PETSCII Support for C64, C128, C128 VDC 80 columns, Vic20, Pet 40/80 columns and C16/Plus4
Colors and Characters:
Platforms that have a different display ratio (80 column modes and Vic20) are now supported natively in the Editor
All Platforms now support native colors (TED/VicIIx)
Color Panel now supports sorting colors by Luminance values.
Color Panel now shows color info on rollover, toggling on color numbers over chips
Color Panel now can condense down to single line mode for more panel space
Character Panel can be forced to a default color
Character Panel can now be sorted by pixel density, it also shows the pixel density in the footer of the panel
Ultimate 64 Cartridge Support:
Multiple Ultimate Carts IP’s can be configured in preferences.
Commodore 64 and 128 Modes supported (this includes VDC)
Import and Export Directly to Ultimate (as PRG, through Screen/Color Mem)
Send SID’s to Ultimate
Reset/Reboot Ultimate
Export D64 and auto LOAD”$”,8:LIST for preview on real machine
“File -> Ultimate” for all the menu options
New Tools added:
DirArt Separators: preconfigured and user updatable line separators
Boxes: Create presets that allow indipendant assigned corners and connecting lines with custom patterns
Lines: Draw lines and supports 4×4 chunky pixel modes
Circles: Draw Circles and supports 4×4 chunky pixel modes
Find and Replace: Rectangular selections can replaced by other rectangular selections
Texture Generator: Spend hours making crazy patterns… really.
Guide Layer and Conversion: You can overlay an image to use a visual guide. You can also convert that guide to PETSCII to get a head start on your image. Conversion supports all platforms (TED/Plus4 100+ colors?), has three conversion engines: Petsciiator, IMG2PETSCII and Pet9scii (I made that one :))
General Editor and Engine Updates/Changes:
Prefs now support tweaking the various defaults and settings. Now separated into multiple tabs.
TED and VDC mode support BLINK, VDC supports Underline
VDC mode has both upper case and lower case ROM’s at the same time, character editor, exports and various tools support this.
Open Recent Files works at an application and OS level (Funny, this is my favourite)
A bug in the resizer tool codes was fixed, the actual dimensions showup properly
File -> New Screen… shows all the various new screen types
Tools -> Presets. All tools with save-able presets can now be exported to petmate frames edited and re-imported.
Tools-> Color Bars. If you are having issues or bugs with export/import issues load a default color bard image and use that for bug references.
LIGHT/DARK Mode actually works now. I wasn’t a fan of the light mode, but its growing on me. If you set it to AUTO it will follow whatever the OS is set to. You can override of course.
Select a frame thumbnail, CTRL Left/Right will change its order, frames can also be dragged around to change their order.
If you have an ULTIMATE configured in prefs and its online and the petmate computer can connect to it you will see an “ULT 64” or “ULT 128” icon above the gear ICON in the tools area.
You can toggle on/off the visibility of the transparency blocks in the menu Image -> Show Transparency
Exporters:
Advanced SEQ Import and Export features, support for enhanced PETSCII for TED and VDC modes
All platforms support single and animation frame binaries (PRG)
C64/128 now supports Single Frame, Animation, Widescreen Scroller, Vertical Scroller and SID tunes
Vic20 PRG exporter can be configured for (3, 5, 8, 16, 24 KB) memory expansion.
Right click on a frame preview for copy commands, exporting to png/clipboard
CBASE BBS prompt export and import (various versions), Characters panel has extended characters for special command codes in prompts
Petmate 9 — Keyboard Shortcuts
On macOS, Cmd is used where Windows/Linux uses Ctrl, except where noted.
