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How to Capture A Screen Snapshot (Studio and Inspire)

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by MARK WEST 2/4/10

Mac Tips

Special Keys

The Mac Command Key

You probably call this the "Apple Key", but it's officially called the Command Key and it is located near your spacebar. It is used on a Mac much like the control key is used on Microsoft Windows®; example: control-c on Windows copies and on a Mac we use command-c; control-v pastes on Windows and command-v pastes on Mac OS.

The Option Key

The Option Key is located near the Command Key and is sometimes called the ALT key. This key can frustrate a Windows user, as it doesn't work as a Windows ALT key does (you'll often use the Command Key on Mac where ALT is used in Windows), such as when tabbing through open applications: on Windows it's ALT-Tab, on a Mac it's Command-Tab.

The Control Key

The Control Key is located near the Command Key and has special funtions on a Mac (see "Right Clicking" below).

Exiting A Bad Program

On Windows, Alt+F4 will quickly terminate a program.

On Mac OS, Command+Q will quickly terminate a program.

The "3-Finger Salute"

On Windows, when a program stops behaving properly, you can press Control+Alt+Delete to invoke the Task Manager to make an application stop.

On Mac OS, you can accomplish the same thing by pressing Command+Option+Escape; this invokes the Force Quit menu and you can make applications stop.

"Right Clicking"

Sometimes you need to right click. On most computers it's easy, as they come with a two-button mouse. On Mac OS, you typically find a single-button mouse.

You can plug a two-button mouse in to a Mac and it will work. The reason is because two-button mice work on Unix and Mac OS is a Unix variant that uses parts from FreeBSD's and NetBSD's implementation of Unix.

You can also "right click" on a Mac with a single button mouse. To do so, you can do either of the following:

  1. Press and hold the Control Key while clicking.
  2. (This one only works if you have a Mac with a touchpad - usually a laptop) place two fingers on the touchpad while clicking.

Screen Capture

ActivStudio and ActivInspire both allow you to take a screen shot.

    ActivStudio 3 Professional

  • In ActivStudio, if you haven't added it to your toolbox, go to the Tools menu, and choose Camera. To get a portion of the whole screen choose Area. Click and drag across the area of the screen you need a snapshot of:
    dragging across a section of screen
    Now you simply refer to the screen capture dialog window that appears:
    screen capture dialog window
    If you hover over each bit, it will pop up a hint telling you where it will be placed. The left-most choice is the current flipchart page.

    • ActivInspire

  • In ActivInspire, if you haven't added it to your toolbox, go to the Tools menu, and choose Camera. To get a portion of the whole screen choose Area Snapshot. Click and drag across the area of the screen you need a snapshot of:
    dragging across a section of screen
    Now you simply refer to the screen capture dialog window that appears:
    screen capture dialog window
    And place it where you want it, such as current page, and it will appear there.

For ActivInspire users, you'll notice new positioning tools that ActivStudio didn't have. You may feel free to ignore them, or continue reading to learn what they do. Left and Top are screen positions. These are cartesean coordinates of your desktop. The uppermost, left-hand corner is 0,0 or x=0 and y=0. If your desktop is set to a screen resolution of 1024 x 768 (1024 wide, 768 tall) then x could range from 0=1024 and y from 0-768. Width is the width of the area you want to copy and Height is the height of the region. You could set these by hand, but when you click and drag, this region is automatically defined for you.


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