zoom in/out command sticks

I have the same issue with zooming via keys. I also have the same zoom problem using mousewheel: it starts zooming and won't stop

my details:
Mac OS X 10.6.6

Model Name: MacBook Pro
  Model Identifier: MacBookPro6,2
  Processor Name: Intel Core i5
  Processor Speed: 2.53 GHz
  Number Of Processors: 1
  Total Number Of Cores: 2
  L2 Cache (per core): 256 KB
  L3 Cache: 3 MB
  Memory: 4 GB
  Processor Interconnect Speed: 4.8 GT/s
  Boot ROM Version: MBP61.0057.B0C
  SMC Version (system): 1.58f15
  Serial Number (system): W8015HF0AGV
  Hardware UUID: A4F2CFE8-6DE3-551C-97FC-81C3311BBADC
  Sudden Motion Sensor:
  State: Enabled

I confirm this bug

I can confirm this bug as well. Would be great to get it addressed soon. Stellarium is close to useless without the ability to zoom in on an area of the sky.

I have had a similar problem where when I start Stellarium it is in full zoom in and will not return to zoom out.

This bug obviously affects far more than just 4 people!
It is such an obvious thing that must be creating frustration for a lot of people. How come no fix has been released yet?
When I use Stellarium at my astronomical society I often boot up the previous version just so as not to have to deal with this.

Don't get me wrong. Stellarium is really great and I love it. I also continue to recommend it to everyone, but I do warn them about this flaw. it would be so nice to see a fix soon.

I frequently do astronomy outreach in schools and libraries as well as speak at museums. I've stopped recommending Stellarium to mac users because of this bug. I'm able to downgrade to get around this but it's too complicated to explain that to a teacher who just wants something simple to work with in his/her class

The bug is still there in 0.11.0 (Mac OS X 10.6.8). Very disappointing. I would have expected such an annoying bug to be fixed before a new release Luckily, Stellarium 0.10.5 is still available via SourceForge, so I'll go back to that version for the moment. Is there any Mac user out there who is not affected by this bug? I guess its importance has to be set accordingly.

I was expecting this bug to be fixed in the next version, but 0.11 came out and it is still there. It's a major inconvenience to use zoom in Stellarium for now. :/

I can also confirm the problems with zooming using the up/down keys on the keyboard. I am using Mac OS-X Snow Leopard with the current version of Stellarium (downloaded an hour ago).

I ALSO notice really poor zooming behavior using my macbook trackpad. When I swipe a bit, SOMETIMES I get a small change in zoom level, but very sporadic and unuseable.

For what its worth, I think I know exactly what the problem is, as I've run into this issue in other software that I've written. I could be wrong, as I don't have time to look into the source code. Basically Stellarium is reacting to individual character/key codes. This is a problem, because when you hold down an arrow key, page down key, or most any key, the computer will very shortly start to repeatedly send that code to the software (sometimes dozens per second). Stellarium seems to be queueing these up and attempting to react to each key code. It cannot keep up with the rapid fire repeat rate, and thus gets behind. When you release the key, it continues processing all the repeated codes that are stored up until it reacts to each one. So when you release the zoom key, it keeps on zooming for a while....and when you release the left arrow key it keeps on slewing left for a while. You can make this problem less noticeable by configuring the character repeat rate in the Control Panels in Windows. Selecting the slowest possible rate will help a lot, but the problem is still there.

To fix this problem (if I've diagnosed it correctly), someone needs to rewrite the code so that instead of responding to individual ASCII codes, the code needs to check for the status of the key. If its pressed, continue to execute the function. If not, stop. I know this sounds simpler than it is. This is a very common problem. If the language this is written in does not already have a function that checks for key status, an easy workaround is to call a small subroutine each time the code returns from carrying out a function associated with a key press. This subroutine simply dumps the queue by quickly checking each ASCII code in the queue and doing nothing with it until it. Because this can be done so quickly, the queue empties and upon sensing an empty queue control is then returned to the main program. Upon sensing another key-press the task is carried out and the subroutine is again called to dump the queue. In this way as soon as the key is released the program will at most finish the current iteration of the task and then halt. This is far less elegant than continuously monitoring key status, but it works. Sorry I cannot offer to look into this myself. This is a great program everyone!

Paul,

that's definitely not the reason. The bug occurs even when you only press the key combination once, and zooming in stops as soon as one presses another key.

Cheers

Burkhard.

Burkhard: Hmmm... I wonder if we are using different versions, because that is not how it works on mine. I am using 0.11.1 on Windows. After your comment I tried it again. If I press and hold the left arrow button for 5 seconds and then press and hold the right arrow button for 5 seconds and then press G, it acts as if the commands are queued up. First it spins left for considerably longer than 5 seconds, then right for much longer than 5 seconds, and then when if finally stops it removes the Ground texture. Pressing other keys does not interrupt the process on mine...I just have to wait for it to catch up. Also, quickly pressing a key just once does not cause any problems. It is interesting that it is working differently for you.

