Pen Tool Switches to "Move" During Natural Writing Motion

[jmohr]

I have found that when using the pen tool, I pick up my stylus to cross a T or J and the cursor quickly changes from the pen's crosshairs to the "move" arrows. Is there a way to turn off the move functions so that I may naturally finish writing a word?

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

To change the behaviour of the pencil tool, show the properties toolbar, and click "Keep tool selected."

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

jmohr,

I believe Bhikkhu's advise will do the trick,

and thank you for the help Bhikkhu

Cheers,
Stefan

[jmohr]

Thank you Bhikkhu for your advise. However, I have tried what you have suggested and the 'move' function still remains - which leads me to wonder if this functionality may be an exception to the rule. I have ensured that the light bulb icon is "on" when selecting the setting you suggested.

I have uploaded a private, youtube video for you to see the issue I am experiencing. It is at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGgGnPcG02I

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

The video is private so I cannot view it. Here, if "keep tool selected" is enabled, then the pencil tool remains selected.

[jmohr]

The video is private so I cannot view it. Here, if "keep tool selected" is enabled, then the pencil tool remains selected.

Sorry Bhikkhu. I've now made the YouTube Video accessible to all.

Just to clarify, during this demonstration of the issue I was experiencing, I had the "keep tool selected" option enabled - in other words, the light bulb icon was yellow and not greyed out.

[Vasyl - PDF-XChange]

Hi, jmohr.

This issue confirmed.
Will be fixed in the next build(upcoming).
Thanks for your video.

Best
Regards.

[sunbun]

I use PDF X-Change Viewer Pro version 2.0 (build 42.2) and i am still suffering the same problem.
so is there a solution for this available? i use the software on a netvertible and it is really important that i can write well on the pages with my stylus otherwise purchasing this software was useless. please do not missunderstand me, the software is fine and i love it but without a working handwriting-input i cannot use the software for writing notes during lectures in university, and that was the reason i bought this software for.
writing on my pc with a wacom tablet handwriting works fine so I was very disappointed when suffering this problem on my new netvertible.

additionally it would be also very important to have influence on the smooting of the handwritten, as many small letters are smoothed to a straight line.

so please tell me that there is a solution for these problems - already released or ready to release within the next weeks.

thx

[Chris - PDF-XChange]

Hi sunbun,

Please download and install the latest release of the Viewer, released on Thursday, Version 2.5.188. Let us know if the problem persists, though It should not.

Chris

[sunbun]

Unfortunately the problem persists.
It is not even possible to begin writing a word, starting with a vertical line. only beginning with a horizontal line makes it possible to write, otherwise the viewer "thinks" i want to scroll up or down the page.

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello sunbun,

I am now checking with the dev guys once again, to see what's the status on this problem.

Will post here as soon as I have any news.

Best,
Stefan

[sunbun]

thx a lot

[John - Tracker Supp]

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello sunbun,

Just spoke with the dev guys and they told me that if you hold the shift key - you should be able to start drawing with a vertical movement as well.
Or you could try with turning on "Enable exclusime mode for commenting tools"

Best,
Stefan

[sunbun]

hm, i already tried the exclusive mode - doesn't work.
as i told i am using the software on my netvertible, so when i want to write something i use it in tablet mode and therefore i cannot use the "shift"-key. but - i just tried in netbook-mode - even pressing shift-key doesn't help.

my netvertible is the gigabyte t1000p, if it helps to find out why it doesn't work.

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Thanks for the update sunbun

Will pass your latest comments to the dev guys.

Best,
Stefan

[hbouzagl]

Hi,
I have the same issue and tested with the new build the issue is still present.
My customer want to cancel my work due to this issue not solved for a long time.
Please, could you fix this point very urgently? I have bought the Pro SDK but cannot use it without this function work correctly.
Regards

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello hbouzagl and sunbun,

I did make a ticket
#647: gigabyte t1000p "netvertible": Pen Tool Switches to "Move" During Natural Writing Motion
And we will have this investigated, but we do not have such a touch screen device right now at hand to test, so reproducing and locating the problem might be a bit tricky.

Will keep you updated with how the investigation goes here in this topic.

