1. The first time you run Picasa, you will be asked whether you want to:
1. Completely scan My Computer for photos (this will find and catalog every picture on your hard drive)
2. Only scan My Documents, My photos and the Desktop
2. Choose the one that's right for you.
3. Then sit back and watch as Picasa locates the photos and adds them to its database. If you have a lot of photos, it could take a while (17+ minutes for 5,960 photos in my case)
4. NOTE: As Picasa creates the database of your photos, it doesn't move photos around, it simply notes where they are on your hard drive and remembers the location
5. The list that results is organized by folder chronologically based on the year the folder was created - from most recent to earliest
6. When the process is finished, the list of folders is displayed in the left-hand column and thumbnail images of the photos in each folder are displayed in the pane on the right

1. Controlling the Display
1. The column on the left of the screen is called the "Library"
2. There are four buttons at the top of the Library column. From left to right they are:
1. Create an album (more about this later)
2. Flat folder view (each of the Picasa folders are displayed individually)
3. Tree structure view (the Picasa folders are displayed as a tree - like Windows Explorer)
4. View Options
1. Sort Picasa folders
2. Shortcuts to actual folders

Adding Photos

1. Anytime you add a photo to your hard drive, Picasa automatically adds it to the Picasa database
2. To add photos from your camera
1. Connect the camera to the computer with a USB cable
2. Turn the camera on
3. Click on the Import button at the top left of the Picasa screen
4. Click on the Select Device butoon at the top left of the Picasa screen
5. Choose the camera
6. View the photos sequentially using the right and left arrow buttons below the displayed picture
7. If any of your pictures need to be rotated, use the buttons marked with circular arrows below the displayed picture
8. If you don't want to add all the photos, Ctrl Left-click on the ones you do want (a blue border will appear on each selected photo)
9. Then click on either the Import All or the Import Selected button at the bottom left of the screen
10. Provide the information requested in the Import Items dialog box. NOTE: This is an important step since the information you enter is used by Picasa when you search for specific pictures at a later date.
1. Folder name
2. Location on hard drive at which to save them
3. Place Taken, Date and Description (optional)
4. Using the radio buttons, choose whether to save all the photos on the original device (in this case, the camera), to delete those that have been transferred to the hard drive, or if you've imported all the photos, whether to delete all the photos from the original device
3. To add photos from your scanner (NOTE: You can only add one photo at a time from the scanner)
1. Turn the scanner on
If you want to scan the photo to an existing folder, select that folder in the Library
2. Click on the Import button at the top left of the Picasa screen
3. Click on the Select Device button at the top left of the Picasa screen
4. Choose the scanner
5. Scan the photo or document
6. To scan the photo into a new folder, Left-click the Import All button at the bottom left of the screen
7. To scan the photo into an existing folder, Shift-Left-click the Import All button at the bottom left of the screen
8. Proceed as in C.2.j above
4. To add photos from the Web or from e-mail
1. Locate the photo you want to add
2. Right-click on it
3. Choose Save Image as ...
4. In the Save As dialog box specify the location on your hard drive where you want the file saved and the file name to use
5. Click the save button

1. Picasa search can find any text associated with a photo. This includes the following:
1. Filenames
2. Captions
3. Keywords
4. Folder, Album, and Collection names
5. Picture color
6. Camera maker / settings
7. Date ("November" or "2003")
2. The most useful of these are (in my opnion) captions and keywords
1. To add a caption to a photo:
1. Double-click the thumbnail to display it full-size in the photo pane
2. Left-click on "Make a Caption" just below the photo
3. Type in a caption of your choosing
4. Return the photo to thumbnail size by closing it (Left-click on the red X in the upper right corner)
2. To add keywords to a photo
1. Select the photo
2. From the View menu choose Keywords (or simply press Ctrl-K)
3. Enter the chosen keyword(s). Previously entered keywords, if any, are displayed.
4. Click the OK button.
3. For example, if you enter as keywords the date, the nature of the event (vacation, christening, etc.), the location (city, state) and the name(s) of the individual(s) in the photo, you will always be able to find that photo (and others with identical keywords).
3. To search for any of these items, type them into the search box on the top-right hand side of the screen.
4. To view all your photos again, clear your search by hitting the ESC key or clicking the button next to the text entry.

