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General discussion

question about Preview and animated Gifs...

Aug 5, 2007 10:14PM PDT

I was reorganizing all the clip art I grab from various sources that I use for reference or inspiration in doing my own projects. One folder contained all animated Gifs. Question is why doesn't
Preview play animated Gifs? I could have sworn at one time that the program displayed a "PLAY" button in the tool bar when ever you opened one of the critters up with Preview. Was I delirious or did they take away that option? If so, then does anyone know why?

There are very few features about the mac OS and it's utilities that I dislike, but I think Preview is a program that could use a bit of work. I hope the new Leopard offers those updates. As an aside... does apple have an official web based "suggestion box" anyplace? Happy

Another question, how does one go about resetting computer wide preferences for an image to be opened up by a specific program? Some jpegs I have will open automatically, when double clicked, in Preview, some in Graphic Converter, some in Photoshop, etc. Is there anyway to reset all of these jpegs to open in Preview at once, rather than having to manually choose the "open with" option for each individual program? I'm sure it is easy but I'm having a brain malfunction this morning.

Preview 3.0.9
OS 10.4.10
iBook G4 1.2 ghz
maxed RAM

Thanks in advance for any response

grim

Discussion is locked

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Some answers
Aug 5, 2007 11:01PM PDT

To change what program opens what file or to make them all the same, try this:
Select a file you want to open.
Get Info
In the Opens With box, choose the app you want to use.
In the Open all other files of this type with this app, put a check mark. (or whatever)

You may have to repeat with files that have a different icon, but that should solve your problem

P

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I knew that, but sometimes the results are inconsistent...
Aug 6, 2007 1:15AM PDT

... or so it seemed in the past.

Anyway... I tried it just now... it works, so it must be witchcraft.

Until next time!

Happy

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(NT) Thanks Peter... ;-)
Aug 6, 2007 1:16AM PDT
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Hmmm... Initial research would seem to indicate...
Aug 6, 2007 12:46AM PDT

... that previous versions of Preview did play animated Gifs but the update to version 3 dropped the option. I would be curious to know why, but can't find any official info about it. Only thing I can think of is that they traded added support for PDFs and sacrificed animated Gifs for some reason.

Quick Time will play animated Gifs but seem to do so at an accelerated pace compared to the frame rate playback they were originally designed with. QT will also play the animation sequence from beginning to end only once. It requires you to activate the loop function in order to repeat over and over.