Screenshot entire window in AppDesigner

Hello everybody,

I'm currently building an app using AppDesigner. I want to implement a button, which captures a screenshot from the entire app after it's been pressed. So that I can compare different sets of data afterwards with just a quick look on their screenshots.

Unfortunately I cannot come up with an idea on how to make Matlab screenshot my entire app window. In a regular Matlab script I use the ScreenCapture function from FileExchange, but this seems not to work within AppDesigner.

imageData = screencapture(gcf,[],'myFigure.jpg'); 

Any suggestions on how to do this?

Since I have multiple tabs it would be ideal to come up with an idea on how to "screenshot" every tab with just one press of a button.

Cheers, Christian

[Kristin Schall - van Bellen]

Does anybody know how it's working by now?

Answer 1

[Adam Danz]

Starting in Matlab r2020b, you can take snapshots of an app / uifigure using the functions below.

See demos:

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/discussions/highlights/133348-new-in-r2020b-record-snapshots-of-your-app

• exportapp
• getframe

[Shahar Wollmark]

What if I am using Matlab 2018 and I have the same problem?

[Image Analyst]

@Shahar Wollmark maybe try saveas() or print().

[Adam Danz]

Unforunately other methods such as print or saveas are not supported for UIFigures in R2018b so I would recommend updating to a release >=20b to save app figures or use a 3rd party screen shot software.

[IoP]

Can you copy to clipboard also somehow?

[Adam Danz]

Generally, copygraphics can be used to copy graphics content from a figure to the clipboard. However, ui controls are not considered to be graphics objects so only graphics objects such as axes will be copied to the clipboard. If your app has no graphics objects, you'll get an error. If your app has a mix of graphics objects and non-graphics objects, you'll get a warning.

The print('-clipboard',clipboardformat) options have similar limitations.

[Dorian]

Hello,

I am using the exportapp function with Matlab R2023a and screenshoting my app does not work while having a very simple class :

function JourButtonPushed(app, event)

exportapp(app,'file.png');

end

It says "Specified handle is not valid for export." and there are no mentions of being able to capture the app itself in the help pages for exportapp or getframe. I have also directly tried the example shown in the link you sent, and app.MyApp (after changing MyApp to my actual app name) still claims that "MyApp" is an undefined class, property or field. Am I doing something wrong or were there changes in the most recent versions that hindered the compatibility ? While unrelated I have also experienced such issues with some app components not posessing an Alpha variable for transparency despite older posts being able to handle the transparency of the same components this way, so this is why I think the newer versions may have changed this aswell ?

[Adam Danz]

@Dorian, the first argument needs to be a figure handle.

function JourButtonPushed(app, event)
    exportapp(app.UIFigure,'file.png'); 
end