Navigation Bugs (new bug in versions 4.x)

[jflund 0]

I keep anticipating each new version of Cura hoping that the navigation issues will be resolved (panning, rotating, zooming). Perhaps the problems only occur on the Mac, maybe just on Retina Macs, I don't know, otherwise I don't know why more people don't complain about it. They do only occur when "Zoom toward mouse direction" is checked. I have a MacBook Pro 15" with Retina display. The latest version (4.x and beyond) have made things worse by adding a new bug (#1 below).

 

Here are the problems I see (again, they only  occur when "Zoom toward mouse direction" is checked):

1) Zooming doesn't zoom toward mouse direction!!! This seems to be a new bug introduced in one of the latest versions of Cura. It appears to zoom toward a position EXACTLY TWICE the coordinates of the mouse. I have to place the cursor in the left lower corner of the screen to get it to zoom toward the center of the screen. This is a new problem as of Version 4.x, This has to be a bug. Could it have something to do with a Mac's Retina screen where coordinates are halved compared to actual pixels? It seems to zoom to a point exactly 2x the current mouse position.

 

2) With "Zoom toward mouse direction" checked, orbiting (rotating) occurs about a point a fixed distance from the viewport (camera position). This is wrong! This has the effect of making orbiting useless when the camera is at any position other than one of the default positions. Doing so INSTANTLY ROTATES EVERYTHING OFFSCREEN. The further away from the default positions the worse the effect is. This is wrong, it is not a design or personal preference. If you feel it is, you aren't understanding the problem. This cannot be the intended effect (I can not see how this could possible be a feature and not a bug).

 

I have written may 3D user interfaces, the key is that orbiting should occur about the point the person is looking at! The mouse cursor should be used to determine where that is. This is how every 3D modeling app works. If the cursor is pointing at a part of the model, orbiting should occur about the point on the model where the mouse is. If not pointing at the model, orbiting should occur about a point halfway between the closest and farthest area of interest (in Cura's case, halfway between the front and back of the build plate (as being seen by, or from the perspective of, the user's current viewport) at the y location of the mouse.  If the camera is over the build plate, orbiting should occur halfway between the camera position and the back of the build plate. A fudge factor can be ue d to prevent orbiting too close to the camera or behind the camera. This provides for a very intuitive user experience. But what exists currently is completely useless when using Zoom toward mouse direction is checked and the camera is not in the default position.

 

I hope someone from Ultimaker will finally listen to this frustration instead of brushing it off as a design preference. It makes it impossible to examine in detail and assess the effects different parameters have on slicing.This is a very important aspect of a slicer, and is handled much better by other slicers. 

 

Cura is too good otherwise to switch to one of the other slicers that allow better inspection of the sliced models. So please fix this so I don't have to use those slicers.

 

Sincerely,

John F. Lund

[nallath 1,120]

Issues / feedback regarding Cura are best reported on github https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura/issues/new/choose

 

To go a bit more in depth; Zoom towards mouse is something that I've added in my own time a while ago. I don't think a whole lot of people are using it, which is probably why it's not been having a lot of attention (you're actually the third or fourth person that I've heard from that uses it).

As for the rotation; This is intentional. The camera isn't a "real" free-form camera. It makes more sense to have a free-form camera in a 3D design program, but take into account that Cura isn't that. It's a CAM program, so it's focus is on the build plate. Combining the more "freeform ish" aproach with this is a bit annoying, i do get that, but fixing it would require a fair bit of rework (and again; I did it in my own time and since few people seem to use it (or they might, they just didn't tell me)) i couldn't be bothered a whole lot by that.

 

[sam2b 1]

On 8/11/2019 at 9:03 PM, jflund said:

Here are the problems I see (again, they only  occur when "Zoom toward mouse direction" is checked):

1) Zooming doesn't zoom toward mouse direction!!! This seems to be a new bug introduced in one of the latest versions of Cura

In Windows 10, Cura 4.4, "Zoom toward mouse direction" no longer works after upgrading from Cura 4.3.  I rely on this feature for my workflow.

 

On 8/12/2019 at 2:03 AM, nallath said:

I don't think a whole lot of people are using it, which is probably why it's not been having a lot of attention (you're actually the third or fourth person that I've heard from that uses it).

So does this mean the feature is no longer supported? What priority will  be placed to fix it?  Else what can I try to troubleshoot, please?

 

Edited November 21, 2019 by sam2b

[nallath 1,120]

Well, it really helps to report all bugs on github. It's way easier for us to keep track of them there.