Undo acting up again in 10.5?

[VashTheStampede]

This happens to me, I'm still trying to get used to saving frequently though. Also when I delete a cp or spline, it will sometimes crash.

[Hookflash]

Originally posted by VashTheStampede
Also when I delete a cp or spline, it will sometimes crash.

Yep, I've noticed this too. A:M 10.x actually seems to be reverting to 9.x's level of stability. Very discouraging. Sometimes I wonder if this is all part of their marketing strategy to get people to upgrade (if the A:M 11 betas are stable, we'll know something's up)... :hmm:

[Obnomauk]

Originally posted by Hookflash
(if the A:M 11 betas are stable, we'll know something's up)... :hmm:

:rolleyes:

What in the name of bagels are you doing that you have to undo that many times?

I think it's been pretty consistent since v5: limit your undo's to 3 or fewer (i have mine set to 2 in the options.) Of course I'm from the generation that grew up with a version of photoshop that only allowed 1 undo so..... save a revision, if you have to go back very far load in the last revision instead. just my 2¢

10.5 runs 5-8 hours a day crashes maybe once every two or three months...(not counting the OSX alpha of course) on my dual 533 G4. But i've always been a little odd on the stability front I guess.

-David Rogers

[VashTheStampede]

I know this isnt entirely related to the crashing issue, but when v11 comes out will 2003 users be able to upgrade to it for free. Just wondering. thanks

[John Keates]

Well, when I was told that I had been "good value" to Hash because I had sent in so many bug reports, I asked if I was deserving of a free upgrade to v11. "We have to eat too" Came the reply. Bugger them!! I am not doing any more beta testing for a good while (AM is at the back of a drawer). If they can't make v10.5 stable then what is the hope for v11?

[John Keates]

Originally posted by Obnomauk
:rolleyes:
10.5 runs 5-8 hours a day crashes maybe once every two or three months
-David Rogers

Frankly David, I just don't believe you! I mean what are you doing with AM exactly? You can't be pushing it that far because I quite frequently find repeatable crash bugs and I am not exactly a power user. If you look at the bug update list on the Hash web site then you will probably see a few fixes with reports credited to me and all I was trying to do was a simple character.

[koon69]

Ive used AM since v8 and stuff is always getting fixed then broke>fixed>broke>fixed>broke. See a pattern! :> I think v11 will be the same. Why do you think there is a update every week! Know anyone else that does this? Didnt think so! :>

[Hookflash]

Originally posted by koon69
Ive used AM since v8 and stuff is always getting fixed then broke>fixed>broke>fixed>broke. See a pattern! :> I think v11 will be the same. Why do you think there is a update every week! Know anyone else that does this? Didnt think so! :>

The more I think about it, the more sense this makes in terms of their subscription-based business model. Why would they want to create a rock-solid app? People would stop renewing their subscriptions, especially when you consider that most of the great animation tools (the only reason to get A:M, imo) don't seem to change that much from year to year. Or, maybe I'm just being paranoid;).

[koon69]

Your not paranoid-they are after your money! lol :>
But you might be onto something. Just imagine that AM was rock solid. The animation systems is still the same. The users are all waiting for this solid version of AM and seem to wait year after year waiting. Whatever they add almost never works from week to week. Spritcles are nice but canc rash your system. Hair is getting better but will crash your system. Nice pattern! Only a matter of time before the big boys chew them up. I think AM will live by having new and young people trying to learn buying AM. Then they will move on. I think Martin once said that he doesnt mind that people elarn on AM then move away. As long as the people moving away gets someone else to buy AM!

[VashTheStampede]

I really like am and i dont plan on moving away from it any time soon. Th crash issue does bug me, but if other people can get by with it i guess i can to. I just have to get used to saving more often. I'm only 13 and I'm to young to and broke to be buying really expensive software. I'm really glad that hash gave am such a low price, because it allows me to pursue my dreams. I want to work in 3d professionally just like many of you guys. AM is great, i just wish it was more stable. I'm still begging my mom for christmas if she can get me zbrush or modo. I just hope modo isn't expensive. I guess I could use my money that I get from graduation at the end of the school year. Anyways, am is still cool with me. Thanks hash, just please make it more stable. (a free upgrade to v11 would be nice to)heheh:)

[Obnomauk]

Originally posted by John Keates
Frankly David, I just don't believe you! I mean what are you doing with AM exactly? You can't be pushing it that far because I quite frequently find repeatable crash bugs and I am not exactly a power user. If you look at the bug update list on the Hash web site then you will probably see a few fixes with reports credited to me and all I was trying to do was a simple character.

