Flare 7 editor CPU usage

[paul55]

Hi,

After upgrading to Flare 7, I notice that while navigating through text using the arrow keys in the Flare XML editor window, the navigation goes kind of slowly and seems to eat up a lot of CPU on my system.

The system is a Compaq SR2050NX, dual-core Xeon with 2 x 2.8GHz cores -- a pretty respectable machine. The machine is basically idle when I'm not doing anything in Flare. Then, when I scroll through text with Flare, Flare.exe shows as using 55% or so of the total CPU -- i.e. slightly more than one core's worth.

I shut off Auto Suggestion and Spell Check While Typing, but that made no difference. I never noticed this when using Flare 6, but I haven't gone back and reloaded that version to do a comparison.

It's not a big deal, but is there any easy solution? Should I file a bug report? Thanks!

-Paul

[Andrew]

There are a few things you can do. I'd go into the View > Show menu and start testing out what happens when you remove certain things from view, or change settings. For example, some people have reported increasing speed by turning off "Show Conditional Indicators." You may also try to remove the ClearType setting, and changing the GDI+ text renderer.

[paul55]

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for your reply; I went in and shut off all the View -> Show options I could -- only "Show Hidden Elements" remained on, and I didn't see how to get it enabled in order to shut it off. But navigating through text stayed at about the same speed and CPU usage. Turning off the block and span XML nesting bars (I forget the correct name for them) didn't help either.

I enabled GDI+ and then navigation got much slower -- it moves at 3-4 characters per second holding down the left/right arrows; CPU usage was still at about 55% (it was the same with or without ClearType, if that matters).

My keyboard repeat rate is maybe 40cps or so, from a test I did in Notepad. As a comparison, I can scroll through a sample paragraph of text in about 7 seconds in Notepad (with no noticeable CPU usage), but the same paragraph takes about 17 sec. in Flare.

With ClearType on, it's actually a little faster -- I can scroll through my sample paragraph in 17 sec. or so, compared with about 22 sec. with ClearType off. So I guess I'll leave that on since it helps a little.

It's also a little faster in Print layout mode -- I can scroll through that test paragraph in about 15 seconds in that mode (with CPU usage at more like 60%).

So it's not really that bad, but do you think it's supposed to behave this way? Is it recomposing the layout or something, each time I move the cursor?

Regards,

-Paul

[lacastle]

Is your Flare project saved locally or on a network? I always work locally because it is faster, and then just backup to the network. I've noticed significant differences.

[paul55]

Hi Laura,

Thanks, that's good to know. In this case the Flare project is on a local hard drive on a "real" machine (not a VM). It is on an encrypted partition, though, but we've been using that setup for years and not had any performance problems there. I'll copy it to a "real" drive partition when I get a chance and see if that helps.

-Paul

[LTinker68]

It is on an encrypted partition, though, but we've been using that setup for years and not had any performance problems there.

If it turns out to be faster on a non-encrypted drive, then make sure you submit a bug report at http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/submit.aspx. That's probably not as common a setup, so might be something they need to look into, especially since there are multiple methods for encrypting data, so they'd probably like to know of your problems. Not that they'll necessarily work on fixing it if a lot of other people don't report the same problem, but good to get it in the books anyway, so to speak.

[Andrew]

Flare's XML Editor is very, very different from a typical text editor, and it will not be as fast. It does real-time transforms of the text file into the WYSIWYG look. That costs resources, so when you're arrowing around in Flare, Flare is basically retransforming a bunch of XML, not simply displaying text. My guess is that it's as fast as it will get, and on that CPU (which is a bit dated, though not terribly slow or anything), that seems about right. I've got a significantly faster 2.4 GHz Core2Duo, and arrowing through a reasonably-sized topic puts my CPU usage at about 40%.

It might be a good idea, if you can, to go back and do a comparison in Flare v6; if a speed disparity exists, I'd report it as a bug. However, given that new functionality is added in every release, you can expect that sometimes things require more resources as they do more work to support more features.

[LTinker68]

However, given that new functionality is added in every release, you can expect that sometimes things require more resources as they do more work to support more features.

The auto-suggestion feature, for example. If that's enabled, that might slow things down, as that evaluate what you type as you type it to determine if there's a match it can suggest.

[samjones6]

For example, some people have reported increasing speed by turning off "Show Conditional Indicators."

Non starter... I can't use flare with this turned off, have tons of conditional stuff.... (I tried... no way!)

[samjones6]

Hi,

After upgrading to Flare 7, I notice that while navigating through text using the arrow keys in the Flare XML editor window, the navigation goes kind of slowly and seems to eat up a lot of CPU on my system.

+1

The Flare 7 editor is really slow for me also.

Painfully slow to:

- open topics
- navigate within a topic

Flare is much much slower than robohelp on the same machine.

My Flare project is local.

System is: Core2 Quad Q9550 2.8 ghz, 3gb RAM, Win XP

Halp!

[samjones6]

My keyboard repeat rate is maybe 40cps or so, from a test I did in Notepad. As a comparison, I can scroll through a sample paragraph of text in about 7 seconds in Notepad (with no noticeable CPU usage), but the same paragraph takes about 17 sec. in Flare.

Yes, it appears that Flare does not use the system repeat rate.

I find this SUPER frustrating.

I reported this to madcap, Madcap Case 25808, Madcap feature request #43827

HTH!

[samjones6]

Flare's XML Editor is very, very different from a typical text editor, and it will not be as fast. It does real-time transforms of the text file into the WYSIWYG look. That costs resources, so when you're arrowing around in Flare, Flare is basically retransforming a bunch of XML, not simply displaying text.

