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 How to speed up edit window update?
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amdi8
New Member

5 Posts

Posted - Feb 28 2005 :  4:18:52 PM  Show Profile
I've been using Visual Assist for quite a while (currently using version 10.0.1283.0 with MS Visual Studio 2003).

However, Visual Assist is totally getting in the way because it's slowing things down too much. The edit window refreshes noticeably slower than I'm typing at full speed than if I have Visual Assist turned off. This is extremely noticeable over remote desktop, but it's still annoying locally.

All I want Visual Assist for is the better intellisense. I'm willing to give up syntax coloring, autocorrections, and anything displayed on the window, but even though I turn it all off, it still slows me down.

Any hints on what I can do to speed things up? I'm running on a dual Xeon 3.2 GHz with 2MB of RAM, so upgrading is not really an option). Otherwise, we'll probably do without Visual Assist for our next project.

Thanks.

feline
Whole Tomato Software

United Kingdom
18942 Posts

Posted - Mar 01 2005 :  5:35:39 PM  Show Profile
are you only getting the slow down over remote desktop? there is a known issue with remote desktop.

if you are getting it under normal conditions try deleting your ncb file. the IDE is quite capable of corrupting this even when VAX is not installed, and this can cause a noticeable slow down.

running on a 1.2gig AMD with 512meg of RAM i get no slow down with VAX with everything turned on, so it is not VAX its self.

zen is the art of being at one with the two'ness
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amdi8
New Member

5 Posts

Posted - Mar 01 2005 :  6:40:52 PM  Show Profile
I am getting the slowdown all the time. Without Remote Desktop is not instantly noticeable, but when I'm typing at full speed it's annoying because VAX can't keep up.

As soon as I turn VAX off, everything is back to being perfectly fast and smooth.

I guess I'll just have to learn to live without VAX then. Maybe Visual Studio 2005 will have better intellisense. Here's hoping anyway...
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Valyk
Senior Member

Canada
26 Posts

Posted - Mar 02 2005 :  08:19:56 AM  Show Profile
Is the option "Show current scope when typing" of the VAView window enabled? This option can also slowdown the edition.
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LarryLeonard
Tomato Guru

USA
1041 Posts

Posted - Mar 02 2005 :  11:57:50 AM  Show Profile
So, have you deleted your NCB file?
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feline
Whole Tomato Software

United Kingdom
18942 Posts

Posted - Mar 02 2005 :  7:11:46 PM  Show Profile
deleting the NCB file has been known to fix this problem, eg 3473

zen is the art of being at one with the two'ness
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evolution
Tomato Guru

USA
105 Posts

Posted - Mar 19 2005 :  4:38:07 PM  Show Profile
I've been having the exact same problem. It actually seems to get a little worse with each new version (though that could just be my imagination).

- I do not work over remote desktop, so that's not the issue here
- I have deleted the .ncb file
- I have created a zero byte .ncb file and marked it read only
- I have disabled the "Show current scope when typing" option

Some files exhibit noticably more slowdown than others, but I can't really see any obvious connection between the files that have the most "lag". As amdi8 mentioned, simply disabling VAX through the VAssistX menu immediately solves the problem and the editor returns to normal smooth operation (albeit with no VAX).


Could it be the "list of methods in current file" dropdown? I've noticed that when I'm typing very rapidly, where I'm getting really bad lag [between when I type the character and when it appears in the editor window] of up to a second or more, the "context" box (the editbox that displays the current function/if block) is blinking/refreshing at about the same rate as the editor is updating, even when I haven't changed scope/function/nesting block. If I hold down a key (say "backspace") until it start repeating, there is no lag, and the context box doesn't appear to try to refresh until I release the key. On the other hand, if I actually press the backspace key a bunch of times, there is lots of lag and the text inside the context box is constantly blinking/refreshing.

Hope that helps - it seems that this problem only affects some types of projects/solutions, since some of the moderators mentioned that they never see this. Everyone here at work that uses VAX gets the exact same editor window lag described in this thread, and we've tried all the solutions suggested in the various threads about this problem. It's actually the primary reason that my co-workers that don't use VAX, don't. If we can't figure this out, I don't think I will continue to use VAX either - a full second of lag when typing is just too much.
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feline
Whole Tomato Software

United Kingdom
18942 Posts

Posted - Mar 20 2005 :  5:16:18 PM  Show Profile
thats not good

evolution are you also running .NET 2003? do you have any other plugin's installed?

can you try turning off:

VAX options -> text editor -> general -> view context and definition fields

i did once see a problem where typing at the bottom of a very long cpp file (something line 50,000 lines from memory) was very slow with VAX enabled.

do you have any very large files in your projects? what language are you using?

if you know a specific file that produces a lot of slow down can you try opening this file on its own in the IDE with open file? this way there is no open project to confuse the situation.

it sounds like there is a specific cause for the problem, but finding that trigger is the real trick.

zen is the art of being at one with the two'ness
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evolution
Tomato Guru

USA
105 Posts

Posted - Mar 21 2005 :  11:04:04 AM  Show Profile
- Yes, I'm also using .NET 2003.

