Inkscape startup splash screen

By their very nature, splash screens are there to be noticed. Putting up a splash screen to make startup "unnoticeable" is a contradiction. You said yourself that startup times are quite short. Don't make them even longer by wasting CPU loading and displaying a splash screen.

actually, lately startup time grows, but the right way to deal with it
is to fix the slowness, not mask it with a splash screen...

Although I think it's better to avoid splash screens, I'm noticing that the svn startup times are getting too long and there's no clear indication that the program is loading (what leads frequently to hit the icon again and open a second instance).
In my machine the first instance of inkscape takes more than 4 seconds to launch.
It's not a long time but it's not immediate either.
Most of the programs that don't have splash screens take usually less than a second, and the window chrome is drawn immediately (Blender, firefox).
Maybe a simple splash screen would help here.

I just wanted to comment. I'm running Inkscape in X11.app on Mac OS X (via MacPorts). Over a bit of use I'm sure I'll gain confidence that Inkscape is loading. Also, since I installed MacPorts I guess you could assume I'm a "technical" user and could figure out if something wasn't working or even just to say I'm "unsupported" since I'm not using Inkscape.app. However, I think it would be nice to have an immediate confirmation that Inkscape is in fact loading.

From what I've read here it seems like a command line flag or a preference setting to show a splash screen would allow the user to decide what is better for him/her. Want Inkscape to launch faster? Disable the splash screen. On a slower machine and want to be sure that you actually launched the program? Enable the splash screen.

i like to propose a insert of a splash screen to linkscape, like PS, Gimp, Illustrator have to indicate to user that the program is loaded. Even indicates what is loading and be easy to configure the splash screen

In my machine Inkscape takes 17 seconds to start.
I have less than 400 fonts installed, and my machine is a Quad Core with 8GB of RAM.
Gimp takes 5 seconds and Scribus 4, and both have splash screens.

Of course the idea should be to avoid the splash screens at all with an instant startup, but it isn't likely to happen soon so I'm all for the splash screen.

Several times I open two or three instances of Inkscape because I can't know if inkscape is opening or not. And I've been using inkscape for a couple of years. Imagine what would think a new user in the same situation.

Im also missing some info about status program, i mean, if it is running or not. Many times i have started two instances of Inkscape due to the long startup time. Close to the 15 seconds, Centrino Duo, 2.5GB RAM.

Please, all the professional design programs have splash screens, Illustrator, Corel, Indesign, Photoshop, Gimp, Scribus... why inkscape dont have it?

Sorry for my english, im a spanish speaker.

I noticed Inkscape renders all icons after start.
We need to monitor the steps and then choose a tactics to avoid the
slownes to the user.

Adib.

On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 2:44 PM, bbyak <email address hidden> wrote:
> actually, lately startup time grows, but the right way to deal with it
> is to fix the slowness, not mask it with a splash screen...
>
> --
> Inkscape startup splash screen
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/322113
> You received this bug notification because you are a member of Inkscape
> Bug Team, which is subscribed to Inkscape.
>

i created a new account specifically to request a splash screen on startup, so even if i see the issue is already here i'm joining the chorus in kindly asking you to add the option of a splash screen on startup. On a windows machine with a 2GHz processor and 5400rpm disk it takes around 10 seconds to cold-start, so i think the OPTION to have a startup splash screen is really necessary. Thanks a lot.

Unassigned? Please, is too hard to do? If theres a manual way to do it, please, let me know. I use Inkscape every day, and is really annoying to see that after 15 seconds after click the icon nothing happens...

Some way to hack mi Inkscape install to show info about startup????!!!

On "older" machines, i.e., my thinkpad with a 1.5 GHz dual core, inkscape takes about 10 seconds to boot.

I would prefer that startup times were reduced, rather than have a splash screen,.. and we could always make it optional, for people that don't want to waste the few extra cycles.

AFAICS The main problem is that inkscape is slow when many fonts are installed. The spash screen is no bad idea, but it would not fix the main problem => Mark this bug as a duplicate of Bug #418726 instead and hope somebody works on this?

Inkscape takes a while to start up (10s - it's very powerful!). I agree. A splash screen doesn't mask it, it would just let me know if Inkscape is even starting. It's never not started, but it's nice to know. Adobe Fireworks or GIMP for example, have a splash screen that says what's going on behind the scenes. Even if I didn't understand half of the status in the splash screen, I would still be happy to know that it's starting.

If it is implemented it should be optional, I agree with Adam.

On my system - Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" running GNOME - I get an entry in my window list bar (a.k.a. task bar) while inkscape is loading to indicate that it is still initializing. It consistently takes about 11 seconds to open a new blank document. I believe that this feature of my operating system is called "startup notification" (http://library.gnome.org/devel/integration-guide/stable/startup-notification.html.en).

Maybe the startup notification should be made more prominent if the application has failed to show a window after three seconds? I don't know what normally happens on other platforms but perhaps something similar would be possible.

Inkscape startup time heavily depends on the number of fonts installed in system. On clean OS with only default font set, Inkscape starts in about 2 seconds, but then I had about 600 fonts installed, its startup time becomes 20-30 seconds. In that situation, I think it is a must to have some notification that Inkscape really starts up (I once forgot that I started it, and started it again, for example).

This is still needed, in 2015 even though it was first added to the wishlist in 2009.

I ended up starting Inkscape twice today after downloading the new 0.91 version. It loaded so slowly that I thought the new version was broken and crashing at start up. After trying to start it twice, I started a pre-release version of .91 which loaded before the two copies of 0.91 opened.

The 'too many fonts' issue I believe is not a valid reasoning for dismissing the need for some manner of feedback that the program is loading. I have the same fonts installed when I open GIMP, Photoshop, Scribus and many other programs that load the exact same font library, and Inkscape is the only one where I try to open it multiple times thinking that I mis-clicked the start icon.

For me, the problem of loading time indication when opening a program is broader than just Inkscape and would deserve to be address in a more general way. I clarify my thought: it would be great if desktops like Gnome, KDE and others was able to be notified of progress during “ghost” loading time of a program. It would be great if it was addressed by FreeDesktop.

Beside this, yes, Inkscape is still damn slow when you have a lot of fonts, and I encounter just the same problem.

The two ways: a splash screen like many many applications, some improvement for making this loading time negligible (but this time is link to Inkscape but also to a lot of other factors like CPU speed and system load, so…).