1. There is a slider in the lower right corner of the main Picasa screen that can be used to decrease and increase the size of the thumbnail images of the photos in Picasa's right-hand pane
2. Viewing Individual Photos
1. To zoom your photo to 100 percent:
1. In your library, double-click the photo you want to zoom in on.
2. Place your cursor over the enlarged photo and click and hold the left mouse button. Picasa zooms the photo to 100%. When you release the mouse button the photo remains at 100%.
3. Click the left mouse button to return the photo to its original size.
2. To zoom in further than 100%: use the slider bar in the bottom-right corner of the Picasa screen. You can zoom in to any photo to a maximum of 400 percent.
3. To exit the zoom and edit modes, just place the cursor over the photo and double-click.
4. Tips:
1. To view a different section of a zoomed-in photo, just click and drag to move the photo in the viewing window (hint: your arrow cursor becomes a hand). NOTE: This feature doesn't work if "Single-click to exit Edit View" is selected in the "Options" dialog box. (To see if this option is selected, choose "Tools" > "Options." Then in the "General" tab, deselect "Single-click to exit Edit View" and click OK.)
2. To see the exact percentage that a photo's been "Zoomed to," look for the small window on the lower-right side of the zoomed image. Additionally, there are two buttons next to the slider bar that fill the image inside the viewing area or display the image at actual size.
3. Viewing a Slideshow
1. To view a slideshow:
1. Choose a folder or an album in the Library
2. Click on the slideshow button
2. When the slideshow is running you can Left-click anywhere on the screen, the slideshow will pause and a set of controls will appear at the bottom. From left to right they do the following:
1. Exit slideshow
2. Go to the previous slide
3. Restart the slideshow
4. Go to the next slide
5. ???
6. Rotate counter-clockwise
7. Rotate clockwise
8. Display/Hide photo captions
9. Set display time
3. You can also choose Options on the Tools menu and then click on the "Slideshow" tab to
1. Loop the slideshow (make it play continuously)
2. Play music in MP3 format during the slideshow (choose the folder in which the music is stored using the look-up box and the Browse button below)
3. Display your slideshow in full resolution (slows things down considerably on older machines)
4. Viewing photos on a Timeline
1. Picasa's Timeline lets you instantaneously scroll through a chronological catalog of your photos.
2. To see a timeline of your photos, click "Timeline" at the top of your screen.
3. To move the timeline forward or back, you can click and drag an album cover.
4. To see a slideshow of the album, double-click one of the thumbnails. This will start a slideshow of the album.

1. Selecting photos for moving
To select a single photo, Left-click on the photo you want to move. A blue border will appear around it.
1. To move multiple contiguous photos, Left-click on the first photo you want to move and Shift Left-click on the last. A blue border will appear around each of the chosen pictures.
2. To move multiple non-contiguous photos, Ctrl Left-click on each photo you want to move. A blue border will appear around each of the chosen pictures.
3. To cancel a choice, left-click on any white [non-picture] area.
2. Moving the photos from folder to folder. NOTE: These procedures will move the photo(s) on your hard drive as well as in Picasa.
1. To move the photo(s) from a folder to another (existing) folder, drag it in the Library to the folder to which you want to move it and drop it there
2. To move the photo(s) to a new folder, Right-click on any selected photo and choose "Move to New Folder."
3. Adding the photos to Albums. NOTE: These procedures DO NOT change the location of the photos on your hard drive.
1. To add the photo(s) to an existing album, Left-click on the "Add to" button just to the right of the Photo Tray, then choose the name of the album to which you want to add the photo(s)
2. To create a new album for the photo(s), Left-click on the "Add to" button just to the right of the Photo Tray, then give the album a name, a date and (optionally) the place taken and a description

1. To rename an individual photo:
1. Select the photo to be renamed.
2. On the File Menu, Left-click on Rename (or simply press F2)
Type in the new name for the photo. If you wish, you can add Date or Resolution data to the filename using the provided checkboxes.
3. Click the Rename button.
2. To rename a group of photos, do the following:
   1. Select the photos you wish to rename.
   2. On the File Menu, Left-click on Rename (or simply press F2)
   3. Enter the common name you wish to use for this group of photos. If you selected 12 photos from a family picnic and selected to rename them "picnic", the files will now be renamed 'picnic.jpg' through 'picnic-11.jpg'.
   4. Click the Rename button.

1. Removing Photos from the Picasa database view but not from the hard drive
1. To remove a single photo
1. Rlight-click on the photo you want to remove
2. Choose Hide from the menu. The photo is removed from the database view
3. To view the photos you have hidden, on the View menu choose Hidden Pictures. Those that you have hidden will appear as a ghost-like image
4. To un-hide a photo, right-click on the ghost-like image and choose Unhide
2. To remove multiple contiguous photos
1. Left-click on the first photo and Shift Left-click on the last you want to remove
2. Right-click on any of the selected photos
3. Choose Hide from the menu. The photo is removed from the database view
3. To remove multiple non-contiguous photos
1. Ctrl Left-click on each of the photos you want to remove
2. Right-click on any of the selected photos
3. Choose Hide from the menu. The photo is removed from the database view
2. Removing photos from both the Picasa database view and the hard drive (full delete)
1. To delete a single photo, Left-click on the photo and press the Delete key
2. To delete multiple contiguous photos, Left-click on the first photo and Shift Left-click on the last you want to remove, then press the Delete key
3. To delete multiple non-contiguous photos, Ctrl Left-click on each of the photos you want to remove, then press the Delete key
4. Deleted photos are retained in the Recycle Bin for some time after their deletion and can be retrieved from there.

.