I get that a lot :)

I am currently doing nothing but working on a short film (10 minutes planned length). On top of that I am updating the text for my book for v10.5 which is typically a little bit of everything, and the occasional freelance animation gig. Just for contrast I animated, rigged and did an insignificant bit of texturing (read 1 texture but I like to add that last bit to my resume) on Day Off the Dead in A:M 8.5 which over the course of a year or so perhaps crashed twice. So once every two or three months still seems like a lot to me.

My current challenge in my personal short film is getting a suspension CP cloth system designed by Carl Albrecht-Buehler to be deformed by a set of poses that are in turn driven by a set of expressions, explicitly I am changing the direction of distortion based on the angle of motion of the leg and increasing the amount of distortion present based on the rate of motion of the leg this entails the use of 8 poses a fairly hefty number of constraints and some of the new expressions functions to 10.5

for instance the rate expression goes like so:

Pose 2= Abs((Degrees(acos(Dot((..|..|Bones|leader.Transform.Translate - ..|..|Bones|calf.Transform.Translate) /
Norm(..|..|Bones|leader.Transform.Translate - ..|..|Bones|calf.Transform.Translate),
(..|..|Bones|follower.Transform.Translate - ..|..|Bones|calf.Transform.Translate) / Norm(..|..|Bones|follower.Transform.Translate - ..|..|Bones|calf.Transform.Translate)
) ) )/359) * 100)

which basically takes the vectors of two bones to measure the angle between them on a given frame based on a common pivot (in this case the knee joint) with the bone 'follower' being translated to the bone 'leader' with a lag of 1 frame. which basically means that the further leader moves in a frame the faster it must be moving and the further the two bones will be apart, the greater the angle, the higher the percentage generated to drive the pose will be. the pose in turn ups the enforcement of a set of relationships from 100 to 120 making the distortion greater the faster the leg moves.

So you might say I push a fair amount. Not as hard as some people do, but hard enough.

I don't say I never find bugs, I've reported more than my fair share, i just said that I don't crash, nor am I saying that you or anyone else must all be doing something wrong to ever get a crash. big difference there. I know people on both platforms with both excellent and terrible stability.

that's my milage, yours may varry.

-David Rogers

[VashTheStampede]

David, your writing another book? I haven't been able to pick up your first one, but I can't wait for you to release your next one. When is it coming out?

[Hookflash]

David: What are your system specs?

[Obnomauk]

Originally posted by VashTheStampede
David, your writing another book? I haven't been able to pick up your first one, but I can't wait for you to release your next one. When is it coming out?

I'm writing a free upgrade to the Guide that will be available in the readers area of my site for those who bought the 2002 version of the book. I'll have it out as soon as I see what the 2004 beta brings to the table. but hopefully no later than say February.

Beyond that Charles River Media have no agreement for future books, this free update is just me being a sucker.. er I man a nice guy. ;) I am probably going to write more but I am... less than thrilled... with the traditional publishing structures (royalties are for chumps let me tell ya.) so will most likely explore cheap pay per download PDF formatted books. i am writing up one such book now, with the intent of releasing it by january, covering the full process of pre-production in workshop format.

keep an eye peeled and I will be certain to post any updates to this forum.

-David Rogers

[Obnomauk]

Originally posted by Hookflash
David: What are your system specs?

My main A:M system:
PowerMac G4 533 Dual Proc
Running A:M in Classic Mode (os 9.2.2) under OSX 10.2.6
1.5 GB RAM 900 MB dedicated to A:M
32 MB NVIDIA GeForce3 powers Monitor1
16 MB ATI Rage 128 powers Monitor2
8 MB ATI Xclaim VR powers Monitor3

Monitor 1 is for the viewport windows (modeling, chor, etc.) Monitor 2 has the PWS, Properties and Toolbars docked on it. Monitor3 is just for the Timeline window and community on the ever so rare occasions that I use it.

