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2 December 2019 (Added 12 February 2024)

Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker V1.1.01

The Full or 6 months Trial version can be purchased from Shop Products, and the Beta version download from the Downloads section. For more details of the product, see Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker.

Issues Fixed

When used on laptops with a small resolution screen, the ‘Create Pattern’ button at the bottom right of the main form was ‘cut off’. Scroll bars were enabled so that the form could be scrolled to the ‘Create Pattern’ button. Fixed.

22 August 2019

Cutter Controller

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Cutter Controller V1.1.00

The Full or 6 months Trial version can be purchased from Shop Products, and the Beta version download from the Downloads section. For more details of the product, see Cutter Controller.

New Features

A menu option to convert text to vectors for GSD/GST files has been added. The file has to be reloaded if the option is changed.
An option to select single shapes and change them has been added.
Support for FCM files created with the ScanNCut SDX Roll Feeder has been added.
For DXF files, support for Polyline and all the AutoCAD 256 Colours has been added.
For SVG files, implemented the defs element list, except for the Symbol element., and implemented the Use element.

Improvements Made

Transparent colours are now supported, instead of being converted to a solid colour. In CutBy Colour, any transparent colour has a % of opacity.
Changed the default drawing view to colour from wire-frame (Black and White) on a new install.
Pressing the reload button will warn if the drawing is to be re-loaded.
When a Trial licence has expired, an information form appears giving instructions on how to upgrade to a Full licence.
The Demo release has had the expiry date removed, and will now run forever.

Issues Fixed

Using the mouse scroll wheel caused the selected combo or number control to change the drawing on the canvas. When the mouse is moved onto the drawing canvas, the control is de-selected. Fixed.
The 'Overlap Cut' and 'Blade Offset' text boxes on the Cut By panel are disabled/greyed out, and can give the impression there are not used. Changed them to read only, this gives black text, but no white background. Fixed.
The target/registration marks are incorrectly detected for a drawing less than 2 times the corner bounds, resulting in non-registration marks lines being deleted. Fixed.
The alignment marks had a tolerance of 0.01mm. Changed the tolerance of the alignment marks to 0.05mm. Fixed.
When the bounding box is visible, and a colour in the Cut By panel is un-checked, the bounding box is still selected. The bounding box is now de-selected when a colour is un-checked. Fixed.
A corrupted user settings file causes application to crash. Fixed.
When a path has all Bezier curves that are very small, the max/min drawing size will be too large, and cause an exception. The drawing won't fit on the mat, and an error will be displayed, with the wrong drawing size. Fixed.
When a file is open via a double click (file association) or open with from Explorer, the Export as FCM option is greyed out. Fixed.
An old demo licence file wasn't being deleted on install. Fixed.
Reading FCM files: -
- FCM files created in Brother's Desktop Canvas Workspace created a corrupt SVG file. Fixed.
Reading DXF files: -
- The default setting had a pen colour that was causing an error when the pen colour for the layer wasn't used. Fixed.
- Changed the default colour from White to Black, since white doesn't seem to show on white. Fixed.
Reading GSD files: -
- The dash width was changed/improved. Fixed.
- Some of the stroke colours were not being added to the Cut By colour combo. Fixed.
- A white fill appeared when there wasn't one. Fixed.
- The font styles Bold, Italic, Underline were been set, and could result in a size difference of the text. Fixed
Reading PDF files, fixed the ‘missing Object Table/XRef not found’ error.
Reading Studio files: -
- The dash width was changed/improved. Fixed.
- Unknown fill types are treated as error. They are now ignored. Fixed.
Reading SVG files: -
- The SVG width/height attribute '%' wasn't detected, producing scaling errors in the drawing. Fixed.
- Some of the child nodes were not parsed, which resulted in missing shapes. Fixed.
- Duplicate paths were being added if the there were groups. Fixed.
- The plus sign in the front of a number caused an error. Fixed.
- A black fill appeared in Cut By Colour, when there wasn't one.. Fixed.
- Some paths are classed as open, but are nearly closed within a tolerance, resulting in no-fill when there should have been one. Added a 'within' tolerance test for the paths start and end points. Fixed.

