GigaOM » Collaboration

Share screenshots with Dropbox Screen Grabber

Simon Mackie — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 21:04:13 +0000

A while ago I wrote about Grabbox, a nifty Mac OS X utility that allows users to share screenshots via Dropbox. Today I stumbled across an equivalent app for Windows: Dropbox Screen Grabber. It allows you to take screenshots using a predefined hotkey combination and then instantly uploads them to your Dropbox public folder, while the URL of the uploaded file can placed on your clipboard to make sharing the screenshots really easy.

You can elect to take screenshots of the whole screen or just the active window. Dropbox Screen Grabber actually has a few features that make it a little more versatile than Grabbox: You can redefine the hotkey combination; automatically resize screenshots before uploading them; and control which Dropbox folder they are uploaded to. You can also use it to automatically upload screenshots of your desktop at predetermined intervals, which could be useful if you want to monitor or record a process, for example.

Dropbox Screen Grabber is a free download from the Dropbox Addons wiki. Users of multi-monitor setups beware: it has a known bug that means it will only take screenshots on the primary monitor.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

GrabBox: Simple Mac Screenshot Sharing Via DropBox

Simon Mackie — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 21:00:55 +0000

One of the things I love about Mac OS X is the quick and versatile screenshot tool always available at my fingertips; it’s incredibly useful to be able to just hit a keyboard shortcut and have a screenshot saved to my desktop. But who says you can’t make a good thing even better? GrabBox is a nifty little utility that extends upon OS X’s built-in capabilities by automatically uploading screenshots to your Dropbox Public folder. It also copies the file’s public Dropbox URL to your clipboard, which makes sharing screenshots with colleagues or clients a snap!

It’s really simple to use. Just take screenshots as you would normally using OS X’s built-in screenshot shortcut keys. Instead of being placed on your desktop, the file is uploaded to your Dropbox Public folder (OS X’s screenshot shortcuts for anyone who doesn’t know: Cmd+Shift+3 takes a screenshot of the whole screen; Cmd+Shift+4 takes a screenshot of a portion of the screen; and Cmd+Shift+4 and then Space takes a screenshot of a particular window).

There are a few preferences you can set, like whether the app will prompt you before uploading the file from your desktop (this happens via a Growl pop-up, as in the screenshot to the right); whether to show GrabBox in the menu bar or in the Dock; and whether to use a URL shortener, which is handy if you’re taking screenshots to share via Twitter.

GrabBox is similar to TinyGrab, an app for Mac and Windows that I wrote about last year, but it’s completely free (donations are encouraged) and uses your own Dropbox account to host the files. If you ever share screenshots with others, it’s highly recommended. You’ll need a Dropbox account to use it; a 2GB account is free.

Found a cool lightweight app recently? Let us know about it below!

(Via One Thing Well)

Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub. req.):

TinyGrab Makes Sharing Screenshots Simple

Simon Mackie — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:00:56 +0000

TinyGrab is a simple, lightweight app that makes sharing screenshots online both easy and fast. I tried the Mac version, but it’s also available for Windows and works in a similar fashion.

To get started with TinyGrab, simply register on the site (by entering your name and email address), then download the app and install it. Fire it up by logging in with the password that TinyGrab emails you.

The procedure for taking a screenshot is the same as it always is with OS X (you can define your own hotkeys in the Windows version): Hit Cmd+Shift+4 to take a partial screenshot, or Cmd+Shift+4 then the spacebar to take a shot of a whole window. The difference with TinyGrab is that after you’ve taken a screenshot, you’ll hear a confirmation bleep, indicating your screenshot has been uploaded to the TinyGrab web site and the image’s URL has been placed into your clipboard. You can then just hit Cmd+V to paste the URL wherever you want to share the image. The URL is in a handy, ready-shortened form for use on Twitter — here’s an example I made earlier: http://grab.by/cM1.

TinyGrab is available in both free and premium flavors. Premium accounts cost £10 ($16), while free accounts are limited to 10 uploads per day, and can’t search through grabs or organize them online.

