I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

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LePaul
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by LePaul »

Okay, good to know

So now I am stuck wondering where the STLViewer executable resides after install
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Krishty
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

Usually %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\Papa’s Best\STL Viewer e.g. here it is A:\Users\Krishty\AppData\Local\Programs\Papa’s Best\STL Viewer
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by GrueMaster »

Why not install it in ProgramFiles? By installing it in %LOCALAPPDATA%, it is only available to the user that installed it. And is possibly why it fails to get recognized when rebooting.
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Krishty
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

If you want to install for all users, you can
  • launch a command window
  • type msiexec /i <your path to Papas Best STL Viewer.msi> MSIINSTALLPERUSER=0
  • hit enter
  • … you’ll notice the setup needs elevation and installs to the global program files folder; it should then be accessable for every user.
This happens automatically if you run from an administrator account (not just from a normal user account with elevation).

However, per-user install is the recommended way because it works well with Roaming User Profiles and corporate environments (where not everyone is an admin). For me, it’s foremost a trust thing – you shouldn’t need to grant full admin rights to a tool just so it displays a simple file!
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by GrueMaster »

Krishty wrote: March 12th, 2019, 4:19 pm you shouldn’t need to grant full admin rights to a tool just so it displays a simple file!
Heh, I can fully relate. I am the maintainer of Win32DiskImager, and I have the same feelings about drag and drop. We added that before Windows 7 took off and removed that function (works if you run Explorer as Admin). All we used it for is to get a path and filename.

Sadly, I haven't had time or a development system to keep up with all of the Windows changes that keep happening. Seems every time some new major patch for Windows 10 comes out, it breaks my app in new mysterious ways.
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by LePaul »

Anything that makes it simple for the end user is ideal. And mimic other program installs they have done. If they have to do registry or command line things to make it work, I may just pass. I just don't want to do a video that causes a zillion comments asking how/why it won't work for them.
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Krishty
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

I’m really interested in getting it to work on your system, because once fixed, more users can profit from it. My experience is, if there’s a problem with the program, not even one out of ten affected users will report it, so it’s important for me to not let you go :D

I don’t think admin rights have anything to do with the thumbnails not working – I’ve had some dozen testers and this point and rights were never an issue.

One more thing you could test is:
  • Open the performance options of your computer, like here
  • make sure that Show thumbnails instead of icons is checked
GrueMaster wrote: March 12th, 2019, 10:12 pmSadly, I haven't had time or a development system to keep up with all of the Windows changes that keep happening. Seems every time some new major patch for Windows 10 comes out, it breaks my app in new mysterious ways.
Yes, don’t get me started on this! There are some reasons why you cannot select Install for all users / install just for me from the setup, but they are so complicated, it took me two weekends to figure out …
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

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I do have Thumbnails set
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by LePaul »

I'll have to check, I had a busy evening last night CNC'ing some aluminum parts so I didn't get to it
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

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I keep meaning to get back to this...since I miss having the preview working on that machine!
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

Haha, great :)

I tried to reproduce your issues by installing the old version to a virtual machine, and installing the new version over it. I could not find any issues, though – everything worked fine. I’ll keep digging …
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by LePaul »

No, uninstall a working version, then install it again. Then try to get the thumbnails to work. I still cant
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

LePaul wrote: March 20th, 2019, 11:38 pm No, uninstall a working version, then install it again. Then try to get the thumbnails to work. I still cant
I just tried that, and it works for me. The virtual machine I used for testing is limited to the 32-bit versions, though.

If you have trouble checking the registry values, you can just export your entire HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT tree to a text file (right-click → Export) and send it to me, then I’ll analyze it. (But if you do it, do it via private message please, because one can see which programs are installed via that export!)
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Re: I wrote a bloat-free STL viewer

Post by Krishty »

I released a new stable version. It fixes many pitfalls from the old versions, and comes with a few enhancements ... https://papas-best.com/stlthumbnails_en

Image

LePaul, you can try installing the new version - maybe it helps with your problems. Feedback on reddit was very positive.

Should I create a new thread for this?
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