Web Page screen shot!!!

**kjc** · Dec 31, 2002, 12:45

Ok, this might be expecting the impossible but i'll ask anyway!!!

Is there anyway that php can grab a screenshot of a web page and save it as a jpg/gif.

A client wants some links for their site and if possible I would likea small thumbnail of the linksite displayed on my clients site.

I doubt this is possible though...

Happy New Year.

**compwizard** · Dec 31, 2002, 13:43

I really don't know if it is possible in PHP, but couldn't you have a cron job/scheduled event run an image capture program on the server and save a screenshot? Sorry I couldn't be more specific.

**Phil.Roberts** · Dec 31, 2002, 15:50

This isnt possible. Screenshots are entirely dependant on the operating system/browser. So to get a screenshot with PHP you would need to write a graphical user-agent (browser) in PHP.

**bcp_2005** · Jan 1, 2003, 08:52

Originally posted by Phil.Roberts
This isnt possible. Screenshots are entirely dependant on the operating system/browser. So to get a screenshot with PHP you would need to write a graphical user-agent (browser) in PHP.

Is that possible?

**Phil.Roberts** · Jan 1, 2003, 09:09

-sigh- No it isnt.

**bcp_2005** · Jan 1, 2003, 09:39

Originally posted by Phil.Roberts
-sigh- No it isnt.

Didn't think so.

**samsm** · Jan 1, 2003, 10:14

I would say it is possible, but a lot of trouble and would require triggering other applications.

For example, if you were using OSX you could have PHP trigger an AppleScript which could load a given page and take a screenshot and you could convert that file...
I'm sure something like that could be done with Windows or Linux as well.

Quite possibly not worth doing, but worth examining if you are interested.

**jofa** · Jan 1, 2003, 10:27

Why php?
Why not a stand-alone app (VB, C#) that reads urls from a list and then grabs the page and takes the screenshot?
(And then upload the images to the server...)

And, yes, I know you can write stand-alone apps in php too, but I don't know how to re-use the web browser component of IE from that language...

**Siltrince** · Jan 1, 2003, 21:46

Originally posted by kjc
...

A client wants some links for their site and if possible I would likea small thumbnail of the linksite displayed ...

Unless you need 50+ screenshots I would say take them yourself.

**QReyes** · Jan 1, 2003, 21:48

It is, however, interesting to find out how to do it.

**Eric.Coleman** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:09

The second post is accurate..

Write a shell script that will take a screen shot of a page, and store it somewhere, I know that can be done, I forget what site it was, but a guy had a perl shell script that did it for him.. if only I could remember

**QReyes** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:11

See. It is possible after all.

**peternm22** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:21

I tried to do this a few weeks back, but I don't have the knowledge to do it on my own

I have Apache and PHP set up on a Windows box. I made a batch file to open IE and load a URL.

I had two problems though:
1) While I could get PHP to execute the batch file, I couldn't figure out how to get PHP to send a URL to the batch file (the only way I could get it to work was to hard code a URL in the batch file)
2) I couldn't figure out how to get the batch file to simulate a keystroke (such as F11) so that the screen capture program in the background would activate and take a screenshot.

Peter

**Eric.Coleman** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:40

If your usin exec or another php command to open IE, you can tell it a url to open like so:

iexplorer.exe "http://site.com"

via command line ( assuming iexplorer.exe is in the CWD )

**peternm22** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:51

Any idea how to simulate a keystroke?

**QReyes** · Jan 1, 2003, 22:58

Why not just make a program to do this? Using VB.net perhaps?

**Siltrince** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:00

Originally posted by friend_al_23
See. It is possible after all.

Everything is possible , you just have to see if it's worth all te trouble

**QReyes** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:04

Originally posted by Siltrince
Everything is possible , you just have to see if it's worth all te trouble

Everything is worthwhile. Even little things.

**peternm22** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:04

The reason I don't just make a program for it is because I don't know much about programming. Just a little of perl, php, and javascript.

**QReyes** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:12

Originally posted by peternm22
The reason I don't just make a program for it is because I don't know much about programming. Just a little of perl, php, and javascript.

You know javascript, then maybe you'll be a hang of the .NET framework. I'm not sure.

**Eric.Coleman** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:25

Hrm, i'll do some research on simulating key strokes

There has to be a command that you can run via shell to take a screen shot...

**peternm22** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:46

Yeah... I just found a way to run the screen capture program via command line. Here's what the batch file looks like so far:

Code:

start iexplore.exe http://www.hotmail.com
start C:\HQScreen.exe 0 PNG 8 picture C:\

The problem is, I need the program to pause for a couple seconds before executing the second line (in order to give the webpage time to load).

Any ideas?

**Eric.Coleman** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:53

hrm...

No clue on that again, im sure there is some type of pause( [int] seconds ); command, but im not a shell scripter, so no clue ;P

**peternm22** · Jan 1, 2003, 23:58

So close, yet so far away

**QReyes** · Jan 2, 2003, 00:03

Why not trigger a count or something after the page pops-up?

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