User:Hey.youcp/Resources

On this page, I will add most of the resources I use for contributing to the wiki. Many users ask about these from time to time, so I thought it would be better if I just create a page with all this information. I will add a summary of the usefulness of each resource in bold. The information on this page is subject to change over time.

CP Cutouts
CP Cutouts is a website that contains many images extracted from Club Penguin's SWF files. I have not used it much in the past, but it is useful for people creating custom penguins. People can simply save the cutouts to their computer and use an image editing software to paste the cutouts on a penguin.

CP Items
CP Items is a website I have used quite a bit in the past. It updates with the item image, ID, name, type, cost, and whether it is a member item or not whenever new items are released. It also has a search feature which you can use to search for items, furniture, igloos, igloo floors, stamps, and music. However, the most useful thing I find about this site is that you can go into its SWF database and get full images of items. Normally, Club Penguin cuts off items in their own SWF database. For example, look at this SWF for the Beta Hat. The top of the item is cut off for whatever reason Club Penguin does this, but CP Items lets you screenshot large images of items without having to save the SWF from CP's database and modify it so that it is not cut off. This has been useful for uploading item images to the wiki. You can access its database by going here and adding the item ID at the end of the link. You can also change the  to   and use it for furniture images.

JSON Files
Club Penguin's JSON files are useful for finding text-based information such as the official names of items and rooms, IDs, tour guide messages, stamp descriptions, as well as a multitude of other things. You can search for these easily by pressing ctrl+f on your keyboard and typing in the item name, ID, etc.

Penguin Avatar Database
This is the database Club Penguin started using in October 2011 for the new Buddy List. It contains the player card images for all penguins. It is a better way to take pictures of penguins when you don't want the player card to be in the picture. For example, here is Billybob's penguin. The  happens to be Billybob's player card ID. Please note that in the link,  is Unicode for an opening curly bracket  and   is Unicode for a closing curly bracket. The reason I have mentioned this is just so that you can tell the  and   apart from the player card ID in the link. Anyway, another thing about the link is that you can manipulate the size of the image by changing the  (600 is the largest). You can also change the  to    if you want the background in the image and the   to   if you want the pin in the image. When you get it how you want it, you can simply right-click and save the image to your computer.

Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is a website that keeps archives of websites. Information about Club Penguin was not always recorded as well when it wasn't as popular as it is now, so this website is useful for finding information on Club Penguin that is no longer available as well as history. You can find old SWFs, old images, and access the old blog posts that Club Penguin removed from their site for some reason. Just type http://clubpenguin.com in the search box, click "Take Me Back", and it will let you choose through many archives recorded throughout the years.

Audacity
Audacity is an audio editing software. I have mainly used it for converting audio files in the  format to the   format, as this is the audio format the wiki supports. It has been useful in the past for uploading music to the wiki for things like user page music requests.

Flash Decompiler Trillix
Flash Decompiler Trillix is an SWF modifying software. It has been useful for extracting SWFs. I prefer SwfModify, but have resorted to using Trillix to open files that SwfModify could not.

GIMP
GIMP is an image editing software. It is the most recent one I started using. It is simpler than Photoshop and is useful for cropping images and adding transparent backgrounds. Although I mostly use Paint.NET as I am most familiar with it, one function GIMP has that Paint.NET currently does not is the "Autocrop Image" function. This function saves time when cropping and is much faster than manually cropping an image, which I have painstakingly done in the past in MS Paint.

Kurst SWF Renderer
Kurst SWF Renderer is a software that converts SWF files to  images. It is useful for generating images that keep the transparency from an SWF and faster than taking a screenshot of an image and adding a transparent background using an image editing software. So for example, when you save an SWF of a stamp from Club Penguin to your computer, you can use Kurst to convert it to an image while keeping the transparency of the stamp's shadow (the stamp's shadow is actually transparent - the same goes for the shadow of catalogs, background icons, penguins, etc.). Also, say you don't use Kurst and take a screenshot an image of an item from the CP Items database. When you remove the white background with your image editing software, it will still leave white pixels around the edges of the item. Kurst produces a "clean cutout" of items since it generates the image straight from the SWF. If you need any help with using this, contact me or Penguin-Pal.

MS Paint
Microsoft Paint is the default image editing software on Windows computers. It is useful for saving images, such as backgrounds, that do not have transparency to your computer. It currently does not support transparency, so programs such as Paint.NET, GIMP, or Photoshop are better options. However, I always use MS Paint when uploading images that do not need transparent backgrounds to the wiki, as there is no need to use other programs to do so.

Paint.NET
Paint.NET is an image editing software. I use it for most of my image editing since it supports transparency and layers. It is useful for cropping images and adding transparent backgrounds. However, the cropping is slightly difficult. I would even say it is easier to crop in MS Paint. GIMP's autocrop function is what brought me to using GIMP, but I still mainly use Paint.NET as my image editing software since it is what I am most familiar with.

Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is an image editing software. I find it complicated to use, so I mainly only use it for creating GIFs (I believe GIMP also supports GIF creating, but I first learned how to in Photoshop). It is useful for cropping images and adding transparent backgrounds. However, I stick to simpler programs such as Paint.NET and GIMP for that kind of editing.

SwfModify
SwfModify is an SWF modifying software. Alongside Paint.NET, this is probably the program I use the most. It is useful for modifying, replacing, deleting, and extracting SWFs. For example of its usefulness, say you are saving an SWF of an item to your computer. The item is cut off in the SWF, so you open it with SwfModify, click "Modify (All Frames)", and extract the SWF of the full item. Now, the item SWF is ready to be converted to an image using Kurst SWF Renderer or opened with your browser and screenshotted. It is also very useful for cutouts, which you can extract from their SWF files. In another example, say you want to extract a cutout of a building or certain object in a room. You can open the room SWF with SwfModify, click "Modify (All Frames)", and extract your desired SWF. However, I must note that the program is a bit fragile and sometimes crashes while trying to open certain SWF files. In these cases, I use Flash Decompiler Trillix. You can read this blog for more information on how to use it.

SWF Opener
SWF Opener is a software that is useful for opening SWF files, as suggested by the name. However, since you can just open SWF files with your browser, it isn't that useful. If I could compare SWF Opener to anything, I would compare it to a platypus, because it doesn't do much.

Penguin-Pal
Yes, Penguin-Pal is actually getting a section on here. He has more knowledge than me about Club Penguin and the wiki and has helped me a lot in the past. He currently does most of the coding for the wiki and has created many helpful pages. He is useful for anything Club penguin or wiki -related if you need help with anything.

Well, That's It!
I hope you found this page useful. I will add more if I can think of any. If there's anything you'd like me to add, just leave a message on my talk page. :)