Sometimes, when you want our advice on something that is happening with Cardbox, the easiest thing is to show us rather than tell us: it can save us all a great deal of time and trouble.

Step 1: Copy the picture to the Windows Clipboard

Copy a window

If the substance of the problem can be encapsulated in the contents of a single window (for example, the main Cardbox window, or an error message box), then make sure that this is the active window, and press Alt+PrtSc (on some keyboards, the PrtSc key may be labelled "Print Screen").  Nothing will appear to happen, but the Clipboard will now contain the entire window display.

Copy the whole screen

If the problem involves more than one window at the same time (for example, a strange Cardbox display plus an error message), then press the Print Screen or PrtSc key.  Nothing will appear to happen, but the Clipboard will now contain the entire screen display.

Step 2: get the picture into a file

Using Windows Paint and email

1. Open the Windows Paint accessory (by default, this is in the Start menu under Programs, Accessories).
2. Press Ctrl+V to paste the contents of the Windows Clipboard.  Paint may ask you whether to increase the size of the current bitmap to accommodate the Clipboard.  If it does ask, say Yes.
3. Press Ctrl+S to save the picture to a file.  You can choose whatever filename you like as long as you remember what name you have chosen and what folder it's in.
• You will see an entry at the bottom of the dialog box labelled "Save As Type".  Open the list and select "JPEG File Interchange Format".
• If "JPEG File Interchange Format" is not available, select "16 Color Bitmap", because it makes the file six times smaller.  Paint will warn you that some colour information will be discarded, but you can always look at the saved result to make sure that nothing important has been lost.
• In many cases even "Monochrome Bitmap" will convey the necessary information, and this reduces the file size by a further factor of four.
4. Close Windows Paint.
5. If you did not use "JPEG File Interchange Format", and have access to a compression program such as PKZIP or WinZip, then please use it to compress the image file that you have just saved.  The smaller the file, the faster it is for you to send and for us to receive.
6. Use your normal email program to send us a message describing the problem, and include the saved file (or files) as an attachment to that email.

Using Microsoft Word and fax

Please do not email us Word documents with pictures in them without checking the file size first.  Some versions of Word are immensely inefficient at storing images, so that even the smallest image comes out as a gigantic file.

1. Open Microsoft Word and start a new document.
2. Press Ctrl+V to paste the contents of the Windows Clipboard.
3. Print out the document and fax it; or fax it directly from Word if you have software that allows you to do this.
• If the picture you are trying to send contains areas of grey, you may find that this comes out black if you try to fax directly from Word.  In this case, try printing out the picture and then faxing it manually, because this often comes out better.