25 July 2019

Vector File Thumbnail Creator

The Vector File Thumbnail Creator (version 1.0.02) is a free to use application that will convert FCM (Brother), GSD/GST (Graphtec), Slice (Making Memories) and Studio/Studio3 (Silhouette America) files to thumbnail images.

For more detials see Vector File Thumbnail Creator or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Added support for reading FCM files created for the SDX Roll Feeder. Note:- The thumbnails appear to be cropped.

25 July 2019

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

A free release of FCM Thumbnail Viewer V1.0.22

For more details see FCM Thumbnail Viewer or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Added support for reading FCM files created for the SDX Roll Feeder.

31 March 2018

Vector File Thumbnail Creator

The Vector File Thumbnail Creator (version 1.0.01) is a free to use application that will convert FCM (Brother), GSD/GST (Graphtec), Slice (Making Memories) and Studio/Studio3 (Silhouette America) files to thumbnail images.

For more detials see Vector File Thumbnail Creator or download it from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

Brother FCM files that are corrupt or damaged caused an application error when thumbnail was viewed. Fixed.
Brother FCM files that have been created in Brother’s Desktop CanvasWorkspace, may create thumbnails with parts missing. Fixed.

19 March 2018

Vector File Thumbnail Creator

The Vector File Thumbnail Creator (version 1.0) is a free to use application that will convert FCM (Brother), GSD/GST (Graphtec), Slice (Making Memories) and Studio/Studio3 (Silhouette America) files to thumbnail images.

For more detials see Vector File Thumbnail Creator or download it from the Downloads section.

17 March 2018

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.1.15

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

The Cloud library entries can now be extracted.
A menu item in the help menu to the location of the Silhouette Studio Library files.
The file extension of the library entry name has been added in the Library Entries.
The progress bar is updated when the Cloud Library Entries are being read in.
New category descriptions for 'Printable Pattern' and 'eBook' category types.

Issues Fixed

All the files in the folders of the destination folder were being searched to see if the folder was empty, and was taking too long. Fixed.
A JPEG file type was not detected. Fixed.
Some of the preview thumbnails in the Studio Library Entry are 300 x 300 pixels, whilst others are 100 x 100 pixels. The picture thumbnail preview box did no show the image at the correct size. Fixed.
Some Cloud Library Entry names in the tree-view list had a file extension. Removed the file extension from the Cloud Library Entry name. Fixed.

Improvements Made

Removed the comma at the end of the keywords list for Non-cloud Library Entries.
Added a spaced between the commas fro Cloud Library Entry keywords.
The time taken to un-check all the extracted library entries in the tree-view list.

8 March 2018

Desktop Interface to Online File Converter

A Free release of Desktop Interface to Online File Converter V1.0.11

For more details see Desktop Interface to Online File Converter or download it from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

When large files greater 20 MB are uploaded to the server for conversion, the error "Cannot connect to the online converter. Conversion terminated" is displayed. Trying to re-connect to the server 'freezes' the application for about 100 seconds. Changed the timeout to 10 minutes. Fixed.
Files that take longer than 100 seconds to upload to the server also cause the error. Changed the maximum upload file size, and the timeout to 10 minutes on the web server. Fixed.

10 March 2017

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.1.00

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Versions of Silhouette Studio 3.7.026 and later have had the folder location changed to Cloud52, and the library file structure changed. This has not yet been fully implemented, but any library entryies n the ‘Cloud’ folder will be displayed, but will NOT be extracted.

Added a progress bar when reading in the Library Entries.
A tree view folder and file type interface to support both Cloud and Non Cloud libraries, instead of the single/all library folder selector.
Added some more support for Cloud libraries (reading some of the library entry details), but the entries will not be extracted.

Issues Fixed

Large libraries take a long time to load. Fixed.
Some Library Entry details that had been changed where not correct. Fixed.
HTML encoded characters in the library entry details description such as '&Amp', weren’t decoded to ‘&’. Fixed.
When both the scroll bars appear, the right scroll bar obscures the longest line of text. Added a line of '*' that are longer by 5 than the longest line. Fixed.
Replacing illegal filename/path name characters showed the replaced chars and not the actual characters. Fixed.

