Super Fast Way to Convert HTML to Thumbnail

"I would like to create a simple 'screenshot' or 'thumbnail' of a website address on the fly, not sure if i want to cache it yet or not, but either way doesn't matter. I'm looking to either develop something myself or find something already developed to use, and I've done a lot of searching on here and Google but haven't seem to come across anything that is known to work or that I think will accomplish what i'm looking to do. Does anybody know of any thumbnail services that works?" -- from stackoverflow.com

In the age of digital images, visual search engines and image-organizing programs normally use thumbnails. By putting thumbnails of webspages to the search results or directory listing, users can preview the site before visiting each search result links. It is an ideal way to improve the usability, user satisfaction and reduce the frustration associated with broken links, inappropriate contents or pop-up ads. Thus, many people would like to put thumbnail picture links of the webpages to facilitate users to make a decision faster and easier while browsing the search results, instead of just putting the text links.

However, as the user form stackoverflow.com mentioned above, currently, there's few program can convert a webpage/URL or even a HTML file to thumbnail, let alone outputting the file using php by pulling the file from somewhere or activating the script with java or php. Fortunately, now we can get help from Firecoresoft! Firecoresoft HTML to Thumbnail Converter is a command line tool that allows you to dynamically convert HTML to Thumbnail - any HTML, URL, HTML file, or MHTML file to Thumbnail through command line singly or in batches. Moreover, since it is a command line tool, there're many ways to implement the command line interface into your applications PHP, ASP, .Net (VB or C#), etc.

Below is a simple step-by-step guide on how to use this command line tool:

Open the cmd.exe

After downloading and installing the command line tool, use the cmd.exe to run it. For this, Win XP users can launch the "Run.exe" and then input "cmd" and hit the "enter key". For Windows 7 users, just type "cmd" in the "Search box" in the "Start" menu.

Input the source webpage's URL or file path

Input "cd" and then type the path you install the HTML to Thumbnail Converter. For example, input "cd C:\Program Files\Firecoresoft\HTML to Image Command Line\HTMLtoImage.exe" and press enter key. After that, you will see all the usage command listed there. Follow the command to input the URL or file path of the HTML file you want to convert. For example, to generate thumbnail image of web page, input "HTMLtoImage /url http://www.youtube.com /width 100 /height 200".

Convert the webpage to thumbnail

Press the enter key again, then the conversion will be started and done well within seconds. The output thumbnail image will contain all the elements in the source webpage. You can also customize the output images' location, name, format, width and height, etc. Feel free to have a try now!