| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78035] |
Thu, 20 October 2011 11:11 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Paul van Delst writes:
> Maybe it's a different 5% each time....
This may be the truth!!
The problem I am working on this morning does a fair
bit of overplotting of data on a line plot. And, I
swear to God, every time I run the program I am getting
a different result with extraneous lines drawn at
apparently random locations! Sometimes the data shows
up and sometimes it doesn't. I haven't been able to
make heads or tails of it so far.
Cheers,
David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.idlcoyote.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78036 is a reply to message #78035] |
Thu, 20 October 2011 11:02  |
Paul Van Delst[1]
Messages: 1157
Registered: April 2002
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Senior Member |
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Hello,
David Fanning wrote:
> ITTVIS claims the graphics system is "95% working",
> but I seem to run into that other 5% every time I
> try to do something useful.
Maybe it's a different 5% each time....
:oD
cheers,
paulv
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78038 is a reply to message #78036] |
Thu, 20 October 2011 01:43 |
lecacheux.alain
Messages: 325
Registered: January 2008
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Senior Member |
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On 20 oct, 00:43, David Fanning <n...@dfanning.com> wrote:
> Beaker writes:
>> So my question is should we move to 8.1 or stay put, given the
>> problems people are reporting? We don't do anything too fancy
>> visualisation wise, just static 2d plots and maps, so we don't need to
>> sit and the bleeding edge of fancy interactive graphics, if that is
>> what causes the most problems.
>
> Broken graphics routines is about half the problem.
> The other half of the problem seems to be the Workbench.
> If you use the command line to do non-graphical things,
> IDL 8.1 might please you.
>
> Certainly lists and hashes are useful. The object
> syntax is fabulous. Lists and hashes have been
> implemented in the IDL language and exist for
> earlier versions of the language. (I use my LinkedList
> object for many "listy" things, and Craig Markwardt
> has a very useful hash object.) As far as I know,
> there are no "memory" issues with either. They
> understand how to clean themselves up properly.
>
> I won't be able to use lists and hashes for another
> couple of years or so, just because of the kind of
> work I do, but if you are not keen to share your
> software and/or everyone you know is using a recent
> version of IDL, then I say go for it.
>
> ITTVIS claims the graphics system is "95% working",
> but I seem to run into that other 5% every time I
> try to do something useful. I have made a line plot
> (sans legend, of course) that works properly. For
> my purposes, I would say the graphics system is
> 95% broken. I guess your mileage may vary, because
> I run into people who say they love the graphics
> routines. They probably aren't as anal about
> how things look as I am. :-)
>
> If you do decide to upgrade to IDL 8.1, be sure
> to purchase the three year maintenance support
> contract at the same time. I have a feeling you
> are *really* going to need it. ;-)
>
> Cheers,
>
> David
> --
> David Fanning, Ph.D.
> Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
> Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming:http://www.idlcoyote.com/
> Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
As a constant user of IDL since IDL v2, I would like to both reinforce
and a little bit attenuate what David is saying.
IDL is an extremely powerful, efficient and elegant tool for doing
calculation, data processing or data visualization in science (maybe
the most powerful among those presently available). Partly because of
the clever properties of the IDL language (continuously improved),
partly due to the robustness of the IDL engine even in case of massive
data processing (I never seen any crash of IDL before v7, except when
there was some strong programming fault made by the user). Therefore,
the future of IDL should be guaranteed.
Now, from v7 and especially with v8, we encounter two surprising
weaknesses:
1) the new IDE, - the so called Workbench -, which relies on the
Eclipse freeware, and replaces (for MS-Windows users only) a native,
perfectly working IDE (available since v3). The Workbench clearly
suffers from several internal bugs, mainly regarding memory
allocation, which preclude, at the moment, any "professional" use of
it. The IDL engine itself does not seem to be in fault; the problem
likely lies in the implementation within Eclipse or in Eclipse itself.