29 January 2017

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

A free release of FCM Thumbnail Viewer V1.0.21

For more details see FCM Thumbnail Viewer or download it from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

Some corrupted files caused an un-expected error, which caused any remaining thumbnails from being displayed. Fixed.

24 November 2016

Desktop Interface to Online File Converter

A Free release of Desktop Interface to Online File Converter V1.0.10

For more details see Desktop Interface to Online File Converter or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Support for expanding or collapsing the tree view list of files.

Improvements Made

Changed the format of renaming any duplicate SVG files. Instead of post fixing them with a timestamp, the number of duplicates in brackets (e.g. filename (1).SVG) is used.
Some error messages were renamed to be more meaningful.
Adding a large numbers of file entries to the Tree View was slow. Changed the algorithm to improve the time taken to add the entries.
The 'already converted files' list was being read in when it shouldn't have been, resulting in unnecessary delays.
Added icons for both Folders and Files in the tree view list

Issues Fixed

The files and folders were not sorted in the correct ascending order. This also caused the files to appear before the folders. Fixed.
The 'Login' form didn't check for the email address or password for being blank, or have the minimum number of characters or the correct format. Fixed.
The file entries in the 'already converted files' list had a timestamp with no DST offset. If the entries were read and compared to the timestamp of the file of disk during a non-DST period/time zone, the timestamp would be different. It will be shown as 'not converted' in the Tree View list of files, and could be converted again. Fixed.
An error occurred when a filename that contained the character ';' in the 'already converted files' list, was read in when the application started, which resulted in the list entries being ignored (already converted files would show up as not being converted). Fixed.
The Folder Dialog Browser for both the Source and Destination folders was not showing the Desktop folder (top level), making it difficult to find the desktop folder.
When the 'already converted files' list is updated, all the files in the list were checked to see if they still existed on a disk. With a large number of files in the list, there could be a long delay saving the list. They are no longer checked. Fixed.
- Also if the files were on a removable drive that was not connected, they would be removed, when they shouldn't have been. Fixed.

19 October 2016

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

A free release of FCM Thumbnail Viewer V1.0.20

For more details see FCM Thumbnail Viewer or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Added support for reading thumbnails from FCD and FC1 files
The thumbnails can be printed

Issues Fixed

When the filename label is longer than the width of the thumbnail, it is not displayed. Ellipses '...' will be added to the filename label, and the full name can be viewed when the mouse pointer is hovered over the label. Fixed.
The filenames were not sorted when more than one was added/viewed. Fixed.

Improved

Moved the filename label closer to the thumbnail image.

8 September 2016

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.0.35

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Versions of Silhouette Studio 3.7.026 and later have had the folder location changed to Cloud52, and the library file structure changed. This has not yet been fully implemented, but any files in the ‘Cloud’ folder will be displayed, but cannot be extracted.

Issues Fixed

When the number of Library Entries was large, the main form didn’t appear straight away, given the impression that the program wasn’t working. It now appears straight away. Fixed.
Entries in the errors/warnings list box could be selected, but not copied. They can no longer be selected/highlighted. Fixed.

7 June 2016

Desktop Interface to Online File Converter

A Free release of Desktop Interface to Online File Converter V1.0.05

For more details see Desktop Interface to Online File Converter or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Files that have already been converted can either be displayed in the tree view list (shown in green), or not at all. If an already converted file has been changed, it will no longer be shown in green.

Improvements Made

The folder name in the Tree View list is in bold.

4 April 2016

Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker V1.1.00

New Features

A Pattern Chart/Graph/Line/Stripes for marking the points, as opposed to measuring them.
A count of the number of cuts for a Cut and Fold pattern, the number of Folds for a Mark and Fold pattern, are displayed on the form and in the Pattern Details section on the Print/PDF output.
The pattern details Author, Website URL, Copyright and Comments are now saved and loaded automatically.