No wonder you don't see this on Windows. Seems to be a Mac only bug. (I also have the kb queueing effect on Mac OS, but that's totally different from the reported problem.)

Anyhow, the problem seems to have been resolved in 0.11.1. Thanks!

Burkhard.

Burkhard: Ahhh, well that would explain the difference then :) Has someone already reported the keyboard queueing issue in another report?

Burkhard, you are really sure that issue was solved?

Hi All, just downloaded Stellarium v 0.11.1 for Mac OS (I'm running Snow Leopard).  This new version stinks!  I have this same bug times everything it seems.  I hit "J" to go backwards in Time and it starts out slow then takes off at Lightspeed.  Same for "L" in forward time.  Left and Right arrows behaving weird and Zoom In and Zoom Out are totally out of sync.  I hit Command+Up Arrow and nothing happens.  I hit them again and it takes off like crazy.
I've gone back to v 0.10.6 and live with the lagging Zoom In/Out problem.
But I like the new changes, they just don't work for me.  Sorry I am a photographer and not a computer code writer or I'd help.  But at least I can help find the bugs.
Cheers

McClean Image Studio- James McClean, Photographer

Voicemail: (850) 417-8388

Visit my web galleries at http://www.McCleanImageStudio.com

--- On Wed, 11/9/11, Alexander Wolf <email address hidden> wrote:

From: Alexander Wolf <email address hidden>
Subject: [Bug 712112] Re: zoom in/out command sticks
To: <email address hidden>
Date: Wednesday, November 9, 2011, 2:55 PM

Burkhard, you are really sure that issue was solved?

--
You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
report.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/712112

Title:
  zoom in/out command sticks

Status in Stellarium:
  In Progress

Bug description:
  just installed v 0.10.6 on Mac OSx SnowLeopard.  Command Up Arrow to
  zoom in (and Cmd Down Arrow) sticks.  That is to say that releasing
  the button does not terminate the command, rather it continues to zoom
  out of control until I hit another key.  This strikes me as very
  awkward, earlier versions never did this.  Thanks for your efforts,
  James McClean

  2011-02-02T15:41:49
  Mac OS X 10.6
  Compiled with GCC 4.0.1
  Qt runtime version: 4.7.0
  Qt compilation version: 4.7.0
  Addressing mode: 32-bit
  You look like a Mac user. How would you like to write some system info code here? That would help a lot.
  /Applications/Stellarium.app/Contents/MacOS/stellarium
   -------------------------------------------------------
  [ This is Stellarium 0.10.6 - http://www.stellarium.org ]
  [ Copyright (C) 2000-2010 Fabien Chereau et al          ]
   -------------------------------------------------------
  Writing log file to: "/Users/James/Library/Application Support/Stellarium/log.txt"
  File search paths:
    0 .  "/Users/James/Library/Application Support/Stellarium"
    1 .  "/Applications/Stellarium.app/Contents/Resources"
  Attempting to use an existing older config file.
  Config file is:  "/Users/James/Library/Application Support/Stellarium/config.ini"
  OpenGL supported version:  "2.1 ATI-1.6.26"
  Qt GL paint engine is:  "OpenGL2"
  Cache directory is:  "/Users/James/Library/Caches/stellarium/stellarium"
  Sky language is  "en_GB"
  Application language is  "en_GB"
  Loading Solar System data ...
  Loaded 38 / 38 planet orbits from "/Applications/Stellarium.app/Contents/Resources/data/ssystem.ini"
  Loading star data ...
  "Loading "/Applications/Stellarium.app/Contents/Resources/stars/default/stars_0_0v0_1.cat": 0_0v0_1; 5013"
  "Loading "/Applications/Stellarium.app/Conte...

Sorry for the late reply - just catching up with my e-mail.

Yes, the original problem (press CMD-up/CMD-down just once and Stellarim zooms in/out until another key is pressed) is definitely gone for me with version 11.1 and Mac OS 10.6.8.

Zooming in and out still behave a bit strangely - pressing CMD-up/CMD-down just once does nothing, but pressing and holding these keys works (stops zooming in/out when I release the keys). There may be a bit of lag because of keyboard queueing, but hardly noticeable.

The time controls (J and L) now also have a stronger effect for me - pressing these keys just once seems to cause a speedup by a factor of 10 or so.

Cheers

Burkhard.

As this bug report is about zoom functionality, that is all that should be discussed. For other issues, file separate bug reports.

This is an issue with Qt. I've just committed a hack to try and deal with this. However, it is better to use Page Up/Page Down, as it does not suffer from this Qt issue. For Mac users on the smaller keyboards, this is the fn-up & fn-down key combination. Use this until the next build is released.

Diff link:
http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~stellarium/stellarium/trunk/revision/5296