During installation a shortcut to the Icon Generator is added to the Windows Desktop. Double clicking on this shortcut will launch a small dialog application that uses, but is independent of, EDS IV. Icon Generator is separate from EDS IV because it may require a long time for it to complete its work. We did not want to keep you from using EDS IV during the time required to generate icons and update design properties for your designs.
EDS IV includes a Windows 'shell extension' that displays icons for embroidery files in Explorer, Find Files, and File Open, Save, and SaveAs dialogs within EDS IV. EDS III provided a similar but less widely available capability within its graphical file open. The icon files with extensions such as .cpf, and .epf, which we call shadow files, that were produced by EDS III will continue to be used by EDS IV when available. For designs that were not produced by EDS III, for example those purchased as a library, these shadow files must be generated.
Icon Generator scans your hard disk(s) searching for embroidery files. It keeps counts of expanded, condensed, and project (OFM) files that need to have their icons and design properties generated or brought up to date. This only needs to be done when you first install EDS IV and whenever you copy embroidery designs from diskettes or CD-ROM libraries of designs. EDS IV will function correctly without running Icon Generator but its integration with Windows will not be as tight from a visual perspective because the icons for some files may not be correctly displayed. It will be more difficult for you to locate the embroidery file you wish to open until Icon Generator has done its work.
You can easily create multiple Icon Generator shortcuts on your desktop, each with a different Target path root. Alternatively you might choose to respecify the Target path root within the shortcut whenever you wish to launch the Icon Generator. To set or change the Target path root on a shortcut to Icon Generator simply right-button click on the shortcut, select Properties from the context menu, and on the Shortcut Tab note that Target is selected. Target is an edit field that is of the form path\EdsShadow.exe TargetPath. The Target Path in a normal install should be C:\Designs and can be changed to any other path or network share. Normally this will not be needed if you have organized your system so that all designs are either in C:\Designs or in subdirectories below that directory, e.g. C:\Designs\Birds or C:\Designs\JonesConstruction, because Icon Generator knows how to find designs in all subdirectories of the Target root.
The visual behavior will be different depending on whether EDS IV is running when you double-click on the Icon Generator shortcut. If it is running, Icon Generator will find it and use EDS IV. If it is not running, Icon Generator will invisibly launch EDS IV and run it in the background. Note that if EDS IV is not installed on the same computer from which Icon Generator is run you will not be able to generate/update icons. The Icon Generator itself is a short, wide dialog that contains, initially, the EDS IV icon to the left of counts of files to update. Beneath that icon the Target root path will initially be displayed, and below that a progress indicator. Begin and Cancel buttons on the right are the only controls you will use to control Icon Generator. When you click Begin, the button will be re-labeled Pause and Icon Generator will begin searching for embroidery files in the Target path root and continue through all sub-directories. You can click Pause at any time; the button will be re-labeled Resume and Icon Generator will discontinue its work until you click that button. Cancel allows you to dismiss Icon Generator completely.
If you cancel Icon Generator before it has completed its work then it will pick up where it left off when you run it again. Alternatively, you can click the Pause button if you need to work in EDS IV without the distraction of files being opened in your workspace, and then click Resume should you take a coffee break or go to lunch. There is almost no system resource cost to leaving Icon Generator launched but Paused so you can use it to generate and update icons at your convenience.
This all depends on the number of embroidery files that require icon generation/update. If all of your embroidery files were generated by EDS III it may take only a few seconds. If you have placed the entire Dakota Designs library on your hard disk and you have a slow computer it can require more than a day to complete its work. Progress will be indicated by the progress indicator and reduced counts of files but you should be aware that some files can take considerably longer than others to process.
Two things can cause Icon Generator to fail. First, if it encounters non-embroidery files with extensions of EXP, CND, or OFM, a variety of failures can occur. The offending file can be read from the line that initially contained the Target root path so you can readily identify the source of the failure. In addition, a very small number of embroidery design errors cannot be correctly diagnosed in condensed files. This occurs fewer than three times in a thousand files among the more than fifteen thousand files used to test Icon Generator and EDS IV. Should you experience such a failure, note the name of the offending file and either remove it or rename it with a different file extension and restart Icon Generator.