Inkscape Forum Inkscape > Slow performance on 4.5 MB file

Inkscape users,

I have an Inkscape file that is about 4.5 megabytes in size. It is
essentially an A4 size comic book page.

One layer contains the orginal scanned pencils, which were in PNG
format. The next layer are flat colours, no gradients, just simple paths
with colour fills.

The top layer is the inks, which were almost all created with the
calligraphy pen. This seems to be where the problem is. Even just
locking/unlocking the layer causes Inkscape to pause for many seconds,
maybe 10 or so.

My computer is by no means the latest, but it should handle these file
sizes alright. I use GIMP and Photoshop on larger file sizes without any
noticeable slowdown. (My computer is a 2.8GHz dual processor, with 2 GB
RAM, running Ubuntu 9.04).

Is it normal for a collection of paths created with the calligraphy pen
to be this bulky and slow a system down?

I tried removing the original scan images to try and reduce the file
size, but it has not helped.

Is there something I'm doing inefficiently or wrong, or is it just that
complicated paths can't help but soak up lots of memory.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

--
Dave M G

On Saturday, 27 June 2009 13:07:48 Dave M G wrote:
> Is there something I'm doing inefficiently or wrong, or is it just that
> complicated paths can't help but soak up lots of memory.
I have long moaned that "Nodes mean slow" :( I have a fast machine and 
2gigs
of RAM. It makes no difference. I think it's all the looping through 
those long
lists of nodes....

You are doomed. Unless you can simplify or chop-up your comic page into 
frames
and assemble them later in Gimp.


\d
--
home: http://otherwise.relics.co.za/
2D vector animation : https://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/things/
Font manager : https://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/fontypython/

Donn,

Thank you for responding.

> I have long moaned that "Nodes mean slow" :( I have a fast machine and 2gigs 
> of RAM. It makes no difference. I think it's all the looping through those long 
> lists of nodes....
>
> You are doomed. Unless you can simplify or chop-up your comic page into frames 
> and assemble them later in Gimp.

Okay. While it's a little disappointing that there isn't a way to
optimize the file for better performance, it's good to know that at
least I'm not doing something wrong.

I'll export the paths into a PNG and handle the colouring in Photoshop
or GIMP. It means committing to rasterizing the images sooner in my
process than I had hoped, but hey, life is full of compromises.

--
Dave M G

And please be sure to file a bug/feature request at
http://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/

In the end there will obviously always be cases where Inkscape is too
slow, but Inkscape could most definitely be faster in some cases. And
just locking/unlocking the layer should (from an intuitive standpoint)
NOT cause such a big pause.

Hey,

I'd like to write a Python script in Inkscape, but I cannot find 
something
like a straightforward "API" or something. I have seriously Googled 
quite a
bit on it, but everything looks horribly complicated. Is there a
straightforward way for creating a line from A to B, for example? Or 
does
everything I want to do in Python require some complicated XML handling?

Thanks,

Maarten


On 6/30/09 12:16 PM, "Jasper van de Gronde" <th.v.d.gronde@hccnet.nl> 
wrote:

>> 
>> 
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________________________________________________________________
Maarten van der Velde
graphic designer

Powel ASA Klæbuveien 194, NO-7037 Trondheim, NORWAY
Phone: +47 73 80 45 00 - Fax: +47 73 80 45 01
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80
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Email: Maarten.van-der-Velde@powel.no
http://www.powel.com/



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All interaction with the svg involves the XML representation. In you
example, to create a new line you would add a bezzier curve objext
into the DOM. (I think that is the right term). Fortunately, the xml
handling code is available in python. Check out existind scripts for
examples.

-Rob A>

On 7/1/09, Maarten van der Velde <Maarten.van-der-Velde@powel.no> wrote:
> Maarten
>> NOT cause such a big pause.
>>>> long
>>> I'll export the paths into a PNG and handle the colouring in Photoshop
>
> Email: Maarten.van-der-Velde@powel.no
> This footnote also confirms that this email message has been swept by
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-user
>

--
Sent from my mobile device

Maarten van der Velde wrote:
> I'd like to write a Python script in Inkscape, but I cannot find something
> like a straightforward "API" or something. I have seriously Googled quite a
> bit on it, but everything looks horribly complicated. Is there a
> straightforward way for creating a line from A to B, for example? Or does
> everything I want to do in Python require some complicated XML handling?