The(se) bug(s) hopefully will be corrected by ITTVIS in the next IDL
versions.
2) the introduction of a new way for doing interactive graphics, which
is only at "95% working" (ITTVIS saying) and certainly at 0.001%
documented ! I am pretty sure that NG is a clever step towards an
easier (interactive) use of IDL graphic objects, following other
unsuccessfull tentatives like LiveTools, ITools, etc... But NG was
delivered by ITTVIS with a number of remaining and particularly
frustrating inconsistencies or bugs. For example the fact, described
by David, that resizing a window may desorganize this window content !
Or that labels go everywhere when axis scale are set as logarithmic...
Many correcting recipes (brightly revealed by Mark Piper in his
webseminars) are impossible to be conceived by a common user alone,
because of the absence of documentation. In other words, I think that
NG was introduced by ITTVIS too early, in a finalization state which,
at the moment, rules out its use in any real programming application.
But, once more, except in these two particular points, IDL 8.1 is
actually a very valuable tool, with many impovements with respect to
earlier versions !
alain.
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78040 is a reply to message #78038] |
Wed, 19 October 2011 15:43 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Beaker writes:
> So my question is should we move to 8.1 or stay put, given the
> problems people are reporting? We don't do anything too fancy
> visualisation wise, just static 2d plots and maps, so we don't need to
> sit and the bleeding edge of fancy interactive graphics, if that is
> what causes the most problems.
Broken graphics routines is about half the problem.
The other half of the problem seems to be the Workbench.
If you use the command line to do non-graphical things,
IDL 8.1 might please you.
Certainly lists and hashes are useful. The object
syntax is fabulous. Lists and hashes have been
implemented in the IDL language and exist for
earlier versions of the language. (I use my LinkedList
object for many "listy" things, and Craig Markwardt
has a very useful hash object.) As far as I know,
there are no "memory" issues with either. They
understand how to clean themselves up properly.
I won't be able to use lists and hashes for another
couple of years or so, just because of the kind of
work I do, but if you are not keen to share your
software and/or everyone you know is using a recent
version of IDL, then I say go for it.
ITTVIS claims the graphics system is "95% working",
but I seem to run into that other 5% every time I
try to do something useful. I have made a line plot
(sans legend, of course) that works properly. For
my purposes, I would say the graphics system is
95% broken. I guess your mileage may vary, because
I run into people who say they love the graphics
routines. They probably aren't as anal about
how things look as I am. :-)
If you do decide to upgrade to IDL 8.1, be sure
to purchase the three year maintenance support
contract at the same time. I have a feeling you
are *really* going to need it. ;-)
Cheers,
David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.idlcoyote.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78041 is a reply to message #78040] |
Wed, 19 October 2011 14:36 |
Matt Francis
Messages: 94
Registered: May 2010
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Member |
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We use IDL 7.1 using the IDLDE for development on windows and Linux
and then in batch mode for near real time data processing and
visualisation. One of my colleagues attended your training course last
week in Melbourne and mentioned all the nice features that IDL 8.1
has, such as list and hashes which I've hacked up implementations of
as custom objects in 7.1 (which is therefore constrained by the
horrible custom object syntax and memory mismanagement).
So my question is should we move to 8.1 or stay put, given the
problems people are reporting? We don't do anything too fancy
visualisation wise, just static 2d plots and maps, so we don't need to
sit and the bleeding edge of fancy interactive graphics, if that is
what causes the most problems.
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78048 is a reply to message #78041] |
Wed, 19 October 2011 09:41 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Paul van Delst writes:
> I know nothing about the windows environment, and I don't use the IDE, so your IDL experience may be normal (anyone?
> anyone?)
>
> But maybe your computer has a virus? Or something.
Or, something. :-(
I suspect this problem is the same problem that
causes the WShow command to occasionally cycle through
all the applications open on the machine. (The WShow
command worked about a third of the time while I was
teaching last week. This is the most it has *ever* worked,
so there is some improvement there, for whatever reason.)
