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Web Capture

Use SnagIt's Web Capture to search (scan) and gather images published on a Web site. For example, you can specify any public web site URL to capture all images used on the site. This is the easiest and best way to build a library of Web images. Preview the images to be captured from the Web site, then include or exclude them from the final scan.

After capturing these images, they can be directed to any folder on your PC or to a designated Catalog Folder so they can be browsed and viewed using SnagIt Catalog.

GIF, JPG, and PNG files can be scanned and captured using SnagIt Web Capture.

This feature is particularly useful for webmasters and graphic designers who need to edit or update Web site images, or for anyone who wants to browse Web images, but doesn't want to be connected to the Internet.

Before you start a Web capture, please check your Web settings. Ask your network administrator or ISP about your specific case. As every Internet connection is unique, we can not tell you exactly what to do, but can give hints about what a general procedure for this setup.

How to Configure Web Settings

1. In the Capture Settings pane, set the mode to Web.

2. Choose the Input Properties... button. The tabbed Input Properties dialog box opens.
   

3. Select the Web Capture Preferences tab. Enable the Allow Web site cookies option.

4. If you use a dial-up connection, set the proxy to Direct Connection (No Proxy) and set HTTP Request Timeout (at the bottom of the tab) to 60 or more seconds.
   If you are on a high-speed connection (ISDN, DSP, or cable modem), leave the proxy set to set to Direct Connection (No Proxy). Set the HTTP Request Timeout to 30 or more seconds.

   If you are on any kind of local area network (LAN), you will probably be behind some kind of firewall (which hopefully has a proxy server). In this case, select Use HTTP Proxy. If Use HTTP Proxy is selected, you will at least have to fill in the Host and Port fields. Contact your network administrator if you do not know what the host is. The Port is usually 80 or 8080, but if neither of those works, you'll have to contact your network administrator.

   Sometimes, proxies will require authentication to allow a computers to use them. In that case, the you should check Enable Proxy Authentication. You will then have to fill in the Username and Password fields. These will generally be what you use to log into your computer, but it doesn't have to be.

5. The Work Offline option should only be checked if you want to cache downloaded data locally on your computer. This will usually only be used with dial-up connections, but anyone who frequently visits a site to download images may want to check this because it will allow faster captures.

6. Click OK to save changes and exit this dialog box.

How to Perform a Web Capture

In the Capture Settings pane, choose Web from the mode options.

1. Go to Input Properties... > Web Capture Preferences and check your Web settings. See the How to Configure Web Settings section in this tutorial for more information.

2. Select the Input menu and choose the desired input option, Fixed Address or Prompt for Address:
   Fixed Address allows you to specify the URL you wish to scan before you begin the capture. Use this option if you do not intend to change the address during a capture session.
   Prompt for Address tells SnagIt to prompt you for the Web site address (URL) when you start capture.

3. If you chose Fixed Address, click Input Properties...> Fixed Address to specify a URL to scan.

4. Select your Output, either File or Catalog, from the Output menu, and specify the Properties by choosing the Output Properties... button.

5. Return to the Capture Settings pane and choose Filters > Properties to set Web capture filter options. For more information, see the How to Set Web Capture Options section of this tutorial.

6. Enable the Preview Window option by choosing the Preview Window button from the Options area.

7. Click the Capture button to perform the capture.

8. After the capture, the Web Capture Summary dialog box will appear. Choose OK.

9. In the Preview Window, a list of the images from the Web site will be displayed.
   
   Use the checkbox next to each image to select or deselect the images that you want included in the final scan. If you want all of the images included in the scan, skip to step 12.

10. At this point, you can choose the Modify Web Filters button to make changes to your filter options, if desired.

11. Choose the Rescan button to scan the site for only the images selected.

12. Choose Finish and the images will be displayed in the Catalog Browser or sent to a file, depending on the Output option you've selected.

How to Set Web Capture Filter Options

Use the Web Capture Filters dialog box to set filter options for the scan when capturing Web images.

1. On the SnagIt Main Screen, choose Filters > Properties. The Web Capture Filters dialog opens.
   
   In the Image Search options area, select a number for Web page link search depth (typing a larger number is also permitted). This is the number of levels of directories from the root Web address to be included in the search. Keep zero if you only want to search the root page.

2. Put a check mark in Stay within domain to limit the search to pages directly connected the root Web address. If selected, external links are ignored.

3. In the File size area, type Minimum and Maximum file sizes in kilobytes (KB) to be captured. To specify no limit, put zeros in the boxes.

4. In the Maximum amount of disk space to use box, type the total size of all the downloaded files in megabytes (MB). This limit prevents overload of the hard drive when scanning very large Web sites. It also prevents you from capturing too much from a Web site, especially if the Stay within domain option is disabled.

5. In the Types of files area, select the file formats to include in the capture. The three types of Web graphics available are listed. Use this option to limit the search and capture.

6. In the Web page background image area, put a check mark in Get background if possible to include the Web page background image. Since some Web sites do not permit this, it is possible for this option to fail.

7. Check Ignore background type if you want SnagIt to ignore the file type (i.e. gif, png, jpg) of the background image and capture it anyway. If this option is not checked, SnagIt will only download the image if the file type matches one checked above in Types of files.

8. Click OK to save the settings, which are applied to the captures you make.

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