image but no official Catalog #, be prepared to enter a meaningful name for the image when attaching it. The recommended name is the Vendor

2 2 Setup ID + the Project ID + Spec ID used in the project. Other choices exist, so check out the section called Naming Custom Items further below. Staging images in a temporary folder Many people find that the number of document files that are generated during a design project makes it important to have an organized approach to storing those files. As a result, either their My Documents folder or Shared Documents folder (or a location on their network) already contains a folder tree for saving all files for clients and their projects. This makes a logical location for creating a temporary folder for project images. Alternatively, if you intend to do any image processing on your images prior to using them in FF&EZ, you may find it equally useful to create temporary folders beneath your My Pictures folder since photo editors usually default to that location when looking for images to load. Finally, if you are accessing FF&EZ through a Citrix connection, you may find it useful to create temporary folders in the root of your C: drive, to minimize the time spent locating the files. You can collect and organize the images as you like, but we strongly recommend two things that you should do: 1) Stage your images in a single folder named for the project, not one for each vendor. The folder you create is meant to be temporary, since FF&EZ stores its images with vendor-prefixed names in a single folder, and there is no need to keep duplicates in another location. FF&EZ can move the original file instead of copying it, or you can delete the entire temporary folder later. 2) Temporarily name each file using the Spec ID of the specification to which it will be attached. If you have downloaded, scanned or used digital photos before, you will have already noted that the names given to these images are usually of no value in reminding you what they contain. Even if you use thumbnail views when searching, naming the image with the Spec ID removes any doubt about where the image needs to go. Remember, however, that this is a temporary name because a Spec ID can refer to entirely different things in different projects FF&EZ will change it to a permanent name later. Collecting image files There are three typical sources for image files: 1) Downloading from web sites by right-clicking and selecting Save image. 2) Scanners 3) Digital cameras. Images from web sites and from cameras are generally ready to use, but here are some things to keep in mind: Web images can have too low a resolution (avoid downloading thumbnails if a larger version is available on the site). If you collect a photo less than 50K in size that prints with obvious jaggies, you may be able to fix this with a photo editor. Most photo editors have a resize or resample command, usually under an Edit or Image menu item. With

3 3 the aspect ratio locked, enlarge a low-res image by % and then run the photo editor s automatic image enhancer (or just the Sharpen tool) to reduce the jaggies. Modern digital cameras may be set to take images that are much too large for our purpose here and will consume excess disk space. Typically, a one megapixel resolution setting is sufficient, which produces file sizes in the K range If your JPEG photos are typically more than 1 meg in file size, you can use a photo editor s Resize or Resample command as above, but using a reduction of 30-50%. Also, some photo managers have an Export command that can batch export a whole set of pictures at a reduced resolution. Aim for a final file size of about 100 to 150k. Digital cameras typically create photos in JPEG format, however some can be set to what is called the raw format. Avoid this setting for the purpose here, since these photos are very large and must be converted or exported to be useful in FF&EZ. Scanners commonly create very large files in bit-map formats like BMP or TIFF or in your graphics software s internal format. Two tips to creating manageable files are 1) scan photo (non-text) sources at 150 DPI, unless they are substantially larger or smaller than a 3 x5 print. Adjust DPI to 300 for smaller originals and to for larger ones. 2) Be sure to save the scan as a JPEG file, not a bit-map (and of course, use the Spec ID for the file name). As above, final file size should be about 100 to 150k.

4 4 Single Spec Procedure The basic procedure for attaching an image to a spec, if you have followed the suggestions above, is very simple (please note that this base procedure refers to specifications, however everything described in it works the same on the requisition screen): 1) Locate the desired spec on FF&EZ s Specification List screen and select Edit. 2) Double-check that the vendor and Catalog # are correct. The Catalog # should be unique within that vendor s products (i.e., if there are different color options, the correct option should be indicated by the Catalog # field. 3) Click the Select button below the image box. Please note that the Select button will change to a Clear button once you have selected an image. Using the Clear button will remove an existing link to an image, so if an image ever needs to be changed, clicking Clear would be the first step. 4) The program will display the Windows image selection dialog box. The first time it appears, it will be pointed at a default location. Navigate to the folder where you have placed your collected images and go to step 5 (but see note below). Important exception for Citrix or Terminal Server users: Keep in mind that you are running FF&EZ on a remote server, not your local PC. When selecting files in this environment, folders that are labeled My Documents refer to a folder on the server, so don t be confused when your documents do not appear. Access to the disk on your own PC is provided by a special mapped drive that points back to your client PC, and on most systems, this is drive V:. To reach it, first go to My Computer instead of My Documents.