> Regardless, while I empathise with your frustration, I sure do appreciate the effort you're expending to exercise the
> function graphics routines and, just as importantly, document that effort.
Well, sometimes I describe myself as a Luddite, but
in truth I think my record shows that I am usually
an early adaptor of new technology. I just usually
prefer that the new technology improves my life
instead of making it more frustrating. I was a little
late to this bandwagon because I couldn't get IDL 8.0
to run on my computer at all. I guess running badly
is also an improvement. :-)
> p.s. So, um, are ITTVIS paying you yet for this testing of IDL in the
field? :o)
Yeah, hundreds of thousands of dollars. I'll soon be rich. ;-)
Cheers,
David
P.S. Let's just say if they offered me some kind of a retirement
package, I would be sorely tempted. :-)
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.idlcoyote.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78049 is a reply to message #78048] |
Wed, 19 October 2011 08:40 |
BLesht
Messages: 89
Registered: March 2007
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Member |
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Ditto that - also random hangs that require a forced quit on a Mac.
8.0 runs the same code with no problem. Sigh...
On Oct 19, 10:06 am, David Fanning <n...@dfanning.com> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Have I mentioned that IDL 8.1 is a piece of work!?
>
> This morning, I have IDL 8.1 running, along with the
> IDL 8.1 on-line help, and a browser. When I type a
> command in the IDL window that is *suppose* to summon
> a widget program to the display, no widget program
> appears. Instead, my browser window is popped to the
> front of my IDL window with what looks like Japanese
> characters in the browser title bar!
>
> For God's sake!!
>
> I mention this now because this weirdness is completely
> reproducible at the moment, unlike other intermittent
> oddities that continue to plague me with this miserable
> excuse for software.
>
> Yesterday, for example, as I was developing some
> map projection software, I noticed that about
> every 5th or 6th time I would run the program that
> no graphics window would appear. No errors or anything
> like that. Just no response whatsoever. If I issued
> a Window command, then a window would appear and all
> would act normally until another 5 or 6 minutes would
> pass.
>
> Very, very strange and irritating behavior. :-(
>
> Cheers,
>
> David
>
> --
> David Fanning, Ph.D.
> Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
> Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming:http://www.idlcoyote.com/
> Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: IDL 8.1 is a Piece of Work [message #78050 is a reply to message #78049] |
Wed, 19 October 2011 09:19 |
Paul Van Delst[1]
Messages: 1157
Registered: April 2002
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Senior Member |
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I know nothing about the windows environment, and I don't use the IDE, so your IDL experience may be normal (anyone?
anyone?)
But maybe your computer has a virus? Or something.
Regardless, while I empathise with your frustration, I sure do appreciate the effort you're expending to exercise the
function graphics routines and, just as importantly, document that effort.
cheers,
paulv
p.s. So, um, are ITTVIS paying you yet for this testing of IDL in the field? :o)
David Fanning wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Have I mentioned that IDL 8.1 is a piece of work!?
>
> This morning, I have IDL 8.1 running, along with the
> IDL 8.1 on-line help, and a browser. When I type a
> command in the IDL window that is *suppose* to summon
> a widget program to the display, no widget program
> appears. Instead, my browser window is popped to the
> front of my IDL window with what looks like Japanese
> characters in the browser title bar!
>
> For God's sake!!
>
> I mention this now because this weirdness is completely
> reproducible at the moment, unlike other intermittent
> oddities that continue to plague me with this miserable
> excuse for software.
>
> Yesterday, for example, as I was developing some
> map projection software, I noticed that about
> every 5th or 6th time I would run the program that
> no graphics window would appear. No errors or anything
> like that. Just no response whatsoever. If I issued
> a Window command, then a window would appear and all
> would act normally until another 5 or 6 minutes would
> pass.
>
> Very, very strange and irritating behavior. :-(
>
> Cheers,
>
> David
>
>
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