Issues Fixed

When a new image is loaded and the 'Remove Space Around Image' is checked, the Margins and Spaces group box is not disabled. Fixed.

Improvements Made

The date format was changed from 01 January 2016 to 1 January 2016 on the Pattern Details section on the Print/PDF output.
Added the Pattern Type and Marking Method used to the PDF/Print document details.

19 March 2016

Cutter Controller

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Cutter Controller V1.0.30

The Full or 6 months Trial version can be purchased from Shop Products, and the Beta version download from the Downloads section. For more details of the product, see Cutter Controller.

New Features

Support for the GST file extension. This is a GSD Template file.
Export the drawing in the FCM file format, as used by the Brother ScanNCut machines.
Read Silhouette Studio/Studio3 files, as used by the Silhouette Studio software.

Improvements Made

Changed the text boxes on speed and force panel to allow direct entry of numbers.
Renamed the label text 'Speed' to 'Down Speed' on the Speed and Force panel.
Changed the tab order on the Speed and Force panel.

Issues Fixed

The pre-supplied ccap files could be changed; they should have been read only. Fixed.

19 March 2016

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

A free release of FCM Thumbnail Viewer V1.0.10

For more details see FCM Thumbnail Viewer or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Coloured thumbnails produced by the Cutter Controller application can now be viewed
Added a menu item for User Guide in the Help menu
Added a menu item for the Installation Folder in the Help menu
Added a Check for Updates feature to the Help menu
Added a 'Product Brand' icon to the .exe file and to the main form

Issues Fixed

The thumbnail bitmap reader wasn't correctly reading the bitmap file. Fixed.
Removed the Black/White Greyscale option, since there was an issue with the bitmap reader. Fixed.

Improved

The thumbnail load times have been improved.
The default install Program Group is now Ideas R Us Software\Brother FCM Thumbnail Viewer

Updated

Changed most of the URL's from 'ideas-r-us.co.uk' to 'ideas-r-us-software.uk'.

Desktop Interface to Online File Converter

A Free release of Desktop Interface to Online File Converter V1.0.01

For more details see Desktop Interface to Online File Converter or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

GST (GSD templates) files can now be converted

Improvements Made

In the File Types group panel, changed Studio to Studio/Studio3

11 February 2016

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.0.31

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

There was an error reading in the index file on Windows 7 64-bit. Fixed.

10 February 2016

Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker V1.0.75

New Features

Measure, Mark, Cut and Fold Method (shortened to Cut and Fold)
Removes excess white from around the design pattern
Invert (make negative), and Mirror the design pattern
Add top and bottom margins to the design pattern
Add blank leaves before and after the design pattern
Add 'spacer folds' between the design pattern for the Cut and Fold method
Choose between leaf or page numbering, with an adjustable start value

Issues Fixed

A black line was added to the right-hand side of the bitmap. This caused the bitmap to shrink when 'Remove Column Space between Shapes' was set and the bitmap didn't contain any blank columns. Fixed.
'Remove Column Space between Shapes' was removing 1 more blank column than it should. Fixed.
When an error occurred creating a pattern document, the progress form was blocking the error message pop up, making it difficult to close without moving the progress form. Fixed.
The size of the book in the PDF pattern documents didn't show decimal centimetres. Fixed.
With no original image loaded, ticking the 'Remove Space between Shapes' check box caused an error. Disabled the group panel 'Original Image' until an image was loaded. Fixed.
For the Demo version, the Units group box and the Pattern Name text box was disabled when the Pattern Details grouped box was disabled. Fixed.
An error creating PDF/Pattern files wasn't disabling various controls to stop the pattern being printed or saved. Fixed.
When an image was loaded, the threshold and check boxes in the Original Image group panel were not reset to their starting values. Fixed.

Updates

Changed the text 'Beta' to 'Demo' in a number of forms/pop up boxes.

