New file selector for the Cool VL Viewer
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Henri Beauchamp
Joined: 2009-03-17 18:42:51
Posts: 5546
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 Today's experimental release (v1.26.11.18) sees the introduction of a new, XUI-based (i.e. viewer-UI based) file (and directory) selector to avoid the use of the operating systems' one within the viewer. The reasons are that: - Under Windows, the OS-based file selector is vulnerable to "parasitic" third-party software (such as Skydrive, but not only), that modify its behaviour and introduce incompatibilities and bugs, often causing crashes when used from within the viewer.
- Under MacOS-X, the OS file selector is blocking, i.e. it pauses the viewer main loop and can lead to disconnection if left open for more than a minute or so.
- Under Linux, while I implemented (like I did for Windows) a non-blocking file selector option, it leads to a slow-refreshing file selector (because the GTK threading mechanism and the way threading is implemented in the viewer don't play nice together), and may also lead to crashes with some buggy GTK2 versions and/or GTK theme engines in some Linux distributions: I therefore had to make the non-blocking option disabled by default. The GTK file selector also relies on a now deprecated GTK2 version (GTK is now v3, and LL never provided any updated pre-built GTK library); I'm therefore planning to get rid of that silly dependency in a near future (GTK is only used by the viewer for the file selector, the OS message box that only appears if something goes wrong on viewer launch, and the clipboard: alternatives for the latter two usages do exist as well)...
- The file and directory picker (llfilepicker.* and lldirpicker.* files) implementation in LL's viewer is extremely dirty and hacky, and difficult to maintain (it got a lot of OS-dependent code, and I don't have access to all OSes neither the time to experiment on them each time a modification is needed...).
- When you use the viewer under different OSes, you are faced with different file selectors, while the rest of the viewer UI is coherent and identical for all OSes it runs under.
- You cannot affect a given position (and size) to the OS file selector on the screen, meaning it most often doesn't appear in the "right place" (or at the right size) for you.
As you can see, these are extremely good reasons, and I therefore *will* get rid of the OS file selector usage in favour of my custom, XUI-based one, in all the Cool VL Viewer branches. I however wanted to give you folks a little forewarning and some time to find possible show-stopper bugs that I won't have detected and fixed so far (I tested extensively the file selector under Linux, and superficially under Windows, so far without any issue detected). Since I'll have things to attend next week that will preclude a new release on next Saturday, you have got about two weeks to find XUI file selector bugs/glitches in v1.26.11.18 and report them...
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| 2014-04-12 12:25:10 |
 
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g0rd0ngrfr33mailgr
Joined: 2011-09-27 11:18:31
Posts: 172
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I just tried it under Arch Linux. It works beautifully, without all the issues the gtk file selector has and with no need for custom pcre and libpng. Thanks 
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| 2014-04-21 11:24:05 |
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Leah Mayo
Joined: 2012-02-09 23:04:18
Posts: 10
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Windows 7 here. I can't change the drive with the new file picker, and only can pick files from the system drive 
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| 2014-04-21 11:56:32 |
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Henri Beauchamp
Joined: 2009-03-17 18:42:51
Posts: 5546
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Ah, yes... A Windoze peculiarity (Linux and MacOS-X use mounts, and the whole file system is unified under the same tree for them). I'll need to add a drive combo to the selector for Windows, or something in that vein...
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| 2014-04-21 13:21:36 |
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Jessica Hultcrantz
Joined: 2012-08-08 17:51:35
Posts: 84
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Only a quick and dirty test so far, but it seemed to work well. I for one is very happy to get rid of all the GTK issues  [edit]Tested on Debian Wheezy[/edit]
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| 2014-04-21 16:20:01 |
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Henri Beauchamp
Joined: 2009-03-17 18:42:51
Posts: 5546
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I finally simply allowed to move up one more level in the directory tree, and list the active drives in the directory list when at level 0... It got the advantage of keeping a coherent selector UI over all OSes.
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| 2014-04-22 12:19:05 |
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Leah Mayo
Joined: 2012-02-09 23:04:18
Posts: 10
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Works great now, thanks for the quick fix! I love the new file picker, very useful in fullscreen mode. Thumbs up!
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| 2014-04-26 15:24:20 |
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Arwen Serpente
Joined: 2012-06-24 15:07:40
Posts: 22
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Henri, is there any way to make the drive/file selection "sticky"? Prior to this change, when I used local textures, the viewer remembered the last file I pulled from and pointed there automatically. Now, I have to click through pointing to the correct drive, file, and then texture each time for every texture. Lots of clicks, lots of time, loss of efficiency. Or, is there a shortcut that I'm missing? Thanks, Arwen
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| 2014-05-04 15:02:42 |
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Henri Beauchamp
Joined: 2009-03-17 18:42:51
Posts: 5546
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 | | | | Arwen Serpente wrote: Henri, is there any way to make the drive/file selection "sticky"? Prior to this change, when I used local textures, the viewer remembered the last file I pulled from and pointed there automatically. Now, I have to click through pointing to the correct drive, file, and then texture each time for every texture. Lots of clicks, lots of time, loss of efficiency. Or, is there a shortcut that I'm missing? Thanks, Arwen | | | | |
The last used directory *is* remembered already !... It's even better than the old selector, since instead of just two contexts (save and load), the new selector remembers the last used directory based on the file type (image, sound, model, animation, etc).
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| 2014-05-04 17:23:39 |
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Arwen Serpente
Joined: 2012-06-24 15:07:40
Posts: 22
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Then I'm doing something wrong. It points to the most recent file during a session. Once I log out and back in, it reverts so that I need to redirect it to the correct directory/file/texture.
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| 2014-05-04 18:23:21 |
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