Setting Preferences

The Preferences dialog box is provided so that you may set your preferences in regards to how the Flying Popcorn program operates.

To open the Preferences dialog box

In the File menu, click Preferences.
Below is a description of the preferences that you can set.

Default Folders & Options

1. Working Folders: Set the location of the folders on your hard drive where various Flying Popcorn elements are stored. These include editing files, backgrounds, textures, effects, images/clipart, sounds, and media. It is recommended that you keep the default locations. For more information, see the Working Folders section below.
2. Default Page: Set the IN, OUT, and ACT effects as well as the page template for the default page. If you choose to use a default page, then whenever you create a new page, the settings chosen here will be applied to it. If not, a simple blank page will be created. For more information on the default page, see Adjusting the default page settings.
3. Play Window: Adjust the play window settings i.e. the size, position, and resolution of the window that the project appears in when it is played. For more information, see Adjusting the play window settings.
4. Exclude Font List: This opens a text file that is a list of fonts that will be excluded when creating an AutoRun file. AutoRun files are stand-alone files that can be used to play a project on computers that do not have Flying Popcorn installed. In order to create these files, Flying Popcorn must include all of the fonts that were used in the project, in case the computer where the project will be played does not have the fonts. With this list, you can exclude certain fonts that you do not want to be included in the AutoRun file. To exclude a font, simply type the name of the font in the list. You can also delete names from the list. The fonts should be Windows TrueType fonts. For more information on AutoRun files, see Publishing your project as an AutoRun file.

Startup Project Selection

1. Open with [Select Project] dialog: Starts Flying Popcorn with the Select Project dialog box open.
2. Open with new empty project: Starts Flying Popcorn with a new empty project already opened.
3. Open "Default.edt": Starts Flying Popcorn with the Default.edt file open. This file is located in the editing file folder (usually C:\Program Files\Popcorn7\edit) and can be edited as you see fit.
4. Restore last editing project: Starts Flying Popcorn by opening the last project that you were editing before you exited the program last time.

New Project Creation

1. Create Project with [Create Project] dialog (by template): When you use the File > New command, the Create Project dialog box is opened so that you can select a project template
2. Create empty project directly (with size dialog): When you use the File > New command, the New File dialog box is opened so that you can select the size of the new blank project.

Backup & Compression

1. Make backup (*.bak) when saving file: Check this option to automatically create a backup file (*.bak) when saving the current file. This can be useful when damage/corruption occurs in your files.
2. Compress data when saving file: Compresses the project data when saving a file. This makes it take up less space on your hard drive but also makes it take longer to save or prepare and play.
3. Auto-save file: Automatically saves a project every time a number of minutes passes while using Flying Popcorn. That number can be set in the box on the right.
4. Show variable info in page info view: Displays the variable information as well as the page information when the Page > Current Page Information command is used.
5. Minimize memory (use temporary file) mode: If a working file is too big, (for example, the file has more than 200 or 2000 pages), a memory allocation problem may happen. In this case, it is necessary to use a temporary file instead of using memory for saving the editing data to prevent a memory allocation problem. (In this minimized memory mode, the program may work more slowly during editing.)

The Working Folders

Flying Popcorn projects incorporate a variety of different files. For you convenience, these are categorized and stored in the working folders. The files that Flying Popcorn provides you are found in these folders, and you can add your own files.

1. Editing File: Project files
2. Background Image: Image files used as background images
3. Image(Clipart): Image files used as image objects
4. Texture Image: Image files used as textures
5. Effect Sound: Sound effects created in Flying Popcorn
6. Media(Audio/Video): Files used as media objects
7. Capture(Image/Video): Images, videos, and MP3 files created with Flying Popcorn
8. Document: TXT and RTF documents used with TextBox objects
9. HTML: HTML files created during web publishing
10. Database: Microsoft Access database files used with database connectivity