Found a cool lightweight app recently? Let us know about it below!

(Via Demogirl)

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

Skitch.com is Fun But Works for Work

Aliza Sherman — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:00:14 +0000

I may be a little late to the Skitch party, but I just had to try it out after coming across it last month. For anyone not yet in the know, Skitch is a Mac OS X-only image sharing application that does require that you download an application. Once you get it, Skitch makes the fact that you had to download yet another thing to your computer totally worthwhile. And I’m saying this after using the application for less than ten minutes. I’m already hooked and sold. (Skitch is free, by the way).

Skitch – and it’s Web-based, cross-platform counterpart Skitch.com – is positioned as a “fast and fun image sharing” tool. With its compact Mac app, Skitch makes it easy to take a snapshot of a Web page and share it with others in all the ways you might share an image.

What hit me the moment I watched the short video demo of the application was how incredibly useful Skitch.com could be for the Web development process.

Right away I can see how handy having Skitch at-the-ready for aspects of my Web work that heretofore required wrangling with PhotoShop (I’m not really a graphics person) to manipulate screenshots. Skitch could help me take, modify and send or post screenshots for:

making recommendations to new clients about their sites and modifications I’d recommend making;
pointing out elements of good Web design on other sites to my clients;
making comments about specific site design and development elements so my requests to my designers are unquestionably clear;
before and after images of client sites after my team conducts a redesign.

The Skitch app does more than take a screenshot. It also provides editing and markup tools to draw and type “on” the image without actually modifying or ruining the image itself.

The first snapshot I took was of the upcoming redesign for my personal Web site. I wanted to show my designer what text I needed to change. All I had to do was take the snapshot, select the text tool and type my message on top of the image and then use the box tool to draw a box around the text I was referencing.

When I made a mistake drawing the box around the text, I clicked on the eraser tool and was able to remove the box without affecting the snapshot in any way.

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

The next images I took were of the original home page and redesigned home page of one of my past clients. On the before shot, I added some text about a few of the key goals I had set forth for the project. The after shot showed the end result of the work from the team I put together along with my comments. These shots could work well on my new site redesign as an example of what I do, and they took less than five minutes to create.

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

To get these images into this blog post, I used a built in share function on Skitch – the “Webpost” button. With this feature, I was able to grab the code quickly and easily to embed images here. And I had the option to share a link to my personal page on Skitch.com or provide a direct URL for a smaller or full sized image.

I can also choose to make my Skitch page Public, Secret – for only people who know the URL, or Private and password protected.

Every image I took while testing out the app was automatically saved into my Skitch account which is a great feature for someone like me who is so forgetful about everything including saving files. I could save a screenshot without sharing it but also choose to modify, share or delete any image later since they were all archived in my account. This feature will automatically give me a nice archive of screenshots as I take and send them to clients, colleagues or vendors so I’ll be able to track down any shot in the future.

While I see the immediate value of Skitch for my Web work, I can’t ignore the fact that it is really, really fun to use. Skitch is one of those apps that will seamlessly cross over from my life to my work and back again.

P.S. – I was able to get ahold of Cris Pearson, co-founder and CEO of plasq, creators of Skitch, and while he didn’t reveal anything earth-shattering, here’s what he had to say.

WWD: Why is the site still in Beta? Isn’t a year a really long time for beta testing?

Pearson: It is a long time. We have not been sure what route to take business model wise. There are many options. Paid VS free, Freemium (a free and a pro version) & subscriptions models are some of the ones we have been pondering. Down side is some customers don’t like to wait to find out pricing etc. Up side is you can experiment more and gather data while you decide.

WWD: When is the Windows version of Skitch going to be avail or is it even in the works? Last I saw it mentioned was March.

Pearson: A windows version is in the works, yes. I’ll stick to the ‘soon’ time frame :)

WWD: Anything else on the horizon for Skitch that would make it fresher and newsier?

Pearson: We plan to beef up the skitch.com features over the next few months. A new dashboard like home screen is one feature we are working on.

We also are looking to add upload support for some other services.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.