- installed plug-ins are:
Microsoft AppVerifier
Incredibuild
Xbox D3D & file event viewer

- I'll try disabling the "View context and definition fields" option. I tried to find that option the other day before I made my original post (and of course it was staring me right in the face the entire time).

- the issue doesn't seem related to the length of the .cpp file. The module I'm working on right now has really bad lag (probably the worst I've seen), and it only has ~600 lines. I did upgrade to the VAX 1298 around the same time that I started working on this module. It would be interesting to see if I get the same lag using an earlier version of VAX on the same module. I'll try that later when it quiets down around here a little.

- We do not have any extremely large (greater than 10,000 lines) files in our solutions. I generally work in two solutions, one of which has around 20 projects, the other around 30. The length of our .cpp files range anywhere from <100 lines up to ~7000 lines.

- I work in C++ almost exclusively.

- I'll try the suggestion of opening the file by itself without its associated project, and let you know what effect this has.

Thanks for the suggestions! :) I'll also ask some of my co-workers that are experiencing the problem to try these suggestions as well.
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feline
Whole Tomato Software

United Kingdom
18942 Posts

Posted - Mar 21 2005 :  4:40:45 PM  Show Profile
i work on C++ solutions of a similar size quite often and i never get any slowdown problems with VAX. since several of you are having this problem i am wondering if one of the other plugin's is having an effect.

can you try disabling the other plugins for me? you can use:

tools menu -> add-in manager...

from the help un-ticking the "startup" column for all of the other plugins and restarting the IDE should do this. with any luck this will fix the lag problem even with the VAX context and definition fields showing.

if it does is there any chance you could try and see which plugin or combination of plugins causes the problem?

zen is the art of being at one with the two'ness
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evolution
Tomato Guru

USA
105 Posts

Posted - Mar 21 2005 :  7:52:15 PM  Show Profile
Disabling the "View context and definition fields" option had no effect.


Disabling all other plug-ins had no effect.


When I opened the file by itself (i.e. double-clicking the .cpp file from windows explorer with no other IDE windows open), there was no lag whatsoever while working on the file. Many of the symbols in the file were colored incorrectly, however (which I suppose is to be expected?).
Next, I tried disabling the "Parse all header files when opening a project", but this didn't really make much of a difference. I disabled the option, cleared the symbol cache, and pressed the rebuild button to rebuild the symbol table. After restarting the IDE and reopening the solution, it still seemed to parse all of the project header files.

After doing this, at first there was almost no lag. After working for about 10 - 15 minutes, viewing/opening other files in the solution, the lag started getting progressively worse. After viewing 5 - 6 other .cpp files from different projects, the lag was back up to ~1 - 1.5 seconds.
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evolution
Tomato Guru

USA
105 Posts

Posted - Mar 22 2005 :  2:04:39 PM  Show Profile
I think I've discovered the culprit - include directories.

I go to VAXOptions -> Projects -> C/C++ Directories. The platform drop-down is set to Custom, and contains the following entries (since I generally work in code that applies to multiple platforms):
C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Xbox SDK\\Xbox\\Include;
C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Xbox SDK\\Include;
C:\\Program Files\\That Other Console That's Still Unannounced\\Include;
C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows XP SP2\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\atlmfc\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\PlatformSDK\\include\\prerelease;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\PlatformSDK\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\SDK\\v1.1\\include;
I tried removing the first three include directories. After restarting my IDE - no lag whatsoever! I then readded those include directories - welcome back lag. I then switched the drop-down to Win32, which contains:
C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Xbox SDK\\Include;
C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows XP SP2\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\atlmfc\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\PlatformSDK\\include\\prerelease;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\Vc7\\PlatformSDK\\include;
c:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\\SDK\\v1.1\\include;
After restarting the IDE, there was a *little* lag - approx. half the amount of lag I was getting previously. I assume this is because there is only one console include directory as opposed to three. I also realize now that the files in which I experience the most lag are the files which are not at all related to consoles - i.e. they don't include any of the files from the console include directories.

So for now, I've switched the platform to "Custom" with all the console include directories removed.

So now the question is: is something configured incorrectly on our end to cause this in the first place, or is this a bug in VAX? Keep in mind that in most cases, it may not be feasible for us to change project configurations (even if they are technically incorrect) if the only problem with the current configuration is that it slows down VAX.
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support
Whole Tomato Software

5566 Posts

Posted - Mar 22 2005 :  9:34:49 PM  Show Profile
We suspect there exist declarations in the headers you removed that make use of complex preprocessor macros. VA X might be spending too much time parsing them.

Can you generate logs for us?

http://www.wholetomato.com/support/faq.html#log
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support
Whole Tomato Software

5566 Posts

Posted - Apr 01 2005 :  11:15:47 AM  Show Profile
Evolution isolated the problem to a custom, complex macro used "10,000 times" in declarations. The macro slowed the VA X parser.

We are working with Evolution to find a fix for all customers. We suspect it will help amdi8 and others.
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support
Whole Tomato Software

5566 Posts

Posted - Apr 04 2005 :  1:18:18 PM  Show Profile
case=552
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