My feeling is that the slow Flare editor is a pure bug.

Flare should be faster than I can type. EVERYTHING is faster than Flare on the same PC:

- Dreamweaver
- Visual Studio (which does tons of stuff while you type)
- Robohelp

You name it.

The Flare editor really needs work. It is painful to use.

[Andrew]

I won't disagree that Flare's editor should be faster, but I haven't had a problem with it keeping up with my typing since maybe Flare 2? Not saying your problem is not very real and aggravating!

[LTinker68]

Likewise, and I usually have numerous programs running at the same time. The only time I had problems was when the anti-virus software was scanning during the day for some odd reason. That slowed the whole computer down, though, not one specific program. I don't know if RoboHelp runs on the .NET platform, but you could try uninstalling .NET and reinstalling it. Just make sure you get the version required by Flare, which varies depending on which version of Flare you're running.

[samjones6]

I don't know if RoboHelp runs on the .NET platform, but you could try uninstalling .NET and reinstalling it. Just make sure you get the version required by Flare, which varies depending on which version of Flare you're running.

.NET has nothing to do with it... if Flare installs and runs, .NET is A-OK.

The issue is the Flare editor. It is just a woof!

I require some of the fancy single source stuff, so have to use Flare. But for content editing and creation, Flare is PAINFUL to use.

I write a lot less now than I used to. I literally do not have the time to wait on the Flare IDE.

Oh well.

[RamonS]

Why do you still use Flare? Based on your comments it is the worst piece of software you ever encountered.

[samjones6]

Why do you still use Flare? Based on your comments it is the worst piece of software you ever encountered.

The Flare architecture and output flexibility is great, and I use several outputs (I compile 15 or so outputs from my project).

The Flare editor is an unqualified dog. It is unquestionably the worst / slowest / buggiest / most keyboard hostile editor in the entire content-authoring industry.

You are right. The Flare editor is the worst piece of software on any of my computers.

That said, I am trying my darndest to help Madcap. I submit between two and fifteen bugs per week to the Madcap team (mostly related to the editor). When working with Madcap, I try to stay upbeat, and to bring issues to their attention in a constructive way. I hope they fix some of the issues I have raised.

I recognize that it is my own dumb fault for expecting Flare to be generally equivalent to Robohelp. I did multiple cycles of Flare evaluation, over a 2 year period, before migrating from Robohelp XP to Flare. Until I actually had to use flare day to day, I did not notice the issues. Issues themselves are no big deal. The issue with Flare is that there are SO MANY. Here are a few tasty ones for the past week or two:

- When using the XML editor, from the keyboard, in a topic with lots of conditional text, with the content and project explorers undocked on a 2nd monitor, when I hit alt-O to open the Format menu, usually the menu does not open, and I have to hit alt-O twice (not yet reported, need to repro on my laptop first).

- When using the XML editor, in a paragraph that has variables, keywords in it, starting at the end of the paragraph hitting ctrl-back arrow to jump words... the cursor stops at the variable, and I cannot use the keyboard to move through the keyboard (reproduced by Flare support, bug #44190. )

- The command line compiler reports success when actually the publish operations fail (see http://forums.madcapsoftware.com/viewto ... 13&t=13132 )

- Shift-end does not work properly to select text (bug #43595)

- The editor is slow to open files and to navigate.

FWIW...

[Andrew Heard]

FWIW I have no such trouble on a Dell Latitude 2.66 Core2 Duo 4GB RAM Windows 7. No probs at all. Sorry.

[NorthEast]

- Shift-end does not work properly to select text (bug #43595)

That one at least is fixed in v7, depending on what you expect it to do.
In v7 it will select text to the edge of of the the window (like Word), as opposed to selecting text to the end of tag (as it did in v6).

[RamonS]

FWIW I have no such trouble on a Dell Latitude 2.66 Core2 Duo 4GB RAM Windows 7. No probs at all. Sorry.

Same here on a AMD X2 4400 with 4GB RAM and W7 64bit. Flare isn't flawless and a good amount of issues is imported from .NET, but overall Flare works as advertised if not even better.

[LTinker68]

The Flare editor is an unqualified dog. It is unquestionably the worst / slowest / buggiest / most keyboard hostile editor in the entire content-authoring industry.

Do you have the same experience running Flare on other computers?

[samjones6]

- Shift-end does not work properly to select text (bug #43595)

That one at least is fixed in v7, depending on what you expect it to do.
In v7 it will select text to the edge of of the the window (like Word), as opposed to selecting text to the end of tag (as it did in v6).

Dude: It is NOT fixed in v7 in all cases. The bug above was reported on v7, and reproduced by Madcap, and is open on Madcap end under the bug # above.

I do not have a full copy of the issue report, so I cannot provide all the steps to repro (sorry, I am busy managing my own product... I am not able to manage Flare also... )

[samjones6]

The Flare editor is an unqualified dog. It is unquestionably the worst / slowest / buggiest / most keyboard hostile editor in the entire content-authoring industry.

Do you have the same experience running Flare on other computers?

Yup.

I should note that the issues I report to Madcap are almost always (over %90) reproduced by Madcap support and opened as bugs.

[samjones6]

Well, the Madcap guys opened a bug on this.... current bug number is 44371.

[young@heart]

Have you checked in Task Manager that hh.exe isn't running, perhaps even more than one instance? Each time it runs it uses up to 50% of cpu and impacts performance noticably. When running Flare 7 it doesn't shut down after veiwing CHM files so may be an issue for you.
There is a short thread on this (I'll have to learn how to point to it some time.) and a bug fix request entered.
Phil