What is the purpose of this?

Anyone here got an idea?

  1. Is there any practical reason I need to see this sheet twice while switching from Edit Mode to Preview Mode?
  2. Does adding two more visual distractions somehow improve the workflow?
  3. And why is it always the plugins fault for the delay?
  4. Why doesn’t it read “While we’re waiting for RapidWeaver to find and process the necessary files we thought we’d annoy you with some pointless blame-shifting dialogue sheets…”

In full RapidWeaver ‘flow’ there are times when I’ll switch between Edit and Preview Modes 10 times a minute to get an element pixel-perfect. That can easily become one or several hundred times an hour.

Am I the only one to find these sheets chipping away at my enjoyment minute by minute? My heart drops now every time I start up a project and then remember I’m going to have to live with these freaking sheets another freaking day.

Marten

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Brilliant and best chuckle of the day so far.

No you are not the only one.

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You are definitely not the only one wondering and annoyed. I am waiting for the time when – opening my projects – I’ll be entertained by a “Curious George” animation (full version).

I don’t see this. Is it a ‘feature’ of RW7?

Yes. Its sole purpose is to make you hate RapidWeaver a little bit more every time you switch from Edit to Preview mode. And I must say it’s succeeding brilliantly! Here’s the one I’m seeing today:

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Fantastically annoying
Fantastically pointless
And why does it say exporting? way to go to confuse people RealMac. Click the Preview button and it says ‘Exporting’ even though there is a separate command called Export.

It has all the feel of a 10 year old going "See sir it wasn’t me it was that boy over there all the time "

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I have avoided the latest update because of this. Hopefully they can revert back to how it was.

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For me this issue is very bad… flicking between edit and preview is taking a long time… longer than I can ever remember. Making even simple edits to (any) stack settings while IN preview mode is no laughing matter… that little blame window pops up 2-3 times after each change.

My normal workflow in RW is almost impossible now. Please fix this…

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Bugger this for a game of soldiers, I’m going back to 7.0.4
I can see absolutely no reason whatsoever for this ‘feature’ to have been introduced, well I can guess but they wouldn’t be polite guesses.

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I assume it is this from the 7.1 release notes:

Added a sheet to show what RapidWeaver is doing during export

although, I realise that doesn’t help or change anything.

I think Marten’s Rants could be an entertaining podcast / blog / Instagram feed, by the way

I actually like this feature (and the humour) – users getting some feedback what’s happening during an export or publish.

I don’t think it takes much xtra time showing the dialogue box. The export can be made either without any notice to the user what’s going on in the engine rooom… the feature would – of course – be much better if you – as a user – could use it to trouble shoot a unsuccessful export.

Best | DeFligra | www.defligra.com
Mac’O’Holic | Stack’O’Holic | Web’O’Holic

@defligra — No one’s disputing the benefit and need for the feedback sheets in Export and Publishing. It’s solely in the switch from Edit to Preview mode that this feedback double-whammy has no productive function other than to impede the workflow. When you’re in a creative flow the last thing you need is needless gratuitous visual distractions.

@PaulRussam — The only reason I can think of is that whoever came up with this idea doesn’t use RapidWeaver on a regular professional basis as the cornerstone of their business. It seems to me the only purpose of these sheets is misdirection, to look busy while nothing is happening on the surface — like a duck gliding across a pond and giving a commentary on what’s happening beneath the surface: “My left foot’s paddling, my right foot’s paddling, my left foot’s paddling, my right foot’s paddling…”

Does anyone need to know any of that information in the switch from Preview to Edit? No. It’s totally superfluous and unnecessary. Worse, it actually makes the whole process seem slow and laborious while simultaneously annoying the application’s core professional user base.

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IMHO the correct place for information like that is a well structured and managed log file for the app where the information can be mined if and when it is needed. Maybe, just maybe, an option in the app to show this information the way it is doing just now for helping to troubleshoot problems - but by default it should be off.

There IS going to be a small overhead incurred by pushing that data up the stack to expose it in the UI. Sure its probably very small… but I would much rather the app got on with previewing the page rather than yanking events off a stream to tell me (a) Information I have not asked to see and (b) Information that for the majority of users is not going to mean very much anyway.

I want RW to push every bit of its resources into getting that preview rendered as fast as possible. Injecting any extra actions into the space that sits between edit and preview feels, to me, like (a) a risk to performance and (b) a ghastly visual distraction which really bothers me.

Whats next? Streamed ads from the RMS Official Add Ons page while preview is being generated?

Turn it off and get back to performance and reliability driven updates. Please.

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“blameshifter.png” excellent. Good name for a band

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The Blameshifters :metal: :guitar: :shamrock:

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Hey Guys,

I understand the frustration, the sheet was introduced as part of the new multithreaded export engine.

When you preview a page, behind the scenes RapidWeaver is actually exporting it, hence why the sheet says “exporting”. - We’re working on changing this so there’s not a sheet on preview.

Please remember we’re working full time on RapidWeaver to make it better, not worse.

Expect an update in the next few weeks that improves this.

Thanks,
Dan

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My mama always told me I was hard to distract – that they could talk about christmas presents without me hearing a word even though sitting on the floor a few meters away :slight_smile:

Still am… even when tv, loudspeaker, computer, son, family are making noises. Or maybe it’ just because I’m deaf on one ear :grin:

Best | DeFligra | www.defligra.com
Mac’O’Holic | Stack’O’Holic | Web’O’Holic

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Result.

Thanks,

Marten

Yes, this is very annoying and very slow. I don’t need the activity window to pop up. I remember earlier versions of RW (v3 or 4) when switching between edit and preview was more or less instantaneous.

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Glad to hear this is being worked on. I updated today and this ‘feature’ is horrible! Bravo for raising this and in such a wonderfully humorous manner. Certainly raised a smile at this end of the UK.