Dots is a 'Lite Brite' look-alike drawing program for children (ages 5 and up) which allows single peg placement, line drawing, floodfills, and file saving (as a BMP bitmap or in the native DOT format that allows ongoing changes to be made to the drawing).
This is a terrific drawing program for younger children. Using a peg-like format, children can place colored "pegs" in the board within a 40x40 grid. Lines of pegs can be "drawn" and you can use floodfill.
The basic palette is only 8 colors but you can "pick" the background black as a color too (handy for erasing individual "pegs").
The finished drawing can be saved as a BMP file (usually about 1.6MB) or in the native re-editable DOT format (about 16kB).
Dots doesn't support a printer but if a masterpiece is saved in BMP format, it can be printed using MS Paint or any other drawing/paint program which supports that format.
We were disappointed that it did not prompt to save before exiting – you can be sure there will be lots of little tears when the program is closed prematurely and the current masterpiece lost. (See Update below.)
However, Dots is a fun, educational program which younger children will love.
Dots has been updated to version 1.2.
The author advises that changes in this version include: undo/redo using frames that can also be used to "play" a movie of the steps used in making your drawing; a pause timer has been added for each frame; the new file format allows the image to be saved in 1/3 the size used in the previous version (the old format is still supported); and the program now reminds the user if a change was made before closing.
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Desktop Utils