digital photo utilities

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Table of Contents

1. What is "digital photo utilities?"

2. Who should use digital photo utilities?

3. What utilities are currently available?

4. Are more utilities planned?

5. What is your upgrade policy?

6. How does digital photo utilities fit into my workflow?

7. What are the computer requirements for running digital photo utilities?

8. I'm having problems installing DPU, what should I do?

9. Is there a Macintosh version of digital photo utilities?

10. When I try to run the application I get a dialog box that says "Unable to Locate DLL" and "The dynamic link library mscoree.dll could not be found in the specified path..."

11. Why does the Mailer ask me to choose a profile?

12. I just upgraded to a new version of digital photo utilities, why am I now experiencing some strange behavior?

13. How do I remove digital photo utilities from my computer?

What is "digital photo utilities?"

digital photo utilities from Pixlabs is a simple, but powerful and extendable collection of software utilities designed to make it easier to manage digital images.  One of the most difficult aspects of digital photography is managing the images after they have been created (managing the "workflow").  digital photo utilities is a flexible program that simplifies and streamlines the digital photography workflow.

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Who should use digital photo utilities?

Our digital photo utilities customers tend to fall into three categories:

1. Occasional users who don't want to remember the details of common actions.  These users set up actions for their most common activities once.  Later they aren't asking themselves "How do I do that again?"  Instead they just use the action again and let digital photo utilities remember how to do it.

2. Enthusiasts/Advanced Amateurs who like the control digital photo utilities affords them.  These users take advantage of the advanced features such as flexible EXIF metadata editing, web gallery customization and sophisticated naming and organization features.

3. Professionals who need power.  These users take advantage of the batch processing features to organize and manipulate their photographs efficiently and consistently.

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What utilities are currently available?

The currently available utilities are listed here.  Each utility is completely documented in the online user manual.

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Are more utilities planned?

Of course!  Lots of useful ones.  Check back regularly to see what has changed, or select the "Check for newer version.." item from the Help menu of digital photo utilities.  If you have suggestions for utilities that you would like to see, drop us a line at support@pixlabs.com.

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What is your upgrade policy?

It is the nature of software to evolve and change.  At Pixlabs, we feel that we provide a great value for your money, however, we like to reward our customers who have chosen to purchase our product.  We have created a very liberal upgrade policy.  All upgrades are FREE except for major revision changes (i.e. from version 1.X to version 2.X).  Existing customers can simply download and install the new version.  Their existing key will work.  The major upgrades will be offered to existing customers at a substantial discount.  In addition, even major upgrades will be made available free of charge to anyone who has purchased the product within 30 days of the major upgrade date.

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How does digital photo utilities fit into my workflow?

Very good question.  We just happen to have a web page describing this.

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What are the requirements for running the digital photo utilities?

digital photo utilities Platform and Software Requirements

The digital photo utilities application is based on Microsoft's .NET framework.  See the Microsoft .NET FAQ for more information. Microsoft's .NET Framework must be installed for digital photo utilities to work properly.

To install digital photo utilities, you must have one of the following operating systems with Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 or later installed on your computer:

Minimum hardware requirements are a Pentium 90* MHz with 32 MB**, however we strongly recommend at least a Pentium 133* with 96MB** of memory.  A display size of 800x600 or greater is required.

* Or the minimum CPU required to run the operating system, whichever is higher.

** Or the minimum RAM required to run the operating system, whichever is higher.

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I'm having problems installing DPU, what should I do?

If your computer already has Microsoft .NET on it, installation should be very straight forward.  Please contact us at support@pixlabs.com for help.

Some rare installation issues:

DPU installer and NTFS formatted volumes

When installing the Digital Photo Utilities (DPU) onto a NTFS formatted drive partition (Windows NT, 2000, and XP only) the System user must have Full permissions to the target install folder (C:\Program Files by default). By default the System user has full permissions to all folders on an NTFS formatted drive partition. Also, if the DPU installer is stored on an NTFS formatted drive partition the System user must have Full permissions to all folders along the path to the folder where the DPU installer is stored.

Since, by default, the System user has the required file and folder permissions this should not be an issue. However, if you get the error, "The installer was interrupted before Digital Photo Utilities could be installed. You need to restart the installer and try again.", while attempting to install DPU then NTFS file permissions may be the issue.

How to check file permissions on NTFS formatted drive partitions

1. To check NTFS file permissions on a drive partition first open Windows Explorer

Click the Start menu and select the Run menu item.

Type in explorer in the field labeled Open: and click the OK button.

2. From within Windows Explorer click on the plus sign (+) next to the drive letter you are attempting to install to, usually this is drive C. This will display a list of folders located in the drive partition. Continue to click the plus signs of those folders that form the path to the install destination folder.

3. Once you have reached the last folder in the path right click on that folder and select the Properties menu item. This opens the folder's properties dialog.

4. Click the Security tab.

5. The Properties dialog contains an upper and a lower section. In the upper section is a list of user and group names. In the lower section is a group of check boxes showing various permission levels. In the upper section look to see if the user System is in the list. If it is not in the list click the Add button and scroll the list of users and groups until you find it and add it to the user list. If the System user is already in the list of users or after you have added it to the list, single click on the System user to select it. Then look at the lower section and confirm that the allow box is checked for the Full Control permission. If it is not checked, you need to check it.

6. Click the OK button to close the dialog.

7. Repeat these steps for every folder in the path until you reach the top level, the drive letter.

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Is there a Macintosh version of digital photo utilities?

No there currently is no Macintosh version available.  We hope to have a version some day, however, our resources are limited.  If you would be interested in being notified when a Macintosh version becomes available, please request that on our feedback page.

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When I try to run the application I get a dialog box that says "Unable to Locate DLL" and "The dynamic link library mscoree.dll could not be found in the specified path..."

This message indicates that you have not yet installed the .NET framework.  See the Microsoft .NET FAQ for more information.

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Why does the Mailer ask me to choose a profile?

Any time digital photo utilities uses a feature of your email program (sending a message or accessing the address book), you will be asked to log in or choose a user profile (if you use Microsoft Outlook or have multiple user profiles).  This is simply a way for the program to "log in" to the correct email account so that the mail it produces will come from the correct account.

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I just upgraded to a new version of digital photo utilities, why am I now experiencing some strange behavior?

The Microsoft installer (which digital photo utilities uses) has a minor bug.  Under certain circumstances you may end up with two versions of the program installed at once.  To remedy this situation simply go to your Start Menu/Control Panel and choose "Add or Remove Programs."  Look in the list for two versions of digital photo utilities.  Select the older version and click on the "Remove" button.

For more information on this issue, see the Upgrade page.

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