Visualizing tasks with Picto Selector

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(I've been granted permission to post this on the forum, thanks Mods!)

We have the experience that we can help our youngest son of 7 a lot when we visualize the daily tasks for him. Things like drying himself after taking a shower, taking a shower etc can be performed without our help after we visualized those tasks for him. And after a while he can do this without those visualizations.

Creating those visualizations was a lot of work, using Word with pictures is a pain. Especially when you want to change / move things around.
Therefore I've created a application (I'm a software developer for 14 years now). To make this easy. I'm currently sharing it as freeware and it is combined with 5000 pictures.

The pictos are coming from the website Sclera.be and have a Dutch, English and French translation. The application itself also supports those languages.

At the main screen picto sheets can be viewed and added. Each sheet can be printed. Pictos can easily be selected from a list and placed between existing pictos, this makes it extremely easy to alter existing picto sheets.

A nice blog that gives an good impression can be found at:
Freeprintablefun.org

If you want to head directly to Picto Selector You can find it at: PECS for All

*Thumbs up* Great

Hi,

I changed the way email can be send from Picto Selector. Before it was depending on Microsoft Office to send email. Now a online connection is all you need.
The Dutch localization has now a nice windows with some explanation how people can send their picto sheets to the 'cookbook'. A yahoo group with the work of other users. When enough people are interested I will create such groups for other localizations.

The new version can be installed by selecting the menu item "Check for updates" in the "File" menu.

edit your first post to add the "go to File > Update to get the new version"

After installation it will automaticly check for updates. I did create a small intro video which shows the most important functionality:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_hx3BUxPdM

*bump*

I've added 1500 new symbols. These Mulberry symbols are downloaded from http://straight-street.com/ and use colors.

(Update as usual)

Version 1.2 is now online. It's a big download (167MB) and includes the Sclera.be, Mulberry and Arasaac symbols. This is a total of over 11000 symbols.

Supported languages are Dutch, English, French and Spanish. See the startpage of PECSforAll for details about the translation status.

When updating the complete download will be used. After this update the updates will be the normal (2 MB) size.

Version 1.2.3 is now online.

- Clock Picto. A new picto type that represents a clock. Add a clock picto, set the time and change it's appearance and ready.
- double click on a picto in the picto list will add that picto on the top picto sheet (if one of them is opened)

Clock picto on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5A4CAHyoOvY

The new version can be installed by selecting the menu item "Check for updates" in the "Help" menu.

I hope it's going well; not something we need, but it sounds like a great product.

It's going great. Currently i've over 150 visitors each day and the 55 downloads each day are generating over 50GB of bandwidth last week. The addition of Spanish and Catalan opened Picto Selector to a lot of people.

The response so far has been very positive.

Version 1.2.4 is now online.

- Time Timer Picto. A new picto type that represents a time timer. Add a time timer picto, set the time and change it's appearance and ready.
- 140 new Arasaac symbols
- german and italian translations of the Arasaac symbols added
- an option in the RMB of a picto in a picto sheet to reset the name to it's original value
- added a new wrong bitmap, a forbidden cross as used in road signs (see
movie)
- i've made the good / wrong pictures less transparant, this improves it visibility


Time Timer picto on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ktrgXlBPZI

The new version can be installed by selecting the menu item "Check for updates" in the "Help" menu.

Version 1.2.7 is now online.

Known issue:
- on some systems the creation of PDF's is failing (the last line of images is missing). Currently the only workaround is to use an external pdf-printer like cute pdf writer (http://www.cutepdf.com/)

Additions:
- Added german translation of the application
- Added 1500 Sclera.be symbols. Those are translated to dutch and english
- Added commandline option -programdir, see explanation at the bottom of this message
- Added automated update check every 30 days, which can be disabled


Commandline parameter: -programdir
When using this parameter when Picto Selector is started some files are stored in a settings folder in the application directory, this is instead of the my documents and application data folders. Use this if you want to use Picto Selector from a network drive with as much data on the server as
possible:
PictoSelector.bin: see below for details about its contents
pictolist.package: downloaded and containing the latest picto updates from the internet
pictolistuser.package: list of user pictos
LayoutTemplates.txt"list of user layout templates


The following information is stored in the PictoSelector.bin file:
Language
PrintTitleFont, PrintPictoNameFont, PrintPictoTextFont: for new picto sheets, updated when changed in a picto sheet
CustomPictoDir, UseCustomPictoDir
PictoGood, PictoGoodColor
PictoWrong, PictoWrongColor
LastVersion, LastVersionDate, LastVersionNeverCheck
GroupFrom, GroupNameCreator
EmailFrom, EmailTo, EmailToHistory
SelectedSets: The symbols sets used in the picto list
PictoClockColors: for new picto sheets, updated when changed in a picto sheet
PictoTimeTimerColors: for new picto sheets, updated when changed in a picto sheet
BorderColor, BorderWidth: for new picto sheets, updated when changed in a picto sheet

The settings file is overwritten when one of these settings is changed. This can cause strange behaviour when multiple users change those settings after each other. The last user saving his settings will win.
The pictosheets and the photos used in them will remain in the local my documents folder.
The best way of using this commandline option is to change the shortcuts of Picto Selector.
The settings file will not be saved when the file is locked against writing.
(without (error) message)


The new version can be installed by selecting the menu item "Check for updates" in the "Help" menu.

Succes,
Martijn

Picto Selector has 16000 symbols now after several updates. I'm currently working on a database version which should run fine on a network. (Nice for sharing the picto sheets over a school/home/office network)

We just moved to France from the US this past summer. My kids like having a picture schedule and my daughter learned to talk using visual prompts. These will be helpful for my daughter to use at school as she knows very little French. Thank you so much for sharing this .

Nice! Great to hear

It's very simple to create a schedule in english, copy it to a new schedule and retranslate it to another language. This way you can easily create 2 sides of a schedule if you want.

Retranslation can be done by selecting another language (a restart is needed for this), selecting the picto's on a sheet and use the right mouse button option "Restore original name"