A number of people have proposed building a drawing API on top of the
current xml handling base, but no one has followed through. You might be
able to save some effort if you merge with svg-utils:

http://www.programmer-art.org/projects/svg-utils

I'm still wishing for a model by which we have access to the living
inkscape internals and access to draw with all of those tools in python.

Aaron Spike

Hey everybdoy,

Thanks for your replies.

So, basically, if I'd want to get information from the underlaying 
drawing
(like the coordinates of a node), I'd have to do XML operations? Like
finding an attribute and it's value, etc?

> http://www.programmer-art.org/projects/svg-utils

I'll have a look!

> 
> I'm still wishing for a model by which we have access to the living
> inkscape internals and access to draw with all of those tools in python.

Yes, that was what I was hoping for. A bit like in Blender, maybe.
Programmig in Python there is surprisingly straight-forward, compared to
its´ user-interface :)  I guess people would create a lot more "effects" 
if
there was a simple and straightforward way of saying things like:

x=selection.drawingNode[3].x

or

myBezier.addDrawingNode(myNewNode)

Kind regards,

Maarten




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Maarten van der Velde wrote:
> or 
> 
> myBezier.addDrawingNode(myNewNode)

Keep going! It would be very helpful to your cause if you could start a
page on the Wiki to design the API you seek. Implementation is probably
pretty easy here, I think it is the API design part that is holding
people back.

Aaron Spike

On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:39:45 +0200
Maarten van der Velde <Maarten.van-der-Velde@powel.no> wrote:

> So, basically, if I'd want to get information from the underlaying
> drawing (like the coordinates of a node), I'd have to do XML
> operations? Like finding an attribute and it's value, etc?

For a node, yes.

Some python extensions actually call another instance of inkscape on
the current file, using the --query-all flag which makes inkscape dump
id,x,y,w,h (i.e. bounding box) for all objects, something you can't
really do just parsing the XML, on account of possible layered
transformations.

Cheers -Terry

Hi,
Use PIL (Python Image Library) or for Lines/Graphs
http://code.google.com/p/svgfig/

http://www.google.fr/search?q=drawing+with+python&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

Norman

On Wed, Jul 1, 2009 at 9:56 AM, Maarten van der

Hi,

Thanks for the links. That looks very good... Something like that, 
indeed, but then straight from Inkscape.

Maarten


-----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
Van: Norman Khine [mailto:norman@khine.net]
Verzonden: wo 1-7-2009 10:39
Aan: Inkscape User Community
Onderwerp: Re: [Inkscape-user] Python API

Hi,
Use PIL (Python Image Library) or for Lines/Graphs
http://code.google.com/p/svgfig/

http://www.google.fr/search?q=drawing+with+python&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

Norman

On Wed, Jul 1, 2009 at 9:56 AM, Maarten van der

I think the following email came directly to me but was intended for the
list. I invite everyone who is interested in this to also look at the
recent thread by Soren on the dev list.

Aaron Spike

Hello all,
> > http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/QuickDrawingAPI
>From my recent toying with python and SVG I have discovered that you can do a 
lot of stuff in Python-Cairo and then generate an SVG file from that!

It seems to me that a lot of the "Artistic API" stuff is already done.
( Not all of it - Inkscape seems to have more scope than what cairo 
provides.
I think it's an SVG version thing. )

Perhaps working with the Cairo (and pycairo) teams could get this idea 
further
and faster.

\d

Hey everybody,

ClarisWorks etc...:  The meaning of life IS Inkscape, isn't it...? ^^

But seriously, elaborating on my previous question (about the creation 
of an
API for creating "artistic" python scripts), wouldn´t it be handy to 
have a
"build in" script editor? Or is that already present and haven't I been 
able
to locate it in Inkscape? Again, I'm thinking of the way one creates VBA
applications in Word... These things would lower the barriers for users 
to
quickly create some scripts, which would result in a more available 
effects
on the internet as well.

Regards,

Maarten


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