Is it just me?


Whenever I'm having quite a number of cloned object, or shapes with different effects then it started to eat up my cpu and memory....

Hi belasungkawa,
I recently posted a nearly identical topic, and am considering submitting a bug about this issue. Here's a link to my topic
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1100&p=5375#p5375
If it's ok with you, I'd like to add a link to your topic (this one) in my topic, in the interest of both strengthening the importance of the issue (by documenting its occurrence for another user besides me), as well as possibly finding resolution for both of us, if it's not found to be a bug (officially).

As you will see, if you read my topic, the issue for me 1st presented as a different problem. But shortly I tracked down the source to the excessive CPU use. Since posting that topic, I've been watching my Task Manager, as I continue to use v 0.46, and gathering further info. In fact, I've visited these forums tonight for the purpose of adding another reply to that topic, reporting what else I've learned, and asking for advice about reporting it as a bug.

I guess the only other comment I have about your particular problem, is that your relatively low memory would not seem to me to be the problem, or the cause of the issue. That's because I run 1.25 GIGs of RAM. Despite that, my CPU is being maxed out at 100% and freezing my system momentarily, quite frequently. I also notice the problem occurs when I'm usisng a lot of layers, gradients, zoom factor (which to me points to memory). But again, with so much RAM, it seems inconceivable.

I'm sorry that I can't offer any more positive help or support for you, but thought you'd be interested to know about my similar issue. Good luck to both of us, lol

Brynn

If Inkscape is constantly using 76% of your CPU, even though you're not doing anything, that may be cause for concern. The RAM usage is no big deal depending on the drawing.

The info in that screenshot alone isn't enough to suggest there is a problem.

Hi brynn,

I just read your previous thread, maybe we do have something in common. I look at the Task Manager and cpu is normal when I'm not doing anything even though I had Inkscape opened. But it went up when I start doing even the simplest thing such as selecting an object , let alone selecting several objects, it'll go to 70%-80% range.

I don't mind if you add a link to this topic..although I just realized that I probably have the most embarrassing screenshot, with a typo error. LOL

Btw, I'm using a very old PC, Pentium 4 1.5 GHz, Windows XP.

This could be related to your drawing. What happens if you start with a blank canvas and draw a single circle? Do you get high cpu usage then?

You'll get high CPU usage if you use lots of blur in a drawing.

belasungkawa wrote:I look at the Task Manager and cpu is normal when I'm not doing anything even though I had Inkscape opened. But it went up when I start doing even the simplest thing such as selecting an object, let alone selecting several objects, it'll go to 70%-80% range.

I have encountered this same thing.

microUgly wrote:What happens if you start with a blank canvas and draw a single circle? Do you get high cpu usage then?

The drag on the cpu goes up as the complexity of the picture I'm working on goes up. If I have a fresh canvas and add a few simply shapes, everything is fine. However, with my avatar picture in the finished projects thread for example, if I want to change the positioning of the blue feathers and have the mask's layer visible so I can see their relative positions the process tends to become ... select feather, wait a few seconds for the feather to be selected, start draging the feather to where I want it, hold mouse in position and keep holding the mouse button, wait for about a half a minute for Inkscape to move the feather, fine tune the position, wait for Inkscape to catch up, release mouse button.

Another example, the kanji characters in the Ko Shogi board I did. I use the text tool to cut and paste the characters into Inkscape as a group (say 25 kanji characters at a time), then convert to paths so I can edit them. My first step after converting is to duplicate the object, go into node editing mode, select all of the nodes except those for one kanji character, delete. Duplicate the original again, repeat the process for the second character. Repeat till I've done all 25 characters. When I drag the mouse to make the box to select the nodes, that part goes smooth. Once I let go of the mouse button it'll usually take Inkscape a minute or so to actually select them.

With either of those pictures, if all the layers are visible and I open the Layers, Fill & Stroke, etc dialogs and it resizes the work area, there's a wait for Inkscape to have to redraw the work space.

All this is on my home computer which is a quad-core (unfortunately Inkscape only utilizes one at a time) 2.4Ghz with 4Gb ram.

When I'm doing that process with the kanji in my spare time on my computer at work (which is older and doesn't have as much speed or memory), after letting go of the mouse button I just walk away from my desk and come back in 5 to 10 minutes to see if it's finished selecting the nodes yet.

I have noticed that the further I zoom out, the less the drag on the cpu when moving things around. Unfortunately being zoomed way out when doing node editing isn't very productive.

Fortunately I'm a very patient person, and with as many nodes as there are in some of the objects I'm making I can understand it dragging the system to a degree. I hope future Inkscape releases will eventually have multi-threading so the work can be distributed across all of my computer's processors. I think that would help greatly. And on the bright side, this has taught me the value of using many layers and only have visible those things I'm actually working on.

It's not just you. It happened to me too.

Regards,
Danna

a

me too!
I have similar problem, see my post here:
* Very Slow when editing A4 Poster with a lot of text...
viewtopic.php?f=29&t=4082

-> any solutions?

Rgds,

Hi amberika and hhtmp88,
I guess 1st I should note that there is a new stable version, just released, 0.47.
However, from my 1st few experiments with it, it seems to have inherited a lot of the same performance/memory issues. I think some of them may take a while to fix, a long while, meaning that it's probably best for users to adopt workflow workarounds. Try to isolate areas of your drawing that use a lot of resources, for example using layers and sub-layers, so that you don't have tons of gradients, blurs, nodes all actively editable at the same time. That way, Inkscape only has to focus on whatever you have visible.

So hhtmp88, the aforementioned tip is probably your best bet. Although please note that I have not yet read your topic, so there may be other issues to address there.

And amberika, wow I wouldn't even know where to look to find the operating temperature of my cpu, and don't even know what a heatsink is!! It sounds like you are your own best resource for this issue, at least if we are the only 2 people working on it, lol. But hopefully someone else will join us here shortly. Meanwhile, just to double-check your logic and comparisons, though, I could ask a couple of questions.

Your problem is 2 computers with overheating cpus, only when you're using Inkscape, correct? Your other computers show the same performance issues with Inkscape, but don't have the overheating issue, correct? I guess it sounds to me like the problem is with the processor. Given Inkscape has this excessive cpu usage at certain times, but if none of the other computers' cpu overheats, then I'd say it would have to be the processor. I don't really know enough to determine whether it's cpu or motherboard; all I know is that the cpu is attached to the mb. But if there's a thermometer that measures cpu operating temp, I guess I'd have to trust that it measures the cpu only.

But in either case, the same tip about isolating portions of the image you're working on can allow Inkscape to only focus on small parts of an inage, and help avoid the cpu overload. Sorry I can't be more help.

Hi brynn!

I am exactly using v0.47.

Thanks for your advise to put some part the drawing into other layers!
but...

How to do?
-> sorry, I am a newbie!
-> for my case, I think, I may need to put all the text blocks into a specific layer (but they are grouped and text flowed into their respective rectangles or circles)
-> any problems if a text block is grouped or text flowed?

It would be great if you can give me some instructions.

Thanks for any kind of help!