We have tried to take Webpage/Website screenshot and use it’s Thumbnail in website worth calculator website.
This method works for most of the websites which are hosted on Linux server except for few java script enabled websites where it throws a error.
But for websites hosted on windows server it works 100% perfectly.
How to Take website screen shot in Windows Server
If you want to start your own website thumbnail generation service it is best to take windows hosting because this software / script works 99.99% correctly on windows Operating System as it is an .exe file
Requirements :
Windows Hosting PHP GD Library Permissions to execute ".exe" files (VPS/Dedicated server is best for this) IE must be installed (because screenshot is taken from IE only)
How this script will work in your hosting server
Thumbnail Generator software checks if it can capture particular website thumbnail or not.
If it can take the screenshot, it will be in the cache.
If not it will capture full webpage (home page of the given domain) and shows it in the IE Browser by using IECapte.exe
The images now are saved into the folder which is specified in the script and the thumbnail would be resized by given dimensions and finally displayed in the Browser
How to Install this Script
Download IECapt and upload it to your windows hosting server
Download Website Thumbnail Generator script and unzip to the same folder where you uploaded the IEcapt
Change the webthumb.php as needed . You can change the cache time, thumbnail size, folder path for thumbnails etc..
Usage Example
webthumb.php?url=http://www.google.com webthumb.php?url=http://www.facebook.com&x=150&y=150
Sample Screen shots taken by me in my PC
save all files to your PHP folder In my PC it is C:\xampp\htdocs\webthumb (I am using XAMPP)
Screenshot of files in that folder
Modify webthumb.php to use it in your PC as like below:
script changes
open your browser and copy/type this path
"http://localhost/webthumb/webthumb.php?url=http://www.google.com"
Check the cache folder.Full size thumbnail image will be saved in that folder (in my System i have created cache folder in “C:/webthumb/cache”
thumbnail screen shot
We will see in next post how to take website screen shot in Linux Server
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