File
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
New 40×25 Screen
Cmd+Shift+T
Ctrl+Shift+T
Open File
Cmd+O
Ctrl+O
Save
Cmd+S
Ctrl+S
Save As
Cmd+Shift+S
Ctrl+Shift+S
Export Petmate Player (.prg)
Cmd+Shift+X
Ctrl+Shift+X
Preferences
Cmd+,
Ctrl+P
Ultimate (File → Ultimate)
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Send to Ultimate
Cmd+Shift+1
Ctrl+Shift+1
Push to Ultimate (no reset)
Cmd+Shift+3
Ctrl+Shift+3
Import Screen from Ultimate
Cmd+Shift+2
Ctrl+Shift+2
Import Charset from Ultimate
—
—
Play SID on Ultimate
—
—
Export D64 to Ultimate
Cmd+Shift+4
Ctrl+Shift+4
Reset Ultimate
—
—
Edit
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Undo
Cmd+Z
Ctrl+Z
Redo
Cmd+Shift+Z
Ctrl+Y
Copy Frame
Cmd+C
Ctrl+C
Copy Frame as PNG
Cmd+Shift+C
Ctrl+Shift+C
Paste Frame
Cmd+Shift+V
Ctrl+V
Paste Text (into text tool)
Cmd+Alt+V
Ctrl+Shift+V
Image
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Shift Canvas Left
Alt+Left
Alt+Left
Shift Canvas Right
Alt+Right
Alt+Right
Shift Canvas Up
Alt+Up
Alt+Up
Shift Canvas Down
Alt+Down
Alt+Down
Toggle Border On/Off
Cmd+B
Ctrl+B
Toggle Grid On/Off
Cmd+G
Ctrl+G
Show Transparency
Cmd+T
Ctrl+T
Crop / Resize
Cmd+\
Ctrl+\
Convert to Mono
Cmd+Shift+M
—
Strip Upper 8 Colors
—
—
Clear Image
Shift+Home
Shift+Home
Selection
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Select All
Cmd+A
Ctrl+A
Paste to New Image
Cmd+N
Ctrl+N
Clear Selection
Cmd+Home
Ctrl+Home
Rotate Left
Cmd+[
Ctrl+[
Rotate Right
Cmd+]
Ctrl+]
Flip Horizontally
H
H
Flip Vertically
V
V
Invert Characters
Cmd+I
Ctrl+I
Frames/Thumbnails
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Align All Frames ×2 Zoom
Cmd+Alt+9
Ctrl+Alt+9
Move Frame Left in Stack
Cmd+Left
Ctrl+Left
Move Frame Right in Stack
Cmd+Right
Ctrl+Right
Duplicate Frame
Insert
Insert
Remove Frame
Delete
Delete
View
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Zoom In
Cmd+=
Ctrl+=
Zoom Out
Cmd+-
Ctrl+-
Zoom ×2 (Default)
Cmd+9
Ctrl+9
Zoom ×1
Cmd+0
Ctrl+0
Toggle Theme (cycle)
Cmd+Shift+D
Ctrl+Shift+D
Find and Replace
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Find and Replace
Cmd+F
Ctrl+F
Tool Selection (no modifiers, canvas focused)
These are single-key shortcuts active when no modal is open and the text tool cursor is not active.
Key
Tool
x
Draw (char + color)
c
Colorize (color only)
0
CharDraw (char only)
9
Reverse Pen (toggle reverse video)
b
Brush / Select
t
Text / Keyboard Entry
z
Pan / Zoom
q
Previous color (step down palette)
e
Next color (step up palette)
g
Toggle Guide Layer visibility
Character / Brush Manipulation (no modifiers, canvas focused)
These single-key shortcuts navigate the charset and manipulate the selected character or captured brush. Active when no text cursor is placed and no modal is open.
Key
Action
a
Move left in charset grid
d
Move right in charset grid
w
Move up in charset grid
s
Move down in charset grid
f
Invert character (toggle reverse)
r
Rotate character or brush left
h
Flip character or brush horizontally
v
Flip character or brush vertically
Color Palette Panel
Action
macOS
Windows / Linux
Color Replace: Select a Source color, then
Cmd + Click -> Color Chip
Ctrl + Click -> ColorChip
Color Selection by Number
These shortcuts map number keys to a platforms palette indices.
Colors 0–7 (Alt or Tab + number)
Key
C64 Color
Alt+1
0 — Black
Alt+2
1 — White
Alt+3
2 — Red
Alt+4
3 — Cyan
Alt+5
4 — Purple
Alt+6
5 — Green
Alt+7
6 — Blue
Alt+8
7 — Yellow
Colors 8–15 (Ctrl + number)
Key
C64 Color
Ctrl+1
8 — Orange
Ctrl+2
9 — Brown
Ctrl+3
10 — Light Red
Ctrl+4
11 — Dark Gray
Ctrl+5
12 — Medium Gray
Ctrl+6
13 — Light Green
Ctrl+7
14 — Light Blue
Ctrl+8
15 — Light Gray
Canvas Mouse Modifier Keys
These modify drawing behavior while using the mouse on the canvas.
Petmate is a cross-platform PETSCII drawing program that was developed by Janne Hellsten (nurpax). The last release by Janne was 0.8.4.
Starting in 2020, I started making bugfixes to my own version, then started adding new features. So I asked Janne if I could continue work on his project and he agreed. So, I am starting at v9 and the project is called Petmate 9.
Version 9x can be installed side by side with Janne’s version, so you can use both.
After installing you are getting an error like: “[33954:0224/200626.651433:FATAL:gpu_data_manager_impl_private.cc(415)] GPU process isn’t usable.” try adding –no-sandbox to the program shortcut or executing command. Ex: “petmate9 –no-sandbox”.
If you want to report bugs and other issues, use the Github repo issues: here