Improvements Made

The form's maximum control has been re-enabled.
Any image that contains a transparent background is changed to white. Some of the newer options in the Original Image group box didn't work correctly with a transparent background.
The option to 'Remove Blank Columns' from the Original Image has been changed to 'Remove Column Space between Shapes'.
To be consistent with the Cut and Fold method, any blank leaves removed due to the 'Min Distance Between Marks' setting, are not removed for the Mark and Fold method.
The pattern details boxes are made bigger.
The way the Pattern Image is created from the Original Image.
The Pattern Preview Image when saved as PDF and pattern files, contained red (alternate lines) or blue (blank folds) indicator lines. This was okay when creating the pattern to see how the pattern would look, but not in finished documents or files. Removed text in the PDF file that described what the lines were.

22 January 2016

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.0.30

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

New Features

Check for existing files on the destination drive, and to display a warning pop-up if any exist.
A progress bar when files are being extracted.
The design number is added the extracted library details text file. It is the same number that is used by the online Silhouette Studio store.
The single log file is replaced with two log files. One that lists the files extracted, and one that lists the errors and warnings for the library entries. The form's radio buttons text has been renamed.

Improvements Made

The required disk space label has been change from whole mega bytes to the nearest 1/100 of a mega byte.
On the progress form, the total number of library entries is shown, e.g. 1 of 250.

Issues Fixed

The method used to read the library files was wrong. This resulted in old library files being extracted when they had been moved to another folder. The index file is now used instead, which gives an accurate count of the library entries. Fixed.
When a Silhouette Studio Library system didn’t have any entries, an error occurred. Fixed.
The extracted GST files were renamed to GSD files, now they are not renamed. Fixed.
Some of the library entries didn't have any drawing/image file to extract. Fixed.
Some of the library entries don't have a bitmap preview. Fixed.
Library entries having the same name were overwritten. Now they are renamed. Fixed.
Library folder names may contain illegal characters when converted to system folder names, causing an error. Fixed.
An 'Unknown' category code in the library detail may have caused an error. Fixed.
Some library entries don't have all the library details (missing artist name, etc). A missing library entry name will use the design number instead. Fixed.
When the library entry details are changed in Silhouette Studio, two external files are used to store these changes (changes to the library entry name are also stored in them). These changes are now read in and applied to the extracted library entry details. Fixed.

3 December 2015

Cutter Controller

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Cutter Controller V1.0.20

The Full or 6 months Trial version can be purchased from Shop Products, and the Beta version download from the Downloads section. For more details of the product, see Cutter Controller.

New Features

Enabled support for Provo Craft Cricut machines
Added a grid overlay to the virtual mat/roll, that can be turned on/off via the 'View' menu, and the grid settings to the 'Settings' menu. The grid settings (grid line style, grid colour, line width, grid spacing, and opacity) are saved/loaded.
The units (Inches/Millimetres) state, and the wire frame state (Colour/Mono) are saved/loaded.
The 'Cut By' panel's position is now saved/loaded.

Improvements Made

Increased the canvas/drawing area, by moving the 'Drawing Dimensions', 'Speed and Force', 'Calibrate X/Y Scaling', 'Contour Cut', and 'Contour Cut Calibration' group panels.
The 'Drawing Dimensions', 'Speed and Force', 'Contour Cut', and 'Contour Cut Calibration' group panels are now movable.
The 'Drawing Dimensions', and 'Speed and Force' panel's visibility (via the 'View' menu) and position can be saved.
The 'Contour Cut', and 'Contour Cut Calibration' group panel can be moved.

Issues Fixed

Bezier curves with the control points outside the bounding box resulted in the control points being the bounding box. Fixed.
The mat size 24" x 12" on Cricut Expression is not been detected. Ignore the error. It may be the Circut Expression used to test is at fault. Fixed.
The scroll bars were not moving the drawing the correct amount, and were jerky. Fixed.

Studio to SVG File Converter

An online version that will convert the Silhouette Studio/Studio 3 file format to an SVG file is available at Studio to SVG File Converter

Desktop Interface to Online File Converter

A Free release of Desktop Interface to Online File Converter V1.0.00

For more details see Desktop Interface to Online File Converter or download it from the Downloads section.

Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor

A Free release of Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor V1.0.00

For more details see Silhouette Studio Library File Extractor or download it from the Downloads section.

30 October 2015

Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker V1.0.00

New Features

Added a menu item for User Guide in the Help menu.
Added a menu item for the Installation Folder in the Help menu.
Added a ‘Product Brand’ icon to the .exe file and to the main form.

Issues Fixed

When a non-picture file is opened, an out of memory exception error occurs. Fixed.
Any patterns created and not saved when a new image was opened, an image dropped onto form, an image pasted or the application was closed, would be lost. A pop-up message box will ask whether to continue with operation or not. Fixed.

Updates

Changed a link on the Help -> About Form to ‘ideas-r-us-software.co.uk’, and changed the name from ‘Ideas R Us’ to ‘Ideas R Us Software’.

Improvements Made

Disabled the form’s maximise control button, since no form controls are re-sizable.

Cutter Controller

A Demo, Full and Trial release of Cutter Controller V1.0.00

The Full or 6 months Trial version can be purchased from Shop Products, and the Beta version download from the Downloads section. For more details of the product, see Cutter Controller.

New Features

Added a menu item for User Guide to the Help menu.
Added a menu item for the Installation Folder to the Help menu.
Added a menu item for the Settings Folder to the Settings menu.
Added a ‘Product Brand’ icon to the .exe file and to the main form.
For a Beta release, a warning message box when spoiler lines will be cut or plotted.

Improvements Made

Changed the maximum blade offset to 1.0mm from 0.5mm.
Set the default cut overlap to 3.0mm, instead of 0.0mm for non-tangential cutters.
The installer now copies the mat/roll list, user named settings, and custom cutters and plotter files to the user’s Local Application Data folder.

Issues Fixed

When calibrating the XY scaling with a Beta release, spoiler lines were cut/plotted when either the allowed maximum width/height was exceeded. Fixed.

Minor Changes

Changed a link on the Help -> About Form to ‘ideas-r-us-software.co.uk’, and changed the name from ‘Ideas R Us’ to ‘Ideas R Us Software’.
Renamed Settings menu items
- Laser Pointer Offset to Calibrate Contour Cutting Offset.
- Calibrate Cutter to Calibrate XY Scaling.
- Custom Mats and Rolls to Add/Edit Mats and Rolls.
- Custom Make and Models to Add/Edit Make and Models.
Renamed labels, message box titles and group panel names
- Make and Models Settings, Laser Offset to Contour Cut Offset
- Message Box text, Calibrate the Laser Pointer Offset to Calibrate Contour Cut Offset
- Group panel Calibrate Laser Pointer Offset to Calibrate Contour Cut Offset.
- Group panel Calibrate Cutter to Calibrate XY Scaling.
Disabled the forms maximise control button, since no form controls are resized.
The spoiler lines for Beta versions are randomly cut/plotted.

26 August 2015

Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker

A Beta version of Book Folding Pattern Maker software has been released. See Crafty49's Book Folding Pattern Maker for more details or download it from the Downloads section.

3 August 2015

Cutter Controller

A Beta release of Cutter Controller V0.5.10 is now available for downloading from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

When pasting from the clipboard on Windows 7/8/10, the application crashed.

2 August 2015

Cutter Controller

A Beta release of Cutter Controller V0.5.09 is now available for downloading from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

When reading in FCM or GSD on Windows 7/8/10, a file error occurred.
The position of the Calibrate Cutter and Calibrate Laser Pointer Offset group panels were in the wrong position when the custom scaling of the display is not set at 100%.

29 July 2015

Cutter Controller

A Beta release of Cutter Controller V0.5.08 is now available for downloading from the Downloads section.

New Features

Added a Check for Updates feature to the Help menu.

Improvements Made

Removed the Inkscape plug-in, since copy/paste is easier to do.
Changed the fixed install location, to a changeable install location, and moved the data files to the user’s Local Application Data folder. The Start Menu has links to the Local Application Data folder, and the folder where the application is installed.
For the GSD file types, the polyline bulge has been implemented.
For the GSD file types, some invalid arc shapes were made to be a circle. After looking at a number of files and with the Graphtec Robo Master software, it appears that this is an error. The arc shape is not added to the drawing, and the warning message has been changed.
The ‘nag’ screen at start up has been changed so it only appears for Beta releases. The details about the version details in the About Box from the Help menu have been changed.

