Handling problems with Manager and Edit

[Pixel_Pusher]

Hello,

I am testing the new version X4 for my workflow. I am working with PSP since version 7 and have all versions since then.

Now my problem:
I want to work with more then one picture at the same time and I want to be able to open more pictures during my work. With version X3 I could switch between Manager and Edit to open more pictures. Now the program closes all opened pictures if I switch from "Edit" to "Manage". Is that as it should work now?????

How can I open the browser inside the Edit area? I could not find a function or Icon to do that. I just found the possibility to use the function 'Dual Monitor'.

If I select the function 'Dual-Monitor' the program changes my selected setting (Thumbnail Mode) to Preview Mode and I cannot change it anymore. Is that as it should be or is it a bug? I want to work with Thumbnail mode and not with Preview Mode.

I have Dual-Monitor switched o and restart the program. Now the two tasks are not opened on my two screens. I currently see the Edit screen and cannot switch to the Manager. Even with the task manager I cannot switch to the Manager of PSP. When I closed the program after switching on Dual-Monitor I had both tasks on different screens and so I would have expaceted to get it with the next start of the program.

If I open more then one picture I get a task in the taskbar for each opened picture. That seem to be very strange for me. I do not have more then one task of the program. I have several opened pictures in own windows (not tabbed) in one program.

Greetings,
Pixel_Pusher

[LeviFiction]

I can't answer everything, as I don't have dual monitors, but I can probably answer three of your questions.

1) Yes, for some reason they feel that images should be closed in Edit mode when you switch to managed mode. Never really got a reply as to why they did this but it is the way they have done it. However, it's not altogether unreasonable either.

The organizer palette (the only palette that can be docked at the bottom of the program) is available in all three modes. So the organizer itself is now different from the managed mode. Manage is simply a mode where you manage the photos, creating collections, tagging photos and rating them and so on. The actual organizer remains available to all modes so you can just activate that in Edit mode to bring in multiple photos just like you could in X2.

So they see moving to Managed mode as moving to a completely different area in X4 rather than opening up a giant organizer like they do in X3. Yes they have changed a lot around.

2) You can do this by activating the organizer palette just like you used to in X2.

3) It's not opening a separate task for each photo persay. If you've ever used the new Internet Explorer you know that they make each new tab available as it if were its own window. This is in fact a feature of the Windows 7 taskbar that PSPX4 is now taking advantage of. I keep getting the complaints that X2 and X3 don't do that but obviously that's because they don't take advantage of this feature of the taskbar.

Sadly there is no way to turn it off that I know of. However, because PSP does not allow multiple instances of itself you can get around this fact if you don't like it. I know some don't like the idea of having to select a specific image to bring PSP back up after they have minimized the window. So if you have multiple images open in PSP and just want to click on the PSP icon instead of specifically specifying an image (a very useful feature in my mind by the way) just hold the "Shift" key while clicking on PSP. Normally if PSP is already open it would attempt to open a new instance, but again since PSPX4 does not allow multiple instances it'll just bring PSP back up on the image you had selected previously.

As a side note don't open PSP like this normally because it will try to reset everything. This only works when PSP is already open.

One really nice thing about the multiple picture view is that if you hover over the preview you actually get a fullscreen view of the images so it's kind of cool to have.

[Pixel_Pusher]

Hi LeviFiction,

thank you very much for this long answer.
I do not like the multiple picture view in the task bar but I can (must) live with that.

The biggest problem is closing the picture when switching to Manager Mode. I currently have two monitors and so I can open Manager and Editor at the same time (although I did not want to do that). Everyone who has just one monitor cannot use the Manager as he did befor.

I do not understand a lot of things Corel does with each new version of PSP.

[LeviFiction]

Well in this case everyone wanted the Organizer that we had with X2 so Corel reinstated the old organizer palette. So working with multiple images using that is as simple as it was before. If you want to manage the photos and edit them then for the most part the organizer palette is more than enough. You can still work with collections, still browse through the computer, still rate images and still drag them into the edit portion.

In fact with the Organizer the Manage mode becomes more just a series of add-ons that are somewhat helpful but nothing I would personally use while editing photos.

You can still add photos to photo trays and do everything you could with X2 as far as I'm aware so unless you need what few features Manage Mode itself offers I don't see as having Manage close files actually effects single screen users too terribly. Granted it's stupid and I have made mention of it and if you truly don't like it you should contact Corel and make them aware of this fact, but it's not really the hindrance that I'm reading from your comment there.

[chickiepet]

I agree with Pixel Pusher, I'm having the same issue. If I have a multilayer image open in the Edit workspace and need to navigate away to find something else to add to my layered image, unless I use the organiser set in the bottom of the screen, I am forced to close out my work...then come back when I've found what I'm looking for. I much prefer to have the option to have the organiser in it's own window like it is currently in X3 so that I can see a page at a time view of my thumbnails, rather than a vast rail of them running across the bottom of the screen. So far, my workflow in X4 is tedious and belaboured due to some of these issues. If I could easily move between the edit workspace to the manage/organiser workspace, without being required to close off the image I'm working on, I'd be a happy camper!