Best,
Stefan

[hbouzagl]

Hi,
it's very easy to reproduce just with the mouse.
Try to start drawing with the mouse on Pencil fuction and you can see that if you move your mouse on the top of the just drawn part you can see the cursor changed to move one and cannot add any line on the already drawn part....
Regards

[Ivan - Tracker Software]

2 hbouzagl: Have you tried to enable Exclusive mode for commenting tools? (Edit -> Preferences -> Commenting -> Enable exclusive mode for commenting tools)

[hbouzagl]

I Just try it and it seems to work on the viewer.
How to do it progamaticaly with a doverb or other commands?
In the help file and manual I havent found any information about the exclusive mode.
Thanks for your help

[sunbun]

i am not sure whether my problem can be reproduced with a mouse.
as i tested the pen-feature in the trial-version of the software in detail, 1st with a mouse and 2nd with my wacom tablet, both worked fine.
my problem only occurs when trying to use the pen-feature via "pressure on the screen" (with finger or stylus).


best regards and thx for checking the problem

sunbun

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hi all

@hbouzagl - you could distribute predefined settings, and apply them when deploying your application

@sunbun - this might be due to some drivers installed on the device that "kick in" when you are using the touchscreen and any prolonged press is counted as "drag" with the mouse rather than allowing you to draw with your pencil tool as you intend.

Best,
Stefan

[hbouzagl]

Hi Stefan,
I can understand that but I want it programaticaly because I want this function only when my customer use the pencil and deactivate when changing the tools.
Changing the parameters take too much time to reload or if you can give me a sample of code in C# that reload very fast the DAT files, I'm OK.

Regards

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hi hbouzagl,

At first I suggested that we merge the discussion here, as it seemed like the two topics are related, but seems like there is a solution for you already, as described by Vasyl in your original topic.

Best,
Stefan

[sunbun]

a driver problem - maybe, but i want to add that at the moment (as i really need the writing-feature) i use the trial-version of pdf-annotator, not that fine as pdf-x-change but here writing with the stylus works without problems! so there seems to be a solution for an application to treat my writing in right way...

best regards

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

Hi sunbun,

To resolve your "writing problem" with the stylus

1. You can use the EU-option:
Edit -> Preferences -> Commenting -> Enable exclusive mode

2. And in your application you should look here for a solution for this problem
https://forum.pdf-xchange.com/ ... =36&t=9423

we have no other solutions currently.

[Corwin - Tracker Sup]

Hi sunbun,

We have tested commenting tool on different devices with touch screen and pen input, but still was unable to reproduce such behaviour on any of them. It looks like you have some third party software that recognizes your vertical pen movement as gesture and blocks commenting in our Viewer.

HTH.

[sunbun]

I only installed Win7 Professional and the drivers provided by Gigabyte, which were necessary to make the touchscreen work. gestures by windows are deactivated. It really seems as there is indeed a conflict between software or drivers, but there is nothing i can deinstall without a loss in using functionality of my touchscreen.
Although, i hope there is a solution within programming of the viewer as neither Paint nor PDF Annotator show this strange behaviour with vertical lines. I am aware that you cannot change the whole programming structure of your software just for one customer, if that is the problem But maybe it is just a small thing...

Maybe I should make a video to show you what's exactly going on and attach it here.
And I will write to Gigabyte support, if they can imagine a cause in their provided drivers. Although it would be maybe more effective if this question does not come from a private person but from a software development team...

Thanx for still caring about my problem!

[John - Tracker Supp]

Sure - a small Video would be most helpful and you can send direct to PDFXView@tracker-software.com

Thanks

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

Hi sunbun

the more we know about this the better so please do make the video. I can't promise what will come from this but we will certainly look into it if you send it. The best way might be to post it on a publicly available resource and link to it on this forum as I think you may have trouble uploading a video to this forum.

regards

[hbouzagl]

Hi,
I have noticed the same issue on some computer (not all) and seems to be a drivers issue for part of the problem.
What I can see is that with PDFannotator, that is based on your SDK, you can write on all the computer tested really without issues and with a very nice quality....
I beleive you can add the functionality to PDFXchange as Pdfannotator is using your SDK to achieve what a lot of developers want to have in your SDK as a standard feature.
Thanks to continue to improve your product.

