GRABBER

File Format
Name	GRABBER
Ontology	Electronic File Formats Graphics GRABBER
Extension(s)	.com, .exe
Released	1987

GRABBER is a screen capture utility for DOS, developed by Gerald (Jerry) A. Monroe.

Images are saved as self-displaying executable files. Older versions use COM format, while newer versions use EXE. The switch to EXE happened sometime between v3.35 and v3.60. The default filenames for v3.x are "SCREEN00.EXE" (or "SCREEN00.COM"), "SCREEN01.EXE", etc. For v2.x, it's "SCREEN_A.COM", "SCREEN_B.COM", etc.

Identification

Information based on minimal research. May not be correct for all files.

v2.10-2.20 (COM format): No readable signature. The first 16 bytes are

fb be 81 00 8a 4c ff 30 ed 09 c9 74 20 56 fc ac

v3.20 to 3.30 (COM format): There's a string at offset 5 that's either

All Code Copyright (C) 1988 Gerald A. Monroe

or

All Code Copyright (C) 1988, 1989 Gerald A. Monroe

v3.34-3.35 (COM format): There's a string at offset 5 that starts with

This file was created by GRABBER.COM Version

EXE files have ASCII "Created by GRABBER" at offset 49.

Software

• GRABBER
  • v2.10
  • v2.20: All Fritz → FILES/GRAPTIES/GRABBER2.LZH
  • v3.2 -or- v3.2 (they are the same, but it's on a alternative link)
  • v3.3
  • v3.34
  • v3.35: RBBS in a Box - Ver 3.1, Number 1 → HDNO/GRABV335.ZIP
  • v3.60
  • v3.77
  • v3.81
  • v3.87
  • v3.94
  • v3.96 -or- v3.96 (they are the same, but it's on a alternative link, and it's smaller because of Deflate compression)
  • v3.97
  • v3.98

The GRABBER distribution (at least v3.87+) includes utilities for converting to common formats such as GIF and PCX.

Sample files

• Versions 3.87 and earlier include some DEMO*.EXE or DEMO*.COM sample files.
• dexvert samples — image/grabber