Post Archive
› January 27, 2002
IrfranView
Harold Goldstein sent an email to the wd-list which reminded me about IrfanView, a windo$e free image viewer/manager. Wow, this fast little freeware program has had some major upgrades since my original download of it. I'm thinking that it's going to replace my acdsee image viewer/manager because acdsee, while reasonably priced, has gotten quite bloated and doesnt open up in the fraction of a millisecond that IfranView does. For me, I'd rather have just enough features but a super quick load/unload time and small footprint for my applications. Why rent a heavy chainsaw for a task that can be accomplished just as quickly with a pocket knife? Then again, behemoths like photoshop and illustrator are essential to me, so I just leave them open all the time. Then again, I only have a 350mhz intel processor, if it not for screen resolution and memory I might be better off using the old ibook (clamshell type). Actually, maybe I'm better off using it anyways. Ok, a personal experiment - for the rest of this week, I'll only use my wingross desktop for email and browser testing - everything else will be via ibook.
Comments
1. January 29, 2002 02:57 AM
2. January 29, 2002 08:00 AM
francois Posted…
OK, I've just mailed my colleagues about Irfanview again. So here's the (restrained) eulogy:This is probably the most versatile and quick of all image viewers. Best of all, being freeware, you can use it guilt-free. (But you'll feel even better if you send Irfan some money!)
Download the latest version at www.irfanview.com
It's worth associating it with all the following file extensions: .GIF, .JPG, .JPEG, .TIF, .TIFF, .BMP, .PCX, .PCT, .PNG, .TGA
It displays animated GIFs. You can even use it to view Photoshop files. If you don't have Photoshop installed, associate it with the .PSD file extension as well.
It's also worth adding to the "Send To" folder (the things you get when you Right-click on a file under "Send To"). If you have Photoshop installed, use "Send To" to view .PSDs in Irfanview without waiting for Photoshop to launch.
Essential shortcut keys: use 'SPACE' to skip forwards alphabetically through image files in a directory, and 'BACKSPACE' to skip backwards. 'ESC' closes it.
Other useful features: Press 'I' to get file information. Press 'S' to save an image in a variety of formats. 'Ctrl-C' will copy the image to clipboard (or a portion of the image, if you've drag-selected an area on the image first), 'Ctrl-V' will paste an image into Irfanview. 'F' scales image to full screen size. 'P' prints -- very understandable, flexible printing options.
For example, the quickest method to save screengrabs: 'Alt-PrintScrn' to grab window area, launch Irfanview, 'Ctrl-V', 'S' to save.
You can have as many instances of Irfanview running at one time as you like.
In my experience, you can't do without it.
francois Posted…
IRFANVIEW IS INDISPENSABLE. I simply cannot imagine using a PC without Irfanview any more. (I've been using it now for over 4 years.) It's the Google of image viewers. I've converted countless colleagues to it, but I've yet to write the definitive plug/eulogy.