5 5 As you can see in the screen shot, your own disk drive appears as C$ on Client with the drive letter V: assigned to it. Opening this disk drive will provide access to your local files, which will be found by starting with the Documents and Settings folder and going from there: Note: On Vista and Windows 7 systems, the folder names will be different (e.g., My Documents is just Documents and Documents and Settings\ user name \ has been replaced by Users\ user name \Documents, etc.). Apparently using a computer was thought to be too easy by Microsoft s development staff, so they mixed it up a bit. 5) Once you locate the folder with your images for the project, you can simply select the correct one (if you named them according to the Spec ID that they match) or you can change the view to Thumbnails with the view control at the top right. Note that the next time you begin selecting an image during this session, the Open Picture dialog will open in the same folder as the last time.

6 6 6) After you choose the image, the file selection window will close, revealing the selected image with options for setting the image name: Keep in mind that the recommended file name is recommended for a reason. If you are staging images temporarily, be sure to check the Move images option to have FF&EZ delete the original after copying it (otherwise you will have to clean up the temporary files yourself). With almost all images, all you need to do now is click on the Save button at the bottom and you will be returned to the main Specifications List screen

7 7 (we will discuss the rest of the options on this screen shortly). You will see the image on the screen, along with the file name: 7) Remember that image selection is a part of the editing process, so you will still need to Save the specification itself to make the image selection permanent. Also note that if you have unchecked the Show images option above the function buttons, images will not be displayed.

8 8 Auto-Image Utility If you have many specs to which you want to attach images, and especially if you are doing this in the Citrix environment in which response is slower due to moving larger image files over a network (or the Internet), you will want to take advantage of the Auto-Image Utility, which can automatically transfer all your images to the server and attach them to the selected specs in one operation. As we mentioned in the beginning of this document, this procedure uses the same concepts of organizing your images as the single-spec approach, so be sure you understand those, especially regarding how to name your image files and how FF&EZ automatically renames them to allow efficient management of your image library. The utility s ability to automatically attach files depends on your naming your source files with the Spec ID of the specification to which they will be attached, and the final names used for your files will follow FF&EZ s standard convention. The latter characteristic also allows this utility to automatically attach any images that already exist in the FF&EZ image library. Procedure 1a) (Optional) If you believe that there may be a lot of image-less specs that match existing images in the FF&EZ library, you can run the utility with the Only check in FF&EZ library option first (more info below). The advantage is that you will then be sure of which specs do not need to have new images gathered. 1b) As described in the Basic Concepts and Preparation section, gather the images you want to use with your specs into a temporary folder, naming them with the Spec ID of the spec to which they will be attached. In all cases, the file extension (image format type) should be left as is, so you may have a CHR001.JPG, CHR001.PNG, etc., depending on the type of image. 2) Open your project and display the Specification List screen. Select the Utilities command, then Auto-Image. 3) The utility, which is a wizard type, will appear. Its first step includes a refresher introduction to the requirements of using it, but the main task will be to indicate where to look for your images. Note that the Prev, Next and Process buttons will be disabled at this point. These will be enabled depending on where you are in the process of setting up the wizard. Each screen will include the necessary explanation of what you will need to do.

