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QSL DESIGN AND PRINTING
This feature has two components.
1. The Toolbox
2. The Design Window
Anything visible anywhere in the Design Window will be printed, in colour if you have
that facility and in a quality that will be determined by your printer.
You MUST have a printer driver installed on your system, even if you use a network
printer.
I recommend that you keep ALL files for the designer i.e. image files and QSL.DAT files
in the Winlog32 sub-folder ..\winlog32\QSL
To use the QSL Designer:
Open Winlog32 menu item menu/Tools/QSL Designer.
Click the 'CREATE NEW' button in the toolbox.
(N.B. The function of each toolbox button will appear if you rest the cursor over it
for a few seconds).
The resulting data boxes, when printing, will contain ONLY the data transferred from
the Log database.
To add a background picture:
Click on the Design window.
Right-click on the design window.
Click on the Picture button that appears in the toolbox.
Select a picture file on .jpg, .bmp, .gif format
This will added to the design window.
To add a background Colour...
Click on the Colour icon on the toolbox.
Select the required colour.
The background colour will only be visible if no background picture has been added.
To add a picture to the Design Window.
Click on the PICTURE button in the toolbox
A new picture box will be added to the top left corner of the Design Window.
Select and drag the picture to required position
Right-click this picture to display the size and file options for the picture.
To add text to the Design Window.
Click on the TEXT button in the toolbox
A new text label will be added to the top left corner of the Design Window.
Select this label and drag to final position
Right-click this label to display format options for this text label.
Select or adjust text, fonts, colours, alignment etc. in the toolbox to you
requirements.
Repeat this process until you have the results you require.
N.B. Text and pictures are added in layers, you will not be able to adjust the layers,
as the next text or picture always overlays the previous so think ahead. This does not
apply to the background picture which is always in the background and it does not apply to
the data labels which are always in front.
All text and pictures are enclosed in a 'box - border' this box does NOT print - it is
just an alignment tool.
N.B. if you want to use the 'Latin' "0" in your callsign or other text press
Cntrl+0
The PREVIEW button drops the boxes from around the text so that you can see the
finished result as will be printed.
The Print button will send the image from the Design Window to your print spool, what
you see in the window will be what you get from the Printer (or should be!).
The print method automatically drops the borders from around the text.
To close the QSL design Window, click the "X" close button at top right of
the Design Window
To Print a QSL using the QSL design, close the Designer if you already have it opened
from the /Tools menu item and open the Print QSL Window from Menu/File/Print QSL
Click the Print QSL button on the Print QSL toolbar, this will open the Toolbox and QSL
Design window and enable a link to the log.
Select an existing design.
Double-click a QSO from the QSO list and the data for that QSO will be added to the
appropriate data labels in the Design Window.
If everything is satisfactory, press the Print button in the Toolbox.
The first printing will always display the printer dialog, where you may select or
change features of the printer. The Printer dialog will not be displayed when sending
further cards to the printer.
When the QSL has printed, you will be prompted to update the Log database, after which
the QSO will no longer be selected for printing and another QSO can be selected.
Date is formatted as per the Log if this option is selected in the Print QSL options.
Mode is re-formatted e.g. A1a becomes CW on the QSL if this option is selected in the
Print QSL options
"QSL Via xxxx " is added to the card if this is found in the Log as with the
QSL Labels.
Data will be added to the User DATA label, if any text is found in either or both the
'Remarks' or 'User' field in the log, text must be formatted in these fields enclosed in
square brackets like [Thanks for new IOTA], text within the brackets will be transported
to the label allowing individual comments to be added from the log.
The option in Print QSL enable the Full frequency to be entered onto the QSL, if this
is already entered into the Log.
You can save the design and recall it later to edit as required.
The DATA labels can NOT be deleted, the data in the data labels can not be changed with
the designer, you must edit the data entered in the Log.
You can hide the data labels using a Toolbox button.
It is not possible to change the content of the DATA labels - it is just a guide as
these will carry the data from the log anyway.
Latin Zero format in callsign data.
Enable this option from Menu/File/Print QSL/Options
When enabled, a callsign with conventional zero from log is printed with a Latin zero
"Ø".
When enabled, this option also applies to all printed output, e.g. Print log.
It is possible to set font and other properties in the DATA labels.
You can save a design as a bitmap using a toolbox button, the design will be saved as a
Windows bitmap file .BMP, these files are NOT compressed so they tend to be rather large
file sizes for general use.
If you wish to change to a compressed format e.g. .GIF or .JPG you must import the BMP
file into appropriate image manipulation software. The QSL designer is NOT capable of
saving in other formats.
A file saved as a bitmap can not be opened into the Designer and edited, it can be
added as a background picture though.
Transporting the QSL Designer DAT files to another system, may not have exactly the
same layout, the fonts selected in the design may not be available on the other system,
and may cause strange results.
Please note that this is not a DTP program and there are some limitations.
HINTS.
Design (Here I can briefly give you the benefit of my 35 years experience in the Print
and Design Industry!)
When deciding on the layout of your QSL, you could copy an existing design, but it will
be loads more fun to develop your own.
Don't overdo the number of colours for your fonts, two different colours is usually
enough, 'rainbow' cards really don't look that good to the eye.
Don't use lots of different font styles in your design, don't mix serif and sans styles
in the same design.
Fonts from the same 'family', changing the size and appearance of a single font always
gives a more pleasing effect overall, e.g. bold, italic etc.
Alignment and equal spacing of labels especially at the left and right margins will
make a huge difference to the appeal of your QSL design.
To make a 'Panel' e.g. white panel on an existing picture image
Add a label, select a font size around the size required for the panel and pad out with
any character (NOT spaces) and make the Font background and Font colour the same e.g. set
both to white making sure that you have set the label to OPAQUE using the Trans/Opaq
button in the toolbox.
The panel can now be overlaid with other new labels and data labels.
To make a text shadow effect.
Make two labels with text and fonts formatted exactly the same size and style but set
the font colours differently, overlaying one label on top of the other but offset a
small amount to produce the shadow effect, careful choice of font colours will give the
best effect. A light and dark shade of the same colour, or using grey as the shadow
against other bright font colours look good.
If the background is dark then use white or a very pale shade for the shadow.
Horizontal lines can be made with multiple underscore characters.
Vertical lines and boxes are not directly possible and this and any other complicated
effect should be first be made into a background picture using a suitable DTP/Image
program and the file used as the background picture in the Design Window.
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