Workspace startup bug

[danwdooley]

I have used X3 and recently decided to have a look at X4 before actually buying the upgrade. I downloaded a trial copy of the full version and installed it. Upon install the Preferences setting is to default open Manage. The other choices are Edit and Last used. The program works ok when Manage is chosen as the default start workspace. If Edit is chose, the program will work ok but if I try to switch to Manage, the program locks and can only be terminated through Task Manager.

I bought the upgrade and installed it and I find that it does the same thing. I had removed the trial copy before installing my purchased upgrade copy. I have tried it on two different computers. One running XP Pro and the other running Windows 7 64 bit. Same thing on both. The program functions properly if the default is set to start Manage mode but will lock up and be non responsive if the default is set to Edit or Last used and then trying to move from Edit mode to Manage mode while the program is running.

Is this a known bug? Anyone else experiencing it? Any work arounds? I can just set it to start in Manage mode but my work practice is to work directly in the "normal" PSP screen just as I did in X3 and also in Photoshop.

Dan

[Ken Berry]

Many of us here have it set to open in Edit by default, and we have no problems then moving to the other workspaces. So I don't think your problems is a bug.

Even though I know your installation is new, you might want to reset it to its factory default. That's under Preferences somewhere, though I cannot confirm its exact location as I am currently working on a tablet computer, and needless to say, that doesn't have PSP on it!

[danwdooley]

Ken,

Thank you. It started out at the factory default. The default is for it to load up to Manage. That works fine. But, in the Preferences, you have the option of choosing what the start up default will be and one of those options is to start in Edit. If you set it to that mode, it will lock up immediately upon clicking on the Manage mode tab. I am hoping that there is something which someone has experienced which may have caused this to happen but they were able to resolve it. You're right, perhaps it's not a program bug per se.

Dan,

[LeviFiction]

It always starts at factory default but if something doesn't load correctly in the workspace definition the workspace always goes to heck. I mean it's caused brushes to not work properly. The handling of workspace errors is so substandard in PSP it's not even funny. The tendency when we encounter odd problems like these is to first suggest doing a factory reset of the workspace just in case something didn't get written properly or something became corrupted at some point.

As of yet, and there have been quite a few complaints that I just haven't read, I have not heard of this particular problem. Do a search and see if you can spot anything. Otherwise the only thing I can recommend is tech support.

You might get recommendations to turn off mediacatalog.exe or turn off image cataloging to see if that helps but if it works okay in Manage mode I can't see how that would be much of a problem.

[danwdooley]

I will try some of those settings but I won't hassle with it too long. I'll toss the minimal investment and go back to Photoshop. I am not an entry level photographer and I don't need a program which is geared more toward the casual point and shoot picture taker who wants a nice file management program to guide him through the simple steps of push button photo fixing. The program will work if I put it in Manage mode to start but that adds extra steps of clicking on the Edit mode tab, closing the image which opened up by default in Manage mode because it was the first one on the list, but is not the one I want to work on, and then going to the one I do want to open. X3 worked quite well at letting me start where I wanted to.

When I installed X4 I stripped out Learning Centre and Organizer from the Edit mode screen. I organized the toolbars and palettes the way I had used them in X3. It's encouraging that I may be the only one experiencing this problem which may mean that there is something I can do here to resolve it. There is hardly anything in common between the two different computers I tried it on other than that X3 is present on both. Wondering if the presence of X3 still being installed may be a factor. I am intending to uninstall X3 on one of them to see if that makes a difference. In the meantime, perhaps someone will read this who has experienced the same problem. And remember, this same issue occurred with the dowloaded trial version of X4 and with the install of the boxed DVD set just purchased.

As to contacting Corel Tech Support but I hear that's of limited value. So we'll see.

Dan,

[Kathy_9]

Dan,

I have not experienced your issue and I have X4 set to open to Edit mode with a customized workspace, but wanted to respond to your concern that having X3 still installed might be part of the problem. Everyone's system/configuration is different so I can't say with certainty but I can tell you that I have X2, X3 & X4 all installed on my system with no issues. Also, I know a number of others here also have multiple versions of PSP installed side by side with no issues.

Kathy

[danwdooley]

Thanks Kathy,

Now I'm presumimg that all who have indicated they're not having the same problem I'm having are at some point trying to go from Edit to Manage mode and the program is responding properly.

I wasn't convinced that having X3 installed as well would contribute to the problem but I wanted to rule out all potential factors I could think of. I uninstalled X3 just to be sure. Within the last few minutes I have also unistalled the Ultimate Bonus pack which I installed with X4 as well as Painter Essentials 4 (which came with X3 and so far I've never used) and my plan is to try installing X4 again but without the bonus pack and try looking at other potential conflicts.

The strange thing is that the same problem occurs on both computers which including having totally different operating systems don't have a lot of other things in common as well. Ok, MS Office, the same browser and a few things of that sort but nothing out of the ordinary as to configuring. But, there must be some common item involved.

Dan,

[Kathy_9]

Dan,

I never use Manage or Adjust, but I can confirm that I can navigate across the three tabs with no issues. I also have MS Office installed along with PSE9, Animation Shop and a host of other free image editing programs.

Sorry I can't be of more help.

Kathy

[danwdooley]

Well I think I have found it. We'll let everyone else consider if its a program bug or not. I uninstalled everything and did a fresh install of X4. At that time I had done nothing to change any of the preferences. So it worked. I could select the default opening mode to Edit and repeated opening and closing of the program proved that I could navigate between the tabs with no issues. I then started shutting down those things which I don't use or want and kept trying and it still worked ok.

Only when I went into the Prefereces and to Units and changed the Ruler display units from Pixels to Inches did it fail. I changed that setting back and forth several times and anytime it's set to Pixels it works. If set to inches, it fails. Since I have a reason for prefering inches to pixels and I suspect that many others may not, the failure issue may not be as widely noticed. I'm curious as to how many others have the ruler units set to inches. And, if the problem shows up for them.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone.

Dan,

[Kathy_9]

I would say you've found a bug. I set up a workspace called "inch test' where I changed the units setting from pixels to inch. I was able to move back and forth between the tabs with no issue at first, but once I closed the program and reopened it, when I switched from Edit to Manage the program froze up and I had to end it via the Task Manager. That was some good detective work on your part.

[LeviFiction]

Interesting, funny thing is during the beta test I actually did this and experienced no bugs which means it was a bug that was introduced later. It's amazing how many new bugs are introduced fixing old ones. Well it's worth reporting. Hopefully a fix won't take too long.

[Kathy_9]

Forgot to mention that I did turn in a bug report.

[Ken Berry]

I got the same result when I set the unit to centimetres (and also for inches).