9 9 4) To enable the Next button, you can do one of two things. Typically, you will use the Select button to browse your system and locate one of your image files (it does not matter which one). In this example, we have changed the file view to show full detail, so that you can see that CHR004 has three different types of files. If a situation like this happens, FF&EZ will automatically pick the version with the latest date and time. This is because the most likely scenario for having duplicate names is that the newest file will be a downsized or converted version of an original image. Keep this in mind when you assemble your images, however, it s still best to avoid having multiple versions in the source folder. Once the utility has found eligible image files, you can move to the next step. However, the second option available is that you can also have FF&EZ only look for existing images in its image library instead by selecting the Only check in FF&EZ library option. If you do this, you will not need to select a source folder and can click Next to continue. Note that FF&EZ will still check for existing images even if you don t use this option. 5) FF&EZ will check for eligible specs and attempt to match them with existing images in its library and with any new ones in the folder that you selected in the previous step. It will then display the results:

10 10 The list of results includes the following columns: Spec ID Library Image New Image Size (K) Use New? The ID of the specification to which an image can be attached. Only specs that have no image and for which an eligible image was found will be included. If an existing image was found in the FF&EZ image library, it will be shown here. Please remember that an existing file s name will be the standardized one as described in the Basic Concepts section, not the temporary name based on the Spec ID. If both an existing image and a new one were found, the existing image will be displayed in red (see Use New? below). Existing images will be displayed for reference. If FF&EZ found a new image in your source folder that matched one of the specs, the file will be listed in this column. The size of the file in kilobytes (review the Basic Concepts for recommended file sizes). A file that is larger than the recommended size will be shown in red. These can still be used, but if you consistently see very large sizes, you are using more disk space than is really necessary, and if you are using FF&EZ over a Citrix connection, your printing and previewing of reports with images can take longer. This is selected automatically for new images and unselected for existing ones. Please note that this means that if both an existing image and a new one are found for the same spec, you will need to select this checkbox in order to replace the old image with the new one. IMPORTANT: Since images are shared among multiple projects, replacing an existing image may affect more than your current project. Always click on that row in the display so you can see what the existing image looks like. If you do not want to replace it, leave Use New? unselected. You can use the manual procedure later to specify a non-standard library image name for your new image and preserve

11 11 the existing one (but also, make sure to understand why this happened). 6) After reviewing the list of images to be attached, you need to specify whether you want any new images copied instead of moved to the FF&EZ image library. Generally, we recommend that you move the images, since this recovers the disk space from the original location. This also makes it easier to see which images did not get used (for instance, if you had a typo in the name you gave an image), since those image files will still be in the source folder. You must select either Move or Copy before you can continue. Then indicate that you are done with your review of the list by checking Review of image selection is complete and click the Next button. 7) The final step in the procedure is to click the Process button to actually perform the attachment process. Important: Since the attachment process is a form of batch editing, you should ensure that no other users are attempting to edit the affected specs at this point. The system will notify you if a problem of this type occurs and give options to help resolve this, but it s best to avoid the possibility. When you click Process, the wizard will display the status of moving (or copying) all new images. Then it will attach all the selected images to the appropriate specs: As you can see in the illustration, FF&EZ automatically renames the files from the Spec ID to the standardized form that uses the Vendor ID and Catalog # (it will also handle specs with CUSTOM as the Catalog #. See Other Scenarios section for more about this kind of exception). 8) When processing is complete, the utility will display an appropriate message and the Done button will appear. Click it to return to the main program. Notes: Since the Auto-Image utility depends on the use of standardized file names, if you know of exceptions to the rules you are better off using the manual procedure on these specs before you run Auto-Image. Also, if a typo causes an image to be attached to the

12 12 wrong spec, all you need to do is clear the image from the incorrect spec and attach it to the correct one. However, it s very likely that this image will have an incorrect (misleading) file name, so we would strongly recommend that you either 1) rename the image to reflect the correct Vendor ID and Catalog # first or 2) select the image using the manual procedure and select the option to make a properly named copy, then delete the original. See the next section for more about reusing existing images.