Regards

[Corwin - Tracker Sup]

Hello,

It looks like PDFannotator doesn't support any kind of gestures (even Windows 7 standard). Such behaviour indeed can fix problems with creating annotations, but this will cause inconvenience for people who like to use gestures in Windows apps.

[sunbun]

so what about a feauture to able / disable gestures in the preferences?

i'll make the video around christmas, at the moment i am too busy with my study...

[John - Tracker Supp]

look forward to it

[hbouzagl]

Hi Corwin,
I use pdfannotatot and he support gesture on all windows plateforms XP, vista, W7 ...
I use it it frequentely without any issue and very very nice quality versus freehand on your SDK (it's just a constatation and not a blam to your dev team).

The only need to have the gesture activated with pdfannotator is to install a pen tablet (like wacom) on the pc where you have pdfannotator.
Without a pen input you cannot use the gesture.

Regards

[Corwin - Tracker Sup]

Hi hbouzagl,

As I can see non of standard gestures works on document page in PDFAnnotator. Maybe you can give more information, of how to enable it?
Also you may be interested that PDFAnnotator doesn't create real PDF inc annotations. This can be checked by Acrobat or PDFX Viewer - ink annotations created with PDFAnnotator are just simply drawn, these cannot be edited with other PDF applications.

The official PDF specification - inc annotation's, is not very friendly for pen input, for example you cannot set different line thickness for one annot. However in the next version of Viewer we will reconsider the possibility of implementing a new pencil tool, which will give much better quality with pen input.

[hbouzagl]

Hi Corwin,
It will be very interesting and URGENT to have a new pencil feature even if at the end it's a draw on the pdf like PDFAnnotator.
Actually, with pdfannotator you can erase a pen annotation on a previously saved pdf annotator file.

The demand is starting to be very high as the pen tablet market is growing very fast.
Regards

[John - Tracker Supp]

We appreciate this and thats why we have committed to improve this option - but do note our annotation will remain annotations rather than 'drawn' items and the 2 options should not be confused - as always we do our utmost to adhere to the PDF specification and to ensure that options we implement remain compatible with all other PDF specification compliant products.

HTH

[david.r]

Hi

I have the same issue as other people here. I'm using x-change viewer for pdf annotations, and I have to start with an horizontal line to enable writing mode with my stylus (otherwise, the document is scrolling).

I don't have the problem with a mouse, but I'm using a tablet PC (ExoPC - so without keyboard and mouse, only a stylus - or my fingers). I've tried to enable exclusive mode, but it's doesn't solve the problem (I have to use pdf annotator for hand writing - but I really prefer x-change viewer).

The only (temporary) solution I have found is to disable "scrolling" in the "stylus" function of Windows - maybe you could try to add an option to disable windows finger scrolling when we are in pen mode (don't know if it's easy - it seems done in pdf-annotator : when I'm outside the document, my finger makes it scroll, when I'm inside, it doesn't scroll anymore and the pen is used).

Thanks.

[Corwin - Tracker Sup]

Hi all,

Good news - in next build of Viewer this problem will be fixed.

[sunbun]

thx to david.r for this temporary solution, my trial-license for annotator expires tomorrow, now i can use david.r's trick to survive til the next build and dont have to spend money for a second software.

and of course thx to the dev-team for this good news.

i guess my video is not necessary any more?

[Chris - PDF-XChange]

Glad to hear a fix is on the way.

Best,

Chris

[jb82]

Also the issue doesn't occur in full screen mode.

[Chris - PDF-XChange]

Thanks jb,

[david.r]

the new version is really better now... thanks

[Chris - PDF-XChange]

Glad to hear.

Best,
Chris

[quant]

Hi Corwin,
It will be very interesting and URGENT to have a new pencil feature even if at the end it's a draw on the pdf like PDFAnnotator.
Actually, with pdfannotator you can erase a pen annotation on a previously saved pdf annotator file.

The demand is starting to be very high as the pen tablet market is growing very fast.
Regards

I add my vote for a feature like PDFannotator has where drawings are basically added to another layer.
I use PDF xchange for all types of annotations, but when I need to handwrite (graphs, math formulas, etc) I have to open the file in PDFannotator and do it there.

Many thanks

[Paul - PDF-XChange]

Hi quant,

your vote noted, do remember however John's comment about the layers:

do note our annotation will remain annotations rather than 'drawn' items and the 2 options should not be confused