Picasa Buttons

Picasa uses buttons to make it easier to perform common tasks. Picasa’s buttons, such as Export and Print, can be found along the bottom of the program window. They can also make it easier to send images to external programs for further processing.

There are two ways to handle sending image files to Picture Padder through the Picasa button mechanism. The one you should choose depends on how you handle edits and name tags in Picasa.

Temporary Files

One method is to export temporary copies of the images. This ensures all unsaved edits have been applied. This has the disadvantage that name tags are not available unless they have been previously written to the image file before export. Temporary files and folders are automatically deleted when Picture Padder no longer references them.

Original Files

The other method is to use the original images which have the edits and nametags reversed. Unsaved edits will not be included in the finished image. Name tags will be available if they exist.

Picasa Button Limit

The Picasa button mechanism can only export a maximum of 120 images at a time. Picture Padder will warn you when it receives exactly 120 images.

This is only a problem if you are exporting images to temporary files. If you attempt to export more than 120, Picasa will export copies of all the images but only inform Picture Padder of the first 120. Picture Padder will not know the remainder exist and cannot delete them therefore leaving them to cluttering up your computer with unused copies.

Temporary files are exported to folders that start with “.temp” (.temp, .temp_1, .temp_2…) in the folder “%LocalAppData%\temp\Picasa3\”. If these folders exist they can be deleted when the images are no longer needed.

If you are using the original files, simply select images past the first 120 and export the next group of images. If the groups of images overlap, Picture Padder will only add an image once.

Avoiding Picasa's Button Limit

The Picasa button limit can be avoided by selecting the images inside the Picasa program and dragging the images to the Picture Padder program. This will be using the original images so unsaved edits will not be included.

You can also choose to export the selected images to a folder then adding the exported images to Picture Padder from there. This will include any unsaved edits but will not include name tag data unless it has been written to the image file. You can write name tag data only to the exported image files by temporarily turning on the “Store name tags in photo” setting in Picasa’s settings while exporting.