Optimize archive on Context Menu

[MBPBo]

I am new to PowerArchiver 2015 so maybe somewhere there are options to do these things, but in looking through the user interface I could not find how to do them.

Since I cannot find options for these settings, these are feature requests for the next version:

1. Preview Window: If I resize the Preview window, I would like to have subsequent sessions remember its new size. Even on my laptop screen, the default width of the Preview window is very narrow and leaves almost half of my screen as empty white space.

2. More information for image files: When an image is displayed in the Preview window, show the image dimensions somewhere (perhaps in the Preview window title bar).

Suggested enhancement to existing feature:

Configuration: View: File Listing: Use color coded filelist - When selected, this option, with the default colors of the program, cause the currently selected file in the archive list to have most of its information become unreadable due to the text color/background color lack of contrast. Only the filename remains readable in this case. Suggest using some technique to keep all file information readable for the currently selected file, without the user having to change most of the default colors for this option.

Regards

[spwolf]

Hello - thank you for taking your time to send us feedback!

1. Lets try this - close all PA windows. Open PA… resize PA preview window. Close PA. Start PA again - did resize stick? Make sure you do not have multiple windows open!

3. Color coded file-list - Thanks, we will improve this. It works good in dark skin already.

2. Can you open this as special thread in Wishlist forums?

thanks!

[MBPBo]

I guess I may have forgotten to mention a few items of information that could be important:

I’m actually using PowerArchiver 2015 Toolbox, not just PowerArchiver 2015. Not sure how the code base may differ between the versions. Also, I’m using this on Windows 7 Home Premium, 64-bit.

Prior to writing my first post about the Preview Window resizing issue, I had tried a LOT of combinations of actions to see if I could get the resized window to be remembered - all without success. Following your straightforward directions yielded the same result - the Preview Window always reverts back to its apparent default size on the next execution of PA.

And just for completeness about the color issue, I am using the Interface Office Black. It appears any Interface setting where the main background of the program screen is white has the low contrast color issue for the selected file.

[spwolf]

can you click on bottom arrow under Configuration icon in Options, save your settings and send them over to support at conexware dot com, please? It might be due to some setting that you have enabled and this will allow us to test with same setting as yours.

thanks!

[Mili]

Hello,

thanks for sending over the settings. we have applied your settings and have changed the size of the preview window. Upon exit and restart of PowerArchiver, the preview window size is remembered.
Is there a specific way that you are using the preview window and/or how are you exiting PowerArchiver?

We’ll try to reproduce using the same steps.
thanks!

[spwolf]

When it comes to color coding, we added one more options to the skins settings.ini file which controls the selected text color… and made it black for default skins so all info is now visible:
http://www.powerarchiver.com/test/release15/powarc150202.exe

thank you!

[MBPBo]

After seeing that my settings were not the issue causing the Preview Window resizing forgetfulness, I should have just chalked it up to a peculiarity of my laptop setup since the issue was really just a minor nuisance. But I let my curiosity get the better of me and so I started to fish around on my PC to see if I could get it working.

The first step toward a solution was finding that I already had 2 installs of previous PowerArchiver versions (2012 and 2013) from a few years ago that had come from some giveaways. The 2012 version was almost completely removed already but the 2013 version was fairly intact. I first uninstalled both, but that left the 2015 version a bit messed up in the registry since there appear to be common entries for all versions. I suspect that some conflict between 2013 and 2015 versions was the original cause of my Preview window issue. So then I uninstalled PA 2015, deleted ALL registry entries with “PowerArchiver” in their keys, and re-installed PA 2015 Toolbox from scratch.

I started the freshly installed PA 2015 Toolbox, resized the Preview window and exited. Upon restart of PA after a resizing of the Preview window, the resized Preview window would be remembered! - SOMETIMES!! I tracked down the registry entry used to hold the Preview window width (PWidth0-2) and tried hard-coding some values to see how PA would behave. The default width of the Preview window is 200 pixels. I found that values up to 782 pixels were acted upon properly by PA 2015 and were persistent across sessions. Any value over 782 pixels caused PA 2015 to revert to the default size of 200 pixels for the Preview window (all this without the Archive Folders Bar displayed). On my 1600x900 laptop screen, I can comfortably resize the Preview window to 980 pixels and the preview seems just fine. But on the next start of PA 2015, my 980-pixel wide Preview window is back to only 200 pixels.

I think this has come almost full circle now. I thought it was a feature request initially. Then it seemed to be a case of my bad, having old versions still installed causing it to not work. And once it was working, more or less, it again seems to have become a feature request to allow the Preview window to be more than 782 pixels wide.

Sorry for the long-winded monologue…

Regards

[spwolf]

excellent troubleshooting! We will enable any size to be maximum in the future.

I think code is protecting users from maximizing the preview so filelist is not seen. We will remove this.

thanks again!

[Mili]

Hello,

Preview window should not have those limitations anymore with the latest update.
Please let us know;
http://dl.powerarchiver.com/2015/powarc150304.exe

Thanks!

[MBPBo]

I tried the latest PA 2015 (15.03.04) a few days ago when I saw that a new version had been released.

The Preview window works great! Now my landscape photos can completely fill the Preview window nicely.

And if the width of the Preview window does not allow for the full display of the selected columns on the left of the screen, a horizontal scroll bar appears at the bottom of the left window to allow any necessary scrolling. Perfect!

I would still be interested to see the dimensions of images listed somewhere on the Preview window (discussed in thread “Display more info in Preview Window”).

Great work!