Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

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Jschierbaum
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Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by Jschierbaum »

I only use pdf-xchange to write digital math notes on a surface pro 7, with a surface pencil.

I used version 8 build 336 for a long time without issue.

Today I made a huge mistake and upgraded to version 9.0 build 350.

Pen behavior has changed and is now unusable. 1 in about 10 pen strokes is now not recorded. it seems to be 1's and l's. Sometimes in the middle of writing, the comment "ends" and the next pen stroke selects the comment, making it extremely frustrating to write over or near other pen strokes.

I tried toggle any and all options in the settings that had anything to do with the digitizer. I tried going into the surface app and "increasing" the weight of the pen, and it didnt help. I am familiar with exclusive mode and keep selected, both are not having the intended effect of previous versions.

PLEASE PROVIDE INSTRUCTION HOW TO REVERT VERSIONS, I CANT RISK A FULL REINSTALL AND LOSING MY UI AND CUSTOM PALLETE PRESETS
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Paul - Tracker Supp
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by Paul - Tracker Supp »

Hi Jschierbaum,

I am very sorry to hear this. I just tested the Surface Pro we have here and it seems to be functioning OK. I have asked the dev team about this to see what changes may have been implemented between 336 and the current version.

Regards a roll back - normally I would simply say "Export your settings to file, uninstall the new version before installing 336, then import your settings again.", however there may be some issues with that. I would like to test your settings in 8.0.336.0 here. Can you export those, email them and some screen grabs of your custom UI and Palette settings to compare with what I get please?

On the subject of screen grabs, can you grab the Pen Tool issue you are reporting as an animation or video perhaps?
Best regards

Paul O'Rorke
Tracker Support North America
http://www.tracker-software.com
Jschierbaum
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by Jschierbaum »

I'll help as much as I can but I don't have an abundance of time to spare to troubleshoot. I have the component parts of your request. settings export, writing samples before and after, two videos showing/describing what i consider a change of behavior, and screenshots of the toolbar I would really rather not lose.

Where can I email this material to? or was I supposed to attach it here?
User4455
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by User4455 »

Dear jschierbaum, dear Paul,

I can confirm, that "something is weird", just like described by jschierbaum.
(I work on a surface book V1)

I would not go as far as calling it unusable, but it is definitely worse than in the previous build. In particular

a) some strokes are not recorded (for me its the top vertical bar of "5"; I go vertical stroke->half circle->top vertical stroke, the latter missing), and

b) at some point I select the older strokes, when starting a stroke on the older stroke (descpite exclusive mode).

This is reproducible in that if I keep trying long enough at some point one or both errors happen. But it still seems kind of random to me (jschierbaum's "1 out of 10" appears reasonable).

As regards the settings: My settings are the same as before and everything worked perfectly fine in the latest V8-built.

Thus, It seems to me that jschierbaum could simply export the settings, reinstall (V8) and import the settings to get back to the previously good behaviour. (Just a heads up: if you use pdf tools, dont forget to separately export its settings as well. Happened to me once....)
If you are afraid to go through with it, why not try it with a portable version first?

Cheers
Jschierbaum
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Joined: Wed Jan 20, 2021 6:00 pm

Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by Jschierbaum »

I have the exact issues described by User4455. It seems not to record specific strokes, for me its the closing of a capital B or greek beta. Handwriting was 90% of my Xchange usage, and in practice it is unusable for me. I've spent the last 24 hours setting up another solution. Like I was resistant to switching from Xchange, I likely won't be switching back to it. Good luck to you all fixing the issues, handwriting with your program was so easy and flexible compared to competitors.

P.S. I tried exporting, uninstalling, reinstalling old version. I probably did it wrong because I didn't even need to load the settings export and all my ui settings/customizations were still there. Writing still did not feel "right", so I looked elsewhere.
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Vasyl-Tracker Dev Team
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by Vasyl-Tracker Dev Team »

Hi guys.

Please confirm that such bugs are still reproducible on your side with the latest 358 build...

Cheers.
Vasyl Yaremyn
Tracker Software Products
Project Developer

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User4455
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by User4455 »

Dear Vasyl,

for me, the issue simply disappeared at some point in time. I believe it was with the next update. Just double-checked: seems fine.

Cheers
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John - Tracker Supp
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Re: Pen (Surface Pro 7) behavior changed, now unusable.

Post by John - Tracker Supp »

Thanks for your update - pleased all is now well.
If posting files to this forum - you must archive the files to a ZIP, RAR or 7z file or they will not be uploaded - thank you.

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Tracker Support
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