Taking and Manipulating Screenshots: Taking pictures of your computer screen helps when you need to report problems and otherwise communicate visually with peers and patrons alike.

What are screenshots and why take them?

A screenshot is a picture of your computer screen. Screenshots are a form of visual communication. They help document strange error messages that sometimes appear on our computers, or help us to communicate exactly where on a page that small, hard to see button is. Screenshots are perfect for creating tutorials (some of which you will see in the TOR), and they also help break up long paragraphs of instructional text. Essentially, they take the guess work out of many computer- and web-orientated conversations.

The way PCs and Macs handle taking screenshots is a different, as noted below:

Screenshots on a Mac

To take a screenshot while you are working on a Mac, follow either of the options below:

Hold down the Shift key AND the Command/Apple key AND 3 to capture the entire screen
Hold down the Shift key AND the Command/Apple key AND 4 to produce crosshairs, which allow you to select whichever part of the screen you would like

On a Mac, the screenshot image is automatically downloaded to the desktop, usually named something generic like, "Picture1.png". You can either copy and paste it into an email/Word document/PowerPoint/etc, or simply drag and drop it into your open document.

Screenshots on the Windows side of a dual-boot iMac

The computers in the GSLIS Tech Lab are dual-boot iMacs, meaning that you can choose to run either the Windows Vista or the Apple Leopard operating system. Either way, you will be using a Mac keyboard. If you are working on the Windows side and would like to take a screenshot, you can press:

F14 to capture the entire screen

Because you are using Windows, the screenshot image is copied to the "Clipboard", meaning that you will not see it until you paste it into an application. You will need to open a program like email, Word, PowerPoint, etc, and paste the image, at which point you will be able to see and manipulate it.

Screenshots on a PC

To take a screenshot while you are working on a PC, follow either of the options below:

Hold down Control AND Print Screen to capture the entire screen
Hold down Alt AND Print Screen to capture only the selected open window

Since you are working on Windows, the image is copied to the "Clipboard," as described above. Again, you won't see the image until you open a program such as email, Word or Powerpoint and paste it into the document.

Assignment!

This is your first TOR activity.

Navigate to your favorite library's website. Using the techniques described on this page, take a screenshot of the library's website.
Open a word processing program and paste or insert the image into a new document. Save the document, then convert it to a PDF file. For instructions on converting a document into a PDF, refer to the Handout: How to create PDFs.
Submit your newly-created PDF via eLearning. Login to eLearning at http://my.simmons.edu/elearning and click on the link to enter the "Technology Orientation Requirement - Spring 2010" course. Note that you need to fill out the Pre-TOR Survey before you can access anything else in the course. Once you've done that, go to the TOR Quizzes and Activities learning module and click on the "PDF Screenshot Assignment", attach your PDF, and submit the assignment.

If you need help attaching your file, please contact the Tech Lab at (617) 521-2802 or e-mail gslislab@simmons.edu.