Issues Fixed

Some shapes with Bezier curves were misshapen and had nodes missing.
For the FCM file types, some shapes that were created with the Scan and Cut machine were not scaled correctly and had the wrong rotation. Fixed.
For the FCM file types, rhinestones circles created in Brother's Canvas caused an 'Unknown Path Type'. Fixed.
Bezier lines were not correctly detected. Fixed.
If there were any error messages when reading a file, the vectors were ignored (not displayed).
In an SVG files, solid lines sometimes appeared as dashed lines. Fixed.
Some SVG files that had stroke mitre limit as a decimal number caused the error ‘Not a valid SVG File’. Fixed.

20 November 2014

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

See FCM Thumbnail Viewer

Issues Fixed

Some thumbnails were not displayed.

16 November 2014

Cutter Controller

A Beta release of Cutter Controller V0.5.05 is now available for downloading from the Downloads section.

Issues Fixed

The menu option to Calibrate Cutter didn't cut/plot the square. Fixed.
When pasting in from Make the Cut (MTC), the Z order of MTC format in clipboard was reversed. Fixed.
When displayed, the ordered paths disappeared after contour cutting. Fixed.
For a Beta release, the diagonal cut/plot lines were not being cut. Fixed.
The Blade Offset and the Cut Overlap were added to the shape path when the Pen tool (not Knife or Other) is selected. Fixed

Improvements Made

The ordered paths and bounding box are temporary turned off when cutting/plotting/contour cutting.
The various releases Beta/Pre-Release are installed in their own folders, so both versions can be used together.

3 August 2014

Cutter Controller

New Features

Drag and drop a supported vector file from a file viewer such as Explorer onto the Cutter Controller drawing canvas.
Copy and Paste from the MTC application onto the Cutter Controller drawing canvas.
In the Make and Model Settings, the serial port number is now saved. When a Make and Model is selected from the Main form, the saved serial port number will be set.
Information about the licence (version type, registered name, days to expire, hardware ID) has been added to the about box.
A nag screen for Beta and Pre releases that shows the days left till the licence expires.
An installer and un-installer added instead of extracting the zip file.
The open file dialog form has been changed to the XP menu styles when opened in Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8.
The clipboard supports the use of SVG when pasted, and will use SVG instead of EMF.
When the drawing has more than 30,000 nodes, a pop-up message box is displayed with the option to join and/or remove duplicate shapes.
Blade Offset for correcting rounded corners/edges (tangential emulation).
Saving the Overlap Cut value for each user named Make and Model, and allowing the Axis Calibration and Laser Offset values to be edited directly.
Support for the Brother Scan and Cut FCM file format.
Pre-join the consecutive shape paths first, before finally joining every shape path in the drawing. This reduces the time taken to join all the shapes.
A Simplify (this is new) and Smooth GUI form to change how much simplifying and smoothing is applied to the drawing (this is the ‘Curve Fit’ button renamed to Simplify/Smooth’ with the user being able to change the distance value). Removes excessive nodes caused by converting a bitmap image to vectors.
Added an option to sort the order of the cutting/plotting shape paths, using none, simply shortest or simply inners first. The order can be displayed (the ‘up’ tool path) before cutting or plotting the drawing.
Support for reading generic HPGL plot files.

