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Viewing Images, Video & PDFs

Updated v2.4.9

At a glance

  • Double-click an image, a recording, a PDF or a G-code file in the browser and it opens right there
  • One viewer for pictures and video — the arrow keys walk a captures folder without stopping at the seam
  • Full playback: scrub, volume, 0.25× to 2× speed, single-frame stepping, and loop
  • Trim a recording to the part that matters and export just that span as a new MP4
  • Attach what you're looking at straight to a Community post
  • G-code, logs and config open read-only with syntax colouring — one click to unlock editing
  • A preview pane and real thumbnails while you browse
  • On an appliance this is the only photo viewer, video player, PDF reader and text editor there is

The file browser opens what it finds. Double-click a screenshot, a screen recording, a machine manual or a .nc program and it appears in JetCad3 — no other application involved, no file association to configure, nothing downloaded.

This matters most on a JC3 Appliance, where JetCad3 is the entire computer. There is no photo viewer, no video player, no PDF reader and no text editor to fall back on. Now there doesn't need to be one.

Pictures and video, one viewer

Images and recordings open full-screen with zoom, pan, fit and 1:1, and 90° rotation for stills. Scroll to zoom toward the pointer, drag to pan, double-click a picture to toggle between fit and actual size.

Video gets the whole transport underneath: play and pause, a scrub bar, volume, playback speed from 0.25× to , single-frame stepping, loop, and full screen.

Screenshots and recordings sit side by side in the same folder, and that is exactly how the viewer treats them — and walk through every picture and every video in the folder without stopping at the boundary between them. Seeking within a video is Shift+← and Shift+→, so the arrow keys never change meaning halfway through a folder.

KeyDoes
Previous / next file
SpacePlay / pause
, .Step one frame
Shift+← Shift+→Seek 5 seconds
M LMute / loop
+ - F 0Zoom in, out, fit, actual size
RRotate (pictures)
EscClose

Trim a recording before you send it

A three-minute recording usually contains fifteen seconds worth watching. Click the scissors, set a start and an end on the scrub bar — the I and O keys drop them at the playhead — and Export clip… writes just that span as a new MP4.

Exporting plays the span through once, so it takes about as long as the clip itself.

Straight into a Community post

The viewer's attach button opens the Community composer with the file already uploading — the same one-click path as the toast right after a capture. Something you recorded yesterday posts exactly like something you recorded a second ago.

Copy, Save a copy…, show in folder and Delete sit beside it.

PDFs, G-code and logs

Manuals, cut lists and supplier datasheets open in the built-in PDF reader with page navigation, zoom and search.

Programs and text — .nc, .gcode, .tap, .log, .csv, .json, .yaml, config files — open in JetCad3's code editor with G-code syntax colouring, line numbers and find. They open read-only with a padlock in the toolbar: a production program can't be altered by a stray keystroke on a shop-floor keyboard, and one click on the padlock unlocks editing and saving when you actually mean to.

While you're browsing

  • Preview pane. Click a file once and the right-hand panel shows the picture, the first page of the PDF, or the head of the program, along with its size, dimensions and duration. The toolbar button collapses it, and it remembers whether it was open and how wide.
  • Thumbnails. Icon view fills in the real picture for images, video and PDFs as you scroll, and caches them so the folder is instant next time.

Project and drawing files

Double-clicking a .jc3 opens it in a tab, exactly as double-clicking one on your desktop does — reusing the current tab if it's empty, otherwise opening a new one. DXF, SVG and shape files go to their importers the same way.

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