Instant Church Directory 2008

17 Comments

• Jeff, Our church bought ICD just 10 days before the new release. Now they want us to pay the full price for the new release. What goes? Most software companies provide it at no cost during the first 30 days. Do we need to get a refund on the older version then buy the new one? current ver. 1.0.60828.21735
  

• I have Version 2.0.7346 .19721 2008
  The images I use for the Famlies are taken with a digital camera extremely sharp and a high resolution I'll make any color, brightness, or contrast changes and make the final crop in the program. Is there any options to increase the final photo quality for color printing?
  Thanks for a terriffic product
  Tom Guidry
  guidry@hotmail.com
  

• Hi Raymond,
  I just saw your comment now (7 months later). Sorry. We did offer a free upgrade for version 1.0 customers. Hopefully you got in touch with us and got the free upgrade.
  -Jeff
  

• Hi Tom,
  Instant Church Directory has a configuration file which you can modify to increase the DPI of the images in the Directory PDF. The config file is named InstantChurchDirectory.exe.config and it can be found where you installed the application. The default path would be:
  
  C:\Program Files\Communication Resources\Instant Church Directory
  
  If you open the InstantChurchDirectory.exe.config file in a text editor (notepad.exe works great) you will see multiple configuration settings. You can modify all of the Medium Dpi settings in the config file to increase the quality of the images in the pdf (see the list below). I recommend to modify all of these settings to a value of “304” (without the quotes):
  
  • ActivityImageDpiMedium
  • CoverImageDpiMedium
  • MemberImageDpiMedium
  • PastorImageDpiMedium
  • StaffImageDpiMedium
  
  WARNING: Be careful in this file. Some of these config settings are used to set the aspect ratio of the images in the pdf and how they are stored in the database. Changing the wrong ones will cause interesting side effects in the application, database, and directory pdf.
  
  
  Another way to increase the quality of the Directory PDF is to open the ICDX file in Microsoft Access. Of course this means that you would need to have a license of Microsoft Access and also know how to navigate around in an Access database file. If you do have Microsoft Access then just browse to the ICDX directory file. The ICDX directory file can usually be found in the "Directory" folder in the same path where the application is installed:
  
  C:\Program Files\Communication Resources\Instant Church Directory\Directory
  
  Open the ChurchDirectory.icdx in Microsoft Access and then modify the OutputQuality setting in the DirectorySettings table to a value of 1. This will do the same as changing the dpi values above in the config file and it is much easier but you need to have Microsoft Access and know how to use it. Most likely just modifying the config file as described above will get you want you want.
  
  Interesting Side Note: We had originally included an option to set the PDF Directory Output Quality in the initial version but we dropped the feature prior to release when we determined that it would just add more confusion to the interface and really did not give you much improvement in the final PDF. The default quality that we have is more than enough for most printers so we removed the option from the interface (but the setting remained in the database file).
  
  Hope this helps,
  -Jeff
  

• I have Instant Church Directory software installed on my Win XP computer. I am about to switch to a Win Vista sp1 machine. How do I accomplish moving the application and data? Thanks for your help!
  

• Hi Jim,
  You will need to copy the ChurchDirectory.ICDX file from your Windows XP computer to the same directory on your Windows Vista computer. You will find the ChurchDirectory.ICDX file in this path on your Windows XP computer:
  C:\Program Files\Communication Resources\Instant Church Directory\Directory\
  
  But I highly recommend moving to our Online version of Instant Church Directory: http://www.instantchurchdirectory.com
  It allows you to work from any computer and we will even host the Church Directory PDF for you (you can import your ICDX file to get started also).
  -Jeff
  

• Does this software work on a mac?
  

• Hi Peter,
  Unfortunately the Instant Church Directory CD product only works on Windows operating systems. But we do have a Online version that will work for your Mac. Check out the Online version at http://www.instantchurchdirectory.com where you can sign up for an online account and create and store your directory through that service.
  
  -Jeff
  

• More and more churches are going to Mac's as they grow weary of Windows, malware and viruses. Why don't you put out a Mac version. Our church would buy it!
  

• Hi Richard,
  Unfortunately we are a small company that is unable to produce a product for both Windows and Mac... we just do not have the resources. But we did hear customers like you and that is why we produced the online version of Instant Church Directory. You can sign up for it here: http://www.instantchurchdirectory.com. The online version will work with both Mac and Windows computers without any issues (and all of the features of the CD product are included in the online version).
  Thanks,
  -Jeff
  

• Jeff,
  
  If we buy your CD, can we 'host' the resulting (is there a resulting) photo version of the Database?
  
  Chris
  

• What is the default setting for DPI in the PDF output?
  
  
  Thanks,
  Kathy
  

• Hi Kathy,
  
  Instant Church Directory generates your directory as a PDF at 72 dpi. The reason for that resolution is to help keep the PDF's file size down. Some directories that have a lot of pages and photos and can have very large file sizes.
  
  Thanks!
  Katie
  

• We are looking into using your website program and we have a Church Windows database with all of our members information. Is there a way to directly import all of that data into your program or would it require us to manually put that info in again?
  

• Hi Brittany Stanley,
  You can import your Church Members into Instant Church Directory (CD version and Online version) by importing from a comma-delimited (.csv) file. So you would need to see if it is possible to export from your Church Windows database into a csv and then import it into Instant Church Directory. Both the Online version and the CD version of Instant Church Directory have tutorials to show how to create and import from a CSV file.
  
  Thanks,
  -Jeff
  

• All of the photos that I have for the directory are in an 8x10 ratio. How do I change the directory to this ratio?
  

• Hi Kim,
  The best place to ask questions about Instant Church Directory is on the Instant Church Directory forums at http://forums.instantchurchdirectory.com.
  Thanks,
  -Jeff