Issues Fixed

The force setting when using Laser Offset calibration is half of the maximum for the selected machine. This is too much and can cause the blade to cut through the media and backing sheet. The user can now set both the force and speed.
Only enable the paste button and menu item Edit->Paste when there is a supported vector format in the clipboard.
When the user cannot change the serial port settings in the Make and Model Settings, the port combo box is selected. It is now disabled.
Missing vectors in some PDF files.
The clipboard EMF file (which can be used to report errors) wasn’t saved when there were unimplemented commands. Fixed
Multiple copies of the same unimplemented EMF commands appeared in the pop up message box. Fixed.
Some clipboard files (EMF) were producing unimplemented commands. Fixed.
Some GSD files had misshaped curves. Fixed.
Using Simplify and Smooth with some files (badly drawn or auto-traced) caused the drawing to be replaced with large circles. Fixed.
When a mat/roll entry was not highlighted/selected, and either the delete or edit button is clicked, an error occurred.
With no drawing loaded, the ‘Check Fit’ button is enabled and will cause an error if clicked. The ‘Check Fit’ button is now disabled.
When a Custom Cutter or Plotter does not use all the available speed and force options in Software Force & Speed, and ‘Use Speed and Force’ is checked in the ‘Speed and Force’ group panel on the main form, all the speed and force settings are displayed/enabled instead of the ones the machine should use.
Some embedded machines that use a USB serial port with a fixed non-standard baud rate, displayed the wrong values in the User Machine Settings form. This caused a problem in that the other settings could not be saved.
The pre-join count was not displayed if the drawing has more than 30,000 nodes.
Some Bezier curves were being drawn as straight lines.
Reading in some plot files (HPGL/DMPL) caused an exception error.
If any Bezier curve is detected, then the ‘Curve Fit’ button (now ‘Simplify/Smooth’) was disabled, even if there are lines/nodes that could be simplified and/or smoothed. It will be disabled only if the drawing has all Bezier curves.
When a drawing has a compound path of closed lines, Curve Fit (Smooth lines) caused the last path closed/ path open to be ignored.
Some SVG drawings had circles and arcs the wrong size and had more Bezier curves than they should have.
Some SVG drawings had incorrect shape attributes that caused an index out of range error.
Some drawings had incorrect shape attributes that caused an error when the drawing was displayed on the screen.
A number of drawings had Bezier curves that appeared as lines. When converted to dashes they consisted of multiple line segments. They are now converted to a line segment.
Very small dash lengths values caused the screen rendering of the dashes to be slow.
Reading a DMPL plot file with CR/LF line endings caused an exception error.
Changing a plot file drawing from wire frame to colour did not show the line, only a blue fill. The stroke colour is now set to blue, and the fill colour is set to none
Some drawings had missing strokes and wrong stroke styles.
The contour cutting button for a non-contour cutting machine was enabled after cutting/drawing, if the drawing has alignment marks.
When a drawing had many small line segments of about 0.2mm, lines were incorrectly removed as duplicates.

Improvements Made

The artificial grey fill has been removed from the FCM file format. The fill is now clear/transparent.
In the FCM file format, the line cut/draw styles now have different colours. Cut Lines are RED, Draw Lines are BLUE and Cut and Draw Lines are BLACK.
A check has been added to make sure that the FCM file format is valid.
When cutting/plotting, the drawing’s stroke colour is set to grey and the fill colour to none, so the red progress line can be seen more easily.
The dialog boxes no longer display on the task bar when active.
In the Speed and Force group, the label ‘T. Speed’ was renamed to ‘Up Speed’.
A new form ‘Make and Model Settings’ that replaces the Serial Port Settings form.
Clicking on the Curve Fit button (now the Simplify/Smooth button) caused the Cut By panel to reset. The Overlap, Multi-cut, Tool, Path Order and Show Up Path only need to be reset when a drawing is re-loaded, loaded/pasted.

1 August 2014

FCM Thumbnail Viewer

The FCM Thumbnail Viewer (or file viewer) (version 1.0) is a free to use application that will display the thumbnail (preview) images from FCM files (used by Brother Scan and Cut machines). See FCM Thumbnail Viewer

11 April 2014

FCM to SVG File Converter

An online beta version that will convert the FCM file format (used by Brother Scan and Cut machines) to an SVG file is available at FCM to SVG File Converter

5 July 2013

GSD to SVG File Converter

An online beta version that will convert the GSD file format (used by Graphtec/Silhouette/Wishblade cutting machines) to an SVG file is available at GSD to SVG File Converter