Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Ideas for improvements and requests for new features in XnView Classic

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The Sheik
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Joined: Fri Jan 28, 2005 7:33 am

Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by The Sheik »

First off, great program, I've given up ACDsee. I do have a couple of suggestions however:

- Easier to read small icons would be great. You can't really see the "jpg" or whatever text on them when they're small.

- Zooming is done by + and -, which makes perfect sense, however you have to hold shift to hit +, so in ACDsee and other apps they let you use = as well.

- Fit image in the right click menu would be nice

- More than one image read ahead, and backwards read ahead when cycling backwards would be cool

- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode

- A "Safe all" associations where it won't steal any

Sometimes my hard drive goes nuts when paging through large amounts of images, not sure what the thrashing is about.
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helmut
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by helmut »

Sheik,

thank you for your accolade and suggestions. Below please find some notes.
The Sheik wrote:...
- Easier to read small icons would be great. You can't really see the "jpg" or whatever text on them when they're small.
Right. The icon set needs some rework.
The Sheik wrote:- Zooming is done by + and -, which makes perfect sense, however you have to hold shift to hit +, so in ACDsee and other apps they let you use = as well.
I guess you have an arabic keyboard. Looks as if your keyboard layout is different from the English & German. So '=' might make sense.
The Sheik wrote:- Fit image in the right click menu would be nice
Correct. We have many tools in the context menu, but not 'View >uto Image Size'. The context menu really needs some tidy up.
The Sheik wrote:- More than one image read ahead, and backwards read ahead when cycling backwards would be cool
Might be useful, but a question of memory.
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
I don't understand what you mean.
The Sheik wrote:- A "Safe all" associations where it won't steal any
Not clear on this one: Do you mean a "Save all" button in Tools > Options > Associations?
The Sheik wrote:Sometimes my hard drive goes nuts when paging through large amounts of images, not sure what the thrashing is about.
What does "large amounts of images" mean? 1,000? 10,000? How large are the images? Could it be a problem of memory available?
The Sheik
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by The Sheik »

Thanks for your blazing fast response! I'll try and clarify a few things:
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- Zooming is done by + and -, which makes perfect sense, however you have to hold shift to hit +, so in ACDsee and other apps they let you use = as well.
I guess you have an arabic keyboard. Looks as if your keyboard layout is different from the English & German. So '=' might make sense.
I have a standard microsoft english keyboard. What i mean is that without hitting shift, the two keys are "- and =" and if you hit shift "_ and +", so to zoom in you must hit shift and press the += key. If it worked for + or = then there would be no need to hit shift.
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- More than one image read ahead, and backwards read ahead when cycling backwards would be cool
Might be useful, but a question of memory.
It could be an option. Enabling the single read ahead by default might make sense too, since most users probobly turn it on anyway.
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
I don't understand what you mean.
In the Options/Associations menu, if you click the "View as Extension" radio button, then click "Add all", nothing happens.
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- A "Safe all" associations where it won't steal any
Not clear on this one: Do you mean a "Save all" button in Tools > Options > Associations?
I mean an option to set the file associations for all files to XnView, unless another application is already registered with that extension.
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:Sometimes my hard drive goes nuts when paging through large amounts of images, not sure what the thrashing is about.
What does "large amounts of images" mean? 1,000? 10,000? How large are the images? Could it be a problem of memory available?
It's a directory of 1,000 images, it totals about 215 megs and the files are of fairly consistent size, all jpegs.
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xnview
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by xnview »

The Sheik wrote:I have a standard microsoft english keyboard. What i mean is that without hitting shift, the two keys are "- and =" and if you hit shift "_ and +", so to zoom in you must hit shift and press the += key. If it worked for + or = then there would be no need to hit shift.
Ok, i'll add it
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- More than one image read ahead, and backwards read ahead when cycling backwards would be cool
Might be useful, but a question of memory.
It could be an option. Enabling the single read ahead by default might make sense too, since most users probobly turn it on anyway.
Yes, some users ask for this option.
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
I don't understand what you mean.
In the Options/Associations menu, if you click the "View as Extension" radio button, then click "Add all", nothing happens.
Associations are not changed??
helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:Sometimes my hard drive goes nuts when paging through large amounts of images, not sure what the thrashing is about.
What does "large amounts of images" mean? 1,000? 10,000? How large are the images? Could it be a problem of memory available?
It's a directory of 1,000 images, it totals about 215 megs and the files are of fairly consistent size, all jpegs.
And what's happened?
Pierre.
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by Guest »