13 13 Other scenarios The following items cover exceptions to the rules as well as things you might want to do as things change in your project. Multiple images Please note that the basic procedure shown above allows you to attach an image to a specification. However, in FF&EZ, a specification is then used by attaching it to an object as a component. Each object can have one or more specs attached, representing one or more products (usually from different manufacturers). As you might guess, this allows each object to have multiple images associated with it. There are two things you must do to take advantage of this: 1) Separate parts of the object (such as chair and COM) into separate specs and attach each to the object as separate components and 2) use the Multi-image version of the Object Illustration Sheet when printing a spec book, which is formatted to show more than just the main image. Remember that COM and other secondary support components will have a specific quantity when used in each object (for instance, 3 sq yds ), unlike the main component, which is almost always 1. You can attach images to be used in this way with either the single spec procedure or with the Auto-Image Utility if you name the original images with the associated Spec ID. Images for custom items From experience, no scheme for organizing data can account for all the variations in the FF&E industry, and custom items are a classic example. If you have an image that can be used with a custom item, the chances are that it is somewhat generic and a Catalog # isn t applicable anyway. In this case, you need to come up with a logical way to name the image. If the image is such that it might be used in multiple projects, we recommend this pattern: vendor id + _ + type + nnnn where type is a very short description of the image and nnnn is a simple number to let you have more than one type from that vendor (up to 9,999 in this pattern). This approach makes it easier to find an existing generic image from that manufacturer without needing a Catalog # (for example, ACME_DRAPES0001). If you try to create a file name that already exists, FF&EZ will show you the existing image and allow you to change the number in the new file s name to something else. If the image is very specific to your current project and likely won t be used again, you can use an easier approach: vendor id + _ + project id + _ + spec id where project id is your current project and spec id is simply the Spec ID used for the item in the current project. This creates what should always be a unique combination of codes. Removing an image from a spec Whenever you want to de-attach an image from a spec, simply use the Edit function on that spec and click on the Clear button beneath the image. When the image is cleared, the button will change back to the Select button.

14 14 Reusing an existing image The approach we ve taken in setting up image handling in FF&EZ allows existing images to be easily reused in future projects. There are three ways this can happen: 1) Whenever you import a specification, whether on the Specification List screen or as part of importing a room on the Room List screen, all attached images remain attached. Each specification points to the same file, which under normal circumstances, would never need to be different. 2) If you have followed the recommended approach to naming image files explained at the beginning of this document, FF&EZ will automatically search in its images folder for an image file named with a Vendor ID and Catalog # that matches your current spec. If found, it will tell you and place you at step 6 in the manual procedure above, with the image already selected (if you don t want to use the existing image, simply use the Reselect button below it). 3) If you believe an image already exists in FF&EZ s image folder, but FF&EZ cannot find it automatically with a Vendor ID / Catalog # search, you can search for it yourself in step 4 above by navigating to the Images folder in the main FF&EZ folder on the server. This scenario can happen if you used non-standard file names for some images (also if the Catalog # was entered differently) and will be most common for generic images used for custom products that do not have a set Catalog #. Remember that FF&EZ s image file names use the Vendor ID as a prefix, so using that and either an image preview or the thumbnail view, you should be able to easily find existing images. Note that in this situation, FF&EZ will also ask if you want to use the original file, or a copy of it with a new name. Generally, you ll want to use the original file unless there is a specific reason not to do so. Replacing an existing image There are two ways to replace an existing image with a different one, and the method you choose will depend on the situation. 1) If the wrong image was selected for the spec and needs to be switched, edit the spec and click on the Clear button. The button will change to a Select button, which you can use as described in the main procedure to select a new image. Note that this does not affect the first image file it is still in the image collection and can be used on other specs. However, if that image was new and was given an incorrect name by being attached to the spec, you should manually rename it to reflect the correct Vendor ID and Catalog #. 2) If the image itself needs to be updated (that is, it isn t necessarily wrong but you have a better version you want to use, you can replace the image file itself. Important: Since images are meant to be shared by other specs in other projects, changing the original image will change it everywhere else, too. If you don t want to do this, use the first technique above. You can replace the original image file in one of two ways: a) If you are comfortable with Windows file management, you can literally copy over the original file with a file of the same name. Please note that Windows may not display

15 15 the changes immediately if it is using memory instead of the disk drive to supply the image content (this is a technique used to make PCs respond faster). b) Edit the spec and Clear the image, then use the main procedure to select your new image file as you normally would, making sure that it will be named with the same name as the original. FF&EZ will show you both the original file and your new one and ask you to confirm replacing the old one. When you confirm and save the new image selection, the old file will be replaced.