I also run on my iBook when i got outside or just lounge on the couch.

-David Rogers

[JTalbotski]

Hey David,

Three monitors, huh? I have two monitors running off my GeForce 4MX (on my dual Gig G4 w/ 1.5 Gig ram) and encounter some funkiness with OpenGL when I have A:M take up space on both monitors. Do you see any strangeness with OpenGL in your system. Maybe because I'm using one card to run two monitors? Do you know anything about this?

Thanks,

Jim

[Obnomauk]

Hey Jim,

I used to live with just two, but now I don't know how I ever managed ;)

I don't get any strangeness here, but I have seen some weird stuff at the Chicago A:M user group when a laptop is powering it's own monitor and the projector (this was a G4 TiBook) not sure what kind of graphics chipset was in that laptop, but once it was unhooked from the projector it was fine, so I think your two monitors off one card theory may be close to the mark.

The only OpenGL glitches I get are due to running it in classic mode (windows that draw white and refuse to refresh that kind of thing) and go away if I boot to os9, but I'm pretty lazy so can't be bothered to do that :)

-David

[JTalbotski]

Thanks, David. Maybe I'll have to look at getting another video card.

BTW, I'm lazy the same way.

Jim

[Wegg]

David. . . I'm also gunna have to call you on the crashing thing. I have only been playing with the modeler in 10.5 so far and. . . its a good thing I have a pretty picture on my desktop because I see it quite a bit while I'm working. Fortunetly I'm back to saving quite often so it isn't slowing me down too much but it is VERY disruptive to the flow. Often times its when you just managed to get a really nice curve or solve a tricky intersection and. . . <boop>. . . "Hello Desktop". Open up the save and repeat the same steps. . . no crash.

Something is wrong. Something way way down deep in the core of the damn MFC dlls they insist on clinging too is un-stable. It always has been since V5.

I am loving the new modeling tools. These new simple additions are amazing time savers and complement AM's workflow really well. The program keeps getting better and better. But it has ALWAYS been un-stable and I'd hate to say it. . . always will be. :annoyed:

[koon69]

I agree with Wegg 100%! Some things are just un-repeatble. I think 10.5 is pretty darn stable but I still find that some things crash it sometimes and other times it doesnt. Like when I work on one side of a model-delete and add a few splines then copy>flip>attach AM crashes. Very random. The one thing that really gets me is when you are doing a rendering and you have to abort the render because you realize you forgot something. 100% AM freezes and I have to do my three finger salute ctr>alt>delete. And I am working in a clean PC. No weird apps. Just AM-Pshop-Premiere-Illustrator-Dreamweaver. No bizarre 3rd party-nothing. No interface changing freeware. Clean. And I never have anything running with AM-never! Im running XPPro with 512ram. But saying that I think AM is much better on stability then ever. I think they need to throw out the MS dll's somehow and maybe use Code Warrior like there doing on the Mac. Clean it up and maybe AM will be as stable as EI or C4d!!! I hope so! I like AM.

[Obnomauk]

Well Wegg we've had this discussion before and I think you have never really believed me, but that's ok :)

The only real thing I can think of different with me and everyone else in the known universe is that I am Slow i am perhaps the slowest modeler i have ever seen. either that or you have your tongue sticking out the left side of your mouth when you work rather than the right. I think A:M prefers the right :D That and the RAM Once I crossed that 1gig line A:M seemed to feel better (probably enough room for the memory to leak into but thats just a theory brought on by not enough coffee in the day.)