Thanks for your quick reply, your efficiency is amazing.
xnview wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
I don't understand what you mean.
In the Options/Associations menu, if you click the "View as Extension" radio button, then click "Add all", nothing happens.
Associations are not changed??
No, it doesn't even change the check boxes in the GUI.
xnview wrote:
helmut wrote: What does "large amounts of images" mean? 1,000? 10,000? How large are the images? Could it be a problem of memory available?
It's a directory of 1,000 images, it totals about 215 megs and the files are of fairly consistent size, all jpegs.
And what's happened?
Occassionally, every hundred images or so, I get serious disk activity and a delay of maybe 20-30 seconds to change to the next image.
Dreamer
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by Dreamer »

xnview wrote:
helmut wrote: Might be useful, but a question of memory.
It could be an option. Enabling the single read ahead by default might make sense too, since most users probobly turn it on anyway.
Yes, some users ask for this option.
What about this? - Read ahead [A] (A=custom number of images)

Or this? - Read ahead MB (B=custom number of megabytes)

Of course also for "Cache behind" - Today, 512 MB RAM is a standard, so it would be nice...

The Sheik wrote:Enabling the single read ahead by default might make sense too, since most users probobly turn it on anyway

Yes, some users turn it on, but other users might think it's slow and they uninstall it before they try it... :(
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xnview
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by xnview »

The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
No, it doesn't even change the check boxes in the GUI.
Which OS do you have? And if you use "Add most used"?
The Sheik wrote:Sometimes my hard drive goes nuts when paging through large amounts of images, not sure what the thrashing is about.
It's a directory of 1,000 images, it totals about 215 megs and the files are of fairly consistent size, all jpegs.
Occassionally, every hundred images or so, I get serious disk activity and a delay of maybe 20-30 seconds to change to the next image.
Do you have "read Ahead" & "cache behind"? Pictures are all in jpeg format?
Pierre.
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helmut
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by helmut »

The Sheik wrote:
xnview wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
I don't understand what you mean.
In the Options/Associations menu, if you click the "View as Extension" radio button, then click "Add all", nothing happens.
I can confirm this (XnView 1.74, Win XP): In "Tools > Options > Associations", when selecting "View as Extension", then pressing button "Add all" and confirming the message box, only some few extensions are marked and added. Looks like a bug :bug:
Dreamer
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by Dreamer »

helmut wrote:
The Sheik wrote:In the Options/Associations menu, if you click the "View as Extension" radio button, then click "Add all", nothing happens.
I can confirm this (XnView 1.74, Win XP): In "Tools > Options > Associations", when selecting "View as Extension", then pressing button "Add all" and confirming the message box, only some few extensions are marked and added. Looks like a bug :bug:
Me too (Win XP SP1), I think it has a same function like "Add most used" button.
The Sheik
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by The Sheik »

xnview wrote:
The Sheik wrote:- Add all doesn't work in associations in view as extension mode
No, it doesn't even change the check boxes in the GUI.
Which OS do you have? And if you use "Add most used"?
Windows XP Pro. It looks like it does add 10 or so if I hit add used or add all, just not as many as it adds in the view extension mode.
xnview wrote:
It's a directory of 1,000 images, it totals about 215 megs and the files are of fairly consistent size, all jpegs.
Occassionally, every hundred images or so, I get serious disk activity and a delay of maybe 20-30 seconds to change to the next image.
Do you have "read Ahead" & "cache behind"? Pictures are all in jpeg format?
I have read ahead and cache behind set, and all pictures are indeed in jpeg format.
aardvarko
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Post by aardvarko »

Can also confirm occasional freezing/hanging in folders with large (more than a few thousand) JPEGs. Seems to occur primarily when changing between images in View mode, although I think it's also occurred just while rendering thumbnails.

I've seen this both with locally stored files and with files stored on a Samba server; when XnView stops responding in this fashion, the smbd process on the server starts consuming 100% CPU, and the count of open handles for XnView changes up and down by a few - as though it's repeatedly fetching a directory listing. Next time it does this, I'll grab a snapshot of open handles.
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xnview
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Re: Several suggestions from a former ACDsee user

Post by xnview »

The Sheik wrote:
xnview wrote:
Occassionally, every hundred images or so, I get serious disk activity and a delay of maybe 20-30 seconds to change to the next image.
Do you have "read Ahead" & "cache behind"? Pictures are all in jpeg format?
I have read ahead and cache behind set, and all pictures are indeed in jpeg format.
Could you disable these options, and tell me if you have always the problem? Perhaps you can try to disable the cache too??
Pierre.
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