There seems to be an undocumented change in the format of what you get when you go to Preview mode and select Copy.

- In versions before 7, you would get a VECTOR image that could be zoomed without pixelating (on a Macintosh, that would be PICT format, not sure what the Windows format was).

- In version 7, this was changed - copying in Preview mode would get you a BITMAP image at screen resolution.

- Having removed v.8, I cannot say what the situation was there, but with 8.5 you get a VECTOR image again, this time in the form of PDF (this is on OS X, where PDF is the native clipoard format - again, I have no idea what happens on Windows).

Please help in filling the blanks:

Macintosh:

pre-7: vector/PICT

7: bitmap/PICT

8: ;)/:?

8.5: vector/PDF

Windows:

pre-7: vector/:

7: bitmap/:

8: :P/:?

8.5: ???/????

Comment,

I was trying to do this testing for you on Windows. I currently have 6, 8, & 8.5 loaded. I dont have 7 anymore.

I wasn't too sure how to test the clipboard besides using the clipboard viewer. But from what I gathered using the clipboard viewer, it seems as though in 6 it is vector, while in 8 & 8.5 it is bitmap. I am not sure how to get the file type for the clipboard. Possibly saved as *.clp ? Not too sure about it.

Those are good questions. I know the answers for Mac, but for Windows...

Perhaps this could work: place a container field on a layout somewhere, set it to crop. Go to Preview mode, copy, go back to Browse and paste into the container field.

Now, to see if the image is vector or bitmap, set the layout's zoom to 400%. That should make it pretty obvious. Next, click into the container and try Export field contents... Filemaker should offer you a file extension that fits the container's content format.

Come to think of it, I already have a file that does almost all of that... here's a modified copy for testing. Thanks for pursuing this.

ScreenShotTest.fp7.zip

This is interesting.

As suspected earlier, it is indeed true that in FM6 it is vector, while in 8 & 8.5 it is bitmap.

Strange format though when exporting from FM8 and 8.5 it tries to export it as a *.Wmf. Why it chooses windows media is beyond me.

Interesting indeed. AFAIK, Wmf is a format that can hold vector and/or bitmap images (similar to PICT on Mac), so that would be the logical choice for a vector image - but then you say it's bitmap, so I don't know. What's the suggested extension in version 6?

Comment,

It may have been a while but I dont think the option of exporting field contents was available for FM6. Please let me know if I am wrong.

Here are the screen shots for FM8 and 8.5.

I dont think the option of exporting field contents was available for FM6

Ah. You are most likely correct on that (I never used version 6).

So it seems like there's a MAJOR difference between the Windows and Mac versions of 8.5, at least.