I agree about the MFC shenanigans but I'm afraid the PC will never be free of those.... They seem to be just duplicating the same functionality in codewarrior for the OSX port but using it more as a translation to the OSX API's (which sounds inherently slow to me but what do I know...) The only way to know if it is an improvement will be to wait for the finished port and see how it stacks up on a problematic system (i could yank a gig of ram out of this box and give it a whirl when it's ready)

-David

[Wegg]

Ya know. . . I think you may be on to something with the whole speed thing. It seems to crash when I'm right in the middle of a huge sequence. I get into a rythm. Once you get to know all they keyboard shortcuts and tricks to it all you can really truck along at a good pace. If your taking it slow then your not putting any pressure on the software . . .

What do you think? Is THAT the pattern? Going to fast for the program to keep up?

[JTalbotski]

Originally posted by Wegg
What do you think? Is THAT the pattern? Going to fast for the program to keep up?

The refresh speed on the Mac in classic mode makes it almost impossible *not* to be too fast for the program. :)

But I don't doubt that this is at least part of the crashing problem.

I'll have to cut down my caffeine intake and try using A:M slower than I usually do.

[Bugle]

Maybe it is some obscure interface bug that was introduced in v5 or so... give the interface more than n commands per second and BANG!

I too have had the "feeling" that going too fast can be dangerous... and I certainly don't get too many "sudden unexplained crashes", just garden variety repeatable bugs

Heh, if that were the case it would explain why the hash folks never ever come accross the instability, after all, they'd be following steps off a list, or clicking stuff slowly, step by step methodically, not zooming ahead with a modelling or animating goal in mind.

Someone go tell 'em to step on it and see...

[Obnomauk]

I can tell you the bug that was introduced in v5: Microsoft Visual C++ with its attendant MFC libraries.

v4 was done in codewarrior on the mac as I recall. I have no idea what they used to code the winders version of it.

The only other program i have ever used that actually used the MFC libraries (esp the portability libraries on the mac) was word 6. and that was without a doubt the most bloated craptastic piece of software ever written.... and I'm including microsoft bob here.... i mean when MS can out crap themselves that's really saying something

On the one hand I appreciate the port to the mac version happening in hours or days rather than weeks or months, but on the other hand..... lets just say I'm really looking forward to the osX port. so much so that I've broken my own record for number of bug reports sent in a week. :)

-David Rogers

[Kevin Sanderson]

I'm a slow poke, too. Maybe that's another reason why I've never had all the problems the people with deadlines have had.

I know Joe Williamsen has recommended patience and letting the software catch up with you as one of the tips he let me post on my tips page.

I've frozen IE and Adobe Photoshop Elements 2 when clicking fast... not as much thinking required with those.

[John Keates]

Speed can definately be an issue but I am not sure that it is the whole story. When I introduced a friend to AM, I sat down and showed him how I go about making a simple head. Click click click. No crash.

OK, I was maybe pausing to explain things but I had previously made a similar head as fast as I could for practice with no probs. Then my friend had a go and he was hit with a LOT of crashes and he wasn't exactly zipping about the place.

I think that undo is a big problem and there is no excuse for it. Hash boasts that they have unlimited undoos when we are advised by learned users not to use more than three. I find that crashes happen most when I am modelling something difficult and going back on myself even if I delete things manually rather than using undo.

At the end of the day, what is needed is for Hash to have someone there at the office making a real project with a normal, off the shelf computer and they need some software that tracks the behaviour of the user. That is what people have been saying for a LONG time but I am not sure whether things will change.

[Dalemation]

Yep, I think speed in modelling must definitely be an issue. I have created a model over the last three evenings without a single crash....and that`s on a PC!

Also, when I use undo I count to 5 to myself before each click. I know you shouldn`t have to do this but it certainly seems to create a stable environment. For me anyway.

[Wegg]

Well. . . I'm old school. So I don't ever touch Undo. Still crashes for me. :-(

[John Keates]

I remember that a while ago I saw an entry in the fix list for v10-something that said something like "Undo in Model mode fixed". I wondered what that could possibly mean and tested it out... Crasharama.

[Hookflash]

Originally posted by Wegg
Well. . . I'm old school. So I don't ever touch Undo. Still crashes for me. :-(

Hey, I just got ahold of the A:M sources. Here's what I found in one of the headers:


// Take THAT, William!!

#ifdef EGGINGTON
random_crash();
#endif


;)

[ewdean]

That's funny!

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