gotcha

Author Topic: Inkscape on Mac 10.12.3 Can't open my Doc properties or global prefs??  (Read 4345 times)

March 17, 2017, 10:26:51 PM
Read 4345 times

Geeup

  • Sr. Newbie

  • Offline
  • **

  • 3
Hi all - complete beginner and newbie here so please be gentle!  I've installed Inkscape on Mac with XQuartz - all installed successfully. 

Have been having a little play and following online tutorial to learn my way around and now can no longer open Document Properties or Preferences - at all.  When I select the icon from toolbar or from the drop down menu it selects them but nothing opens up?  Everything else appears to be working fine.  I'm moderately confident I haven't disabled them (can you even do that?) but I could previously open them and now - nothing.

Is this a known issue?  Have I buggered something up somewhere? Is this a MAC issue?  (I have tried the good old shut down and reopen...)

Cheers :)

March 18, 2017, 12:00:18 AM
Reply #1

brynn

  • Administrator

  • Offline
  • ******

  • 3,941
  • Gender
    Female

    Female
    • Inkscape Community
Welcome to the forum!

You mean these Document Properties and Preferences are Inkscape dialogs?  I assume they are, but I'm not familiar with Mac or XQuartz, so I thought I should confirm it.

Would you happen to be using dual or multiple monitors?  Or have you ever used more than one monitor on the computer where you installed Inkscape?  We've seen things like this happen when someone was using more than one monitor.  And they may have switched back to one monitor, but for some reason, Inkscape is opening them on the closed extra monitor.  It is a bug.  Changing your screen orientation could do it too (not Inkscape doc orientation, but your computer screen).

Another thing that might be happening, is that you have the dialogs docked.  There is a way to sort of minimize a docked dialog (used to be called "iconified"), so that there's only a small bit of text to indicate it.  So after you open one of those dialogs, look to the right side of the screen.  That's the docking area.  If it's minimized in the docking area, you'll see some text to the right of the docking area, which is written sideways, bottom to top.  If you see the text, you can click on it, and the dialog will open.  More info here on docked dialogs:  http://tavmjong.free.fr/INKSCAPE/MANUAL/html/Anatomy.html and scroll down.

Or sometimes if you have the dialogs floating, they can open up somewhere outside the visible screen area.  Or if the dialog is floating, and you minimized it (I mean the real kind of minimizing) it can be reduced to a tiny window somewhere along the bottom of the Inkscape window.  It's so tiny that only the minimize, restore and close buttons can be seen.  If it does that, it can be hard to notice.  I think this has been fixed in current versions, but if you installed an older version, for some reason.

Document Properties and Inkscape Preferences are both such huge dialogs, that I suspect most people leave them floating.  But it depends on what preferences you've set.  If you double-click on any tool, in the toolbar on left side of the window, it should open Inkscape Preferences, to that tool.  So try double-clicking on the Selection tool, and look around in any of these places, to try and find it.

  • Inkscape version 0.92.3
  • Windows 7 Pro, 64-bit
Inkscape Tutorials (and manuals)                      Inkscape Community Gallery                        Inkscape for Cutting Design                     



"Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity" - Horace Mann                       

March 18, 2017, 02:00:51 AM
Reply #2

Geeup

  • Sr. Newbie

  • Offline
  • **

  • 3
Thanks for your reply, ideas and welcome!!   :)

Definitely not iconified/docked somewhere - I wish! 

I do use a second monitor as a second desktop and I suspect that's something to do with the issue combined with the XQuartz config not really liking mac.  After messing around all afternoon I found if I shrank down my icons and screen res then I could see part of the doc properties dialog box out to the far right side of the main Inkscape area but couldn't select it or move it.  NO idea what it's doing out there or how to get it appearing back over the general workspace where the other dialog boxes open.  I've tried both screens/monitors and same issue on both.  Everything else works fine but SUPER frustrating I can't access these 2!  I may have had a minor tantrum this afternoon.......

Has anyone else with a Mac solved this whilst still using the second monitor?

March 18, 2017, 04:42:14 AM
Reply #3

brynn

  • Administrator

  • Offline
  • ******

  • 3,941
  • Gender
    Female

    Female
    • Inkscape Community
I haven't heard anything about it being fixed.  Some people may have found solutions, but to be honest, I haven't paid very close attention.

I'll try to find a bug report.  And meanwhile, you could search the mailing list archives, because I do remember at least one case being discussed on a list.  Unforunately, I don't remember if it was the development list or the user list. 

https://sourceforge.net/p/inkscape/mailman/inkscape-devel/
https://sourceforge.net/p/inkscape/mailman/inkscape-user/

I wonder.....IF you could access Inkscape preferences, if you changed the window size/position/status options  if it might have some effect.  It really should NOT cause the windows (dialogs) to move.  But under such circumstances, maybe it somehow could??

In leiu of using Inkscape Preferences dialog, you could "manually" edit the preferences.xml file.  although I have no idea what values are used for each option.  And it's a long shot anyway.

I'll post a soon as I can search the bug tackers.
  • Inkscape version 0.92.3
  • Windows 7 Pro, 64-bit
Inkscape Tutorials (and manuals)                      Inkscape Community Gallery                        Inkscape for Cutting Design                     



"Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity" - Horace Mann                       

March 18, 2017, 05:49:16 AM
Reply #4

Moini

  • IC Mentor

  • Offline
  • ******

  • 1,568
    • VektorRascheln

March 18, 2017, 07:36:19 AM
Reply #5

brynn

  • Administrator

  • Offline
  • ******

  • 3,941
  • Gender
    Female

    Female
    • Inkscape Community
Oh!  I didn't realize (a) that it's been found to be a Mac-only problem, and (2) that there is a workaround.  Awesome news!  Well, relatively awesome - would be better if fixed.  But workaround is still nice  :)
  • Inkscape version 0.92.3
  • Windows 7 Pro, 64-bit
Inkscape Tutorials (and manuals)                      Inkscape Community Gallery                        Inkscape for Cutting Design                     



"Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity" - Horace Mann                       

March 18, 2017, 02:57:24 PM
Reply #6

Geeup

  • Sr. Newbie

  • Offline
  • **

  • 3