BUG Report :- Big delay presenting help file

[alan9876]

When I launch the portable PDFXCview.exe v2.0 (Build 50.0) it takes takes 14 seconds before the splash screen and a new icon on the task bar and a full screen display of the viewer screen.
That I can live with.

If I now hit F1, or go to Help / Contents,
11 Seconds of nothing happens until a new splash screen,
10 Seconds before a second instance of the viewer,
15 seconds whilst opening the file and gathering annotations and other things.

After launching PDFXCview.exe, if instead I OPEN and navigate to PDFVManual.PDF,
it omits the splash screen and the second instance,
and takes only 3 seconds "gathering" and then the file is open.

Having accessed the file, it is listed as recent,
and launching via "Recent files" instead of OPEN also takes only 3 seconds.

3 seconds is a magic time - the attention span / memory duration of a hamster / gold fish - I can do that.
36 seconds is time for me to wander off, make myself a coffee, and forget the question ! !

It does not seem to matter if the PDFVManual.PDF and PDFXCview.exe are in the same folder,
or if PDFVManual.PDF is within a HELP folder that is in the same folder as PDFXCview.exe,
it makes no difference, neither F1 nor Help/contents is able to locate the help file in the first instance, and they launch a second instance which eventually finds a PDF to suit it.

Is this new "feature" intended for some reason, or can we expect a fix ?
Is there some special path relative to the location of PDFXCview.exe which will immediately find PDFVManual.PDF.
It seems that this version trawls through all 2.06 GB (2,218,832,140 bytes) held in 21013 files in 3180 folders on drive H;\ before giving up and launching a second instance that repeats the same search but with a little more success ! !

I expect any application that has F1 help to respond instantly without having major delays as it gets around to giving up and launching a second instance to finally complete the job.
It is inconvenient that I must remember that this application is very bad at obeying F1.

N.B. Whilst composing the above I have also been thinking of other things to try.
I can now report that all my security is handled by Comodo Internet Security, and I find that when I disable the Defence+ behaviour blocker and the Anti-virus, the delays are significantly less for loading and displaying, but it still goes through the nonsense of having to use a second instance to find and display the help file.

This is however the only PDF product in my price range (free) that enabled me to print out the "apartment vouchers" for my daughter's holiday this week. I finally achieved success getting a HP psc 2115 printer to give acceptable print-out with only the Black cartridge (colour was empty). Even my son with access to Adobe was unable to produce B & W images from the very complex PDF that held these vouchers.

Good product, shame about the Help.

Regards
Alan

[John - Tracker Supp]

Hi Alan,

We have changes coming here in build 2.051 released tomorrow which should help resolve this .....

Thanks for your comments and patience.

[alan9876]

Thanks,

I was hoping for a quick response - more than satisfied.

Really surprised at how quickly "features" get fixed.
Mostly my experience with other products is a delay of at least 2 months before anything happens.
Going to bed now - probably won't sleep with excited anticipation of tomorrow ! !

Regards
Alan

[John - Tracker Supp]

Hope this gets resolved Alan - will try and check before it reaches the 'publish' stage which will be sometime tomorrow morning Pacific Time.

[ugradedeveloper]

Any update on when to expect build 51?

Thanks.

[John - Tracker Supp]

Hoping tomorrow - we have updated to the latest release of MS Visual Studio this week to enable some required functionality - but of course its never that easy ..

MS have removed support of some functionality for W2K support - we still support W2K - but they do not and we have spent 3 days working out alternative ways to resolve.

Thanks for your patience.

[ugradedeveloper]

Well, I still have a client I need to support who is running Windows 2000... So I'm glad you are taking the time to get it right!

[John - Tracker Supp]

Hi upgradedev...

They are being uploaded now and the mirrors will take perhaps 1 hour or so to synchronize -

Thanks for your patience.

[alan9876]

Regret Build 51 does not fix my issue.
I am using XP Home with SP3

My first report was based only on my experience as a User.
I have now investigated more completely whilst observing processes with Windows task Manager.
PDFVManual.pdf and PDFVLicense.pdf held at H:\Downloads\PDF_VIEW_51\Help\
Builds 50 and 51 have the following apparently identical features when invoking Help via Function key F1 or via HELP / Contents :-

If PDFXCview.exe is in H:\Downloads\PDF_VIEW_51\Help\,
F1 does nothing and takes zero time doing,
it immediately realises the help files are not in the correct path relationship, i.e.
H:\Downloads\PDF_VIEW_51\Help\Help\
so it does not search for them - it just waits for the next command.
I can live with that ! !

If PDFXCview.exe is in H:\Downloads\PDF_VIEW_51\,
then F1 instantly knows the help files are in the correct relationship,
so it does not search drive H:\ looking for them,
but it triggers the launch of a second instance of PDFXCview.exe,
and it takes a long time for the second instance to open the help file.
This I find inconvenient.

There is no such delay when using File / Open and select the help file.

Incidentally I got Build 51 from
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/product/downloads
BUT although the download was build 51
the page only promised "Version: 2.050 (Updated on 13 May, 2010)"
at least it got the date right ! !

Regards
Alan

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

I updated the build number to show the correct one now: 2.0.51

But am afraid that I can not help with the slow opening.
Can you please try on another machine?
There is some time needed to load the Viewer initially but when you have it opened already the second instance for the help file should launch near instantly.

Will request some of the dev guys to have a look at this topic and advise if they have any insight on the problem.

Regards,
Stefan

[alan9876]

The "new" feature I am complaining of is not so much the time taken to launch each instance of PDF-XChange,
but that although the first instance is able to open one TAB for each PDF that is launched via File / Open or RECENT,
(and this also applies to the help PDF),
when F1 or Help / Contents is used it takes just as long to launch a second instance of PDF-XChange for the sole purpose of displaying the help.

NB The time taken to launch each instance is up to 15 Seconds when Security is maximum,
and is only 3 seconds when disabled (and internet off).

With Build 37.2 this second instance never happened,
though I now realise that used a PDFV.chm help file.

Is there a reason why the help.pdf needs a second instance, and cannot use an extra TAB ?

Regards
Alan