Darren's Weekly Nugget 04/24/2006

[Darren]

While discussing one of my previous nuggets, another cool tip came up, and I was asked to make it a full-fledged nugget, so here goes.  If you design a VI icon in another application (like Microsoft Paint), you can drag the image file from Windows Explorer or your desktop into the icon image area in the upper-right corner of your VI window.  This will automatically update the B&W, 16, and 256 color icons of the VI.  I just tried with several image file types...this nugget works with BMP, JPG, GIF, and PNG files.  It does not appear to work with TIF files.

-D

P.S. - Check out past nuggets here.

[RVallieu]

Is there a size limitation on the image file used based on readability once transferred to the VI Icon?

[smercurio_fc]

Is there a cool tip that will be able to transfer the image directly from my head into the icon?

Just joking, of course. We're a long away from Hal at the rate we're going...

Useful tip, as always.

[Darren]

I don't think there is a size limitation...if the image you attempt to drag is greater than 32x32 pixels in size, I believe it will be shrunk to fit in the 32x32 square.

-D

[JeffBoettcher]

Just thought it'd be worth mentioning that, while I haven't tried it, I expect the supported image file types might vary slightly on non-Windows systems.  Most notably, BMP might not work, but I'd expect the others Darren mentioned would.

Message Edited by Jeff B on 04-25-2006 07:14 AM

[daveTW]

Hey Darren,
I just played a bit with with it and found, that LV8 resizes even those with aspect ratios other than 1 and large pictures of 1000x500. This is very good work by the NI- guys.
Andf then I noticed, that the image put into the clipboard, when you make "select all" & "copy" in the Icon- Editor, now has the right size of 32x32, so you can make a new picture of it in Paint Shop Pro. This didn't work correctly in former LV- versions (ok, I jumped over from LV 6.1, so I don't know about LV 7).
Dave